Morning News Round-Up -- 5.4.10: Buy your Corona today...

The County of Santa Clara has a big, gigantic $200,000,000+ deficit that they need to bridge. How? Like everyone else does: use reserves, cut jobs, "streamline services," and banning toys at fast food joints... But leave it up to a realist (non-politician) to shed some light on things. Patricia Gardner of the Silicon Valley Council of Nonprofits adds, "...it is great that [County Executive] Smith is preserving so much of our servcies at a time when our community is having so much hardship...[but] we need to be mindful that this budget does not take into account any of the state cuts..." May revise next week... hold on to your hats...

The folks in South County are not too pleased (apparently) with the new redistricting lines drawn by the Santa Clara Valley Water District Board... that's because one of the two seats puts Gilroy with Palo Alto... can't we all just get along? Or at least get it right?

Joe Rodriguez in the Merc tries to get back into the political realm and breaks down the similarities between the San Jose City Council re-election races of Pete Constant in District 1 and Sam Liccardo in District 3. Two popular incumbents, also-rans running against them, etc., etc.

A San Jose Police Officer that is due to be laid off saved the life of a cyclist this week. Chief Davis jumped at the chance to praise the officer after getting bashed by Protect San Jose last week...

This is weird, and seems a little out of line. Councilmember Pierluigi Oliverio writes an open letter to San Jose Police Chief Rob Davis on San Jose Inside pushing for the promotion of Captain Gary Kirby... Watch Dog has to wonder whose water PO is carrying with this....

Another tough day for the South Bay Labor Council in the Mercury News. This time from the Editorial page regarding the San Jose (barely) International Airport and recommendations from the Airport head honcho that should be re-looked at to cut costs at the airport to make it even a little bit competitive with SFO and OAK. They include: "...contracting out services and paying living wages..." That will be a fun Rules Committee meeting on Wednesday...

While we are on it... we bring you this from the Chronicle: "San Francisco and its largest union have reached a long-delayed tentative agreement on a giveback plan, helping the city trim its projected $483 million budget deficit."

While we are on SFGate.com...

The Chronicle gets in on the action, obviously. The newspaper is so worried that they will lose the 49ers and that their beloved Giants will somehow get hurt if a team moves 30 miles further away, that they are now writing Editorials criticizing the A's for cracking down on their banner policy in the stadium. (We'd LOVE to see someone try to put up a banner anywhere in SBC, errr AT&T Park...) Actually, the Editorial isn't that bad and tells the Oakland City Attorney to back the f... up.

You have got to love California. In November, we will have a ballot measure, funded by oil companies, that looks to make AB 32 (the big anti-global warming bill) obsolete and a ballot measure to make recreational pot legal. Ironically, you will need to smoke pot to make all the November election commercials bearable...

This will make some people really happy... and some people not so much... metering lights in San Jose on 280. Thank you Mr. Roadshow for the heads up.

Morning News Round-Up -- 3.2.10: Another "reliable" poll?

Yesterday's (unreliable, 7-point margin of error) poll about the 49ers in Santa Clara that was leaked to the Chronicle's Matier & Ross (and made fun of by Watch Dog), is in the news again: This time, showing support for the A's to San Jose move. If one part of the poll is unreliable, then can we trust the other parts of the poll? Oregon-based Rick Lindholm did the poll of 200 folks in each city about each stadium issue, and is now on the defensive. He claims that the poll wasn't paid for by anyone, rather that it is his own poll that he uses in an ongoing way to help with other clients. Here is Lindholm's reasoning for doing the poll in today's story: "Lindholm said he was not hired by anyone to conduct either survey. He said he does polling on a variety of issues in the Bay Area, using the results to help him build a database for his other polling work for private clients." But last June, when he did another "unpaid" poll talking about baseball in San Jose, said this: "Lindholm told the Mercury News on Tuesday that he had conducted the polls for free and that no one had hired him to do them." This guy is either loves doing polls for free or loves to see his name in the paper... or both. It is becoming more and more clear that this guy is working for one or more San Francisco interests that would like to kill one or both stadium measures in Santa Clara County.

