No vision from the city council candidates
All the candidates for the November 8, 2011 Cupertino City Council have no vision.
The incumbent mayor and council member Gilbert Wong claims to be a leader with a vision, but what is his vision? He does not show anything new that we don't know. He says he wants to keep a strong Cupertino? What does a strong Cupertino mean? It's just a word that means nothing. So having Apple Campus 2 means that Cupertino is strong? Does that mean that without Wong there's no new Apple headquarters? Let's be honest. Can Cupertino afford to refuse Apple to build its new headquarters? Anyway Wong acted like a child during the presentation of Steve Jobs on June 7, 2011 to the city council. Instead of being professional, he tried to show off that he owned an iPad and that his daughter loved it so much. He wanted an Apple store in Cupertino and that he would bring people to the store. Why not watch Jobs' response and judge by yourself.
Wong wants to continue to lead Cupertino, but why doesn't he take care of the rundown properties that he and his father own in San Jose? Read the article in the Mercury News about the problems with the tenants at http://mytown.mercurynews.com/archives/cambrianresident/20081002/news4.shtml.
In 2007 I supported Wong in spite of the attacks against him. Today I recommend not to re-elect him.
Marty Miller will try for the third time, and maybe it's a charm. The last time he lost to Barry Chang who got the Chinese votes. So this time he hopes to be elected on the bandwagon of Wong with the Chinese votes. His sign is next to Wong's everywhere in the city. He runs as a pro business, but he does not explain how he's going to revitalize the business districts. As a candidate, one can say anything, but once elected everything becomes quiet. Look at all the council members today. What have they done for the business districts? Actions talk louder than words. If Wong is re-elected against my recommendation, Miller can have a good chance of being elected too, but he has a strong contender in Tong, who can get the Chinese votes like Chang did last time.
Homer Tong, a member of the Fremont Union High School District board of trustees, wants to make Cupertino a school town where all the residents participate in the schools' events, sports and activities. He seems to be stuck in the school environment instead of providing a vision of a city that our children want to have fun. Go and ask our children where they go to have fun? Not in Cupertino because there's nothing. As parents, don't we want our children stay closer to home rather than going and have fun far away?
Rod Sinks, Donna Austin and Chris Zhang are the other candidates. Sinks is the High-Tech person who is into green. So he should bring cleantech companies to Cupertino. Austin wants to keep Cupertino the way it is. Zhang, the youngest of the pack, believes that he's running for the school board about wanting to improve the science classes. What's wrong with the science classes at Monta Vista and Lynnbrook? Does he know that Physics Honor at Monta Vista is more difficult than Physics 2A at De Anza college? Anyway what can a city council member do with classes? He has a good idea about offering free WiFi in Cupertino. Steve Jobs said that with the tax revenues from Apple, the city can provide free WiFi. So why wait?
They all talk about Vallco and Mainstreet, but so far we don't see anything happening at all. Vallco has been in a limbo state for the past decades. It doesn't want to die, but doesn't want to succeed either. It changed names back and forth to confuse the people. The fences in front of Sears (corner of Wolfe and Stevens Creek) have become a sore eye and the sorrow state of a mall that our children do not want to frequent. The candidates do not provide any concrete solutions to this problem. About the Mainstreet or downtown, there's no sign that it will become a reality soon. It's not the time to continue to ask the residents whether they want a downtown or not, and what kind of downtown they want. The candidates should ask themselves the following question: Why do people go to Santana Row on Friday nights and weekends?
It's very unfortunate that we have a son in Cupertino that we don't want to promote to attract tourists. He's adored all over the world, but the city doesn't care about him. Yes I'm talking about Steve Jobs. The city should have a theme to honor him with a statue, a street name, a place or a museum. The tourists will come and spend, bringing more revenues to the city coffer. The businesses will benefit tremendously.
Two candidates will be selected. The top three mentioned above will have a chance, but they have to show that they are doers and not talkers. Sinks is the dark horse. So vote on November 8, 2011. Talk to the kids.
