San Jose Inside

With its vastly superior public education system, will Boston surpass Silicon Valley as the global leader of technological innovation? It’s a distinct possibility unless we get our act together. Boston is poised to win, considering the current fights focus on turf instead of better educational results for our children.

Mayor Chuck Reed’s top priorities in a cautiously optimistic 2013-14 budget proposal, released Friday, include restoring public safety salaries and city services. How does he plan to do it? Good question.

The Santa Clara County Board of Supervisors votes Tuesday on whether to hold a special election June 4, with a possible June 30 runoff, to replace disgraced District 2 Supervisor George Shirakawa Jr. Other items on the agenda include hillside development, potential fundraisers on county property and a huge new contract for the Santa Clara Valley Health and Hospital System.

The District Attorney’s investigation into George Shirakawa Jr. has some new paperwork to add to the pile, as discrepancies may have been found Monday in forms the former county supervisor filed during and after his time as a member of the San Jose City Council in the late 90s and early 2000s. The City Clerk’s Office began making copies of forms for the DA when San Jose Inside’s inspection of “Friends for George Shirakawa Jr.” campaign forms found inconsistent signatures from previous campaign treasurers Shirakawa employed for his 1998 council re-election campaign and officeholder account.

Rising crime rates and controversy surrounding San Jose’s Measure B pension reform efforts may have cut into Mayor Chuck Reed’s approval rating, which, according to a recent opinion poll, is listed at 55 percent.

The day begins like any other in beautiful Silicon Valley: children are on their way to school, commuters are stuck in traffic, etc. Our carefree existence then suddenly gives way to a terrorist attack at a high-profile technology company. People are killed, injured, power is out, phone service is down, and a pursuit is underway for those who have set out to harm us. Police and fire departments across the region and in neighboring counties attempt to communicate and provide mutual aid, as an “all hands on deck” approach is required to tackle the catastrophic situation as it unfolds. But in this scenario, one of the main issues is that there is no way to for all personnel to effectively communicate with other agencies in real time.

Like all the portraits Carter took of friends or people who attended events he chronicled, San Jose has never looked better. “It’s a panorama of ten or so shots stitched together in Photoshop with a nice sky dropped in and a special filter applied to give it a painted quality,” Carter explained. “There’s an eight […]

I don’t regularly watch Board of Supes meetings. But I watched on Tuesday because I don’t often see a board trying to figure out how to replace a colleague who is being charged with five felonies. (Sorry, George Shirakawa, it has nothing to do with you being a Raiders fan. That would have been cause enough for a sixth felony.) The board decided to hold a special election on June 4 because they didn’t want to look like 4 white guys telling East San Jose who should represent them. Brilliant political move. I noticed something interesting in the process.

After months of reading about the horrors of sequestration, most folks didn’t even blink when President Obama signed the document ordering the cuts beginning March 1, 2013. Call it “sequestration fatigue,” but the hype leading up to the date was akin to the expectation of all computers crashing on Y2K. While I have heard some pundits call the 2.3 percent reduction in Federal government spending “budget dust,” the cuts target certain departments and programs and leaves others alone.

As an active resident in Santa Clara County’s District 2, I, like so many others, am ashamed of George Shirakawa. The former supervisor blatantly violated the trust of the most vulnerable residents of our district. His deplorable actions have led this district, which suffers from high rates of poverty, gangs, drug issues, under-education and lack of healthcare, to have absolutely no representation until August.

Shaky, candid home videos and snapshots documenting the lives of two slain Santa Cruz police officers played on a loop inside HP Pavilion’s massive overhead projectors Thursday. The memorial service for Sgt. Loran “Butch” Baker, 51, and Officer Elizabeth Butler, 38, welcomed nearly 18,000 into the downtown San Jose arena, following a motorcade of fire engines, motorcycles, cop cruisers, trucks and limousines that snaked its way down Highway 17. Thousands of onlookers, from first responders to Hells Angels, stood on the roadside to express their condolences, raising signs or laying down flowers on the curb.

Influential local photographer and advertising executive Peter S. Carter died last night after a fall on the stairs of his Victorian home. A gifted strategist, he advised valley political and business leaders and operated a successful advertising agency for many years, reinventing himself as a photographer of social events as the industry changed.

In my last column about San Jose Parks Foundation, I stressed the economic importance of parks, as well as the overwhelming evidence of the correlation between health and the presence of accessible parks and trails—both for individuals and a community’s wellbeing. There is another layer of health benefits that is even more critical: the essential role that parks and trails play for the environment.

A South Bay gun buyback became the third largest in the nation last weekend, when Santa Clara County traded $114,000 in cash for 1,116 firearms. Forty-seven of the guns were assault weapons, 479 handguns, 355 rifles and 235 shotguns. There’s still $36,000 leftover for a future buyback.

The Beltway in Washington D. C. is a place of intrigue. Dysfunction, infighting, ancient irrelevant practices, and crises of leadership are common. Yet, sometimes there are individuals who stand out as diamonds in the rough.