May 4, 2006

ELECTION ‘06

Chavez on the 'front end of change'

Mayoral candidate answers our many questions

Editor’s note:
The Times newspapers interviewed the five major mayoral candidates and these interviews will appear in the next few issues culminating in the Times endorsement of a candidate for mayor. The interviews appear in the order that they took place. Last week we featured Michael Mulcahy’s interview. Today we are featuring Cindy Chavez; May 18: Dave Cortese; May 25: Chuck Reed; June 1: Times endorsement.

By Daniel DeBolt
Staff Writer

Cindy Chavez is proud to be the only woman running for mayor. She acknowledges that it gives her a political advantage. But, she hopes this scenario won’t last. “Eight years down the road I hope there will be lots of women who seek the mayor’s office,” she said.

Chavez found mentors in other women when she was young and hopes to carry on the torch to a new generation. “I met a lot of women who were activists in the valley who mentored me and I’d like to do the same,” she said.

Originally Chavez wanted to be a lawyer. But while doing an internship in Terry Christensen’s class at San Jose State with Assemblyman Dan McCorkadale she found that politics was more to her liking. She drove McCorkadale around for two days while he ran for the state senate and was impressed with his ability to take time to hear the problems of seniors and the disabled without concern about gaining a vote. “He was known for wearing out his shoes while walking the precinct and he really cared about the people he represented,” said Chavez. “I was impressed.”

After she graduated with a political science degree she took a job with then-supervisor Ron Gonzales working as a budget and policy aide on health, human services and transportation issues at the Board of Supervisors. Four years later, Chavez joined the South Bay Labor Council as staff Director.

Elected to San Jose's City Council representing District 3 in 1998, four years later she ran unopposed for re-election and was named vice mayor during her second term.

She enjoys her work on the council because she likes being on the “front end of making changes in the community.”

Chavez met her husband Mike Potter while working on Diane Feinstein’s campaign for governor. “She didn’t win but I’ll always think of her fondly because we met on that campaign!” Potter is the district director for Assemblyman Joe Coto.

The couple lives in the Naglee Park neighborhood in downtown San Jose where they are raising their “very energetic” 5-year-old son Brennan.

To find out more about Cindy Chavez visit her Web site at www.chavez4mayor.com

Q and A

Cost of living/city budget

Many Silicon Valley workers are leaving the area because of the high cost of living. What can be done to make more affordable housing available in this area?

The city’s investment in affordable housing can lead to private investment in housing as well. In Spartan Keyes, a neighborhood just south of downtown, we worked closely with the neighborhood to build new homes and a new park. They had not had a new park there in literally a hundred years. Private projects sprung up, one called Brickyard Place where single women make up the majority of homebuyers. There are two others happening in that same neighborhood now as well.

Photos by Jeff Frazee

How can we attract more jobs to San Jose?

We need to make it easier for people to start and grow businesses here by removing some of the processes that are in their way. I am co-chairing a committee called Counter to Council. One of the projects we’re working on now makes sure someone who is adding to their building or their home gets one inspector through the whole process. We are also looking at adding an ombudsmen position for projects that are stuck because of conflict between with the city. We are also working on condo mapping large buildings so smaller businesses can use them. CEOs I’ve met with say housing and transportation are important. One problem is the airport, it looks worse than airports in some third-world countries I’ve been to…seriously, (she laughs) Uganda. We also need to improve the bus system and light rail and do it now.

There is a concern that the process for opening up a small business in San Jose is too arduous. Should this process be streamlined? If so, how?

Right now we have a small business ambassador program. It’s about mentoring and advocacy. We started without telling anyone and picked some businesses that were stuck. We found that having an advocate for them is important.

Sometimes it’s just an education process. Some people don’t know how to get permits to upgrade a building.

We have a lot of rules that people can’t remember why we have them. We have asked our staff to process map what we are asking people to do. If there are redundancies we are going to eliminate them. In downtown we’ve literally cut the process in half. I’m confident we can do it for small businesses.

What can be done about the loss of our community centers and their staff?

We have to decide what we are good at doing, what we should be good at doing and what we shouldn’t be doing any longer. With the community centers I think that we have a very unique opportunity to partner with nonprofits that might be more appropriately skilled to provide these services. In the Washington neighborhood there is a good example. The nonprofit there has the right second language skills and skills in dealing with gangs.

Transportation

Should BART be brought to San Jose? If so, what can be done to prevent it from taking funding from other projects in neighborhoods it won’t serve?