The County is considering giving defendants some rights when they are charged with misdemeanors by having a defense attorney from the public defenders office show up. How progressive... for 1930. The cost is a million buck for the next two years.

Note to Michelle McGurk: Make sure you don't include this in today's City Hall clippings. We don't want anyone to freak out about this headline: Tesla kicks tires on new Palo Alto headquarters. While Tesla kick the tires, Paul Krutko kicks himself...

The power outage on Sunday in Palo Alto is causing a (seemingly) growing headache for the Utilities Department in Palo Alto. The Department wasn't giving residents and businesses any information about the outage, when the lights would come back on, or what the cause was. The Utilities Department's official response: "We're very sorry for the inconvience... We failed... I'm sorry..."

The Mayor of Palo Alto, Pat Burt, gave his State of the City yesterday and talked about improving infrastructure, installing red-light cameras, how he wants to improve relations with Stanford (yeah, right), and of course High-Speed Rail. He didn't mention that he wanted to improve the communications efforts of the Palo Alto Utilities Department...

Steve Poizner is getting ready to launch a statewide ad campaign... hopefully in the ad he will describe his thinking of why it took so long to start his statewide ad campaign... "I waited so long to start this ad campaign because I love coming from 20 points down and I've been busy bidding on stuff on eBay. I'm Steve Poizner, and I approved this message."

Poizner's announcement about this ad campaign couldn't come on a shittier day, and not because of the weather. But Jerry Brown is slated to announce that he is officially "official" in the race too...

Morgan Hill has strong, limited development rules in place and has for a long, long time. They seem to be working, according to a recent study.

Finally, we take a look at San Jose Inside where Councilmember Pierluigi Oliverio gets all academic on our asses. He goes into parking theories and how free parking is a bad idea. Watch Dog actually agrees... so Councilmember Oliverio, how about proposing that the Mayor and Council have to pay for parking everyday in the City Hall garage. Symbolic, yes. But powerful. Email us if you are interested in proposing that idea here. (We won't tell anyone we gave you the idea...)

Morning News Round-Up -- 2.5.10: No hospitals, no eminent domain, no affordable housing...

You may remember Greg Zlotnick, he was on the Santa Clara Valley Water District Board but was then gifted/given a high-paying job with the District in 2007 by then CEO-Stan Williams without the Board's approval. Well, Zlotnick has been fired... job-eliminated, actually, by the new CEO.

The County's Public Safety and Justice Committee voted not to arm Juvenile Probation Officers this week. Bringing up the obvious question, the County has a Safety and Justice Committee? Even the Merc had to throw in a little jab at the Committee: "...At a high-intensity gathering of the normally sparsely attended public safety and justice committee..."

Most people clamour to have a hospital in their town -- think about downtown San Jose... but Campbell is saying no to a certain type of "boutique hospital" that would only serve rich people. The vote was 4 to 1 against changing zoning rules that would have allowed the hospital to move forward.

A long time ago, there was a big deal about the Saratoga Cemetary Board and their plans for some eminent domain findings. That really raised the profile of the group just above "anonymous" to "almost anonymous" in the public's eye. But they are back in the news again arguing about what the minutes of their meetings say, who drafts them, and if they are biased in any way. There are some nasty accusations made relative to this story, which makes it all the more interesting. Enjoy.

Cupertino voted against a plan to build 18-20 new affordable housing units in their City. The plan was actually brought forward by the Rotary Club of Cupertino. We guess the Rotary Club of Cupertino doesn't have the same pull as the Rotary Club of Cupertino...

The Sunnyvale City Council figured out its priorities for the coming year... and marijuana is on the list. Thank goodness, we could use some. It is Friday after all... wait dude, they are actually going to crack down on it. Damn...

Morning News Round-Up -- 1.27.10: Joe Friday Wednesday...

We never came back for a post yesterday, apologies to everyone... we'll include some stories from yesterday, just in case you missed them...