Vote NO on Measure C. We don't want more taxes.
posted by Hann @ 12:28 AM
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12 Comments:
This is the response from Frank Geefay, a volunteer for Homer Tong.
Hi Hann,
I am one of Homer's volunteers who gets email from his website. I assume that you are the author of the CupertinoLife blog.
I take it that you are in your mid to late 20's from the constant of your message. It is good to know that young people are interested in the city and vote. It has been my observations that most young people below the age of about 35 have little active interest in politics or voting or civic matters. If you are below 35 and are an active voter who cares about our community then you certainly have earned the right to be critical of our Council members and candidates.
Your article stressed the word "vision". In truth there are few visionaries or people in political office who have a vision of any sort. It's dangerous to be a person of vision. They tend to be targets of assassinations and live short lives.
Homer does not have a vision of how to change the world or Cupertino. His is more in the category of concerns. To my knowledge he has never used the word vision to characterize himself. But Homer is most certainly a person with a passion, a passion to see that the youth of this community be equipped and well prepared to be the leaders, technologist, innovators, business persons, etc. of the future. He has dedicated 30 years of his life teaching Chemistry at De Anza College and serving his 5th term on the Fremont Union High School Board of Trustees.
(Continue next...)
(Continued from Geefay's response)
California is in financial crisis. State colleges and universities are in great trouble because the State is unable to give the an adequate budget to run effectively. The same is true with all public schools in California. Cities like Oakland are having mass layoffs and school closures because of the lack of adequate funds from the state.
Cupertino has been more fortunate. Last year residents raised $3M for CUSD so that they would not have to lay off any elementary school teachers. Both FUHSD and CUSD still have money left from parcel tax but they will eventually run out since the parcel taxes were based upon pre-crisis California dollars. The schools can continue to ask residents for more money or try to get more parcel taxes passes but in truth people like you an I will get tired of doing this year after year.
Homers concern (not vision because he has no better vision than you or I) is that if our schools run out of money there will be mass layoffs and, program cancellations which will affect the quality of education resulting in our high academic standards being compromised. This is not good for the future of kids going to our schools nor will it be beneficial to property values. So much about Cupertino is about schools. Yet there is not one Council member today that represents schools. There are no other candidates running that have Homer's experience to adequately represent schools. Homer feels that he can help our schools best by serving on City Council. That is why he is running. He believes that the city can help our to be financially strapped schools and want to take proactive measure to prepare for that eventuality. It looks like you may have visited his website at homerforcupertino.com but if not the site is packed full of information, far more than any other candidate's website. He does have specific ideas how to help our schools.
Homer is not perfect but he is the only one running that truly has a purpose, a mission. But he is not just for schools. He has openly expressed his concerns about pollution coming from the Lehigh Cement plant. He is the only candidate that actually named the cement plant in his ballot statement when he filed his application to run a couple of months ago. Rod Sinks is also concerned. All other candidates are now saying how bad Lehigh is but Homer was the first and is very sincere in his belief that harm is being done to residents. Whether you agree with him or not he really cares about our community.
People with vision are Gandhi, Martin Luther king, Abraham Lincoln. So if anyone says that they have a vision my advice to you is not to vote for them because they are spinning a lie to get votes. So I hope you will vote for Homer.
Best Regards,
Frank Geefay
Thanks Frank Geefay for the civic education.
According to him, those under 35 with a voting record have the right to criticize the council members and candidates. If they don't vote, they must shut up. Those above 35 must also shut up.
It looks like most of us better shut up and don't vote.
If Frank remembers, Barry Chang campaigned for air quality against the Lehigh Cement plant. Now that he's a council member, what happens?
I believe Frank remembers the past recessions. We're going through a cycle. Our schools have been doing good no matter what. A good school has to do with a combination of parents, students and teachers. It happens that the parents living in Cupertino are educated. This is a major influence on their children who perform well even though some teachers are not good. Look around the city. Why are there so many tutoring and SAT test centers?
