Tag: mark derry

Stealing from the Garlic Festival – first the tickets from the office, then $18,000 from the cash box. Hopefully, the security measures in place – and there are solid security procedures – finger the suspect and, despite that person’s volunteer status, the Gilroy Police Department makes an arrest and prosecution takes place. It’s really no different than a parent club officer stealing from the school club. It’s very sad, but an ugly crime has been committed and that money belongs to our community organizations. Good news, though, after a ticket-by-ticket audit, the Garlic Festival found only three stolen tickets made it through the gates. Great job getting the word out to the public after the ticket theft. Often the tendency is to keep quiet, and 99.9 percent of the time it’s the way wrong call. Three tickets worth $50 got through – that’s a phenomenally good number after $12,000 worth of tickets were stolen.

The two subjects, as sometimes happens in life, collided in my brain and made a connection. Years ago with Miss Jenny, we were fortunate to take a trip to see her “Granny.” Thelma Hudson hailed from Fairhope, Alabama. She wasn’t really her grandmother, but Thelma, who resided in Gilroy with her pastor husband for many years before retiring to the south, took care of Miss Jenny as her “Granny Nanny” when she was a youngin’ and Miss Jenny’s parents were both hard at work supporting the family.

I’ve been thinking about this column ever since my father died in 1998 and my sister, brothers and I went through the house and made “our picks” of the things we wanted to keep.

At a recent City Council retreat, ’twas suggested that the city fill in the swimming pool at South Valley Middle School and build bocce ball courts. And, as a stunningly brilliant ancillary measure, the city will seek a summer use contract with the Hilton Garden Inn and Motel 6 that would allow east side Gilroy residents to purchase a $125 family pass, giving them summer access to the hotel pools. Parking not included. Just kidding … I think, but sometimes you just shake you’re head and wonder about the inability to connect the dots.

If the bloom temporarily vacated your mental rose, reminder … the annual Rotary Flower Fest Sale is Saturday – (weather report 72 degrees purrrfect) at Syngenta Seeds on Hecker Pass. Put on your best elbow pads and mosey on out to pluck from the marvelous selection. Heard the Rotarians working the flower floor were all going to don David Cox wigs, now that would be a funny picture … Starts at 8 a.m., ends at 3. Buying beautiful flowers for the Rotary’s charitable giving programs is pretty darn sweet.

Wow! Toured the new Gilroy Library this week and it’s a knock-your-socks-off facility. Impressive on many levels. In scouting college campuses with the three daughters over time, the importance of a library as a college community indicator became clear. It’s a functional showpiece that has to integrate design aesthetics with purpose. There’s a feel that goes along with the functionality and the new Gilroy library’s got it. It’s airy, it’s pleasing, it has meeting rooms and rooms for tech classes and a children’s story room with a padded carpet and a pull-down projection screen. There are places to study or read with broad street views and an expansive area for teaching reading along with good space for the Friends of the Library to store and sell donated books. Mark your calendar for a grand opening celebration on Saturday, April 28 … this is truly a fine public use addition that will serve the community for many years to come. The grassroots committee that supported the bond effort to get it built, the Gilroy City Council, the city staff and Santa Clara County Librarians have really accomplished something.

Never heard this Gilroy-centric line, but when Doug the veteran Las Vegas cab driver who used to run a Vegas casino poker room “back in the day” heard we were from the Garlic Capital he immediately showed his hand. “You know what they called a hand with three 10s?” We didn’t have a clue what the old-time poker players called it. “They’d say, ‘I’ve got 30 miles of bad road between San Jose and Gilroy.’ ” Miss Jenny and I laughed out loud. The card quip referred to the 30-mile stretch of Monterey Highway. Before the new U.S. 101 it was known as “Blood Alley” – a nasty stretch of stoplights, accidents, backed-up traffic and fruit-peddling stands, the latter being its lone saving grace. It seems like so long ago, but the Sig Sanchez Freeway between Morgan Hill and San Jose opened less than 10 years ago in 2003.

Let’s start with a couple of Super Positives … First, the Gilroy High wrestling machine. We ought to have a Decade of Dominance banner downtown noting the 10 straight Central Coast Section Division team championships – and get the team a spot on a flatbed for the upcoming Memorial Day Parade. Think about what an absolutely awesome accomplishment that is. Imagine 10 football or 10 basketball or 10 CCS soccer or field hockey titles in a row. Even though the competition has become fiercer, Gilroy High has remained steadfast at the top, this despite every team gunning to take them down (pun intended). Loved reading Sports Editor Josh Weaver’s stories about the state championships online over the weekend as the drama unfolded in Bakersfield. Two GHS state champions emerged, Willie Fox and Nikko Villareal. Both are great stories – Nikko in his last-chance match beating a “shoe-in” favorite, three-time state champion Alex Cisneros from Selma, in the waning seconds of the final period and Willie, frustrated for two years at the CCS and state levels, erasing both demons  and dashing off with the state title in dominating fashion. More important than the winning is the spirit Coach Greg Varela and the supporters of GHS wrestling have developed in the young men. They displayed that collective graciousness and class at a recent school board meeting when they showed up to rally around the cause of creating a respectable wrestling practice facility at GHS. They were focused, yet humble and so appreciative. They deservedly won the hearts and minds of the trustees, performing in life as they do on the mat. At the state meet, GHS Principal Marco Sanchez, a former Olympic wrestler, was overcome with emotion. He knows what it takes – the practice time, the pain, the mental toughness to be one-on-one under the spotlight, the discipline to get it done. From the Gilroy Hawks to the state title, it just continues to be a story of triumph about a program that is the stuff of legends. Now there’s a screenplay idea ...

As the city of Gilroy happily reports glowing and growing sales tax numbers – “Seven straight quarters of sales tax increases” – and the unions call for new hiring, I wonder if anyone gets it. Or will we turn a blind eye to reality and take the easy way out as Mayor Al Pinheiro did in the last election? Personally, he said, binding arbitration for public safety employees was a horrible burden for the city, but he declined to take on the political fight to overturn it. That could have caused a real election rumble with the firefighters and police unions spending money to save the right for an out-of-town attorney to have the final say on pay and benefits for Gilroy’s public safety employees.

Hallelujah, our downtown coffee shop is going to stay open in the evenings. Congrats and welcome to the new owners of the shop formerly known as Fifth Street Coffee and then Sue's. The new owners, Philip Willis and his girlfriend Tiffany Smith, already have leapfrogged the naming pack with the cool selection of "Dragonfly on Fifth." The logo should be awesome – as awesome as Willis' quote from our story: "I don't know what the heck I'm doing. But this is something I've been thinking about for a year now. I wanted to be involved, and be a part of the community." A spring grand gala is planned with new floors, seating, paint, and - yes - hours befitting a real coffee shop that will stay open until 9 p.m. Could this be a key sign that a downtown breakthrough is ahead?