The story about the toddler who lost his life because of a tree that crashed into the parked truck in San Jose took an interesting turn into yesterday's paper. Of course this is a huge tragedy, but yesterday's story shed light onto the City of San Jose's budget cuts over the past few years that has meant trees in front of houses (but in the public right-of-way) are now homeowners' responsibility... expect neighbors to show up at the next round of budget discussions talking about trees. Trees, police officers (and pensions), firefighers (and pensions), public employees (and pensions), library hours, parks, community centers -- the budget discussions will not be particularly fun this year.

And...

There is already a response from the City about trees in today's paper in the form of an "aggressive public awareness campaign"...

And...

The Merc Editorial Board chimes in and says San Jose's tree law make sense... which is perhaps the last popular position of the day.

Sheriff Laurie Smith is in a much better re-election position than the other County law enforcement officer (DA Dolores Carr) this year, but that doesn't mean she is getting a free re-election pass... there are three folks lining up to challenge Smith. The Merc singles out one candidate, retired SJPD Captain Richard Calderon, as a candidate that "...has issues of his own..." (Rich Robinson, clip that sentence from the story for your "op research" file...)

And if it is Wednesday (or any day, for that matter), Dolores Carr will be in the paper. Today she is there defending her boycott of a local judge. Using a double negative (sort of) she wrote to the Merc via email and said that boycotting a judge is "not unheard of"... Maybe, there are some legal experts in the story that have a different opinion. Until tomorrow's story about Dolores Carr...

San Jose's Club Wet is back open... but the Police Chief's ability to close down clubs in the future is about to be curbed by the City Council. Stemming from a lawsuit Club Wet brought against the City last year, the City (and club owners) have reworked the ordinance, started talking to each other, and apparently the clubs aren't the brawl-magnets they once were... for now. Anyway, club owners and the City (but perhaps not the Police Chief) seem happier than they were late last fall. That doesn't mean Watch Dog will be rolling into Club Wet anytime soon, but maybe...

Mayor Reed and Councilmembers Sam Liccardo and Rose Herrera proposed a job-spurring package this week to be heard in a few weeks that would encourage businesses to stay and grow or relocate to San Jose. Watch Dog doesn't know if it will help, but it probably can't hurt... Liccardo wrote about it this week on San Jose Inside.

Santa Clara County is the new Belmont? If a measure gets traction to ban smoking in apartment buildings, the County will join Belmont... it is one of the ideas Board of Supervisors President Ken Yeager is proposing. He also gave his State of the County yesterday and it was nice to see all of you there... it was perhaps the most political crowd ever at a State of the County with all the candidates and glad-handing. Is the County Building sexy again?

The 49er's vote in June in Santa Clara is even closer than it was. The Santa Clara Council voted on a procedural measure to move it forward. But the quote in this Merc story is a gem, from Councilmember Jamie Matthews: "Ultimately, the people will decide, and they are smarter than all of us..." ...Especially smarter than the Santa Clara City Council... just kidding. Perhaps the "no on stadium" folks can use that quote against Matthews in a Gavin-esque manner...

Protect San Jose gives us the (Just the) "Facts About Cannabis Use"... which was not written by Sgt. Joe Friday (or Chief Davis), but it might as well have been... Damn hippies!

Monday's gun-point gas station robbery in north Gilroy was caught on tape... Don't expect this video to appear on one of those late-night "America's Scariest Videos" anytime soon. The whole thing went down in a pretty orderly and mellow way actually. They were probably stealing money for pot...

Morning News Round-Up -- 10.8.09: A Governor from San Jose?

District Attorney Dolores Carr received (mostly) good news when Judge Andrea Brown said defense attorneys in the child molestation videotape scandal couldn’t prove conspiracy. Defense attorney Al Lopez is keeping his fingers crossed the Judge will overturn his client’s conviction. Perhaps next week there will be a day without Dolores Carr in the news... there is still that pesky ethics issue and the "make the Grand Jury public" issue from yesterday...

