San Jose Inside

For as long as I can remember, the body politic in San Jose has often displayed disturbing public signs of penis envy of its once-larger neighbor to the north, San Francisco. But a little rebranding could be exactly what San Jose needs to compete in the future.

A day after the City Council decided to go to the ballot box in June for pension reform, the police union signed a tentative agreement with the city of San Jose to extend a 10-percent pay cut through the 2012-13 fiscal year. The agreement will need to be ratified by the Police Officers Association membership. If that is achieved, the POA expects the deal to save the city $25 million.

Let the real battle begin. On Tuesday, the City Council voted 6-5 to place a retirement reform ballot measure before voters in June 2012, which will also be the same time California voters take part in the presidential primary election. Supporting the ballot measure were Mayor Chuck Reed and councilmembers Madison Nguyen, Pete Constant, Rose Herrera, Sam Liccardo and Pierluigi Oliverio. Voting against the measure were councilmembers Xavier Campos, Kansen Chu, Ash Kalra, Nancy Pyle and Don Rocha.

Back in August, Fly detailed the sordid tale of fear and loathing taking place within the Milpitas Planning Commission. Mark Tiernan, a veteran in organizing local campaigns, felt he was kicked out of his commission chair position in a coup partly orchestrated by fellow commissioner Noella Tabladillo. Tiernan said loudly in a commission meeting that Tabladillo couldn’t be trusted, and she in turn called him an asshole. Tiernan then made a bold claim to Fly that he thought Mayor Jose Esteves was behind the whole thing. Esteves is now having Tiernan removed from the commission, but there could be an even bigger things happening behind the scenes.

We need career technical education and well-trained career counselors in every middle and high school in California. Columnists in local and national print media agree based on what I read Sunday, Dec. 4. Let me explain. Not everyone needs a 4-year college degree, but everyone must have requisite skills for the jobs of the 21st century in order to enjoy a middle-class income.

In a quest for even more affordable housing in San Jose, the City Council voted 10-1 to amend the North San Jose Area Development Policy. I voted no. Remember that San Jose has been the leader in providing affordable housing in the state of California, while other cities have done very little. As I wrote about on a prior blog, affordable housing must be a shared goal and not just in San Jose.

UPDATE: San Jose Inside has selected reader questions and sent them to Vice Mayor Madison Nguyen’s office. Thanks to all who participated.
This week, San Jose Vice Mayor Madison Nguyen has agreed to answer questions from San Jose Inside readers. She is the fourth public official to participate in this series. Questions are selected from online posts to this site.

With San Jose’s budget shortfall coming in at far less than the $80 million expected, the City Council will defer any action next Tuesday to declare a fiscal emergency. New projections put the shortfall at around $25 million. However, Mayor Chuck Reed still wants an election next year to reform employee pensions. The preferred election date for the ballot measures would be June 5, 2012, according to a memo sent out Thursday by Reed and councilmembers Pete Constant, Rose Herrera, Sam Liccardo and Madison Nguyen.

Editor’s Note: Jim Unland is a sergeant in the San Jose Police Department and president of the Police Officers Association. He wrote this column for San Jose Inside.

Good news has been hard to come by as of late. That is until yesterday. The city of San Jose Police and Fire Retirement Board voted yesterday to accept the plan actuary recommendations on pension costs for next year. And surprise, surprise, pension costs shrank to the tune of $55 million in the police and fire plan. That’s not a typo—$55 million will come off the projected budget deficit as a result of pay and concessions and concessions agreed to by police officers and firefighters.

Chris Shimek and I grew up in the same neighborhood.  We played baseball together, attended the same neighborhood schools—but the thing we had most in common was we shared the same best friend. The Chris I knew was outgoing, friendly, cheerful, and abhorred violence against women and children.  It is why he became a San Jose police officer. Something happened to the Chris I knew on Sunday, November 27, when he took the life of his soon to be ex-wife and himself.

Many juvenile offender services are not effective and some methods, like “shock incarceration treatment,” such as Scared Straight, actually worsen anti-social behavior. Unfortunately, with TV reality shows touting such interventions, communities continue to support these high-profile, ineffective programs. The thinking is: ‘We will just scare them into changing their ways.’ Only by looking at certain studies do we see that mixing youthful offenders with adult criminals, or with like-minded peers, only increases the chances that they will commit another crime. 

With many people rushing off for Thanksgiving last week, the Police Officers Association came out with a surprising announcement that George Beattie, the union president, was retiring from his POA position. Beattie, a lieutenant with the San Jose Police Department, has never been a fan of the media, so he didn’t give an interview in the Mercury News’ report. But his successor, Sgt. Jim Unland, who was previously vice president of the POA, was quoted as saying that negotiations with the city over pension reform are still proceeding “one day at a time.”

Move over Google, it seems public service is one of the valley’s most desired jobs. Two Cupertino councilmembers, Kris Wang and Barry Chang, are supposedly interested in the race for a seat on the county Board of Supervisors.

We continue to attempt to build education reform from the top down rather than from the bottom up. Building a foundation with our two teachers’ unions (CTA and CFT) for lasting school reform—beginning with evaluation systems that are effective, pay for performance plans that work, and ending tenure as we know it today—is the only way we will hit a home run. Until then, our children and schools lose.

The sick leave payout perk was something that the current City Council inherited from a prior council. Although once considered a nice perk, if the city continues this trend without any change it will continue further on a downward spiral of spending money it does not have.