San Jose Inside

The report in the Mercury News yesterday that mandatory water rationing in Silicon Valley may soon be a reality is not unexpected. The decision of the judge to limit the flow of water through the Sacramento River Delta—which supplies 50 percent of our needs—to protect an endangered smelt is largely due to inadequate rainfall this past year and the crumbling delta infrastructure that desperately needs attention. There is only so much water available even at the best of times, but we are in a drought year and there could be many more to follow. It isn’t unheard of and the situation could get a lot worse.

City Hall Diary

At the August 28 city council evening meeting, the council spent over two hours deliberating on where to put the park that is part of the Irvine Development in North San Jose. This item was continued from the August 14 meeting where the council discussed it at length until 1 a.m.

The Business Journal so much reminds me of that old saying about editors: that they “come in after the battle and shoot the wounded.”  Never was it truer than in their recent editorial about Cirque du Soleil. They have been absent in past years concerning the takeover of City Hall by lobbyists; absent on the unconscionable stealing of our future by the transfer of 1400 acres of industrial tax base to residential housing; absent on any meaningful discussion of the proper support for small businesses in the downtown; and absurdly critical of candidate Chuck Reed on some relatively minor issues in the recent election. Not much of a record.

It’s my turn to complain about traffic. Traffic: another reason to keep jobs in San Jose.

I join over 50 percent of San Jose residents who leave their homes every day to travel to their jobs to earn a living outside of San Jose. Those of us who commute, trek highways 101, 880, 85, 87 and 280 mostly north to the “land of jobs.” I am getting back on the road and joining my fellow residents on our neighborhood streets as we try to snake our way to the freeway entrance—a feat in and of itself.  I hesitate to say this, but now I am reminded why people cut through neighborhoods. Saving a few minutes commuting is a big deal to many with all the traffic congestion to slow us down.

If, as the old strategist suggested, politics is war by other means, then we are seeing something new in the epic battle between the reformers and the fixers in San Jose; namely, the introduction of legal assaults to buttress the crumbing coalition of lobbyists, developers and labor that has ruled and nearly ruined our city in the past decade. You wonder how gullible, or actually, how dumb these people feel the rest of us are.

City Hall Diary

I survived another late night city council meeting. This one was the last of the 2006-2007 fiscal year. The meeting began at 1:30 p.m. but did not end until 11:30 p.m.  I am not quite sure if having a ten hour meeting allows for the time needed to go over important items like Coyote Valley, a hazardous waste facility, and Evergreen, among others.  Members of the community come to the city council meetings and have to wait for hours just to be heard for one or two minutes regarding their particular issue.  And, of course, we had a smorgasbord of last-minute issues that either couldn’t wait until August, or were not planned appropriately to come up at an earlier meeting date.

Here are a few important issues with my opinions.

Wall of Taco Trucks to Keep Aggressive Builders From Skirting Triggers

The City’s confidence in protecting Coyote Valley from evil housing developers has desperately degenerated to a point where Team San Jose has been hired to design and manage a protective barrier around the perimeter of the undeveloped Mecca of Santa Clara Valley.

Chronic Concerns of Housing Costs, Traffic and Worker Visas Disappear

The Silicon Valley Leadership Group’s annual Business Climate Survey was released yesterday with scandals surprisingly topping the list of valley CEO’s greatest worries.

In what some in the media have termed “The Year of the Philistine,” several chronic concerns such as housing costs, traffic congestion, worker visas and healthcare coverage have been replaced with anxiety over the safety of their daughters attending parties at local community colleges and the fear of getting ensnarled in a stock backdating scandal.

The 28 percent hike in garbage rates for single-family homes approved by the San Jose City Council by a vote of 8-2 on Tuesday seems to have been a very unpopular move. The increase averages about $5.65 per month, raising the current rate from $20.15 to $25.80 for about 55 percent of the city’s residents. (Putting it into perspective, the increase equals about 20 miles’ worth of gas in one of those jumbo SUVs that can be seen with the naked eye from the moon or an iceberg lettuce side salad at an average overpriced Silicon Valley restaurant.)

In the wake of some of the worst land use decisions in the history of our valley, we are faced with a real dilemma: do we use our General Plan as a guide to budgetary decisions and building a better city or do we take the expedient route of rationalization and profit?  As they elect a new leader in France, I am reminded of the legendary, but never-spoken line of a doomed queen, “Let them eat cake.”  Well, for too long we have been given such cavalier and foolish judgment in our land use decisions.  The demands of the few—the privileged class of political insiders—has predominated over the needs of our citizens.

After a long Monday, we could discuss the Sharks’ win over Detroit (third game winners go on to win the series 70 percent of the time) or the strange vote at the San Jose City Council on the Evergreen development—where six members gave the okay to “study” the conversion of over 200 acres of job-creating land to housing—or even the boom in downtown high-rise housing with the optimism that springs from it.  No, I will resist all these issues, although it is tempting to ask why six council members wished to give away 200 acres of tax base for more traffic. Old habits—selling out the future—apparently die hard even in the new City Hall.

City Hall Diary

San Jose has opportunities to build tall buildings in North San Jose and create large parks at the same time.  I am hopeful that we will take advantage of these opportunities so that we can create great places and huge parks.

Currently in North San Jose, we are in the midst of a “build up” for commercial office and transit village housing. I support this for many reasons: jobs, tax base, light rail, and the Guadalupe River Park Trail, among others.  Industry leads housing development; thus, I believe we should move forward with land use incrementally.

The debate over the San Jose Flea Market is a microcosm of our city and society as a whole. One side represents an “out with the old, in with the new” mentality that can be good for the city. The other side offers a realistic criticism of our inability to preserve anything that could be deemed historical or part of the fabric of our culture.  Though I do see merit on both sides of the argument, I support the development of the land around the flea market and think it could be a great thing for our city. 

I usually don’t give more than a passing glance at news about the trials and tribulations of the giant roulette wheel on Wall Street. The hollow ring of their dog-ate-my-homework excuses for dips in market values, like the reasons dreamed up by the PR departments of the oil companies to explain the rise in gas prices while the price of a barrel of oil goes down, just never seem quite credible. However, the excuses given for the recent market falls—turmoil in the mortgage “industry” and the overvalued real estate market—caught my attention because of a local story in the Mercury News on Sunday.

Welcome to “Mission Green,” San Jose’s Neighborhood of the Future

Last week, I put forth the idea for a Google or Yahoo “Search and Discover Museum” to be developed at the old Martin Luther King Library property on W. San Carlos.  Before such an exciting project (or any other project) could be built there, space would have to be found for the 150 or more city employees who currently hold their offices there.