Beware, this is a long post so get well hydrated and nourished first…
So what just happened that made me spill my milk? The Morgan Hill Times has published a couple of articles where I don’t think all parties were treated equally, neither the issues nor the people involved which includes all candidates and sitting councilmembers too. Not quite a drive by shooting, kind of closer to a Vespa rider with a whiffle ball bat whacking you up side the head, looks harmless but still hurts.
On September 12th an article came out about the proposed South County Catholic High School in the Morgan Hill Times. I had just addressed the City Council in favor of the high school. If you’ve never addressed the councilmembers in their digs I can tell you they can be a deflating group with their poker faces… I expressed I felt we needed an option in high quality education locally and we could take hundreds, if not around a thousand, cars off the road heading mostly to points north to private schools every day. One speaker stated that combined all the cars coming from or passing through Morgan Hill taking students to Catholic schools drive 24,000 miles a day. Even at a conservative 25 mpg that’s burning over 950 gallons of gas a day with the associated pollutants and loss of thousands of hours of potentially productive time. This is an environmental issue too.
The Catholic High School was proposed to be built on what is now declared by the state to be prime agricultural land. I spoke to people who have farmed that land and they do not feel it is the best but still, ag land is not being made anymore so any of it is precious.
A reporter for the M.H. Times asked me to comment but between not having her phone number at the time and not knowing her deadline she turned in her article without my comments. Okay, that won’t happen again.
The following week the same reporter called me about an article that would feature all of the candidate’s position and vision on growth in Morgan Hill.
This time I caught up with her and we spoke extensively about the background on a range of items and a great deal on the SEQ which was of great interest to her. As a planning commissioner I helped write the Morgan Hill Agricultural Lands Preservation Program so I have a fair amount of background on that document and the Southeast Quadrant’s issues.
I included a lot of background on what has happened since the SEQ annexation application was rejected by LAFCO.
LAFCO Definition: The Local Agency Formation Commission (LAFCO) is a state mandated local agency established to oversee the boundaries of cities and special districts.
Encouraging orderly boundaries, discouraging urban sprawl, and preserving agricultural and open space lands are the key goals of LAFCO.
I made comments with supporting statements during our conversation and followed it up with an email addressing more specifically what I think we’ll be doing in the future.
When I saw the article itself on September 20th I spilled my milk so had to eat my graham crackers dry, not good.
The article read like Councilmember Rene Spring and Julie Hutcheson had a much more in depth and better documented conversation.
I’ve never seen anything like it. The article opened with a sitting councilmember providing his perspective, which is drastically curbing growth, and then the reporter states that he can gain allies in this year’s election to support his position and he goes on to endorse Hutcheson and Martinez-Beltran.
Somehow the reporter was able to put an old settled issue, the SEQ, back on the front page a couple weeks back and it followed prominently into this article. Now the Catholic high school has become the SEQ even though the SEQ was only mentioned as historic background in the Staff Report. I spoke to the editor and reminded him that it was his paper that brought “SEQ” back up broadly in the public arena thanks to the efforts of Rene.
So if someone wants to bring the SEQ back into the conversation then let’s have a complete conversation. Let’s hear from all sides this time. Let’s hear about how inaction has led to residential development in the area and done so without the benefit of Morgan Hill’s more restrictive requirements. This development has impacted the residents at the south end of Trail Drive with the five homes which house dozens of people who leave their cars parked on the city streets in the adjacent neighborhood. Let’s talk about approximately 85 acres of land that has been developed (+25 acres) or has changed hands and is ready for McMansions (2 – 10 acre lots) or the acreage that is moving into the hands of offshore investors (about 40 acres).
I don’t believe that the SEQ is an issue for this election because we won’t be developing homes there anytime soon. A proposed high school is located within the geographical borders of the SEQ but that’s the only correlation. Hey, if someone feels compelled to talk about it how about we have an honest and open dialog, I will gladly participate to clear things up but only if it is based on facts and good science, maybe even some good intentions should be heard out...
I felt the article left out some important background comments for the few quotes of mine. Items important to me like I am also an environmentalist who wants to control growth - but we have a voter approved (by over 76%) measure that is our guideline. Heck, I said most Morgan Hillans are environmentalists, most of us live here because of the natural beauty surrounding us. Or that other respectable folks, including council members, have admonished the overuse of the term “urban sprawl”. Or that I was one of the planning commissioners that prompted a discussion on future development on the Monterey Road Corridor about 5 years ago, and many more issues.
Strangely the article also seems to give one person credit for prompting the update of the residential control system which became the vote getting Measure S. No person or organization prompted the new program, it was already scheduled due to the sunset provision in 2020.
I want to move away from any settled issues and try to figure out how to further many of the efforts I have already been working on and try out a few new ideas for things like economic development, public safety, traffic, transportation, and yes the big issues in residential development that have nothing to do with past issues but everything to do with maintaining our existing growth controls.
Let’s work on new issues and leave the old ones where they are unless we can make it better now.
I think I should get back to work telling you about why I am running for office and what I plan on doing when I get there.
Please feel free to share your thoughts and post right here.
Stay tuned and come back soon, more to come…