This is one of my passions. I think San Jose deserves BART, buses, Caltrain, light rail and a world-class airport. We are the 10th largest city in the country—we need every mode possible available to us. With BART we will have 310,000 passengers a day. I don’t believe there isn’t any neighborhood it won’t have a positive impact on. We are in a global economy. One of the challenges China and India have is moving people around. That problem isn’t an option for this county. We need to work diligently to make sure BART gets its fair share of local, federal and state money.

What can be done to mitigate the major traffic problems there could be with future developments and an expanding city population?

I think there will be a lot of money available. Certain projects have funding problems. The county expressways are one example. All development projects such as Coyote Valley, Evergreen, and North San Jose need to have funding for traffic concerns as part of those plans. We also need to make sure our transportation projects move up on federal funding project lists.

Development

Recent decisions about Coyote Valley development have lead to the project being criticized as another example of urban sprawl. What would constitute acceptable triggers before building homes in Coyote Valley. How many jobs should there be first?

The priority needs to be jobs first and than housing. What is critical about Coyote Valley is it can’t negatively impact the city.

What can be done to make sure Coyote Valley development isn’t detrimental to other neighborhoods in San Jose by draining city resources? Should developers be responsible for a percentage of infrastructure improvements?

Yes. And in fact I would say not a percentage but it would have to have a zero net impact on the rest of the city, period.

With plans for continued housing growth in the Evergreen area, how will you, as mayor, ensure that any negative impacts on traffic, schools and city services will be minimized for Evergreen residents? How will you balance the interests of the local residents versus the interests of developers?

I know there is a planning process going on right now that my colleagues are chairing. I’ve lead similar efforts downtown that were successful. One started out with criticism from the community but didn’t end that way because we did so much work with the community.

Crime/Police

Although San Jose has a low crime rate compared to other cities it still has a gang problem. What do you intend to do regarding gangs?

In 1997 when I bought my house on Sixth Street, a neighbor had a big party and some kids got in a fight in front of our house at 2 a.m. My husband said there was a shooting outside. Although I was scared I was also tired so when I felt something in our bed I didn’t think anything of it and just put it on our dresser. The next day I realized it was a bullet. I went from being frightened to being angry. I asked the police what we could do and they said, move because it was not a safe neighborhood. It was then that I decided to run for office. I didn’t feel as confident in any one of them as I did myself.

The thing I know now as an elected official in San Jose is that you cannot make the changes you want to make without significant relationships with the community and the police. We cleaned up Saint James Park. We said we weren’t going to criminalize homelessness but we said any drugs or prostitution and you will be arrested.

A boy was shot in Olinder Park when it was half weeds. It motivated us to rebuild that park. If you go out there now it is a different world.

The city paid $1.8 million for the police shooting of Bich Cau Thi Tran. Can expensive tragedies like these be prevented? If so, how?

There’s a big controversy over whether we should be using Tasers. It is an option that should continue to be used. I think the answer is continued training and more options for force. We need to continue training for officers in dealing with people that are mentally ill. They are training officers with videos of what it looks like when someone is mentally ill.

Sports

Citizens throughout the city complain they don’t have enough sports fields, especially in Almaden where citizens have spent years trying to build fields for their kids. How would you address this issue?

In the downtown by the time I’m out of office we will have doubled the amount of park space. Great cities are cities with great neighborhoods and great parks and community centers. We need to be a lot more creative about where we put playfields. I know there is a lot of controversy about putting playfields in protected open space. I’m more supportive of doing that. As part of planning the greenbelt I think we need to plan more sports fields. I did not take leadership in the McKean Road sports field saga. My hope is Nancy will elevate it to a citywide issue.

If elected mayor, will you continue the city’s pursuit of bringing Major League Baseball, namely the Oakland A’s, to San Jose? If so, how will you go about doing this, considering that the San Francisco Giants have territorial rights to San Jose? Should the city spend money to buy land for a park before the territorial rights issue is resolved?

The city of San Jose should have major multi league sports in it. Sports, even if you think the games are dumb, are good for cities because it gives people an opportunity to get together and get excited about the same thing. The arena is such a good example. I personally think the challenges related to baseball are significant. Do I think the city ought to make itself enormously prepared? Yes, we should. But we need to be very mindful that the community needs to buy into this.

If elected mayor, will one of your goals be to bring Major League Soccer back to San Jose? If so, will the city of San Jose be able to provide the new team with a new soccer-specific stadium, as previously asked for by the owners of the San Jose Earthquakes?

