San Jose Inside

Anyone who wants to look at a parallel example of what our own downtown is becoming need look no further than … well … Rome. An article  in the New York Times on Tuesday paints a picture of the historic medieval district of Trastevere—just south of Vatican City on the west bank of the Tiber—and other ancient parts of central Rome around Piazza Navona and Campo dei Fiori, just a “stone’s throw from where Julius Caesar met his treacherous end,” as being under siege by “booze-soaked” tourists (mostly from America and Northern Europe) that have made these areas living hell for residents, some of whose families have been there since Christians were fed to lions.

Furious Over Stunt To Steal Daughter’s Headlines

The Hilton family has filed a lawsuit with the Santa Clara County Superior Court alleging that ex-Mayor Gonzales and former aide Joe Guerra have used unfair tactics in order to wrest headlines away from their daughter, infamous socialite Paris Hilton.

The San Jose City Council voted unanimously to end free downtown parking in city garages and impose a $5 charge after 10 p.m. Thursday through Saturday nights from July 1. This comes in the wake of the widespread use and abuse of the garages for partying and mayhem at night as we have been discussing here on SJI. The projected $400,000 of revenue raised by this fee will be used to pay for city parking garage policing and clean-up.

The city council’s new plan for “soft” closings has stirred up debate about our downtown—what it has become and what it could be. Wrongfully or rightfully, some people are on one side of the fence, saying that downtown is a place of murders and thugs, while others wonder if it is really that bad.

If you thought the downtown problems I described in last week’s column are bad, wait until you see what the Downtown Association and nightclub lobby have in store for the very near future. They call it “soft closing,” which is really just a euphemism for extending opening hours for nightclubs from 2 a.m. until 3 a.m. The city planning department will hold a hearing on the matter of a proposed pilot program for a large designated area of downtown on June 11 at 6:30 p.m., followed by a city council hearing on June 19 at 1:30 p.m., both at City Hall.

City Hall Diary

It is 11:00 p.m. on Tuesday May 8. I just finished attending my second community meeting of the night. The day has flown by!

My day began at 9:30 a.m. with a long closed-session meeting followed by a “Good Government” event at Adobe. I then went to the 1:30 p.m. Tuesday afternoon city council meeting. The garbage rate increase was on the agenda today. Although many people attended the meeting, I felt that this item should have been heard at night.

Budget Cuts to Mental Health Services in Question

Varmints are in the news again this week as renegade squirrels descended on a sleepy South San Jose school on Wednesday and attacked several students and a room mom during snack time.

Hypocritical actions are in full bloom in San Jose.  In this case, it is a recommendation to the Sunshine Task Force by one of its members who is exhibiting that most unfortunate characteristic. Labor representative Bob Brownstein is suggesting that the city be required to detail all costs anytime a significant public subsidy is required. The wages of any jobs, impact on neighborhoods, return in taxes, and anything that could reasonably be assumed to be a pertinent part of a project, would have to be expeditiously disclosed. This is just like the joke about not being able to run a two-car funeral. In recent municipal lore, it is known as not being able to give away retail space to Starbuck’s. That’s some business sense—and some funeral.

The results are in and the sound and fury are subsiding: the Mexican Heritage Plaza is still in the red, the San Jose Police Department arrests more minorities than their ratio in the population, and people are still skeptical of sports facilities. And, in a news flash from Monte Sereno, neighbors are fighting over a fence. There does not seem to be much else of excitement in the paper these days.

As tempting as it is to write this week on the navel gazing of the San Jose Police Department and its study of itself suggesting some important and disturbing targeting of minorities, I will save that until another day. My topic today is the one that refuses to go away, the Tombstone (“the town too tough to die”) of our time. It is the scam of the century, the development too lucrative to die: Coyote Valley. Like Freddy Krueger, no matter how many times it is declared dead in innumerable study sessions and elections or in the pronouncements of mayors and budget directors and editorial writers, the new city of sprawl and delusion keeps coming back. No one can drive a stake in its heart, protected as it is by the woolly thinking of certain council members, the Hessians of the lobbying cult, and an impenetrable Kevlar vest of greenbacks and cynicism.

Part I

The organizational audit for the Valley Transportation Authority (VTA) presents a picture neither unexpected nor unwarranted.  It clearly exposes that not only does the emperor have no clothes, but he may not even be the emperor. 

There was a strange and bizarre convergence of issues at the San Jose City Council this week. On the one hand, there was the 1stACT Silicon Valley presentation of proposals for downtown—large and small items that included expanding the Convention Center, building a baseball stadium and 21st century light tower, and creating more Guadalupe River trails, as well as fountains and quiet spots that are a treasure to any city.  They accurately presented them as big projects and “small wonders.” A key man behind this was the Adobe CEO, Bruce Chizen, as good a friend as downtown dreamers have had in a long while, and the main presenter was Connie Martinez of the Children’s Discovery Museum. The finances were unspoken, but the vision was impressive.  It is a wonderful look at what might be.

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.

People do not drive nearly as well as they used to in California. That’s a fact. Stand at the intersection of Market and Santa Clara Streets for ten minutes and you will see ten obvious violations at a minimum. In nearly every light cycle, someone will run a red light, another will illegally turn through a crosswalk full of pedestrians and nearly everyone going north on Market is speeding. There is a widespread lack of common courtesy, common sense and common decency among drivers these days.

San Jose’s best annual event began its 17th year last night at the California Theatre with a Bay Area premiere showing of Indian director Mira Nair’s “The Namesake,” from the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel of the same name. This was quite a coup for our film festival as Nair’s previous film, “Vanity Fair,” starring Reese Witherspoon and former Cinequest honoree Gabriel Byrne, got a big Hollywood-blowout release. The filmmakers were on hand at the opening gala afterward.

Finally, our new mayor and city council have listened to the voices of San Jose’s citizens and neighborhood leaders and set budget priorities for the coming year that are in accordance with the wishes of the vast majority. In a meeting on Tuesday, the mayor, council members and their staffs made a commitment to funding the items most often mentioned on this site and in the neighborhoods. These break down into roughly three areas: public safety, public works infrastructure, and public recreational services.