Why do we need the Coyote Valley?
The answer to this question is pivotal to the future of the city and a key to determining who the next mayor of San Jose will be. Why indeed? It seems that the reason for developing the virgin valley that was called into being to redress the historic imbalance that San Jose has in a tax base, i.e., the ability to provide quality services like police and fire and libraries and youth workers for our citizens, has been forgotten.
What has changed and why are memories so pitifully short? Well, it seems that many in our city have quickly forgotten the lessons of the past. Doing so, they may be condemned to repeat them. Memories are indeed short – at City Hall institutional memory is now measured in nanoseconds – and offenders are retired or sent to ignominious “house mouse hell.” Let me explain.
In the sixties and seventies rampant and uncontrolled growth driven by a city government in league with the growth machine, nearly pushed our community to the edge of extinction as a livable place. Big labor was a willing ally of big development interests; Downtown was murdered. Schools on double sessions, police calls unanswered, library hours curtailed, and toilets backing up into homes were the hallmarks of a city running on an insane auto-pilot.
Those who benefit from such amnesia, the selfish coterie of developers and their paid help, the lobbyist cult, are only too happy to see this turn of events. In fact, they pray daily for such blindness. There has to be a core group of those inside City Hall and outside in the neighborhoods that remain faithful to the credo once used by Janet Gray Hayes in a successful campaign for mayor, “Let’s make San Jose better before we make it bigger.” The standard of a rational growth policy has fallen in the dust. In all directions and in all quarters there is a demand for leadership and courage.
The question awaits an answer.
Next: Development 101 Part 3: What happened to the neighborhood groups, the Downtown advocates, PACT, and others who always were in the vanguard of honorable positions of support for rational growth and neighborhood power? Who or what emasculated them?
How do we put an end to these grandiose delusions? I am glad Sisco Systems balked at the fees to pay for the new Downtown North.
Has anyone noticed that all the fees are going up? There is a new “Storm Sewer Service Charge”, when the streets are only swept once a month. I guess for more money, they won’t be swept at all. Vector Control wants more money…
If the city and county officials keep increasing fees, stretching resources and reducing services, San Jose will top the list of least desirable places to live. Higher fees and poor services will drive retirees and families out of the area and turn it into a massive transient community, where residents don’t stick around long enough to care who is running the place.
I think, I just figured out what’s in the works at the city hall.
My bad! I guess I misspelled Cisco.
The answer to why do we need to develope Coyote Valley is choice. San Jose would have more housing options, more employment options and more recreational options. This is the benefit to living in an urban area. The continued growth of San Jose would benefit all of us residents in many ways.
I love San Jose for what it is, but I would also like to see San Jose expand and proliferate.
What is better than San Jose? More San Jose.
I do not fear that the devlopment of Coyote Valley will have a negative impact on the quality of life for the rest of the city. That said, what risk is there in the development is it is properly planned and managed? Notice I the word properly, not perfectly.
Cisco is right. It smacks of a “taking:” Forcing the property owners to pay in order to get permits to build. An end run on the Constitution so that the City wont have to condem!
Tom,
I believe you have missed the major switch in City Hall’s short term ( 1-5 years ) high growth to generate additional taxes strategy (supported by large developers primarily inerested in additional infill residential development ) about where the majority of San Jose growth will be and where the new tax money ( property tax increment and retail sales taxes ) to fund San Jose city government is going to come from – North San Jose and the Downtown Core Extension tos Bird Ave / CalTrain and Taylor Ave.
The Coyote Valley Plan is too far in the future ( 5-10 + years ) has too many design and practical business location problems and has too many oponents to quickly generate the needed tax funds in the next 2-5 years but is now being modified to allow housing / retail first with offices to maybe follow later violating the basic Smart Growth Plan concepts that San Jose advocates in the Coyote Plan and else where but an unbiased analysis shows they do not actually consistently follow the main Smart Growth principals.
North San Jose Plan and the Downtown core expansion which are closer to Smart Growth priinciples than most actual San Jose developmnet plans will be primarily infill residential development and some retail in the next 2-5 years to generate the additional tax increment property taxes and sales taxes but without the change in the traffic LOS ( Level of Service ) policy and Park Impact fees / credits the majority of proposed development ( 26 million sq foot of proposed development )could not happen. These 2 plans if properly done, which is always a problem when campaign contributor developeers not the city and residents drive the process, could result in people actually living close to their jobs but additional investment in public transist infrastructure ( light rail / buses etc ) and bike paths / trails will have to be well planned and implemented or we will have more traffic jams in this area.
