Santee Vice Mayor Dustin Trotter, R, was voted to City Council in 2020 in the tightest city council race in the city’s history, winning by only five votes. In November, he is running against long-time Santee resident and former Padre Municipal Water District director August “Augie” Scalzitti for District 4.
Trotter was born and raised in Santee. Married his wife who he met in high school, and they have raised their two children in Santee. Trotter is the owner of TDT Construction, located in Santee, and has been in business since 2006.
Trotter said over the past four years in office his top priorities and accomplishments were road infrastructure and capital improvement projects.
“In the past four years we have put in an average of $4.5 million a year fixing the roads and an additional $6 million in capital improvements,” he said. “Almost $11 million a year and $44 million in total fixing our streets, the largest amount that has ever been spent by this city. That was one of my top priorities when I came into office, going back to the fundamentals of public safety, and roads and infrastructure.”
Trotter said a couple of pet projects accomplished were the Veterans Memorial Project on the corner of Mast Boulevard and Fanita Parkway.
“That is my baby,” he said. “We dedicated it on Nov. 11, 2020. Privately funded and dedicated it to the city for the public. In addition to that was the Santee Hometown Heroes Banner Program on Mast Boulevard running westwardly towards the city limits now, with banners past West Hills High School to West Hills Park. Through the next two cycles we should be getting to the city limits.”
The Heroes Banner Program recognizes residents, their family members, business owners, and adopted Marines who have served, are serving, or given their lives in the U.S. Armed Forces.
“We identified as a city that there were so many veterans in the city, growing up here, having their names and faces on the banners, that is something that I wanted to do.”
Trotter said another project was getting the playground at Weston Park, as when the community was built there, there was no playground or exercise equipment for citizens to use.
“That was a combination of grant funding we identified and city sources. Now, that community has pretty park, a play structure, exercise equipment, and apparatus to directly help them,” he said.
Trotter said over the next four years he wants to continue his priority for road infrastructure and capital improvements.
“One of the goals I set was to get to a Pavement Condition Index of 70. Right now, we are sitting in the low 60s. Right now, this year we are funded for another $4.5 million, and my colleagues and I have already funded another $4.5 for next year. So, we have two years of funding in place,” he said.
Trotter said two years ago, with the dissolution of County Service Area No. 69 in San Diego, the city of Santee and Lakeside joined for medical services, he and Councilmember Laura Koval, were the city representatives. The Santee-Lakeside Emergency Medical Services Authority provides emergency ambulance services in both areas and was formed in January 2023 as a joint effort between the Santee Fire Department and the Lakeside Fire Protection District.
“We have been able to drastically change emergency medical services to our region,” he said. “As we added basic life service ambulances into service, those have really helped our guys to be able to transport to hospitals and keep our advanced life support ambulances in service. By making these changes in our medical services, we have been able to keep our paramedics available for our citizens. Additionally, we restructured our staffing for our fire department and for the first time, we have a design for a brand-new fire station in this city. There are two parts to that. One, identify the location, and I was able to identify that with our current infrastructure with properties that we own.”
Trotter said they located a city owned property with water and electrical infrastructure, which is about a 40% savings from building on a property with no infrastructure.
“We are putting in an interim station now,” he said. “It will be the first time in 44 years in the city’s history that we have three active fire stations in our city serving the southern part of the city which has been underserved over the years.”
Trotter said in 2023, City Council did a third-party study on the city’s fire department, and it came back with about 33 recommendations to improve fire service in the city.
“Our fire chief has done an amazing job,” he said. “He knocked out about half of all the recommendations in the first few months of last year. The big things are the additional fire stations, additional staffing and resources we need when we get to a full four stations in the city.”
Trotter said at that time, the fire department wanted the city to do it all, but Council said it did not have the funding for it all, and Council has put more money into the fire department in the past four years than the previous 24 years combined.
With everything that the city is trying to do to help build up the Santee Fire Department, Trotter said he supports Measure S, started by the Santee Firefighters Association, for a half-cent sales tax increase for infrastructure improvements, construction of fire stations, additional staffing and equipment necessary.
“There was no way we could do it with our budget, so they have taken a citizen’s initiative for this, and it is paid for by all the people who shop in our city. There was no way we were going to put this on property taxes and put it on the backs of our citizens, so this is a solution. I support the Firefighters Association and their efforts to do what is needed for the city and ultimately make the city better,” he said.
Trotter said after all the proposals the city has seen over the past 4 years for the development of Fanita Ranch, the newest proposal is the best that has been presented to the city.
“This really is the best and I think they really take into account a lot of the citizens, people’s feedback, stakeholders, and what that community would really look like,” he said. “It is almost 3,000 acres and 70% gets saved for perpetuity. It does not get touched. It is saved for open space. It has protection of wildlife and environmental issues. I believe this is the best project we have ever seen. The city and the community are going to get the most ever seen come back to the city.”
Trotter said District 4 is overwhelmingly single-family homes.
“I fundamentally believe in home ownership,” he said. “This city has been built out as a bedroom community. But we do need a mix of housing. We need everything from entry housing, to middle level, and higher end housing and we continue to build in that manner. As far as regional housing assessments are concerned, realistically we will never reach those numbers. We do not have enough land in this city. We average about 103 homes per year built here in the city. So, building 100 homes a year is 1,000 homes in a decade. They [the state] want us to eight to nine times that. It is unrealistic what the state wants us to do, but we do need to adapt and create housing for all people.”
Trotter said with only one trolley station in the city, and it being in Town Center, there is no land to build high density housing in that area.
“It does not give us many housing options in that area. There is some county land around there that I think will get developed in the future that will continue to grow around Santee Trolley Square, but it is not like we can tear down or put a bunch of homes right around the trolley station because it is actually in a shopping center, It is our economic driver, not necessarily a housing driver,” he said.
Trotter said being a native of East County, marrying his high school sweetheart, and raising his children, they are all West Hill High School graduates.
“My roots, my family, my business, are deep here in Santee,” he said. “I’ve been in construction industry for 28 years. I am community service oriented. Many years serving for the Santee Santas board, worked with the Santee Food Bank, other service organizations before coming to City Council, served on the Santee Parks & Recreation Committee, Community Oriented Policing Committee, and have served several positions as an elected official,” he said.
