Monthly Archives: August 2015

SOUTH COUNTY—The California Highway Patrol will be on the lookout for impaired drivers at a special checkpoint somewhere in southern Santa Clara County Saturday, according to a statement from the agency’s Hollister-Gilroy office.

Since the beginning of time, growth has been unstoppable and it will always be so.  Even in cities that are fully built out, plans are then made to build up. Such is the pressure to develop housing to meet the needs of the ever-growing population in communities across the world, including Gilroy.In a recent Santa Clara County Valley Water District report, it’s predicted that the population growth for the county will increase by about 550,400, or from 1,880,900 in 2010 to 2,431,300 by 2035. And some of these newcomers will probably be looking to locate in Gilroy.Our elected leaders address the need for controlled growth by planning for development 15 to 20 years from now.There is a small, vocal segment of our community that has an "I am aboard, so pull in the gang-way" mentality. They do not want Gilroy to add another resident EVER. They often raise the objection that Gilroy doesn’t have enough water for further development, unaware that residential consumption is much less than for agriculture.Zero development is not realistic. It is not healthy. A vibrant economy must continue to grow at a controlled and measured rate. If Gilroy is to grow, the north central area, the so-called 720 acres, is the sensible place for new neighborhoods.The worst examples of growth are those that are not properly planned, which is why the city has acted to ensure the North Gilroy Neighborhood District (NGND) is one such plan being considered.While controversy remains over this issue, readers should know that the NGND plan was vetted by many members of the community at town hall meetings and was endorsed by a nearly half of the General Plan Advisory Committee, community members tasked with recommending Gilroy's future land use vision. Nine of 22 members were absent for the final vote, which was 10-1-1 in favor of the controlled growth plan.The strategy of controlled growth includes the growing of business and job opportunities. All go hand in hand if a city is to prosper. To ensure prosperity, it takes leaders with a vision.The common denominators of dying cities are that they are stale and lack growth. Factoring in new, controlled growth is a primary strategy to ensure that downtowns and local businesses thrive. Otherwise, as the population ages and sons and daughters move away, stores are forced to close and nothing replaces them, causing the city to spiral to a slow death.The first sign of deterioration is the city’s quality of life, including maintenance of streets and parks, quality of safety (police and fire), repairing damaged sewers, city services we all demand and take for granted, retooling our aging infrastructure and buildings, all which takes hundreds of millions of dollars.  The VisionThe GPAC and the City Council understand that neighborhood districts, walkable, public transit-oriented communities, cannot happen by developing a few acres at a time. It takes large scale planning to get schools where they belong, roads and intersections in the right places, and to be sure the community flows. These projects also provide the funding to fix current problems, such as the Day Road/Santa Teresa mess we have now. It would also allow the city to build the long-awaited Buena Vista/101 interchange that is key to the city's master plan for traffic.Also, Gilroy desperately needs active senior housing. The plan is to build roughly 1,000 seniors-only, clustered housing units in the North Gilroy district. Seniors pay taxes, but place far less than average demands on public services like police and schools.Certainly controversy over the NGND/720-acre issue continues to spur debate. However, there are important reasons for continued growth and our citizens understand that growth is important to the future financial viability of the city. But growth needs to be carefully planned or we will have sprawl. The NGND plan is an exemplary example of the way future growth should be planned.Ronald L. Kirkish is a retired semiconductor engineer and 31-year Gilroy resident. He can be reached at (408) 309-9390 or hykirkish@Charter.net. He wrote this piece for the Dispatch.

Is Wild Iris Drive off Mantelli Drive a publically maintained street?  If so, how can they restrict people from walking there?

SOUTH COUNTY—Authorities are seeking witnesses to a late-night sexual assault that took place Wednesday off of U.S. 101 in southern Santa Clara County.

GILROY—It’s been a busy summer for the Cougar and Mustangs volleyball teams. They’ve logged countless practice hours to prep for the upcoming season, and on Sept. 1 they’ll show each other what they’ve learned.

Services will be held at Gilroy Methodist Church on September 18, 2015 at 3:00 P.M. to celebrate the life of such an amazing woman.

When I was a kid, I absolutely adored Davy Jones, the singer from the Monkees. I was so infatuated that I sulked through an entire vacation with my parents because everyone I knew was going to the Monkees concert in Boston that week while I was stuck on Cape Cod with my old (actually they were in their 30s) boring parents. I’d give my right arm for a vacation with my parents on Cape Cod about now, but that memory reminds me of the days when so many of us cherished our transistor radios as they played the latest songs by the Monkees, the Beatles, the Supremes, and so many others. Some of the staff here at Live Oak Adult Day Services couldn’t get through a day back then without a song by Elvis Presley or Bobby Sherman or Three Dog Night.

She’s a descendant of Captain William Bradford, an Englishman who came to America on the Mayflower and served as governor of the Plymouth Colony in the 1600s. And in the 1870s, one of her distant relatives dueled against Old West lawman Wyatt Earp.

GILROY—The parents of a 15-year-old girl killed in a car accident on Miller Avenue are planning to bring a wrongful death lawsuit against the city. The family believes that another fatal wreck in the same location three months prior should have moved the city to make safety improvements.

GILROY—Options to renovate or relocate the Interim Center from the Arts from its current home in downtown Gilroy would cost between $1.5 million and $24 million, according to discussions at Monday’s special council study session regarding the building’s future.