March 26, 2009

City Council approves mayor’s budget message

By Carol Rosen
Editor

City Council members voted unanimously to approve the budget message presented last week by Mayor Chuck Reed. City Manager Deb Figone will use that budget as a guide for preparing the city’s 2009-10 budget.

Prior to the council’s final June vote, meetings will be held in each council district to educate residents and allow them to provide suggestions and ideas for helping the city eliminate its deficit.

As reported last week, Reed’s message contained few unknowns in attempts to balance the expected $61 million shortfall for the next fiscal year calling on everyone involved, including residents, to help plug the budget gap. He asked citizens and employees to “suggest innovative ideas” designed to eliminate the shortfall with the most minor impacts on residents, employees, businesses and city services.

The budget message calls for the city to continue adding police officers; preserve funding for school crossing guards; and invest in economic development opportunities, especially in emerging industries such as clean technology to create new jobs and build the city’s revenue. Many projects that he suggested could receive ARRA stimulus funding from the federal government.

Reed’s budget message outlined recommendations to push forward San Jose’s economic goals. These include supporting baseball and soccer stadiums, utilizing Work2Future as well as directing the city manager to identify opportunities linking the workforce development program, continuing and building on gang prevention programs and the city’s Green Vision goals. He also suggested city officials use a coordinated marketing effort to “identify opportunities to improve collaboration and use resources more effectively.

Cesar Chavez
The council unanimously voted to approve a memorial walkway for Cesar Chavez that will link city landmarks to Chavez’ memory. There will be commemorative signs at seven places within a five-mile route between downtown’s Plaza de Cesar Chavez and the Mexican Heritage Plaza.

Calling Chavez a ”hometown hero,” Reed said he came to admire the founder and leader of the Farmworkers’ Union as a boy working on his family’s farm. Signs along the route will be simple, based on Chavez’ character, and will contain his image.

The city has not yet determined how to pay for the memorials, but according to Reed, will be determined later.

Other agenda items included a unanimous vote to approve addition funds of $4.5 million for proposed cost overruns on the South San Jose Police Substation.

The council pushed out a vote on raising the legal ceiling on property taxes collected by the Redevelopment Agency until April 7 based on a request from county officials who said that doubling the cap could deprive their budget shortfall of necessary revenues.

Bag ban busted
In a turnaround, Santa Clara County Supervisors voted for an educational campaign to deter grocery shoppers from using plastic bags instead of voting for a ban or fee on their use.

The campaign, “Bring a cloth bag,” will be directed toward stores in unincorporated areas of the county. Given current economic conditions, the supervisors didn’t feel right imposing a 25-cent fee on plastic bags. The supervisors will continue to oversee bag behavior in shoppers within the unincorporated areas.

If after a year, the educational campaign does not dissuade shoppers from the landfill clogging bags, supervisors will revisit issuing a fee or ban.

In other county news, Supervisors Ken Yeager and Dave Cor-tese suggested the county staff develop an aggressive Eco Pass program for county employees. It will enable full-time employees to buy annual Eco Pass stickers at a single low cost providing free access to the Valley Transportation Author-ity’s bus and light rail systems.

The board also agreed to a request from Cortese and Yeager to direct county staff to study incorporation of LEED certification in future real estate transactions in which the county is leasing or is renting out to emphasize energy efficiency and to reduce operating and maintenance costs.