Morning News Round-Up -- 5.11.10: Life without a leaf-blower hotline...

Ballots are out... candidates are running around like crazy... and the Merc is about to weigh in on all the races... A while back they endorsed Teresa Alvarado for Supervisor... and Jeff Rosen for District Attorney... and now they are getting into the San Jose City Council races. District 5 is first up and they give a big nod to Magdalena Carrasco to replace Nora Campos. Some choice quotes that District 5 voters will be seeing a lot of in the coming weeks...

"What she lacks in political connections, she makes up in intelligence, thoughtfulness and a deep understanding of the values and needs of the community. We recommend her in the June 8 primary."

"Despite having served on the Planning Commission, he shows little insight into city operations."

And perhaps the most damning...

"He [Xavier Campos] was chief operating officer of the Mexican-American Community Services Agency, which is under criminal investigation for skimming off workers' retirement contributions. He says he was aware of MACSA's cash-flow problems but not the diversion of funds."

Ouch...

New, high-tech luggage scanners at Mineta San Jose (International) Airport get a write up in today's Merc. They are apparently cutting-edge, very cool, and something that "should be done everywhere"... Now, if only airlines and people started flying out of the joint, they could actually start using the luggage scanners...

Apparently several judge seats are up in the County... Tracey Kaplan at the Merc had the (tedious) task of getting into the nitty gritty of each race.

The San Jose/Evergreen Community College District is closer to getting a new chancellor... there are three finalists -- one local (the President of Evergreen Valley College) and two not so local... Watch Dog will bet on one of the two not so local folks...

The not-so-newly-formed Santa Clara County Elections Commission will meet finally... after 2 years. This seems to be over the objections of the Registrar of Voters. He seems to hate oversight more than a large, local police department does...

Add a rail company to the list of folks opposing High-Speed Rail... Union Pacific.

This should piss people off... the Leaf Blower Complaint Hotline in Palo Alto will be shut down due to budget cuts. If you have a complaint about your neighbor's leaf blowing, please call 800-Get A Life...

A new tax may be coming to Mountain View this fall... this time, more taxes on your 650 phone line that you are so proud of...

Measure B (BART to Silicon Valley) drama coming to an end? The legal eagle update...

Election drama and nail biting appeared to be over when Measure B passed mid-November.

(Measure B was a tax measure to continue funding the BART extension to downtown San Jose.)

Not so fast, cried Measure B opponents last week as they filed a last minute lawsuit to delay certification and force a recount. As Watch Dog readers know, only yesterday a judge in San Jose sent them packing when it turned out the lawsuit was filed in the wrong county.

Fast-forward to today.

In a gloomy San Francisco morning in San Francisco Superior Court where arguments were heard by Judge Peter Busch for a temporary restraining order to prevent certification of election results.

Slight problem - the Registrar is good at PR and law. The Registrar this morning dropped the certified results in the mail this morning before going to court.

(No surprise) Judge Busch denied the restraining order as results had already been certified.

Is this the end of the drama? Only time will tell.

David Schonbrunn of TransDef.org, the chief opponents of Measure B, says "No one knows how the voters of Santa Clara County really voted on this." Well, the Judge, the Registrar, Carl Guardino, and more than 2/3 of the voters know how the County voted on this...the only people that don't seem to get it are the TransDef.org folks...

The Registrar graciuosly pointed out TransDef could request a recount -- at TransDef.org's cost -- for an estimated $400,000. Does T.J. Rogers have that kind of money to put behind a recount?

Stay tuned as the drama continues to unfold.

Morning News Round-Up –- 11.27.08: "Final" Semi-Official Results...

The election is over...really. The Santa Clara Registrar of Voters has posted the “Final – Semi-Official Results.” Only the Registrar could use the phrase "Final" and "Semi-Official" right next to each other...Automatic re-counts happened in 3 races West Valley/Mission Community College District, Gilroy Unified School District, and Berryessa Union. So what happened in these ‘recount’ seats?:

• …West Valley/Mission will see incumbent Chris Constantin and newcomer Adrienne Grey taking seats.
• …the Berryessa drama concluded with Richard Claspill and Khoa Nguyen taking seats, incumbent Rudy Nasol lost his.
• ...in Gilroy, Fred Tovar, Rhoda Bress, and Mark Good held on. Jaime Rosso lost his seat by a mere 6 votes…if only Rosso had walked/called 7 more voters...

And in everyone’s favorite ballot fight, Measure B…after what looked like a heartbreakingly close defeat on election night, the yes folks pulled it out after all the provisional ballots were counted with 66.78%. But this may drag on for a bit…

Santa Clara Unified School District Trustee Don Bordenave hung on to his seat by just 29 votes, while newcomer Albert Gonzalez came in nearly 6,000 votes ahead of Bordenave. What happened there? Incumbents don’t usually get smoked.

Did all the election silliness get your juices flowing? Well, it ain’t over yet. The election of George Shirakawa, Jr. to the Board of Supervisors has left a vacancy in San Jose’s East Side Union High School District, applications will be accepted through December 10. If Eddie Garcia didn’t burn bridges perhaps he can get back on, after all, Eddie is one of the Bay Areas Most Inspirational Latino Leaders.

The Mission City Lantern offers gift suggestions for everyone from Mayor Reed's bud Vic Ajlouny to Erlinda Estrada – all this was all posted a minute after wishing everyone a peaceful and joyous 2009...ironic.

Letterman would be proud... Scott Herhold wrote the Ten Reasons to be Thankful. Among them the end (for now) of the mania for Coyote Valley development and Little Saigon. Wait until March, however, when the Little Saigon issue will be all over the place in the recall election of San Jose Councilmember Madison Nguyen.

The Thanksgiving free-for-all dates back to 1991 when Los Gatos residents Matt Ober, Brock Baxter, Kevin Sweatt, Ted Sweatt, Joey Alvarado, Wes Coy, Craig Evansa, Mike Ortega, Jeff Frederick, Huy-Lin Nguyen, and Jeremy Harms headed out to play pad-free football at LGHS. It has since grown to be the National Turkey Bowl League, "Where Athletes Are Reborn Once A Year — Thanksgiving Day."

Saratoga Councilwoman Jill Hunter learned the Village Post Office would be leaving town for the first time at a hastily called community meeting.

Facing a $3.3 million shortfall Morgan Hill will be adding to its financial woes. After more than 3 years of negotiations, the City Council unanimously approved purchase of Associated Concrete’s property for $3.9 million.

The Gilroy Dispatch wants to know your thoughts on which local governmental agency is the worst run. Your choices are the Water District, VTA, Gilroy Unified School District, or the City of Gilroy. So far, Gilroy itself is running away with the vote. Perhaps Watch Dog should run the “Which local newspaper is the worst run”…