UVALDE, Texas – The Uvalde City Council on Tuesday night unanimously accepted the resignation of District 3 City Councilman Pete Arredondo, who is also the embattled school district police chief.
After the council passed the motion to accept Arredondo’s resignation, residents who attended the meeting applauded.
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Arredondo resigned his seat earlier this month, saying in a letter that he didn’t want to be a distraction for city government.
“I feel this is the best decision for Uvalde,” Arredondo said in his letter to the council earlier this month.
Council members voted Tuesday on a resolution to hold a special election on Nov. 8 to fill the vacant District 3 seat.
Arredondo won his council seat on May 7, just weeks before the school shooting at Robb Elementary that left 19 students and two teachers dead. He was secretly sworn into office on May 31 but never attended a council meeting including a special emergency council meeting on June 7 and special council meetings on June 21 and June 30.
Arredondo is facing intense criticism from Uvalde residents and Texas Department of Public Safety Director Col. Steven McCraw for his response to the shooting. McCraw said that Arredondo was the on-scene commander at the school and called his response “abject failure.” Arredondo told the Texas Tribune in June that he did not consider himself the incident commander and assumed that another official had taken control of the situation.
Arredondo has since been placed on leave from the Uvalde Consolidated Independent School District.