Politics

The Santa Clara County Planning Commission approved plans to build the Cordoba Center in San Martin – a mosque, cemetery and meeting place for the South Valley Islamic Community – at its meeting late Thursday afternoon, according to Hamdy Abbass, spokesman for SVIC who attended the meeting in San Jose.

Wearing white T-shirts with black lettering that reads: “Sanctuary for All,” dozens of immigrant advocates and their allies filled council chambers on Monday to witness city leaders proclaim their support of all residents, regardless of citizenship status.

During tonight’s regular City Council meeting, Mayor Don Gage asked that a "Quality of Life" bond measure discussion be put on the agenda for the Council’s next scheduled meeting on June 3.

John Garcia, who served as recreation supervisor for the City of

GILROY—A request to add 721 acres north of Gilroy to the city is under review by planners after the city council sidestepped most staff concerns and put it on the fast track to an expected summer vote.

The bizarre events of December 2015 will be long etched in Gilroy’s political history. Mayor Don Gage stunned the city by resigning without warning a year before his term ended, effectively handing the reins to his political ally, Perry Woodward. The handoff allowed Woodward to run as an incumbent—but not before the duo pushed through approval of a massive farmland annexation that would have, along with other planned developments, made Gilroy one of the Bay Area’s biggest cities—a sprawling urban mass of 120,000 residents, more than double the city’s population today.

Gilroy's population surpassed the 52,000 mark this year, though