2008 was certainly a roller-coaster ride. From the rise and fall of oil to the housing market collapse and finally the recession. 2009 will be a challenging year for each and every one one of us.
The City of San Jose will have a newer City Council. What I mean by newer is that six out of 11 members will have two years experience or less on the council, including Pete Constant, Sam Liccardo, Kansen Chu, Ash Kalra, Rose Herrera and myself. Councilmembers Herrera and Kalra are the newest members, replacing eight-year veterans Dave Cortese and Forest Williams.
The 2009 San Jose city council will be unique in that four of the 11 members will be under 40. I am not a historian of the San Jose City Council but four under 40 certainly seems to be historic for our council. The under-40 club includes Councilmembers Kalra, Liccardo, Madison Nguyen and myself.
In addition, the council has wide racial diversity, with Chinese, Greek, Indian, Italian, Latina and Vietnamese, among others, represented. Also: Of the 10 council members, the make up is half female and half male.
Some insiders try to size up the council based on their endorsements during their political campaigns, or on whether some council members are labor or chamber players, or on the political left or on the political right. In the end, the 2009 council will need to solve big problems, and in my view will need to pull together solutions for residents of San Jose, and not interest groups.
The council has a full plate in 2009 and the years thereafter. As we work to balance the current $65 million shortfall in the budget. ($65 million is the same amount the City spent on the Hayes Mansion about 10 years ago without voter approval,) We will be working through the ongoing structural deficit, implementing the Green Vision, and making wise land use decisions.
I am looking forward to being part of this new council. Although the future is a bit bleak; I have high hopes that San Jose has good representation in it’s elected officials and will do great work.
The first challenge in front of us is the budget. I hope you plan on attending Mayor Reed’s Neighborhood Priority Setting meeting on Jan. 24, from 9am-noon at City Hall (free parking). It is important that you provide your feedback on how you would like to see the City spend the money it does have, and perhaps on how the City can deliver services differently.
Excellent post, Pierluigi. There are many challenges facing local governments in Silicon Valley. The continued effort by SJI, the Lantern, and others will be to encourage discussion.
It is interesting that we got a flurry of these self important bloggers in Santa Clara who claimed to have developed this coalition of self appointed experts. Yet, unlike SJI, they refuse comments and have not posted for weeks.
Pierluigi,
Good news,the “old guard” is disappearing from the landscape. I watch the Council meetings on the public access channel. For several years, I’ve been amazed at the length of time Forest could speak without actually saying anything. Who is left? Ahh, yes, Nora with her labor ties, a real budget-buster in these lean times.
Pierluigi-
Yes I agree with you residents first on the budget over special interests. I used to be under 40 and those were the days. Good luck this year.
Thanks for the open invite to the Priority Setting meeting, I plan to be there.
However, before offering new ideas new and feedback on how I would like to see City funds spent and services delivered, I would like to hear a recap of the many ideas which were submitted LAST YEAR during this same type of session. AND, more importantly, the specific actions that resulted (or what may be in progress or what was suggested but could not be done) to come full circle from last year’s feedback session exercise.
Often it has felt like community is invited to come together to share ideas, voluminous notes are taken, and then…what? As a measure of accountability, the City’s reporting back to the people it serves about what happened with their feedback would make these sessions feel informative, productive, and collaborative.
My .02
Tina
Great post Councilman,
The question in 2009-10 will be one of choices:
—Dealing with the structural deficit or funding special projects
—Dealing with the realities of funding core services or those that provide them
—Dealing with those that provide core services and those that depend on core services
—Boosting jobs, retail and sales tax vs. building homes on homes on homes
—Building a city that serves the builders vs. building a city that serves those who will live here 25, 50, 100 years from now.
Not easy. No simple answers. So many wanting a voice; so many wanting influence.
The question in 2009-10 will be one of choices, who makes them and why.
Always the elephant in the room.