Citizens feel disengaged (can you say “2 Minutes”) from the process and our representatives might as well be on a beach in Thailand having drinks with developers and lobbyists.
Issue city ID cards to SJ citizens.
Set up web surveys to get citizen input on important issues and direction.
Set up web kiosks at public places so that citizens can ‘vote’.
Track by district how the citizens voted versus how the cit council rep voted and thus we have a report card for measuring how well we were represented.
In today’s merc…
“Two weeks ago, the city’s other plan to fund the overhauls hit a snag when lawmakers said no action would be taken in Sacramento this year on a city-sponsored proposal to use tax dollars that would normally go to schools and other local jurisdictions to pay for the traffic improvements.”
Am I reading the above correctly? The city wants to take money away from already strapped, struggling schools for road improvements?
That’s vintage Smart Growth! Here’s another idea for our mavens of Smart Growth.
Indian land will be ‘discovered’ to exist on the site of the new CH and will be converted into a casino. The glass rotunda would make an excellent facility for hosting the World Poker Tour IMO.
Our schools then offer blackjack, craps, and cashier training to supply the new casino with workers. win win win.
Coyote Valley = North Morgan Hill.
If you lived in Coyote would you fight the 101/85 traffic to get to San Jose, especially Downtown, for goods and services or would you simply head down the road for an easy drive to Morgan Hill?
Guys, don’t be down on San Jose. Santana Row is best thing ever happened to San Jose because of its great shopping and dining with excellent European atmosphere. Downtown, on the other hand, has excellent urban feel with great attractions, hotels, arena, library and clubs. Both combined makes San Jose better than London, Paris and even San Francisco. Granted, downtown can still be impoved with more housing and retail. I brought many cosmopolitan savy friends and relatives from world great cities and countries to San Jose, and they all thought San Jose was better than their hometowns. You see, Santana Row is world class shopping and dining destination while downtown is great in its own right. If they build highrise Coyote urban center immediately, not later and not keep on planning, then it’s fantasic.
The development of Coyote Valley is a potential disaster waiting to happen. The Mayor has had his sights set on Coyote since he was elected. Fortunately, the massive Cisco campus did not happen, no thanks to the Mayor. But he has not given up. He has stacked the Coyote Valley task force to all but insure the result he wants and now is suggesting that the “triggers” be relaxed. We can only hope that no plan is approved until this Mayor is long gone.
Tom raises critical issues that tend to be ignored by our “leaders.” Emergency response time, traffic impacts, numerous environmental impacts, schools, etc. SJ cannot grow out if it can’t even take care of those of us currently here.
The proposed increases for garbage/recycling and for storm sewer services are a classic example of growing with poor planning. Of course the $11 million dollar giveaway that the Mayor engineered helped to require this rate increase.
Poor planning, sprawling growth, rate increases, etc. will continue until people start saying “enough.” You can start by protesting the proposed rate increases by writing to the the City Clerk. Complete information is included with the notice all residents received informing them of the increase. If few people protest then our “leaders” will keep doing this, in spite of promises not to raise rates.
How much longer are we going to take it???
The Committee for Green Foothills blog is hotlinking to Tom McEnery’s excellent post on Coyote Valley (http://www.greenfoothills.org/blog/). The two previous posts on our blog discuss how San Jose appears to be abandoning General Plan triggers that limit Coyote growth, and how developers may use residential sales to subsidize commercial building and evade any triggers that remain for controlling growth. The result is a significant threat to downtown and North First Street development.
Also worth noting: Coyote Valley plans insufficient housing for the development it is adding, so the end result will be increased sprawl elsewhere, and an even tighter housing market in the City.
The BEST way to solve the City’s (and County’s) financial needs may be the way UAL decided to solve theirs: reduce or eliminate the retirement costs! When retirees make more being retired than they made working, the system needs to be changed.
Tom McEnery gave a good description of what happened to SJ during the 60’s & 70’s. I want to add my own thoughts. One of SJ’s great failings is the lack of a group of powerful and politically connected people who cared what happened to the city and how it grew. The worst and most base elements of suburban sprawl were allowed to flourish in the SJ of the 60’s and 70’s helping to create the city as it exists today: a non-descript, formless city that sprawls in all directions with no civic cohesiveness.
Years ago I had a conversation with a guy who worked for Dutch Hamann. This guy was apart-and-parcel member of the crowd that pursued the worst growth policies for the city.
A couple of highlights: “We annexed everything we could because we didn’t want Santa Clara to become a bigger city.”