I think it would be premature to say what we were going to do to work with Lou Wolfe to bring soccer here. I just can’t say we are going to give him a stadium. That would make his position very hot, very strong. But I do think that we need to be ready for the opportunity for major league sports to come to San Jose.

City Hall

There seems to be an anti city hall feeling brewing during this election following events such as the Nor Cal garbage deal scandal and the late notice given before subsidizing the Grand Prix. What, specifically, must be done to get the community to trust city hall again?

I put together, with a couple of my colleagues on the council, a series of recommendations that are in the category of sunshine ordinances. The challenge is, its difficult sometimes to get info as a councilmember and its difficult for journalists and neighborhood leaders to get info. We met at my house I said you tell me you frustrations and I’ll tell you mine. Sunshine and information is important for people to engage in debate and I like debate.


The Mercury news requested information on the San Jose Grand Prix after the council voted for the $4 million subsidy. The information given to the Mercury news had pages with information blacked out. Was the city right in keeping information confidential?

I was not at the rules committee. Some of my colleagues requested an extension. I requested that it be brought to the council right away. I asked the city attorney if we were at a legal disadvantage by releasing this info and he said no.

I don’t think we should be making these decisions on a case by case basis, that’s silly.

The Sunshine law proposals currently don’t have any provisions for enforcement. Should a Sunshine law to be enforced through fines or censure or dismissal of those who violate it?

I think it’s far more important that we have a culture where people give info first. I don’t think more fines will fix that. I worry a little bit that we are creating a big stick and more rules that we trip over. Our first goal should be to protect the interests of the public, not to give political advantage of one over another.

Mayor Gonzales has proposed that city elections be publicly funded, a policy some other cities have adopted. Do you think this would be an appropriate policy for San Jose?

I am excited about researching it. I like the idea of citizens being able to run for office that might not be as well connected. Raising money is difficult. It was difficult for me and I had some political experience. I meet neighborhood leaders all the time who should be in public office. We need to make sure we don’t spend money on people who don’t have a base of support.

Other cities have done this by ordinance or by election. I think people need to buy into this.

Your campaign

What political party do you affiliate with?

I am a Democrat.

Who is endorsing your campaign and of those endorsements, which is the most important to you?

That’s like saying do I like my mom better or my dad. One I’m particularly proud of is I have seven of my council colleagues, all the council members not running for mayor. The others that are really important to me are Republican County Sheriff Laurie Smith and former Police Chief William Lansdowne—I’m really honored to have his endorsement.

In the past, have you proven you have the management skills necessary to lead a group and the skills necessary to convince other council members to vote with you to get things done in city hall?

Yes. I’ve given you so many examples. I’m afraid you’re going to turn off that recorder and say enough already! (laughs)

How would you go about selecting and working with a new city manager?

Here’s what I’m looking for: strong, thoughtful, professional, strong. We have a strong mayor, strong manager system and there aren’t many cities that operate like this. I knew that there would be no subtlety about Les White. He’s disagreed with me in public and I love it. In every project we bring forth he is very independent. That’s the word I left out— independent.

How does your campaign deal with lobbyist contributions?

I’ve taken lobbyist contributions.

Will you work to fix the city’s relationship with the county?

The city and the county have had a tough relationship for maybe 30 years. I see my role as a bridge builder. Supervisor Liz Kniss has endorsed me and Supervisor James Beall has endorsed me. I know Don Gage has endorsed someone else but he’s been a partner in moving things through the VTA board. I’ve called on my other partners for help and I will continue to do that.

San Jose is the largest city in the Bay Area, though most people still refer to the area as the San Francisco Bay Area. What specifically needs to be done to “put us on the map” so to speak? What big projects would you pursue? What is your vision for San Jose?

San Jose is a really very powerful and important city. The truth is we don’t have to be like San Francisco, we are pretty wonderful on our own. When Detroit got smaller and we got bigger and became the 10th largest city it was because San Jose has its own way—we are creative and collaborative. We were the first city in the country to provide children under 18 with health insurance. The citizens of San Jose hold more patents than any other city in the country. People come here to learn about strategies for dealing with gangs and graffiti. The strong neighborhoods program—there is nothing like that in the country.

I would love San Jose to be the city that has the most kids graduating from high school and more kids going to college than any other city.

And finally…why do you want to be mayor?

It’s really about determination and bringing a whole bunch of folks across the finish line. I am absolutely confident I can do that. I’ve done it as a council member in the face of challenges and still rebuilt schools, rebuilt parks. I think I can do that citywide. That’s why I want to be mayor.