The SF Chronicle ran a very interesting article yesterday looking at the difference between locally owned businesses and big box chains from the point of view of local tax revenues. Worth a read.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/01/04/INA8150K55.DTL
Pierluigi,
Tina asks good questions. A Neighborhood Priority Setting meeting does not sound like a very productive use of anybody’s time. Isn’t there a better way to solicit input from more than a handful of people? What about a Digg like web site where residents can vote up/down and comment on proposals? The site could be updated so residents could see what actions were taken based on the input. Maybe we could get a few thousand participating instead of the handful of “professionals” that can be found at these meetings.
Welcome everyone to SAN JOSE COVERED UP, inspired by SJR.
http://www.sanjosecoveredup.blogspot.com
Pierluigi,
I am hopeful as well but will wait to see how the city council actually votes.
#5- Tina,
Amen to that! Well said.
#10- Nicolas Von Hoffman,
Who exactly are you, and why are you posting this here instead of under Rants and Raves?
I claim the right using the San Jose Revealed law.
Editor,
I’m surprised SJI is allowing free advertising for competing blogs. Isn’t spam prohibited on SJI?
#13-You can use whomever name you want, but isn’t what you’re doing by using a fake name as hypocritical as the blog you are going after?
Entry 14
Actually that is how SJR got started by jumping on San Jose Inside and throwing out their URL. Now is the time for all of us to start blogs but I do not have that type of time since I am employed.
Try TechCrunch.com
#15-Ed,
I think this whole thing is silly. People are losing their jobs, homes, and schools are being cut, there are better things to talk about than who is hating on who.
The last thing we need is for our downtown investment to fail.
We are now almost sitting on “two” empty high rise towers downtown, and we continue to build.With the compleetion of the second Riverpark Towers downtown our inventory of empty office space (glut) will hurt future development.
Maybe Re-development should reconsider their investment stratergies downtown? Is it time to offer big incentives to get those towers filled and get jobs downtown.
We do not need for our downtown to fail.
Richard,
I forget… tell me again why downtown is so damned important.
#16 Kathleen,
re: “…there are better things to talk about than who is hating on who.”
I could not agree more.
To your point, “better things to talk about”… how about talking about ways to keep San Jose financially healthy and safe?
The more people that understand how a city functions, develops its budget, manages its money, and makes choices, the more informed its voters become… the more they become able to offer constructive ideas and suggestions, and support for for those decisions and Council persons supporting them.
It’s not easy, but it is at least worth a try.
I am not even a San Jose resident, but I cannot help but make one point. There is no hotel in San Jose more beautiful than the Hayes Mansion and, what is truly embarrasssing, there is no 5 star restaurant or bar, within or without a hotel, that is even close to the quality of the beverage and food offered at the Hayes Mansion. The Hayes is in a bad and depressing location, but that is simply nature taking its course in San Jose over the centuries where only a few neighborhoods are habitable for a person of any refinement. It was simply “out there” when the edifice was put up. Even as the city may be losing money at the Hayes, it is certainly doing more than a few things right and what it is doing right is certainly finer if not more profitable than what the private sector is botching outright in the many dreadful local restaurant and saloon offerings.
http://www.sanjoseca.gov/clerk/Agenda/20090113/20090113_0306att.pdf
or
http://tinyurl.com/09council
Are these your high hopes Pierluigi?
#21
The document from Campos, Pyle and the 2 new councilpeople kills any chance of the city outsourcing. Business as usual at city hall even during a recession when private sector is losing jobs and taking pay cuts.
#20 Dave, I’m also an out of towner, not familiar with the Hayes Mansion.
Silicon Valley, including San Jose, has no urban “youth” hostel to accommodate budget travelers. Consequently most younger international travelers will meander along our Coast and never set foot in Silicon Valley (which is not shown on any road map). They will miss out on many tourist attractions that San Jose offers, as well as eating, drinking and shopping at local businesses.
Perhaps the Hayes Mansion or some other site would be a good location for such hostel. There are millions square feet of vacant buildings in the valley.
Do you know of any suitable sites in Santa Clara that are vacant, close to public transport, restaurants, shopping and entertainment?
I’ve been on this SJI site for a long time and, except for Kathleen, had no luck convincing anyone of the missed opportunities for increased tourism income to “provincial” San Jose City.
Downtown San Jose would be ideal site for SV Hostel, but any stop along Caltrain or the trolley would suffice.
pgp3