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.
Local business owner Jaime Rosso quipped on the library tour that the only thing missing is a Starbucks … and that’s not a bad idea, though mother-and-daughter team Konni and Kassi, co-owners at First Street Coffee, would be a better option.
Option for the Gilroy Farmer’s Market would be to hold the weekly summer event in the expansive paseo that is being finished outside the new library in the City Hall complex. It’s not far from downtown and the Demonstration Garden, plus the whole paseo will be a very inviting area for shoppers and vendors. It’s good Farmer’s Market food for thought brought to you by Gilroy Head Librarian Lani Yoshimura.
Food for Gilroy Foundation thought: “Project Roadmap is an alliance partner of the Morgan Hill Community Foundation … High school counselors are identifying students who have the motivation and ability to attend and succeed in college, but who are struggling due to factors like socio-economic status, being the first in their family to attend college, or language barriers,” wrote columnist Lisa Pampuch about the new effort in Morgan Hill. That’s a crying need in Gilroy and I wonder if we could replicate it here. High school principals Marco Sanchez and John Perales can let us know if they need publicity help.
Help is what the City Council should give our auto dealers with regards to the new proposals for a batten-down-the-hatches city sign ordinance. Don’t get me wrong, there are many junky signs in Gilroy that should be “red-tagged” and, if not removed, confiscated or have a fine issued for a violation, but the Council has to pick through this minefield topic and separate the wheat from the chaff. In-town, cheap-O furniture stores, for example, that have a purple inflatable octopus flying 60 feet in the air for 6 months should be warned and fined. A-frame signs should be regulated, not just stuck in the middle of the sidewalk on the curb and left there. It’s just a nitty-gritty issue, but one thing’s clear: there’s more and more sign clutter filling Gilroy space and that junk should be regulated.
Junk it – the high speed rail project that is. Assemblywoman Diane Harkey (R-Dana Point) has figured out a way, and authored a bill that makes sense. The press release says: “The bill makes use of a little known section of the California Constitution, Article XVI, which allows the Legislature to repeal uncontracted bond debt. AB 1455 would repeal the remaining $9 billion in available state debt funding for the project, but allow $950 million to be used for local and regional rail projects.” Makes so much sense that there’s a snowball’s chance in hell it will happen.
A flower sale benefitting the local Future Farmers of America organization will happen Saturday even though rain is highly likely. Buy Saturday, plant Sunday. The FFA farm is at 9110 Kern Ave., the sale is from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. and it’s a most worthy cause that supports local farming know-how that comes with plenty of life lessons.
Yes, the next weekend is the ever-popular Rotary-Goldsmith’s, er … Rotary-Syngenta flower sale in the Syngenta greenhouses on Hecker Pass from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. Set your alarm clocks a week ahead for the stampede …
With St. Mary’s School Principal Christa Hanson retiring, the school’s reunion/homecoming/open house on Friday, April 27 celebrating its 140th anniversary should be huge. Picnic on the lawn beginning at 5 p.m. BYOB or pre-order from Stubby’s Sports Bar and Grill. Student tours, raffles, no-host wine and beer … All that’s missing is Bob Filice’s spaghetti and I bet there will be a towering fare-thee-well cake for Christa. Unofficial school publicist Kelly “B. Good” Barbazette will see to that.
That buffalo chicken salad at the Claddagh Irish Pub in the Hecker Pass Plaza on First Street is killer good. So are the baby back ribs at BBQ 152 on Monterey Road just north of downtown. But the simple roasted chicken recipe that famous chef Thomas Kellor (French Laundry in Napa) dished up in the oddest spot – the Northern California Golf Association Magazine – tops them all. Try it, you’ll love it: Buy a whole chicken (Rocca’s Market in San Martin). Wash it and pat it bone dry inside and out with paper towels. Refrigerate overnight. Pre-heat the oven to 450. Salt the chicken very generously inside and out. Sprinkle pepper inside and out. Tuck the wings under and truss the legs. Roast for 50 to 60 minutes until chicken reaches 160 degrees. Remove. Add some fresh thyme to pan juices, baste chicken with pan juices and let rest for 10 minutes … Enjoy!
Reach Editor Mark Derry at ed****@ga****.com