Turns out gubernatorial wannabe Meg Whitman was registered to vote earlier than the Sacramento Bee (and others reported). After hours snooping through old paper records and microfiche Registrar of Voters offices in Ohio, San Mateo, and Santa Clara County dug up dusty registration records. More interesting now is, during the tough economic climate when County officials are slashing budgets, who pays for the tedious snooping to help the gubernatorial candidate? The Merc’s Scott Herhold weighs in on the drama musing – is this really the most important question in the Governors race? Probably not, but it is fun...

Speaking of the Governor's race... there is a new poll out. Jerry Brown and Meg Whitman score big -- no surprises there. But the big surprise is that Tom Campbell seems tied at the top with Whitman on the Republican side with Steve Poizner falling bad. Perhaps the next Governor will be from San Jose?

Santa Clara County has been ordered to pay $500,000 to a watchdog group for “stiffing the public on records requests.” Acting County Counsel Miguel Marquez expressed doubt that the half-million dollar settlement would hurt during these tough times “I don’t think $500,000 in and of itself is going to impact programs.” Really?

Mountain View’s City Council tinkers “around the edges” on finding places for new housing according to consultant Simon Alejandrino. Tops on the list, ditch those old “soft story” apartment buildings to find another 2,000 homes. Councilmember Ronit Bryant hopes for more mixed use while colleague Laura Macias is looking for affordability.

The Merc’s Editorial Board weighs in on local elections:

According to the Ed Board -- Sunnyvale residents should say yes to Mayor Tony Spitaleri, Councilmember Chris Moylan, and newcomer Jim Griffith.

and...

The Merc recommends a yes vote on parcel taxes for Fremont Union High School’s Measure G and Santa Clara Unified’s Measure C.

Looking at next year’s elections – Los Gatos Union School District ponders a bond measure to raise (around) $24 million for a new Lexington School along with other school projects.

The Mountain View–Whisman School District is heading for big changes. Trustee Ellen Wheeler says sticking to home schools might not be best for students “we know that low-income Hispanic and low-income African-American students” do better when they go to a “different school.”

Morgan Hill Police haven’t found the shooter for last week's gang related killing of Juan Arellano and Morgan Hill is rocking from the violence. Police are holding a community meeting to talk turkey on gang violence.

Not wanting to be left out of the gang action... Gilroy Police are dealing with (suspected) gang violence that landed a hearing and speech impaired man in the hospital.

Pissed off Gilroy developers asked the City Council to talk dancing. They are complaining that a police officer is a real party pooper and won’t let club customers dance the night away. Developer Gary Walton called dancing one of the “oldest forms of human expression.” The straw breaking this camel’s back was the (non) dance at Gilroy’s Gaslight Theatre where police busted vandals and broke up fights. Sounds like Club Wet...

San Jose Insider Jessica Fromm chats with candidates in next years County Supervisor race to succeed Don Gage pointing to Rosemary Kamei and Teresa Alvarado as the candidates to watch. Perhaps these candidates should start talking gang intervention in Gilroy and Morgan Hill...

Protect San Jose’s numbers geek, Ed Rast, launches a multi-part series hoping to get you to give San Jose’s City Hall an earful about budget priorities.

Morning News Round-Up -- 9.30.09: Take that, Arnold... love Harry

“Take that, Arnold,” is what Watch Dog assumes San Jose Redevelopment Director Harry Mavrogenes was saying when a Sacramento Superior Court Judge ruled the hand in the cookie jar had to go. At least for last year’s cookie raid. San Jose Mayor Chuck Reed didn’t sound hopeful San Jose’s stolen cookies would return “once the state has the money…”

Santa Clara County launched a reverse 911 to let you know about life-threatening emergencies. Kirsten Hofmann with the Office of Emergency Services wants your cell because, like you know, “… land lines are so yesterday.”

We’re not making fun, really. Palo Alto’s new Police Chief Dennis Burns wants to turn his officers into a team of learners. Hopefully they will learn from Burns, not former Police Chief Johnson.

