MORGAN HILL
– Not content to sit on the sidelines while an all-San Jose task
force makes plans that will significantly impact South County,
Mayor Dennis Kennedy brought together local leaders to ensure their
voices are heard.
MORGAN HILL – Not content to sit on the sidelines while an all-San Jose task force makes plans that will significantly impact South County, Mayor Dennis Kennedy brought together local leaders to ensure their voices are heard.
Representatives from the City of Gilroy, San Martin, Gavilan College and Morgan Hill School District formed a local task force Wednesday in an effort to get the ear of San Jose Mayor Ron Ganzales and his San Jose Coyote Valley Specific Plan Task Force.
San Jose is planning on developing the Coyote Valley, bringing with it 25,000 homes, 50,000 jobs and 80,000 new residents that will surely bring increased traffic, congestion, pollution and stretch the limits of the Morgan Hill Unified School District and Gavilan College.
Santa Clara County Supervisor Don Gage and former MHUSD trustee Russ Danielson, who are on the San Jose task force, attended the meeting.
An area of major concern surrounds the schools. Gavilan President Steve Kinsella said the Coyote Valley plan fully expects Gavilan to build – with its own resources – a full, technological-oriented campus in San Jose because Gavilan’s boundaries extend north to Bernal Road, as do those of MHUSD.
South Valley and San Benito County voters approved a $108 million bond issue in March to upgrade the main Gilroy campus and build permanent campuses in Morgan Hill and Hollister. Kinsella said that part of that money would need to be used for the northern campus.
Kinsella explained that money to start a Coyote Valley campus was included in the bond and that only about $40 million of the $108 million was designated for new campuses in Morgan Hill, Hollister and Coyote Valley. The remaining $68 million would renovate the Gilroy main campus.
“Of the $39.596 million, $12 million is designated for San Benito County, $18 million to expand the Gilroy campus and $8.4 million to split between Morgan Hill and Coyote Valley,” Kinsella said. “That will allow us to get started.”
The remainder of building funds would come from the state, from donations and grants and other, non-property tax sources. Buildout of a new campus would take between 15 and 20 years, he said.
Kinsella wanted to put South Valley taxpayers’ minds at ease.
“As Coyote Valley builds out,” he said, “the property tax revenue (from those new houses) will come into Gavilan’s operating budget.”
Superintendent Carolyn McKennan questioned the number and size of schools planned. At least eight new schools would need to be built by MHUSD to educate these new San Jose residents.
New houses would be assessed an as-yet- undetermined parcel tax for schools, but the bulk of the work dealing with new schools for this San Jose community would be performed by MHUSD and its trustees, most of whom are Morgan Hill residents. Transportation is also a concern in a district that has limited busing.
At least one of the three scenarios touted by San Jose Task Force members shows multi-story schools (up to 10 stories) with playgrounds on the top floor, a situation expected in New York City but not in rural South Valley, which trustee Shellé Thomas questioned.
“We’re still a rural district,” Thomas said. “They are looking at an urban fix.”
Though there is a move afoot to separate Coyote Valley from MHUSD, until that might be done, the 80,000 Coyote Valley residents will produce far more voters than Morgan Hill’s 35,000, potentially moving control of the district north.
In an effort to slow San Jose’s zeal to approve the project, Councilman Greg Sellers asked that a potential lawsuit be placed on a future agenda.
Brian Schmidt, with the Committee for Green Foothills, proposed that the planning be slowed down. The race to approval, he said, is because San Jose Mayor Ron Gonzales wants the plan finished before his term ends. Gonzales has refused several requests for a Morgan Hill resident to sit on the task force.
The City of San Jose did not send a representative to the South Valley task force meeting.
The formal comments from the South Valley task force will be compiled and delivered to the appropriate authorities in San Jose.
The next step for the Coyote Valley Task Force is to consider three alternative land use plans at a June 12 workshop and a June 14 meeting.
They will then draft the final plan for an Aug. 14 workshop and an Aug. 16 meeting.
The plan will go before the San Jose City Council on Sept. 21, with final approval expected in early December.
Details on the Coyote Valley Specific Plan: Sal Yakubu, sa***********@*******ca.gov; Susan Walsh, su*********@*******ca.gov; or call 277-4576.
