No, it’s not Brandi Chastain, Sarah Winchester or Madison Nguyen. Since I grew up watching reruns of Maude, I am compelled to cast my vote for Adrienne Barbeau, who graduated from Del Mar High School in 1963. About a year ago, she came back to San Jose to fill in for George Romero at a horror convention and I asked her about Del Mar High. She said it was a flagship school in those days.

Tuesday the San Jose City Council voted 10-1 to approve the plan put forward by Mayor Reed and Councilmember Campos to rebuild and sustain the operation of the Mexican Heritage Plaza.  As we stated in a recent e-mail to our Plaza friends, this decision is the right one and has been nearly ten years in the making.  In that time, many different groups, committees, and policy makers have struggled to solve the structural and financial challenges inherent in operating the Plaza safely, making it available to meet the community’s needs and programming it with critically and popularly successful artistic and cultural events. Since the facility opened:

The protestors have left for the time being and quiet has returned to the plaza of the smoking fountains at San Jose City Hall. How long the peace will last is an open question. It is far too early to discern the answer. But one thing is clear: the primary heroes in the enterprise are evident to all. First and foremost is Sam Liccardo, the District 3 council member who seized the reins and achieved a resolution, snatching stalemate from the jaws of defeat. Then there is Mayor Chuck Reed, who dug the cement out from around the feet of many in City Hall and gave his approval to the agreement that ended the hunger strike of the redoubtable Ly Tong. Vice Mayor Dave Cortese is one who clearly knew that ending this protest, for whatever reason, was the correct course.

Joshua Herrera May be Facing Life in Prison Because of an Unevaluated Gang Enhancement Law

On the steps of the Main Jail, Rebecca Rivera called out to God and her son at the same time. She asked that God save her son from a life in prison, and that her son hear her prayer. 24-year-old Joshua Herrera, housed on the fourth floor of that jail, did in fact hear his mother and the 200 or so supporters who chanted and cheered through Rebecca’s impromptu speech, many of whom also had sons, uncles, nephews somewhere in that building. And from the fourth floor, it must have been quite a sight, an unlikely movement that Rivera has pieced together since Joshua was convicted of home invasion robbery with gang enhancements in 2006. Marching alongside the Herrera family were young Chicano men who also have been labeled as gang members themselves, college students sporting their banners, firefighters who met Joshua, and about 50 leather-clad bikers sitting on Harleys that roared like they had jet engines inside them.

This past week, I was saddened to read about the tragic deaths of two competitive bicyclists in the horrible accident involving a deputy from the Santa Clara County Sheriff’s Department. The young deputy’s life will never be the same, as he will have to live with the consequences and, probably worse, his own memories of this tragedy.

St. Patrick, Ireland’s primary patron saint, died on March 17, 461, in his hideaway at Saul, Downpatrick, near the County Down monastery he founded (now in Northern Ireland).

Born in Wales around 389, a native of Roman Britain, Patrick was abducted and taken to Ireland as a slave at the age of 16 where he worked as a shepherd in County Antrim. He escaped after six years and made his way to continental Europe where he became a pupil of St. Germanus. Made bishop in 431, Patrick was charged with the conversion of the entire island of Ireland to Christianity.

Last week I wrote about exploring furloughs instead of layoffs to balance the budget.  Part of my job is to come up with ideas/solutions to issues/problems. There are lots of departments in a city our size and lots of different opinions. What one department sees as black, another may see as white, and yet another, grey.

When it comes to the question of the December shutdown of City Hall (200 East Santa Clara), the reality is that it is not the same as a private sector shutdown where employees simply do not get paid regardless of accrued vacation hours.

Spitzer’s Significant Contribution to Whoring Recognized

Just one day after his resignation, the United Pimp Union has told all of its members all across the United States and certain areas of Canada to honor soon-to-be-former New York Governor Eliot Spitzer by retiring the number 9, thereby bestowing on him the designation as the first John in world history to have his client number retired.

There must be a better way of dealing with California’s budget crisis and $8 billion deficit than by laying off teachers as part of an across-the-board 10 percent spending cut. Our schools are in a pretty sorry state as it is due to inadequate funding. Many teachers that I know have to supply their students with classroom necessities and pay for them out of their own pockets. Now many of these dedicated educators are going to be getting their pink slips.

The naming of places and the honoring of icons is an often confusing and sometimes treacherous country to enter. Walking by the empty lot on Jackson between Sixth and Seventh Streets that was once the city corporation yard led me to a number of thoughts about that problem, our government, and local history. For many years this was site of the city-owned garage and maintenance facility. Its acquisition is shrouded in a bit of mystery from the sordid days of the forced internment of Japanese Americans. It is alive in the memories of many members of that community who believed their area and property were seized during that tragic time. But the story goes back even further than the recent focus on the World War Two chapter. As L. A. Chung pointed out in the Mercury News, it goes back to the destruction of our old Chinatown in the area of the Fairmont Hotel.

SJSU teacher and sonic outlaw Allen Strange was a master of electronic music and cooking

THROUGHOUT the nine years I spent at San Jose State University, nobody taught me how to control my voltage more than did Allen Strange, who passed away last week at the age of 64. He was a true sonic outlaw, which is precisely why we got along so well. One of the original pioneers of analog electronic music, Allen wrote the first textbook on that subject way back in the early ‘70s, long before synthesizers were ubiquitous. Even today, that book is a hoot to look through.

With the recent ruling that all California homeschool teachers need to have teaching credentials, the debate that rages on about homeschooling in general will get even more heated than ever before. Many people are happy that this new mandate has come down from the state. It will affect San Jose citizens because there are charter school and homeschooling groups in this area that have had their world turned upside down.

This past Wednesday night I hosted a community budget meeting for my district. Between City Hall and my meeting I stopped at home to pick up my laptop. As I left, I saw my neighbors out in front of their homes. My next door neighbor was tossing a ball with his son. Other neighbors were working on a car, fiddling with sprinklers and carrying groceries into their home.  I thought to myself: no one is going to show up for this meeting

Untapped Pool of Buyers-Using-Offensive-Language Targeted

The San Jose Convention and Visitors Bureau, under the direction of city officials, has launched an awareness campaign in expectation of a whole new wave of cussers flooding the downtown housing market in search of a more tolerant and obscenity-laced community.

Today marks a new beginning for San Jose Inside.  We have formed an alliance with Metro Newspapers, Boulevards, NBC11, Topix and the Los Gatos Observer that will create a comprehensive digital-age system to deliver local news, information and opinion, and provide citizen journalists an outlet to bring matters to the attention of the community and discuss issues of importance to residents of San Jose and Silicon Valley.

Just about the only thing that the San Jose City Council assured on Tuesday is that they will have to deal with the Little Saigon issue again. The next time they vote on the matter, though, there will at least be a community consensus. Yeah, right. Dealing with the most thankless, no-win issue ever to come before this city council tested the character and political skills of each elected member, and it was good political theater to boot.