Dig deep, the Sea Scout’s need your extra coin to complete renovations to the Palo Alto Baylands EcoCenter. For more information or to donate to the project, call Environmental Volunteers at 650-961-0545.

Republican Gubernatorial wanna be Meg Whitman finally ‘fessed up as to why she waited until she was 46 (2002) to register to vote after telling Republican conventioneers she’d been registered since 1998. And, why she only voted occasionally after 2002. It was hard.

The Merc’s Patty Fisher asks questions which haunt friends of battered victims. Kathleen Kreneck with Next Door hopes you respond, they’re trying to keep the doors open after the Governor took all funding away from domestic violence programs.

Palo Alto State Senator Joe Simitian is heading to D.C. – no, he hasn’t landed that coveted appointment or a seat in Congress (yet). Simitian is meeting with the feds to talk dollars for education.

What mid-week news round-up would be complete without a few tragedies…

• (former) Boy Scout leader David Adler is now a convicted sex offender after kiddie porn was found on his computer when he returned from the Philippines and London.
• (former) Silicon Valley engineer Cecil Cox is heading to prison for running killing 2 women as they crossed Stevens Creek Boulevard. The eagle eyes of a librarian led to Cox’ arrest.
• 3 teenagers were stabbed following a “likely gang related” melee at Mountain Views Community Center where a birthday party was taking place.

Protect San Jose’s number's geek opens with a dispute of former California Employment Development Director Michael Bernicks opinion that economic recovery follows recession and concludes with San Jose must include the public in budget discussions.

Life is tough when you’re a kid. San Jose Insider/ Santa Clara County Board of Education Trustee Joseph DiSalvo points out it’s even harder for kids in the LGBT community. DiSalvo argues for support and protection of LGBT youth and wonders how far we’ve come after attending the annual BAYMEC fundraiser.

Morning News Round-Up -- 6.9.09: Video Gate, Day 7

Video Gate is not over yet. Councilmembers Sam Liccardo and Ash Kalra sent a letter to Police Officers Association chief Bobby Lopez yesterday about the video and the Merc Editorial Board chimed in as well. The Editorial Board didn't pull many punches. If you don't want to read the actual Editorial, here are a few choice words they used to describe the video (and the POA): "juvenile" "thin-skinned" ""inflammatory" "intimidating"... The POA certainly got its money's worth from the PR firm that put the video out. Oh yeah, Boby Lopez promises to take down the video from YouTube and from ProtectSanJose.com... but it isn't gone yet (as of 8:15 a.m.).

All this talk about Raj Jayadev got us thinking, what does this guy write about on Silicon Valley De-Bug? Here's his latest: The Death of Vietnamese Man Calls Out to a Vietnamese Woman, and the City Policies that May Have Failed Them Both. Consider Jayadev's criticism of the San Jose Police with this organization's logo... or this organization's tag-line, "Promoting technology to protect the innocent from Police brutality." In other big cities, Watch Dog thinks Jayadev would be considered a pretty mellow critic.

On the flip side of things, Kathleen commented on Watch Dog yesterday, and yes, we have the courage to post comments... Here is the information about her Vigil tonight at City Hall.

Moving right along... The San Jose City Council is thinking about taking a pay cut. But Councilmember Chu is still standing in the way... We guess Watch Dog's notes and Herhold's column haven't made their way to Councilmember Chu's desk yet...

Councilmember Pierluigi Oliverio's budget survey is done. It is so scientific it hurts. The responses are here... but all you really need to do is figure out what Oliverio would cut or keep -- because (amazingly) they match up with the results. In Watch Dog's survey, we found that 90 percent of the people love Watch Dog "a lot." And 4 out of 5 dentists surveyed recommended sugarless gum for their patients who chew gum.

The 49ers apparently aren't going to sign the convicted dog-fighting-ring-leader Michael Vick to their squad. In an related note, the political people trying to get a ballot measure passed in Santa Clara next March exhaled loudly.

On the fourth day of Christmas... four Red Ruffed lemurs... and some falcons at City Hall...

