With Labor Day on the doorstep, campaign season is just around
the corner.
With Labor Day on the doorstep, campaign season is just around the corner. And there’s good news: Plenty of the candidates have voting records to scrutinize. Some of those go way back – like Paul Kloecker’s – and some are more recent. Voters, for example, should remember the controversial so-called “Best of the Best” pay policy for city employees which called for Gilroy city employees to be paid 10 percent more than those in comparable cities. Seems even more asinine in the wake of the economic tsunami and all the unfortunate layoffs at City Hall, but voters should remember that then-councilman, and now candidate, Russ Valiquette voted for that policy. What were you thinking, Russ? the voters surely would like to know.
Know, too, that there will be plenty of other votes we’ll be scrutinizing in the next month or so. Come to think of it, the paper should put together a “How They Voted” list and publish it. Any reader who has a question about a prior vote – or even one that’s potentially upcoming – send me an email at ed****@****ic.com and we’ll incorporate it.
Incorporated a lot of miles into the plans last week as we trekked up to Corvallis, Oregon, where daughter Mariah will be a full-time student at Oregon State University in just a few weeks. Student-parent orientation took a couple of days. It’s a beautiful campus in a college town that straddles the Willamette River. Since the choice was made sight unseen, it’s a relief to find the campus and town as inviting as we all hoped.
Hoping to be a “Ball Dude” at a Giants game at AT&T Park in about 12 years. Not sure how you accomplish that – whether it’s a matter of saving pennies or selling old baseball cards – but it’s a good goal. Ground ball down the right field line foul, hop off the provided stool, remember the Little League lessons to keep the glove down and, hopefully, make the play before tossing the ball to a happy child in the seats to surrounding polite applause. If the Giants whip the Dodgers that game, ever the sweeter … Could this be the year the San Francisco Giants end the World Series championship drought? Stranger things have happened, like the Quake Game I attended in 1989 that seems like just a few short years ago.
Short time until the next Passport Weekend for our emerging South County wineries. It’s just a month away, from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Saturday and Sunday, Oct. 2 and 3. It’s really a beautiful time of the year at the wineries with the fall colors accentuating the serene atmosphere. Get a ticket, map out about four wineries you’re interested in and end up the day at a good location. That’s the game plan … unless of course you hire a limo and driver, then the game plan can be flexible with a capital F.
Not an F, but an A for Morgan Hill City Manager Ed Tewes and his team at City Hall. In response to all the “glittering” news reports coming out to the 38,000-population southern California city of Bell about outrageous public employee salaries being paid to administrators, Tewes decided to post all Morgan Hill city employee compensation numbers on the city’s website. The “we-have-nothing-to-hide” attitude is so incredibly refreshing. No hoops, no delays, no obfuscation/complication about the numbers, just pure, straightforward information for the public. Gilroy should engender the same trust and do likewise. It should take less than a week to accomplish. That would be refreshing.
Not so refreshing, are the pay numbers the two reporters for the Los Angeles Times uncovered. Bell’s top administrator Robert Rizzo was paid $787,637 a year, Police Chief Randy Adams’ salary was $457,000 and Assistant City Manager Angela Spaccia’s was $376,000. The three resigned amid the furor. But there’s more to the list. The director of administrative services, $422,707; director of general services, $421,402; the director of community services, $273,542; business development coordinator, $295,627; and a police captain earning $238,075. Unreal, but a very good example of why our society needs newspapers and reporters.
Reporting, too, that you can join the Arbor Day Foundation in September and get a bonus. Gilroy has, after all, earned a distinction as a Tree City, USA. One of the many Great Things About Gilroy is how many beautiful trees line our streets, parks, streams and hillsides. If you join the largest nonprofit organization in the United States dedicated to planting trees this month, you will receive 10 Free Arizona Cypress trees, a tree native to the Southwest that’s very adaptable to a variety of soils. It’s extremely drought tolerant and grows quickly. Local landscaper Greg Bozzo, no doubt, would suggest the tree as a screen, and now I’m wondering if the Leadership Gilroy Class (shouting out to Konni Thomas at First Street Coffee) could purchase a few memberships and plant an inexpensive living fence around the community garden downtown. A $10 membership online at www.arborday.org/september earns 10 trees.
For the men and women who were towering trees of strength in the 9/11 terrorist attack, there will be a Memorial Commemoration on Saturday, Sept. 11, at 8 a.m. at the flag pole in front of the police station at 7th and Hanna Streets. The public is welcome to pay respects.
