The proposal was to reduce the bureaucracy.  Have fewer steps needed to open a business.  Fewer forms to fill out.  Fewer people to process the forms.  Fewer managers to manage the people who process the forms.

If the city put up fewer hurdles, they wouldn’t need so many fees.

> Also, keep in mind: the $600K comes from restricted Environmental Services grant funds, not from the General Fund, so that money can’t be used to pay for police, libraries, etc anyway.

Oh, I see.  It’s FREE money.  Manna from heaven.

How come the gubbermint always seems to get lots of free money, but working people never do?

Thanks for your response, Sam. I understand this agreement was made years ago. I agree that the city could provide better contiguous service, but it seems we got some of the worst county pockets which are going to demand lots of resources up front. Talking to a couple of police officers that work these areas, I learned that no extra officers have been added to patrol these new areas, but that the size of their beats have been increased with many more calls for service. What do you see as the short and long term answers to address the policing issue? A spike in crime is not what we need if we are trying to encourage business to come here.

Harry, I’m proposing a plan to revitalize business activity, not to perform miracles!

Steve, good question.  The one-time $600,000 costs of implementation of the bag ban will be greatly outweighed in the first year by the ongoing savings of implementation.  Why? Because your local recyclers spend hundreds of thousands of dollars every year to manually extract plastic bags from sorting machinery (the processing machinery has to be stopped completely to ensure it can be done so safely).  They pass those costs along to ratepayers, i.e., you.  Grocery and other small retail stores pay hundreds of millions of dollars annually for plastic and paper bags, and they pass those costs along with the “free” bags to consumers, i.e., you.  Your tax dollars pay to clean creeks, outfalls, and sewers of plastic bag-created blockages. 
Also, keep in mind: the $600K comes from restricted Environmental Services grant funds, not from the General Fund, so that money can’t be used to pay for police, libraries, etc anyway.  It will be used for outreach and education to local businesses, the distribution of free re-usable bags to consumers, and the like. 
Sam

Greg, we’re constrained by our $100 million deficit here; reducing or eliminating fees will simply expand the size of that deficit.  For that reason, we’ve constrained the outright fee waivers to a relatively small category (business license fees on small firms). Although one might simplistically respond, “so what,” the reality is that after eight consecutive years of service cuts, these reductions will cut well into the bone of our basic police, fire, library, park, and other services.  Employing a system of fee rebates ensures that we can pay businesses back as future tax revenues are created.  While job creation is a critical priority, we do it in a way that’s fiscally damaging.

Greg and Steve,
A response to several points you’ve raised here:
First, Greg: contrary to your “chameleon” reference, nobody in the City has been more consistent or outspoken than me in voting against residential conversions of industrial and commercial land, in an attempt to reverse decades of a worsening jobs-housing balance.
Second, Greg, the “borrowing funds from a variety of accounts to build yet more affordable housing” misses some critically important context. The RDA has proposed to “borrow” some $65 million in affordable housing funds (i.e., dollars required by state law to fund affordable projects), and I merely proposed to cap the amount of that borrowing at $40 million.
If you’re really concerned about improving the jobs/housing imbalance, Greg, then you’ll support policies that reduce the chronic difference between the value of residentially-zoned land versus industrial/commercial land.  One policy that does so is the inclusionary policy that I’ve successfully pushed. Lenders and investors in the industry will tell you that through their standard residual land analysis, inclusionary policies reduce the market value of residentially-zoned land, thereby reducing the incentives for developers to push to convert industrial land.  That should be welcomed by anyone concerned about our jobs-housing imbalance.
Third, contrary to Steve’s suggestion, if housing is going to be built—and the existing General Plan 2020 already entitles land owners to build tens of thousands of units more—then the type of housing with the LEAST negative fiscal impact is high-density housing near transit.  Low-density housing poses the greatest drain on our services, with the least tax revenue per square foot.
Finally, Steve, you’re right that annexing county areas is a loser for the city treasury because it disperses city services.  Unfortunately, the agreements with the County that mandated those annexations were approved years ago, before I came into office, and we’ve committed to honor our agreements, in part because the County and the City serve the same residents (i.e, any dollar spent by the City is saved by the County), and because it’s incredibly inefficient for the County to be providing services in diffuse pockets throughout the region, when the City can more efficiently do so in a contiguous geographical area. 
Thanks for your thoughts, gentlemen—I hope we can continue this dialogue.

Paul Higgins

Good work!

I applaud you sincere efforts and appreciate your fundamental efforts for a better downtown.

Whitmore has failed to engage the thousands of former students and his vice presidents such as Phillips are functional idiots.  Phillips actually could be held in violation of the law to the extent of personal liability for violating the civil rights of students.  He is known by the faculty as having a peculiar sense of race relations on campus and there are many people on campus that wan Phillips to resign.  Whitmore also has been known to express a lack of confidence in the Student Affairs staff.

Paul Higgins was contacted by a friend of mine wanting to get some advice about opening a restaurant in downtown San Jose.  He was courteous, friendly, and so very informative.  Higgins is what the downtown association needs.  He has done a great job working with people, and my cousin feels that Higgins was responsbile for her success.

There is no one at San Jose State, Bob, who is helping engage the students as downtown customers.  The Student Affairs and Housing staff are just collecting paychecks and treating downtown with benign neglect.  Verril Phillips did actively protect this guy who was serving booze to underage students.

Bob, what is more embarrassing about Phillips is that at a public meeting, Vice President of Student Affairs, Verril Phillips, actually encouraged the student council to violate open meeting laws by insisting that people coming to speak list their full address.  After that meeting, my cousin called both the State Attorney General’s office and County Counsel and they were told that Phillips could have been forced to resign for violating California open meeting law, and he also could have caused the student council leadership to be also cited.  This guy does not care about the students or downtown San Jose.

Downtown needs San Jose Inside, downtown needs Eric Johnson, Paul Higgins, and I love Peter Campbell’s columns as well.

Education does not need Verril Phillips, an uncaring person with no interest in student success.