The County is not going to take the State's cuts lying down... well, mostly they are going to take the State's cuts lying down. But they might try to do something about the (proposed) closing of Henry Coe State Park.

The Merc's Scott Herhold reviews the De Anza rape case (again) following a 20/20 story this week. Take a look and decide for yourself what you think about the column, but one line stands out: "...this case will always haunt Carr politically..." (Not M.L. or Larry but Dolores.)

It's been a good week for Silicon Valley businesses: yesterday Cisco joined other blue chip companies on the Dow Jones index and later in the day Apple previewed a new iPhone (and announced that the old one will only be $99)... Watch Dog is saving iPennies for the old iPhone.

If you live in Mountain View, your rates on most utilities are going up. Water, sewer, garbage, recycling, etc., etc., etc. Oh, and just to be nice, they are giving you a few weeks to prepare -- the hikes go into affect July 1. Water and sewer is going up 5% and garbage/recycling is going up 7%. Thank you Mountain View...

City Unions in Palo Alto are fighting back, and packing the City Council Chambers. Last night was public Round 1, Watch Dog expects this to be a long fight...

That fight in Palo Alto shouldn't be confused with this one. Two teenagers wielding pipes fought police. Police eventually won.

Mission City Lantern throws props Watch Dog's way, sort of...

We would include updates from San Jose Revealed, but they must be sleeping in late or taking a long weekend or both...

Morning News Round-Up – 6.2.09: It's a do-over...

Leading the way, our Sister blog Watch Dog San Mateo posts Silicon Valley news…

• Businesses face new taxes in November, odd time to do this... A big oops from Palo Alto officials over an ill-advised probe into Children’s Theatre
• San Jose’s Cayetano Figueroa-Fernandez used his break time to sell meth in the company parking lot
• Not related to Silicon Valley but Watch Dog couldn’t resist, senior prank day at Menlo-Atherton scores big…

Santa Clara city leaders, and the Niners, face a motley crew of anti-stadium voices. City manager Ron Garratt looks forward to lively discussion an election will bring saying “it makes for a better project when folks are involved.” Stanford economist Roger Noll says Santa Clara will end up with a “better deal than just about any other city…”

Palo Alto Unified School District Trustees aren’t waiting for the other enormous/painful shoe to drop from the State. Tonight Trustees propose a budget that keeps existing pay raises. Trustees expect September will have them sorting out the State’s disaster.

A Santa Clara County Grand Jury report slams the Valley Transportation Authority (VTA). Words matter and these words paint a picture of the VTA as a petulant teenager… Unresponsive, unaccountable, disobedient and dishonest. VTA spokesperson Jennie Loft shoots back that the report is filled with erroneous information and sounds more like the “anti-BART rhetoric… rejected by voters in November,” than a Grand Jury report.

The Morgan Hill Times Editorial Board takes a shot at Caltrain’s budget cutting proposal to eliminate service to the Southern portion of Santa Clara County. The Times calls for more service and a “shuttle train.”

Bike commuter/Santa Clara County Supervisor Ken Yeager is pissed county fleet cars go unused, take vacations to Malibu, and several drivers “are racking up… parking fines,” for over $100,000. President Liz Kniss praised Yeager and called for a halt on the proposed purchase of new sheriff’s cars. The President didn’t point out the audit was decades overdue…

Shock, shock hits the streets of San Jose. San Jose Councilmember Nora Campos officially announced her plans to take termed out Assemblymember Joe “Mr. Insurance” Coto’s seat. Campos’ promised not to forget San Jose saying “my biggest job will be to make sure we don’t lose any more local money.” The surprise is that anyone thought otherwise…

Taking pity on taxpayers, the Santa Clara Valley Water District directors voted unanimously not to raise rates and to make more than $100 million in budget cuts. Director Rosemary Kamei warns the cuts come from delayed projects and rate payers will be in for a rude awakening at a future date…

This summer kids are losing their Jamba Juice jobs to unemployed old folks. Business owners like Details’ Bernie Levine are cutting staff while trying to keep mortgage paying parents off unemployment lines.

