IF YOU’RE one of the thousands who’ve trudged their way through the knee-high piles of bike parts in the yard of Faber’s Cyclery over the years, you will be blown away by how clean and orderly the place is these days. Located at the corner of South First Street and Margaret, Faber’s is one of the oldest buildings in the South Bay and it soaks in over a century of history. The place was a corner saloon in 1884 and has been a bicycle business since 1921.

When I read that nonprofit developer Neighborhood Housing Services was having trouble selling the 17 condos of their new development just south of downtown, I can’t say I was surprised, given the worsening national mortgage crisis. The main selling point is that these units are considered “affordable housing” for buyers that have a low enough income to qualify for borrower assistance (less than $84,900 for a family of four). Originally offered at $535,000, the two-bedroom condos are now priced at $450,000 and still aren’t selling. I don’t know about you, but I don’t see how anyone could consider $535,000 or $450,000 homes to be affordable on an average family income, even with the incentives.

When you think of San Jose and its financial ability, its real strength, I wonder what comes to mind: downtown, and places like the TECH Museum, the beautiful Fairmont Hotel, or perhaps the Arena? I imagine it might be any of those. It might also be another place, that is, more a state of mind than a physical location, namely, Silicon Valley. But if those or similar sites leap to mind, I have one other location to conjure: North San Jose. Sometimes known as the “Golden Triangle,” it is one of the largest and richest pieces of real estate in the world. There are big plans for it still. These plans call for adding 83,000 jobs and 32,000 homes in the area north and west of Interstate 880 and south of Highway 237. About 8,000 residences are currently planned for this very special area.

Are Foundations In Tune with Democratic Process?

Last week I saw a glimpse into the future of California philanthropy: big money and big commitments, the kind of which could literally change the course of how some California communities develop over the next decade.

This weekend I had a garage sale, which was an enlightening experience for me in more ways than one. Well, maybe enlightening isn’t the best use of words, but it was interesting to say the least. The whole concept of the garage sale is really a strange one when you take the time to think about it. OK, so let me see: I will take all my unwanted junk, used clothes and useless things and lay it all out on my grass so that others can come, rummage through it, and buy items for a fraction of their original cost.

Last week, the Mercury News reported that San Jose city officials and a team of developers had come to an agreement on a $132 million deal that “sets the stage for a major league soccer stadium near the airport as early as 2010.”  The Mercury News article failed to address a number of important questions surrounding the project.

City Hall Diary

Recently, I attended the San Jose Elections Commission where Instant Runoff Voting (IRV) was on the agenda. (By the way, there are two unfilled seats waiting for SJ residents on this commission.) IRV was discussed, but the commission deferred the item for one year.  The main reason for deferral was that to implement IRV would require a vote of the people to change the city charter. This in itself was not a worry; however, the cost for the city to put it on the ballot was viewed as bad timing, considering our current budget deficit.

Without Public Scrutiny or Accountability, Lavish Spending Insured

In 1944, Sig Sanchez was appointed to the Santa Clara Valley Water Board. Months later he was dismissed, but only after he had disappeared into the jungles of the Philippines, perhaps forgotten by all except Assemblyman Ira Ruskin. For almost 25 years, Mr. Sanchez, believing himself to be a member in good standing, has been voting remotely and regularly, casting his rogue votes without public scrutiny or accountability.

Your birth is a mistake you’ll spend your whole life trying to correct.
—Chuck Palahniuk

PART OF being a respectable columnist is to exhibit a strong degree of self-confidence and integrity when admitting one’s mistakes. Since I have committed more than my share of embarrassing howlers over the years, I feel the time is right to do just that. So here are a few to get us started.

Mayor Reed’s proposal for green building mandates would make San Jose’s policy the most advanced in California, according to the article by Erin Sherbert in this week’s Metro. The mandates would apply to commercial as well as residential developments. Reed wants to create a renewable-energy-powered San Jose that will reduce consumption in the city by half within the next two decades. Since the average green building saves 50 percent in energy usage, and reduces carbon dioxide emissions by 40 percent and solid waste by 70 percent, it is an attainable goal.

We all love to be as little children: to see colorful animals and play with tinker toys. And if we have young kids or grandchildren, it can be a great joy to travel the city and see so many examples of toys, painted tigers, and kaleidoscopic shades and tints at our obvious points of interest. This is the state of our public art in San Jose: colorful, playful, and totally one dimensional. There has to be more in a city and its description of itself as evidenced in her adopted pubic art program. There is a pivotal question though: Are we mature and confident enough to reflect this as a statement of who we are?

This past week was an unusually (or maybe not so unusually) busy week for the HP Pavilion as they hosted two Sharks games, two concerts and a football game, all in the space of a few days. Not only did the staff and crew who change over the arena work some serious overtime last week, but the whole downtown benefitted from HP Pavilion being one of the busiest venues in the country.

San Jose’s Code of Conduct and the Constitution

Attached to every San Jose City Council agenda is a “Code of Conduct” for public meetings. The council wants to foster an atmosphere of “fairness, courtesy, and respect for differing points of view.”  But are these suggestions/requirements Constitutional?

City Hall Diary

Last Tuesday, the city council had two agenda items to vote on that would allow for applicants to sell alcohol: one for a Whole Foods grocery store and the other for a gas station.

Marking Will Raise Awareness and Legitimize Worldwide Concern

Following the dubious and controversial path set by fashion designer Mark Ecko when he purchased Barry Bonds’s home run baseball, conducted an online public poll, and ultimately branded the Cooperstown-bound ball with an asterisk, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) has bowed to public pressure and decided to place an asterisk on the Olympic torch.

It’s now more than three years and counting since the old San Jose Medical Center was closed, and it’s still getting kicked around in a game of political soccer. Corporate owner Hospital Corporation of America (HCA), who abruptly closed downtown’s only emergency room hospital in December 2004, citing profitability concerns as the reason, wants to pull down the building, sell off the land for development, and walk away with a bucket of gold, leaving all responsibility behind. However, the city council will not approve a rezoning of the site to facilitate the demolition and sale of the land until they have a deal on a location for a new downtown clinic.