If George Shirakawa Jr. receives community service instead of jail time as punishment for his felony mail fraud, he can thank a judge with whom he’s shared a political relationship for more than a decade.

The special election to succeed former San Jose Councilman Kansen Chu—and by extension his temporarily appointed fill-in Margie Matthews—takes greater shape next week, when candidates must file their first campaign disclosure forms for 2015. But what have they been doing in the meantime?

Healthy meals equal healthy minds, and as the caretakers of young minds we have a duty to ensure that the nutritional needs of all students are being met right alongside their educational requirements.

San Jose Inside editor Josh Koehn sat down with Mayor-elect Sam Liccardo last week to discuss the recent election, what accomplishments he'll cite when running for re-election in four years and how he plans to mend relationships with political adversaries.

San Jose Inside has learned that Kerry Hillis, a policy aide currently on leave from county Supervisor Cindy Chavez’ staff, purchased the anonymous attack blog The Daily Fetch from political consultant Jay Rosenthal in late 2012, according to a source. Hillis has also done work for San Jose's police union and mayoral candidate Dave Cortese.

Campaign disclosure forms covering the first half of 2014 came due Thursday, giving political nerds their first chance to break down exactly how much money was raised and spent in the first half of the year. The numbers also show who's well poised for the November runoff.

Sam Liccardo will not accept a voluntary expenditure limit for the San Jose mayoral runoff. The decision leaves little doubt that the 2014 mayor's race will end up being the most expensive in city history.

Magdalena Carrasco stunned everyone by mollywhopping Xavier Campos in last week’s election rematch, but the newest San Jose councilmember-elect didn’t do it alone. In fact, one could argue she barely did it herself.

Philip Bump’s ascension from suspected hatchet man to prodigious blogger and Tweeter has been an extraordinary rise over the last half-decade.

Kathleen King ran the county's $450 million sales tax campaign, and she also happens to be CEO of the organization most likely to get leftover money from Measure A. So, coincidence or kickback?

The staff churn in Speaker pro Tem Nora Campos’ office is the talk of Sacramento, raising questions about the assemblymember’s ability to advocate for constituents who’ve been shortchanged by ineffective leadership.

The county’s Democratic Central Committee will vote Thursday night on whether to advance its endorsement process by a month, and the result could have a dramatic impact on the San Jose mayor’s race.

The year 2013 will be remembered for its political turmoil, local and nationwide. A former county supervisor went to jail and the spotlight subsequently landed on his political buddy, a San Jose councilman. The Supreme Court ruled that same-sex couples have the right to get married, and the president lied to the nation about domestic spying. San Jose Inside runs down the list of stories that caught our attention this year.

More than a baker’s dozen have declared plans to run for mayor of San Jose next year, but no announcement was more startling than former councilman Forrest Williams’. Out of the spotlight since his failed 2010 county supervisor bid against Mike Wasserman, his announcement last month came out of left-left field considering his past supporters at the South Bay Labor Council are all-in for former vice mayor and present county supe Dave Cortese. Fly isn’t the only one scratching its head over Williams’ kind-of, sort-of run. He said SBLC officials have called to “ask what’s my plan,” which is code for “WTF, Forrest?” There are some theories that 2010 figures into his new effort. A look at disclosure forms shows that Williams and his wife, Dorothy, had to forgive $116,950 they loaned his supervisor campaign. Williams insisted that he forgave only about $50-60K, though, and isn’t running to help pay off old debts.

As previously noted in this space, it’s nearly impossible to get Xavier Campos to agree to an interview. It helps, however, if you have a close relationship with the media-dodging councilman like NBC’s Damian Trujillo, who scored a rare on-camera chat last week. What did we learn from Trujillo’s interview and a follow-up report? Hardly anything. But we did learn plenty about Trujillo and NBC Bay Area.

Almost 28,000 people are expected to run in the 9th Annual Silicon Valley Turkey Trot, the Thanksgiving morning race put on each year by the Silicon Valley Leadership Group Foundation. The runners, walkers and joggers might be surprised to note that money raised in previous years to pay health care premiums for low income kids was diverted to political campaigns.