Girls Middle School students aren’t looking for Jamba Juice, they launched an eco-friendly micro business with $100. “Buckle My Jeans” co-founders Jamie Bindon, Rachael Rappoport, Maggie Brown and Jaime McConachie report their motto “we’ve got your jeans in the bag,” was a no-brainer. There’s no truth to the rumor Watch Dog was first in line for the doggie bag…

San Jose was the site of a green/labor conference with such luminaries as economist James Galbraith, Sierra Club leader Carl Pope and San Jose’s own Cindy Chavez. (Un)surprisingly, the only coverage was from an alternative/online media source out of San Francisco.

The crashing economy has a few bright spots. Palo Alto officials are looking for a place to build a new cop-shop, current negotiations could turn to their favor. Councilmember John Barton said it was an example of the council “acting in a very business-wise manner.”

The Merc’s Joe Rodriguez reports a small victory in consumer affairs. The 17 year old credit nightmare for Manuel and Luz Fausto is over and there’s a check for $500,000 in the mail. Consumer advocate Denise Richardson says the web is buzzing, “finally, some good news to report.”

Morgan Hill Superintendent Alan Nishino announced he’s outa here at the end of June. Nishino leaves a $4.1 million shortfall and a “fractured” union relationship.

Gilroy Councilmember Dion Bracco supported colleagues who said no to South County Housing’s project a few months ago. Bracco said he wouldn’t spend his own money on the project, at the time. Last night Bracco convinced colleagues a do-over was needed because the project owner was now changing the financial agreement.

San Jose Revealed calls this week the “boringest week ever,” aside from the Merc’s Scott Herhold increasingly busy schedule and old news about Nora Campos it wasn’t worth a visit to the keyboard yesterday.

Morning News Round-Up -- 3.31.09: Butterflies, Earthquakes, and Porn, OH MY!

In case you missed it, Watch Dog had late breaking baseball news yesterday…MLB Commissioner Bud Selig named a panel to study the A’s options. The Merc’s Morning Buzz tries to spray some water on San Jose’s excitement…the apparently aren't impressed with Lew Wolff's ability to attract microphones magnetically to his mouth...

A minor 4.3 earthquake in the foothills near Mt. Hamilton yesterday shook nerves around Silicon Valley and beyond and uncovered a brand new fault line. Oh, goody. The new fault line runs parallel to the more active Calaveras line which shook the area last in 2007. You can tell the USGS all about your shaking here...

The Merc’s Editorial Board wonders why Supervisor Dave Cortese is the only one seeking a public explanation as to why a 10 year old was tossed in the pokey. In case you missed it, tossing the 10 year old into jail is also a violation of Federal law. Oops…The DA’s office recently turned over kid cases to LACY, none too soon it would seem.

Neighbors around Watson Park are pissed off. It seems San Jose once used the park as a toxic dump. When the sludge was re-discovered the City offered to help. Now that the cleanup is over, the neighbors are trying to deal with the aftermath (home prices, health effects)…

Morgan Hill’s "mixed-use" Measure A plan could be considered panacea by proponents, at least the Morgan Hill Times seems to think so. With support by everyone from the Greenbelt Alliance and Sierra Club to the Chamber of Commerce and Downtown Association it looks like former Mayor Dennis Kennedy is keeping his promise to not take anything for granted. Not everyone seems to think mixed use is a good idea, downtown property owner Gary Walton claims it’s “like fitting a square peg in a round hole.” Walton must not get out of Morgan Hill much…

Gilroy’s Safeway has a creep prowling the parking lot. An 18 year old woman was the third victim attacked while heading back to the car. The attacker looks for women traveling solo, until they catch him, take the baggers on their offer for help back to your car...

San Jose Revealed offers a new target to porn crusaders Councilmember Pete "Ball Gag" Constant and former Councilmember Larry Pegram: Sexy San Jose. We would give you an idea about what Revealed wrote, but the website is down -- and has been since (before?) Revealed posted about it...

San Jose Insider/Councilmember Pierluigi Oliverio keeps his partying ways going. This time celebrating the San Jose Bike Party with a “Psychedelic Robot Ride.” Watch Dog note from one blogger to another, too much rode-here-rode-there, blah blah blah.

According to the Merc’s Chris O’Brien, Senator Dianne Feinstein is trying to clean up the bureaucratic quagmire that surrounds the patent office. Local giants Cisco and Google have been complaining about patent messes that cost them big bucks and squelch the free flow of ideas... looks like they found their advocate.

The Merc’s Scott Herhold spends too much time wandering the halls of Justice. His column is all about the white or khaki shirts that watch as your worldly possessions roll through the x-ray machine, and how much those shirts make.

Sal Pizzaro shares a celebration with the Amigos de Cesar Chavez who will be delivering over 250 lunches to farm workers in Santa Clara County in honor of Cesar Chavez’ birthday today.

Those fluttering leaves everyone is seeing around the Valley are actually Painted Lady butterflies making their annual migration North. De Anza biologist Ryan Phillips is giddy with excitement and called the mass migration “truly spectacular.”

San Jose Police are investigating a late night shooting in San Jose. Sounds like neighbors on Sebasian Way were feuding, the gunman shot at men standing outside his neighbors home. Luckily for the victims (and shooter), neither victim was critically injured.

Meanwhile, Santa Clara Police are still looking into Sunday's murder/suicide...Neighbors are shocked by the deaths of 6 Sunday night. Neighbor Amit Sinha said, "It's such a quiet neighborhood. I don't even hear anybody speaking in a loud voice. And then there are 20 police with semi-automatic guns."

A Mountain View woman who disappeared for four days last year after partying in Mountain View is now heading to jail. To stay out of trouble with the parents she lied to the Police saying she’d been kidnapped and assaulted...now she’s ‘fessed up to concocting the story. Liz Wylie, Police spokesperson, said something was amiss about the story…Y'think?

Morning (early p.m.) News Round-Up – 1.7.09: Larry Pegram vs. Darwin...coming to a school board near you

Sunnyvale City Council installed CSW (Chief Seat Warmer) Dean Chu to the City Council for Iraq-bound Councilmember Otto Lee last night, in spite of opposition from residents and former Mayors. Chu, who failed in his 2007 attempt to be re-elected, will hold down the fort for Lee. This sets up the dynamic where Chu will serve on the Council along with the guy that beat him in an election -- Dave Whittum. Awkward...

Metro’s Fly blogs about the reinvigorated efforts of the religious right to slap filters on public libraries -- and then some. The Values Advocacy Council, having helped in the passage of a constitutional amendment to prevent some citizens from getting married, is now calling their anti-free speech filters/stop teaching evolution b.s. the “Children’s Bill of Rights.” Watch out local school districts, the Scopes Trial is coming to your Board meetings...

The cost of housing each underage prison inmate is over $250,000 annually so it’s understandable that there’s a push to find alternatives to prison. A report released Tuesday said alternative programs show promise but lack accountability, a never ending story it seems. The County Supervisors will have their work cut out for them to maintain the County’s good reputation and not slide back to warehousing juveniles in the State prison system in the face of budget cut backs. Santa Clara County Probation Chief Sheila Mitchell said, "Keeping the kids here is common sense."

San Jose Revealed this week rationalizes why they were down (too many visitors), spanks supporters of Kevin Moore for making fun of a voice of support to Revealed on Facebook (Revealed has only 10 Facebook fans), updates reader 2008 highlights and predictions (...the Merc. will leave town), and ponders Mayor Chuck Reed’s upcoming State of the City speech (not exciting).

Silicon Valley technology at work…to choose boys? There’s an increasing number of boys being born among Asian immigrant families. According to journalist Preeti Shekar, a highly sought after gender selection tool has both, "sexist and racist consequences." San Jose’s Dr. Suresh Nayak refused to speak to the Mercury News about ads he runs offering to assist parents choose the gender of their child.