It was a tough week, image-wise, for the City of San Jose. The nation’s seventh-smartest city looked pretty stupid thanks to two stories that received a fair amount of press attention.
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The End Is Nigh for Team San Jose
City Councilwoman Rose Herrera didn’t mince her words. “If we were the private sector we would be asking for resignations,” she said about Team San Jose, which runs the McEnery Convention Center and Visitors Bureau.
Councilman Sam Liccardo reported that when compared with six other similar-sized California cities, San Jose comes in dead last in the number of conventions booked. Meanwhile, special events like the Genghis Khan exhibition not only end up losing money—they have to be bailed out by the city. Yet shortly after CEO Dan Fenton informed the city that Team San Jose was $950,000 over budget, he went and gave bonuses to himself and his staff
San Jose’s Police and Fire Unions Lost More than an Election
Forget Meg Whitman…San Jose’s police and fire unions were the biggest losers in this past election. Meg Whitman can take another $140 million out of petty cash, but San Jose’s police and fire departments may not soon be able to recover from the damage that they have done to their reputations. Frankly, I’m not sure that the rank and file have any idea how much damage they have done to their trust relationship with the San Jose public. The rhetoric employed to try and defeat Measures V and W will likely not be forgotten for quite some time.
Endorsement: Don Rocha for City Council
Back in March, when he first launched his campaign, Donald Rocha was careful to a fault. He declined to take positions on controversial issues, saying he needed to first get familiar with the issues, and then to go out into the community and find out what his constituents were thinking.
Seven months later, Rocha has evolved as a political actor. Having studied the policy papers, pounded the pavement and knocked on a few thousand doors, he says he now knows what his district wants and how to get it.
Reed: City Union Bosses ‘Lying, Cheating and Lawbreaking’
Mayor Chuck Reed came out swinging this afternoon, calling for an end to the “lying, cheating and lawbreaking” by public employee unions who oppose Measures V and W.
At a press conference held this afternoon at the Chamber of Commerce headquarters in downtown San Jose, Reed denounced the police and firefighters unions’ controversial campaign to dissuade citizens from voting yes on the measures.
Measure V & W Opponents Confront Councilman Over Campaign Sign Removal
Members of the San Jose Fire Department and San Jose Police Department confronted Councilman Pierluigi Oliverio at his Willow Glen home after a political consultant spotted the council member removing signs. Oliverio says the signs were illegally posted and that he removed them consistent with city ordinances.
San Jose Police Union’s Latest Shot
The San Jose Police Officers’ Association got their money’s worth out of the full page ad that they took out in last Sunday’s Mercury News. The story received a lot of coverage from other media outlets and was the lead story for several Bay Area television stations
South Bay Labor Council Accepted Gambling Money While Funding Candidates
A paper trail suggests that money from Bay 101, the San Jose card club, made its way to the campaign of City Council candidate Xavier Campos. Public records show that following the card club’s $50,000 contribution in support of a ballot measure, funds were transferred to Campos-aligned organizations that subsequently funded Campos’ bitter battle for a District 5 council seat, in apparent violation of city campaign laws.
City Didn’t Follow the Team San Jose Money Trail
Like an underwater homeowner on an adjustable-rate mortgage in late 2008, Team San Jose was unfazed by money issues in the months leading up to its being slapped with a default notice. And like a feckless federal regulator, the city official charged with overseeing the local business-union-municipal alliance was upbeat—right up until the report that $750,000 had fallen off the truck.
Team San Jose in Crisis
Team San Jose, the peculiar alliance of hoteliers, unions and city bureaucrats that runs the city’s entertainment and convention venues, is facing the biggest crisis in its short, contentious history.
Last Wednesday, finance chief Scott P. Johnson issued a report showing that the quasi-public entity overshot its budget by $750,000, and tangled its bookkeeping so badly that director Dan Fenton can’t even say exactly where the missing money went. Then on Monday, City Councilmember Sam Liccardo turned up the heat, asking city manager Deb Figone to dig into the hotel-tax-funded entity, which is run by Fenton and an executive committee including South Bay Labor Council boss Cindy Chavez.
Council Hears About Impact of Cuts
Now that we don’t have any money, this is how we are dealing. This seemed to be the theme of today’s San Jose City Council meeting, where council members were updated on some of the painful cutbacks that have taken place since the city budget was slashed.
Potential City Ballot Measures
On Tuesday, Aug. 3, the City Council will decide on five possible ballot measures that would go before San Jose voters in November. So far, the Council has budgeted money to place two items on the ballot; therefore the council must choose two of the five. However a group known as Baseball San Jose has offered to pay for the cost of putting the Downtown Baseball Stadium question on the ballot, so three ballot measure may go before voters.
Team Takes San Jose.org
It looks like the lines between the city’s visitors bureau and the labor-business coalition that runs city-owned facilities is being further blurred, if they exist at all. Until very recently, the Convention and Visitors Bureau, a quasi-public, hotel tax–funded organization, and one of the three entities that make up Team San Jose, operated the SanJose.org website.
The site made mention of Team San Jose as an “innovative public-private” partnership between the CVB, South Bay Labor Council and a group of local hoteliers, who joined forces to streamline the process by which out-of-towners can spend their cash.
San Jose’s Long, Hot Summer
Lately, San Jose’s political rhetoric has been hotter than its weather. Here are a few samples of comments by San Jose residents that were published by the Mercury News in recent days:
“With the resulting layoffs of 230 police and fire personnel looming, their (the unions’) motto needs to be revisited. Perhaps it should be modified to read, ‘To protect and preserve union power at the expense of public safety.’”
“Public and private workers increasingly live in separate economies…public employee unions have had a stranglehold on state and local elected officials for decades. This has to end, as the taxpayers are fed up and tapped out.”
City Council Approves Mayor’s Budget
Thirty minutes before the San Jose City Council went into closed session to decide whether to impose a 10 percent pay cut on public employees, Councilmember Pierluigi Oliverio addressed the large group of union members and other citizens gathered for the meeting.
“If you’re angry, it’s ok to be angry,” Oliverio said, “because the system is all screwed up.”
Last Tuesday, the City Council decided to delay its vote on the 10 percent wage cut for city employees, after five unions provided a counter-offer that they claimed would be the equivalent of the proposed cut.
However, after studying the offer, City Manager Debra Figone and City Attorney Richard Doyle determined that it was unacceptable. Figone recommended the city impose the cuts and implement the Mayor’s budget proposal.
The motion passed on an 8 to 3 vote, with council members Pyle, Kalra and Campos opposing. The Council deferred action on wage and benefit concessions with the five labor unions until the Council meeting of Tuesday, June 22.
Should San Jose Have its Own Navy?
Should San Jose have its own Navy to protect and defend Alviso? Ask that question to most people and they would respond, “Of course not,” and add, “Are you crazy?”
Most people would agree that the City of San Jose doesn’t need a Navy, but what about having our own State Department? We could be like Berkeley, and issue policy declarations for the rest of the world to follow and obey.
The San Jose City Council’s unilateral call to boycott the State of Arizona over the immigration issue is a bit like one principality declaring economic war over another. Give me a break.
