San Jose Inside

When we think about our city, we often think about the big-ticket items that make a huge impact.  We are always talking about ways to enrich San Jose with more, more, and more! This includes building BART, baseball stadiums, funding large scale developments and adding retail shopping.  But it seems that when we do that—which is important—smaller projects that are also important to some citizens fall through the cracks.

The Evergreen issue is still looming next week, but it is not the only development item on the radar screen these days. After a stinging editorial in the Mercury News on Tuesday, the city council unanimously backed off approving a proposal to begin major urban development in the Almaden Valley greenbelt by supporting Council Member Nancy Pyle in her efforts to thwart the usual assortment of lobbyists and support current city growth restraints. Planning Director Joe Horwedel said the Almaden proposal by the Rancho San Vicente partnership is so far removed from city policy that is isn’t worth the cost of the planning work and an Environmental Impact Report. We may have dodged a bullet here, but the issue will surely surface again.

I thought I would run a list of things I am thankful for before Thanksgiving.  Beside the obvious—family, friends, etc.—here are some San Jose items.

I am thankful for:

But Poignant Personal Letter Gives Sage Advice

After a landslide victory by the Reed reformist movement over the incumbent machine of Chavez, Gonzales, Labor, the Democratic Party, lobbyists, Coyote Valley land developers, the city council, county supervisors, former mayors Hammer, Mineta, Hayes, former president Clinton, and just about everyone else except for the voters, outgoing mayor Ron Gonzales rose above bitterness, the referendum on his administration, and depositions to write a personal and heartfelt letter to his successor.  It is full of advice and exposes a human side of the Mayor that was seldom seen.

It is an axiom that some things that sound so very good can sometimes be so horribly bad. So it is with the current vision of our twenty-four–hour downtown; the result of the so-called “wonderful” activity of nightclubs and revelers often comes closer to a nightmare.  Someone attending an event at HP Pavilion and wanting to have a post game drink at the Tied House or a bowl of pasta at Original Joe’s, faces the equivalent of a trip from the UN Green Zone to the Baghdad airport. Few would have the temerity to attempt the short drive to either.  They just go home. The same goes for anyone getting off the freeway at Santa Clara Street on a weekend.  And those who live in our downtown, either in the new housing in the core or in the immediate neighborhoods, are unable to enjoy the peace and tranquility that we all need when we come home after a long day of work or play.  Cruisers, youth in full-party mode, and an annoying array of troublemakers from other cities are filling up our downtown in the late-night and early-morning hours.

What’s the solution?  Blame the police.

When I was a kid growing up in the mountains of southern California in the 1960s, one of the most magnificent sights, then common, was to see a full-grown California condor soaring overhead. My father, a professional pilot, and I used to fly alongside the giant birds at 8,000 feet where they would soar in thermals for hours without flapping their wings once. We wondered how they learned to do that. Then, all of a sudden, the condors disappeared—victims of the huge influx of humans greedy for space and resources. It happened so fast. Now, forty years later, these amazing birds are making a very slow return and our state is all the better for it. The unfortunate thing is that the condor’s long-term trip to the nearly-extinct species list didn’t have to happen.

It is said that in war, truth is the first casualty. I have often felt that it is the same in political campaigns—where the stakes are lower and the attention slimmer.  We will see how much this axiom holds true in the currently forming battle for mayor of San Jose.  The result will determine a lot: most everything about our evolution as a city and region, our national reputation, our ethics, and the wellbeing of future generations yet unborn.  Now, that is raising the stakes a trifle.

Anyone who is a regular reader of Leonard McKay’s columns knows something of our once-idyllic valley before it was paved over and covered with seemingly endless, sprawling housing developments and strip malls. Residents of Santa Clara County have seen the population nearly double to two million since 1970 with no end in sight. With profits to be made, the county is in real danger of losing its remaining open spaces to greedy developers who care nothing about the quality of life of those of us who live here. The Santa Clara County Land Conservation Initiative on the November ballot aims to insure that an adequate amount of our open space remains that way for future generations.

I know that the subjects of professional sports franchises, music halls, retail and housing have all been discussed on this blog at length as a few things San Jose is missing.  We all agree that San Jose has the amazing potential to be a great city or no one would waste their time talking about it, but my question is: What do we really need in San Jose?

A little-known Union hero of the Battle of Gettysburg was Brig. Gen. John Buford. On the first day of that epic struggle to determine the fate of the United States, he had the judgment to seize the high ground outside of the town and, with it, the victory was all but assured—only the deadly bloodletting was to follow for three horrible, tragic days. Well, it’s only June, but never too soon to begin the speculation on who will have the high ground in the election for mayor next November. In this campaign, the key issues will be ethics, growth and vision. Chavez is attempting to make it a schools and neighborhoods choice, but she has a daunting task.

There is an interesting battle brewing in Santa Clara County that will decide the future of transit, transportation and, perhaps, a politician or two.  It revolves around the recent county effort to place a half-cent sales tax increase on the June ballot. It is intended to bail out the BART project; maybe “bail out” is incorrect—more appropriately we might say “save.”  But it is being strangely combined with other county projects as a tax to fund several items other than BART, like hospitals and housing for low-income people. You see, put in this form the measure needs only a bare majority vote to pass, while as a transit measure, it would take an unlikely two-thirds vote.

I do like give and take; it’s healthy, it’s in my nature, and I believe that is the tradition of San Jose—a hallowed one. But if our next mayor’s race becomes the traditional American election, one full of personalities but short of vision, replete with attacks, more thunder than light, then we all lose.  Our city needs the next campaign to be about ideas and issues rather than platitudes and endorsements and who is the “nicest.” With that goal in mind, I’d like to speak about issues and an idea or two—those things that we need to be the focal points of the next mayoral election, namely growth, a big park, safety and ethics.