Finally, our new mayor and city council have listened to the voices of San Jose’s citizens and neighborhood leaders and set budget priorities for the coming year that are in accordance with the wishes of the vast majority. In a meeting on Tuesday, the mayor, council members and their staffs made a commitment to funding the items most often mentioned on this site and in the neighborhoods. These break down into roughly three areas: public safety, public works infrastructure, and public recreational services.

Well, the committee that has been debating the future of downtown’s nightclub culture and, in the truest sense, the “future” of downtown itself, seems to have figured it out. Unfortunately, I fear that they have it very, very wrong.

The San Jose Mercury News editorial and article on Sunday about the state of our downtown brought up more issues that will inspire further debate about what kind of downtown we all want.

The main issue of the article was the policing of downtown—something we have discussed at great length on San Jose Inside—which doesn’t have a simple solution.  But, the money the city is spending on police being downtown is not just the city’s responsibility. Those that cause the conditions that warrant extra policemen should definitely bear some of the financial responsibility for it. Fly-by-night promoters and nightclub owners would think twice about opening a sleazy club for a quick buck if they knew they had to shell out some money from their own pockets for police protection of those exposed to their clubs and patrons. It is definitely an issue that needs to be addressed.

The City of San Jose Via a Web Browser

If elected, constituent service will be my top priority. 

For the past twelve years, I have worked in the private sector high-tech industry.  Based on my experience, web browser technology is an excellent communication tool that can be implemented into the way the City of San Jose does business. By implementing a web-based solution to the District 6 office, I will be able to enhance constituent services and, within a year, have empirical evidence describing specific outcomes by tracking constituent issues in real time.

For those of you who think that nothing of interest or importance ever happens in San Jose, take a wander around the San Jose Museum of Art’s current exhibitions. It’s impossible not to enjoy this fascinating local show of works by M.C. Escher and some of the seminal artists from the Op Art era. Judging by the large crowds I witnessed there over the weekend, these exhibitions are very popular and are bringing locals and visitors here alike, proving once again that our museum is a vital part of life in San Jose and the region.

Every few years at a showing of movie classics or at a meeting of mystery writers, it once again raises its black, shinny head.  Known in lore and anecdotes everywhere as the “Black Bird,” it is the creation of writer Dashiell Hammett and was portrayed in the film noir classic, “The Maltese Falcon,” starring that hardboiled realist, Humphrey Bogart.  It is, in short, “the stuff that dreams are made of.”

Don’t worry, this article is not going to be about our purpose on earth or any existential crisis I may be having; but, rather, about when it comes to politicians and the voting process, what really matters.

SF Mayor Admits To Wearing Diapers During Staff Meetings

After several embarrassing revelations this week, San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom saved the best for last with an admission that he wears diapers during long staff meetings and “some cross country air travel.”

When I read that the San Francisco Symphony plans to come to San Jose on October 5 and play a free concert in Chavez Plaza, I jumped for joy. They are also increasing their number of performances at the Flint Center next season by adding three family concerts, and the symphony’s Youth Orchestra will present Prokofiev’s “Peter and the Wolf” in the California Theater on December 15. This is exactly the type of regional approach that we need to take here in Bay Area. How lucky we are to have our neighboring world-class orchestra coming here to play an absolutely free concert for our community and picking up the $100,000 tab themselves.

Rarely in recent San Jose history has such a tiny tempest been stirred up in this diminutive a teacup. When Mayor Chuck Reed announced that he was going to charge a modest $20 fee for attending this year’s State of the City address—instead of having Jerry Strangis and the assorted lobbyists and other hangers on that populate the corridors of City Hall pay the fare—there was a hushed silence.

When we think about our city, we often think about the big-ticket items that make a huge impact.  We are always talking about ways to enrich San Jose with more, more, and more! This includes building BART, baseball stadiums, funding large scale developments and adding retail shopping.  But it seems that when we do that—which is important—smaller projects that are also important to some citizens fall through the cracks.

What did city officials not know, and when did they not know it?

The 1996 Measure I Initiative called for the “relocation and consolidation of civic offices in the downtown.”  But the new City Hall complex at Fourth and E. Santa Clara St. was not built large enough to provide the consolidation of city offices called for in the ballot measure.

Vacant High-Rise Proves Perfect Bearing for Emergency Routes

An agreement was reached early Thursday morning when airport officials met with several downtown representatives to hammer out a deal to protect building heights while allowing for the safest emergency route over the city’s center; their solution: aim at the Sobrato building.

The San Jose Water Co. supplies 1 million residents in San Jose and nearby communities from the Lexington Reservoir in the Santa Cruz Mountains. They own more than 1,000 acres of the watershed between the reservoir and Summit Road where they have stated it is their intention to start a vigorous logging operation. Their plan is to divide the area into nine sections and log one section per year on a rotating basis, removing 40 percent of all trees with a circumference of more than 24 inches. They equate this with “brush clearing” and assert that it is being done to cut down on fire danger. A one-hundred-foot-tall redwood is pretty big brush!

He appeared at City Hall the other day. He came like an avenging developmental angel, spewing bile and insults in his wake. He referenced a Broadway play, “Wicked,” and said “no good deed goes unpunished.” He rocked ‘em and he socked ‘em in a singularly awesome performance. All in the room were transfixed.

Meet Carl Berg.