March 25, 2004

OPINION

Almaden Valley Community Association

The Value of the Candidate Forum
By Bob Boydston, President, AVCA

About eight years ago, I attended a candidate forum for the office of county supervisor being put on by AVCA. I was a member of AVCA, but was not connected with the AVCA Board. I so appreciated the opportunity to see the candidates in person that I had the opinion that if AVCA did nothing else, it was fortunate to have such an organization.

AVCA will be putting on another candidate forum in September of this year for those candidates in the November election. There will be candidates from Congressional Districts 15 and 16, State Senate District 15, State Assembly District 21 as well as the runoff for the two remaining candidates for City Council District 10. All candidates will be invited.

For the March election this year, AVCA and VEP, our sister community association in the Blossom Valley, had the candidates for City Council District 10 sign an Ethics Agreement. That agreement is still in effect for the remaining two candidates, Rich De La Rosa and Nancy Pyle. The

other candidates will also be invited to sign such an agreement, with the exception of the Congressional Districts, where the Almaden Valley is only a small part of the total district.

In the judgement of AVCA, the recent March election for City Council District 10 was cleanly conducted. This is to the credit of the candidates, but AVCA also feels that the presence of the Ethics Agreement made a contribution.

It is planned that the forum for the candidates for the November election will be held sometime in September.

Besides the candidate forum, any issue that becomes of concern to the residents of the Almaden Valley also becomes an opportunity for AVCA to provide a forum to hear both sides. After consideration, it is the policy of AVCA to take a position and publish it.

One of the items that AVCA is watching is the city ordinance about selling food and alcohol at gas stations which will be debated at the City Council meeting on March 30. They had postponed it originally for 60 days and postponement may occur again.

The AVCA Web site is www.avca-sj.org. The average daily traffic volume is 66 visits.