San Jose Inside

Last week, the San Jose City Council unanimously approved an official Cesar E. Chavez walkway, a five-mile route beginning downtown at the park named after the civil rights hero who founded the United Farm Workers of America. The route will continue east all the way down Santa Clara Street, almost to 680, and then south before looping back up and around to the Mexican Heritage Plaza.

he citizens of San Jose should be the ones to decide whether or not the city’s redevelopment agency should be permitted to lift its tax increment ceiling. The members of the San Jose City Council, who double as RDA Board Members, are looking at lifting the current $7.6 billion tax increment cap to $15 billion. (Will it be double your pleasure, or double your pain?) This important decision should not be made by a handful of politicians, it should be made by the people.

The jockeying has started early for the termed-out District 1 supervisor’s seat held by Don Gage, which will be on the ballot in June 2010, still more than a year away. Former San Jose City Councilmember Forrest Williams has been telling anyone who will listen that he’s running for the seat, and water district board member Rosemary Kamei has been mentioned as another possible candidate. One interesting entrant would be Teresa Alvarado, daughter of ex-Supervisor Blanca Alvarado, who’s been telling friends she’s serious about taking a run at it. The race could become even more interesting if Republican Pat Dando, a former San Jose city councilmember and mayoral candidate who currently runs the Chamber of Commerce, dives in

By Jessica Lussenhop

Families all over Santa Clara County are reportedly laying off their children in an effort to trim household expenses. An estimated 220 local kids have been laid off from their families just within the last three months, according to county reports, and more layoffs are likely on the way.

Last week Michael Phelps taught me about championship perseverance, Rudy Giuliani schooled me down on never letting terrorists win, Colin Powell explained how American might can defeat all, and Steve Forbes showed me that despite what all the losers say, “there is nothing wrong with the fundamentals of our economy.”

Billed as the “Super Bowl of Success,” the day-long seminar held at the HP Pavilion in San Jose was named simply “Get Motivated,” and drew more than 10,000 people. Sitting in the penthouse suite my friends and I snuck into, I couldn’t help but feel that in spite of the pyrotechnics, the famous people, and the massive energy, which (I assume) can only be matched by a mega-church revival, this was a funeral for an old American way of thinking. It was a celebration of the rock-solid institutions of an American identity that once was—unbridled capitalism, Jesus, and winning—in the face of a new, changing, and confusing America. Phelps, Giuliani, Powell, Forbes and the rest of us came together for once last hoorah.

On Friday, March 20, I participated in a fun event called San Jose Bike Party. The “bike party” is organized by people who promote bicycling in San Jose. They pass out flyers at bike shops and use the internet to get the message out. There have been 18 “Bike Parties” so far and the 19th is coming up on April 17 at 8:45pm at the old Zorba the Greek Restaurant parking lot located at South Bascom Avenue and Stokes Avenue in District 6. The bike parties are themed events, around themes like mustaches, mardi gras, robots etc… The event has some of the flair of the Burning Man scene, plus some rockabilly style, but it also includes just regular bicycle enthusiasts.

It’s San Jose Inside’s open forum. All opinions on any topic of local interest are welcome.

The Mercury News devoted the majority of its front page today to an in-depth look at the hormonal changes that occur in adolescents. Under the large, all caps headline “PUBERTY,” Silicon Valley’s only daily newspaper, winner of several Pulitzer prizes under its previous ownership, breathlessly revealed that humans between the ages of 10 and 16 begin paying attention to members of the opposite sex — and leave clothes on the floors of their rooms.

The legendary Herb Caen invented what was once called three-dot, or dot-dot-dot, journalism; that is, using the ellipsis to separate sections of his commentary. In my case, I’ll call it splat-splat-splat journalism, which suits this week’s musings—in honor of some local heroes.

Should San Jose City service levels be cut, and fees for services raised, so that city employees can enjoy more pay?

The Mercury News recently reported that automatic “step increases” will cost the city $10 million in FY 09-10 (almost $8 million to be paid from the city’s general fund). “It’s going to come from layoffs or reducing services…” Councilman Oliverio said…“Or, we can recognize the severity of the situation, bargaining units come together…and come up with a way to save jobs and save the city money.” (Mercury News 3/22).

President Barack and First Lady Michelle Obama have had an enormous amount of face time on television since the Inaugural on Jan. 20.  Just in the last few days we have seen the president ESPN, Jay Leno, and 60 Minutes and Michelle in the White House garden.

Let me softly suggest that the First Couple use their popularity to squelch the insidious and growing problem with schoolyard bullying

Apparently San Jose State University is quite the party school. Except it’s not the students who are having all the fun. On March 5, around noon, police were called to room 229 of Clark Hall, where Food Culture was being taught. According to Detective Mike Santos, the officers on the scene found the instructor Eileen Trans, whom they say was a tad bit intoxicated. “She walked in and she had fallen and hit her head on the whiteboard and then she just started acting really weird,” said Dan Lu, a student in the class. Though she was not arrested or cited, the officers had someone come pick her up, and told the class it was canceled for the day. The following week a new teacher was filling in for Trans.

When Mayor Chuck Reed and his City Council allies created the Public Intoxication Task Force back in October, they put its members on a tight leash. The Task Force, created in response to community members outraged over the large number of Latinos arrested for being drunk in public, predictably demanded full access to arrest reports, as well as a greater scope and extended timeline so they could get down to the bottom of this issue. Members of the group soon began to feel stonewalled by city leaders—and let them know it.

Last Friday night I went to something that seems almost counterintuitive these days given the decline of their industry—a celebration for journalists. The Northern California Ethnic Media Awards, held in San Francisco, honored the various faces and forms of ethnic media outlets—the Sing Toa Daily’s investigation on SRO’s, Allianza’s photo essay on Oaxacan migrants, the Nichi Bei Times full issue on the concept of “mixed race.”

Last week I responded to many of your questions with a term, “Meet-and-Confer.” This terminology is used in reference to discussions that city management has with unions about almost anything.

Once a labor contract is agreed upon, any thought of a change requires a meet-and-confer meeting. It could be a compensation freeze, sick time, vacation time, grievance, health care, retirement, education reimbursement, uniform allowance, time off with pay to conduct union activities, examining the possibility of using a non- union person to provide a city service, or even discussions about future employees who have not been hired yet, etc… So with the current budget deficit, if we want to have a discussion about city staff taking one day off without pay ($2.88M) to avoid layoffs, then there needs to be a closed-door meeting.