Wednesday, April 15, 2009

Morning News Round-Up -- 4.15.09: Post Marked (by midnight) Edition...

San Jose’s City Council learned their deficit is growing and the stock market meltdown requires San Jose officials to cough up an additional $50 million (or more) to recover the over $1 billion lost in the employee pension fund. The bad news led Councilmembers to quibble over details of the disaster. Councilmember Nancy Pyle urged not to plan the next 5 years based on bad news, Councilmember Sam Liccardo pointed out that even “great stock market returns…doesn’t get us out of the hole.”

Unless you live under a rock, you know San Jose Police are under the microscope for
their Drunk Latino arrests. Now it seems Santa Clara County arrests far more juveniles than almost anywhere else in California. The (not-so) lucky officials in San Jose arrest the highest percentage of the youth. Police Chief Rob Davis says, “We firmly believe other alternatives are more effective in helping these youth.” The hits just keep on coming for the Police Chief...

and, just in time…

San Jose’s City Council has (finally) found a new Independent Police Auditor. Senior City Auditor Chris Constantin steps into former Independent Police Auditor Barbara Attard's shoes (and her salary) with support from Silicon Valley De-Bug’s Raj Jayadev. The appointment was questioned by ACLU Director Skyler Porras.

The demise of traditional newspapers is all the rage, San Jose Revealed jumps into the act advocating for the survival of hyper-local news. Yeah, kinda like what Watch Dog Silicon Valley does but without the snark. EveryBlock San Jose has cool charts showing the number of police calls -- 25,000 in the past month.

If you put off filing those taxes, you’re not alone. San Jose’s H&R Block office was open until 11pm Monday and the post office is open to midnight. One (anonymous) taxpayer still coughing up money for back taxes from a failed business is pissed he’s not getting any reduction while AIG walks with $100 billion. Looking on the bright side, Claudia Hill with TaxMam in Cupertino said with the reduced incomes (layoffs) more people are getting refunds this year.

San Jose icon Hicklebee’s hits 30 with a big party Saturday and an award from Senator Joe Simitian for being the small business of the year. Being the small business of the year in this economy is no small feat...

Pissed off Mountain View NIMBYs have asked the anti-immigrant Judicial Watch to help shut down a Day Worker center. The D.C. based bigots are “helping” around the country to shut down “sanctuary” cities. They didn’t do their homework well, Mountain View is not a “sanctuary” city, but this might encourage them to become one.

This is big news, especially if you are Stanford or the City of Palo Alto. Stanford dropped its plans to expand its Mall with new shops and a hotel. Stanford says it is because that expansion has been a distraction from their hospital and other expansion plans on campus. (Perhaps the economy has something to do with it too...) Former Palo Alto City Councilmember Bern Beecham had a different take. He is blaming the much talked-about "Palo Alto Process" for the demise of the Mall plan and said, "To me, this is a real black eye for the city process..." Tell us how you really feel Bern.

Los Altos City Council is ready to launch “Shop Los Altos” to separate you from your dwindling dollars. Julie Rose with the Los Altos Chamber of Commerce said it sends the message that Los Altos loves its business community.

The cratering economy is hitting local non-profits hard. Santa Clara County’s Healthy Kid’s wants to take care of 12 uninsured Morgan Hill children, they asked Morgan Hill for the dollars to make it so. Councilmember Larry Carr wants to help and asked the Community Health Foundation to cover the costs, after all, he said, we gave you a half million…

While we're in Morgan Hill...

Morgan Hill is laying people off and giving others raises. This has some Councilmembers scratching their heads. Councilmember Marby Lee wants to talk about the incongruity of firing people and paying the remain folks more. City Manager Ed Tewes said the failing property tax revenues means another $1 million out of City coffers.

San Jose Insider/Santa Clara County Board of Ed Trustee Joseph DiSalvo sends us back a few days and showing the report card to the parents. DiSalvo makes his case for doing away with grades and focusing on learning.

Keep your iPod at home is the word from Mountain View Police. Petty thieves are increasingly breaking car windows to steal everything from your smelly gym bag to iPods – so keep your stuff in your home, if that hasn't been taken away yet...

How did we miss this? Tesla CEO Elon Musk was pissed local gossip blog was getting the dish from insiders and set a trap by sending everyone their own personalized memo. Small problem, General Counsel Craig Harding sent everyone his “fingerprint” edition. Some smart aleck figured out the Musk idea and promptly sent the Harding memo to Valley Wag. (Tesla Chronicles here...)

No comments: