Liccardo lays out pragmatic, innovative strategies for area homelessness; local housing advocates squawk
In his annual State of the City address, SJ Mayor Sam Liccardo sounded like a clear-eyed CEO as he outlined changes to the city's homelessness problem by acknowledging past mistakes and pivoting to more effective solutions. Liccardo advocated a move away from the expensive and slow Permanent Housing First strategies favored by local housing nonprofits, and towards a faster, cheaper, transitional housing model which is being implemented successfully by cutting-edge cities. Local housing advocates, predictably, decried the mayor's direction. Below are excerpts from Liccardo's speech and comments by Jennifer Loving of Destination Home and Edward Ring of the California Policy Center.
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City hits pause button on residential densification efforts
Pushing back against local housing advocates, SJ City Council passed an urgency ordinance to limit the impact of SB9--the state law which strips cities of their authority over local zoning. Additionally, the city shelved a local densification proposal known as Opportunity Housing. Tobin Gilman of Families and Homes--the leading grass roots organization fighting citywide up zoning--explains the developments.
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Labor's "Unity" redistricting map rejected, Cohen's compromise plan gains Council approval
In a resounding defeat for the anti-Asian gerrymander efforts of Labor and local progressive nonprofits, the San Jose City Council embraced a middle ground redistricting plan championed by D4 Councilmember David Cohen. Through a series of votes on the precise details of the plan, the council refuted the false race-baiting claims hilariously floated by local progressives and endorsed a map that meets both legal and ethical parameters of good faith redistricting. City Hall Insiders provide a brief review of the major issues below.
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Are local nonprofits becoming fronts for hard left, anti-Asian causes?
Local philanthropists were gobsmacked recently to discover that many of the local environmental, health care, and community nonprofits to which they donate have lined up in public support of Labor's widely criticized redistricting maps, which have been credibly accused of suppressing Asian-American votes. It is unclear if the Board of Directors of any of the nonprofits voted to approve their group's advocacy, if the groups actually studied the various redistricting proposals, nor how such advocacy aligns with the nonprofits' publicly-stated missions. The nonprofits who signed a public letter to the City of SJ advocating the discredited, discriminatory plan, are listed below.
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Why politicians pit one race against another in redistricting
Jackson Reese, vice president of the California Policy Center think tank, pulls back the curtain on the county's and city's redistricting follies, and breaks down how politicians and interest groups shamelessly use the process to advance their electoral interests.
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Hard-left SJ Councilmembers resist compromise redistricting plan, continue efforts to suppress Asian votes
It didn't take long for CM David Cohen's middle-ground redistricting map to get attacked by SJ. City Council's labor-backed, extremist wing, who keep trying to silence Asian voters in a scheme to rig future elections. City Hall watchers close to the action highlight the brazen shenanigans of CM's Esparza, Peralez, and Arenas below.
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Doan on Anti-Asian redistricting efforts: "They want to dilute the Asian vote so they can aggrandize the power of their special interests."
"We won't be silenced," chanted a mostly Asian-American crowd outside last Tuesday's SJ Council meeting during which the Labor-backed "Unity" map was roundly dismissed as a discriminatory and bad faith redistricting effort. Candidate for D7 Council seat Bien Doan led the demonstration, and talked to Opp Now about his view of the follies of the Labor scheme.
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Ex-downtown councilmember lambasts "Unity" redistricting plan as discriminatory, unwieldy
David Pandori, former central San Jose councilmember, recently wrote a letter to the SJ City Council daylighting the divisive and unworkable nature of the labor-backed gerrymander proposal for San Jose. The full text of Pandori's letter follows.
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Oliverio: Are shady special interests using niche software to rig election results?
Planning Commissioner Pierluigi Oliverio decries what appears to be the use of special technology by progressive groups to manipulate election results via the redistricting process.
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Local media consensus: County gerrymandering effort corrupt, flawed
In a rare turn of unanimity against local labor interests, both the San Jose Mercury News Editorial Board and San Jose Inside news desk ("The Fly") have come out critical of the county's discredited "Yellow Map" redistricting proposal. The "Yellow Map" would take away Right of Candidacy for more conservative politicians, suppress the Vietnamese vote, and is shot full of ethical and legal policy debacles. Excerpts from both publications below.
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Are San Jose's redistricting follies a sign of municipal dysfunction? D3 Council Candidate (and Psychology PhD) Irene Smith diagnoses
If you've ever thought "this is too divisive" while listening to arguments and comments in city politics, you've got company with Irene Smith, candidate for San Jose's D3 council seat. Smith has a masters in Family and Child Counseling and a PhD in Psychology. At the Santa Clara County small claims court, she has heard over 2,000 cases. Smith sits down with Opp Now's Christopher Escher for a discussion about what the redistricting kerfuffle says about the city's mental health and the hope for cooperative problem-solving.
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Labor supporters misinform, mislead in effort to defend hilariously-named "Unity" map
A Working Partnership representative, on October 11, sent a letter to the City that contained transparently false claims about key elements of the discredited "Unity" redistricting map. Members of the Community Map support team called out the inaccuracies, as outlined below.
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