One of the surprising side effects of the efforts to save
Bonfante Gardens Theme Park is the impact it’s having on Eagle
Ridge.
One of the surprising side effects of the efforts to save Bonfante Gardens Theme Park is the impact it’s having on Eagle Ridge. Years ago, the gated residential community was approved for development with the understanding that the narrower-than-normal, private streets at Eagle Ridge would not be patrolled by Gilroy police officers. After all, the developers told the community “it’s going to be a place for retirees.” And the homes were going to cost $350,000 or so.
Well, much has changed, and now a number of residents who are tired of speeding drivers and stop-sign runners want to make Gilroy police patrols a reality.
Serendipitously perhaps, residents so inclined have been handed a bargaining chip with the proposed two-way land swap that could greatly ease Bonfante Gardens’ staggering debt load and provide a money-making opportunity for Eagle Ridge’s primarily developer, Shapell Homes. Some Eagle Ridge homeowners say that without the traffic patrols, they will fight the land-swap deal.
Now they seem to have Mayor Al Pinheiro on their side.
“I believe the citizens of Eagle Ridge have a right to a level of service that others throughout Gilroy have,” Pinheiro said.
What Pinheiro forgets to mention is that Eagle Ridge residents have a privilege that other Gilroy residents don’t – a guard to keep the “riff-raff” off their streets. They have private roads, not public streets, lining their development. And it needs to be emphasized that no other private roads in Gilroy receive traffic enforcement patrols.
Eagle Ridge homeowners bought their homes knowing – and perhaps because – the streets were behind a gate. The privilege of private roads means no city police traffic patrols.
Assistant Gilroy Police Chief Lanny Brown is correct when he reminds us that the proposed Eagle Ridge patrols won’t be free: “This is going to cost somebody something,” Brown said. “The builders (Shapell) knew about all of this at the front end. They saved incredible amounts of money by getting (the city) to let them build those streets below public standard.”
The “somebody” to which Brown refers ought to be Eagle Ridge residents, not Gilroy taxpayers in general.
Despite his unprecedented quasi-endorsement of publicly financed police traffic patrols for private roads, Pinheiro, who also sits on the board of directors for Bonfante Gardens, has countered that he’s certainly not putting the good of the theme park ahead of the good of Gilroy.
That may be the case, but Pinheiro should avoid the slightest hint of impropriety and step away from the Eagle Ridge debate and certainly not vote on issues that could be held up as vote-swaying “carrots” for homeowners to approve the land addition to Eagle Ridge.
If the residents of Eagle Ridge want police patrolling their posh private streets, they should pay full freight for it. They can certainly pursue contracts for traffic enforcement with the Gilroy Police Department or the Santa Clara County Sheriff’s Department. Or, as a condition of approval of the land-swap deal, they should propose that Shappell bear a substantial burden of those costs for the next 25 years. After all, Shappell saved a lot of money on hard costs associated with building the roads.
A cost split for traffic patrols between Shappell and homeowners would make ultimate sense.