This individual retired to a lovely home in the Carmel area – I recall asking him why he retired to Carmel instead of San Jose. Interesting answer. “We like the small-town feel of Carmel and besides who would want to live in that “toilet” of San Jose!” My response: “Yeah, but you helped create the very city you now despise!!!” His response:
“So what!”
This valley ended up the way it did because of that kind of attitude. The people who did the damage had no intention of living in the mess they created. They made their ‘gold’, made the mess, and then moved to places like Pebble Beach, Carmel, etc. to live their lives away from the “rabble”.
Because so many of the people who “developed” San Jose had no intention of staying here, they had no interest in seeing that the city and valley develop properly and remain a liveable place.
I think San Jose is too far gone to fix.
Once again, Mark C has told it exactly like it is (and was). My family lived next door to one of Hamman’s assistant managers and I can tell the same story.
How do we define a “rational growth process?” How do we measure “better before bigger?” Many San Jose schools while not on double sessions still compare poorly to our neighbors in surrounding communities. Library hours are still not what they should be and there is talk of cutting back even more. As far as I can tell big labor is still a willing ally of development interests that agree to use union labor.
Neighborhood groups can never be the vanguards of “rational growth”, whatever that means. We cannot expect our residents to waste years of their lives working through a planning process that is quickly tossed in the garbage can when powerful development interests disagree. San Jose is just too large for neighborhood groups with a narrow set of concerns to play in the big leagues with labor, developers, chamber, etc…
Is no one else fed up with how this City is being run that they will get off their ass and try to become part of the political process – run for office? I hear that Manny Diaz is going to run in District 3 and that there is no one else to oppose him. That guy is just looking for anywhere to land and I will run if that means that he does not get elected. Does everyone move to Los Gatos or Carmel and say to hell with it?
Sure, let’s get the house in order before we expand the City. However, as a world-class city, our demand for housing has outstripped the supply for so long that our supply of affordable housing exists primarily in dilapidated housing in poor neighborhoods.
In my view, the NIMBYs are the hypocrites who continue to object to every new housing proposal to protect their ever-increasing property values. The “I got mine” attitude is not easliy masked by those who have seen their home values increase by about 60% during the past three years. Allowing for new housing would moderate appreciation – oh no!
We must provide housing and the answer is and always has been high-density development. Will will not get BART or other transportation projects done until we can prove that we are determined to provide this kind of development. Kudos to the Mayor for his North First St. vision. That’s a good start.
His proposal is being poo-pooed by the very people who want public transportation, fewer cars and more money for public education. How can that be? I can understand the ire of the no-growth faction over Coyote Valley, but I can’t understand how they can denegrate the Mayor’s plans for North First Street. Isn’t putting the labor force near the jobs the goal of Smart Growth? Let’s allow developers to build as much high-density development as the market will absorb in infill locations – remember, San Francisco was high-density before they had BART.
And finally, the only way to get the market to respond is to continue to allow new development without requiring affordable housing give-aways. This program has proved to be the #1 impediment to high-density housing, and removing it has been a boon for San Jose’s housing supply. The only way we will materially impact the supply of affordable housing over the long-term is to allow high-density housing at market rates. Let the developers take the downside risk.
San Jose averages 1.7 employed people per residence. Any jobs-plus-housing development that provides more than 1.7 jobs for each residence will therefore make the housing crisis worse in the City.
Coyote Valley plans 50,000 “leading” jobs, an undefined number of additional support jobs, and 25,000 residences. To the extent someone prioritizes housing, Coyote Valley should be seen as bad for San Jose.
And BTW, the small planned residences in Coyote will probably support even fewer than 1.7 jobs on average.
It is unbelievable that they are already trying to have and end run around the triggers that they set a year ago when they wanted Cisco there. I always thought they would do. The easiest money maker and sure thing is housing for developers but housing does not support itself. Coyote valley should be off limits completely and should stay and rural area. In 20, 30, 50 years from now someone will say wasn’t it smart of those politicans to stop the development we have this beautiful valley left basicly untouched. Look at the rest of the city. They are developing all the hillsides and everywhere else isn’t that enough. How many people do we need? Lets build housing next to jobs and downtown where there is transit. Lets build only commerical and residential that will pay for itself and not be a drain on our resources for people that are already here. Finally, this city will be broke just like the state if we don’t do something about the pension plan give aways to employees. I say lets pull a United Airlines and say we can’t pay it. These must stop becasue we simply can not afford it.
Thanks Tom for adding some historical perspective to your post. As a “younger” member of the community, it is important to understand the historical landscape of San Jose and the impact those decisions/events have influenced/dictated today’s political climate.
Not to worry, amaslov, spelling and grammar are lost disciplines in San Hozay.
John Michael O’Connor