I personally feel that even without his involvement, apple will be able to lead their own company and expand on their own. His lack of active involvement is a cause for concern in the community. He is not a good example or a role model for the community, and I also recommend not to have him for re-election.
Frank Geefay has a narrow minded understanding of the constitutional rights of an individual.
This is the response from Chris Zhang:
Thank you Hann. I enjoyed reading your analysis on the last election, as well as this link you sent.
To clarify one thing, when I said I’d like to improve our science and foreign language classes, I did not mean to make the course more difficult. Making the classes more difficult doesn’t not necessarily improve education. But helping students learn takes patience, time, and money. I’d like to influence the school board to spend the taxpayers money more wisely. I’m sorry I wasn’t able to convey this point clearly enough.
Like I mentioned at the LWV candidates’ forum, all the candidates say they will do things like improve education, grow business, and so forth. But the devil is in the details. For example, how do you help Vallco, when the management isn’t very interested in helping themselves? Rod Sinks says he will help our business, but the only detailed plan I’ve heard from him is his support of Measure C. Is that going to help business grow? I don’t think so.
I have a detailed plan to achieve all my goals. Most of them are detailed in the campaign website. But if you have any questions, please feel free to let me know.
Thank you,
Chris Zhang
When it ain't broke don't fix it.
Chris Zhang needs to learn about the job of a city council.
I'd like to comment on your criticism of my statement, that people under the age of 35 who don't vote don't have a right to vote? I apologies for not making myself clearer. This was meant as a complement. I believe that active voters and concerned citizens who engage in activities to improve society, such as you and I, have a more valid right for criticizing governments and people running for office than those who only criticize but take no active part to make thing different. However I will defend to my last breath anyone's right to freely express their opinions whether I agree or not or whether they participate in the political process or not. This is guaranteed by our Constitution which I am a huge fan of.
As for the comment that schools have taken care of themselves in the past so we don't have to worry about them: this statement does not taken into account that this nation is still in the greatest financial mess since the great depression over 70 years ago. California is in its greatest financial deficit in history. Both you and I are too young to remember the last great depression but my father went through it and it was devastating. Unemployment is currently around 12% statewide vs. 10% nationwide. I have 2 daughter who graduated from college a few years ago and cannot find a decent paying job. You may be luckier.
Schools all over the state are running into financial difficulty and laying off teachers, closing schools sites and increasing class size. State Colleges and Universities have dramatically increasing tuition to help offset the lack of fund that normally come from the State.
To believe that Cupetino schools are immune to money problem is to assign mystical powers to the school districts. Our schools have always been among the lowest funded in the state. They have frequently requested the passage of parcel taxes to offset the difference. Homer has been on the Board of Trustee for almost 20 years. He sees the high school district running critically low of money in the next year or two. CUSD is in more jeopardy. Residents donated $3M to keep the district afloat last year and another parcel tax was passed to keep them afloat until possibly the end of next year but the clock ticks on and reserves are getting depleted.
To wait in the hopes that schools will pull a rabbit out of the hat is very risky. It is much wiser to elect a person like Homer on City Council so that proactive plans can be made in case the worst case scenarios happens. Homer has experience helping run a $100M annual budget school district slightly bigger than that of the city so there is no negative even if everything went as you say.
City Council now has 4 businessmen (Mark Santora owns a company, Oran Mahone is a manager it HP, Gilbert Wong owns and runs a rental housing business, Barry Chang owns a real estate company). We need more balance. We need an educator on City Council since so much about Cupertino is about schools.
If it is your objective to criticize everything I say then I am probably wasting my word. I hope you can provide some better solutions. Realistic solutions are much more difficult to come by and worth their weight in diamonds. So please post your solutions so we can engage in meaningful dialog. I wish you luck on finding a better candidate to vote for than Homer.
Best Regards,
Frank
We need to work hard to maintain the quality of our schools, Hann. If you don't think that's a huge party of the city council's duty, good luck finding a candidate that shares your view. Thank you. - Chris Zhang
Chris,
Why are there two different school boards? What is the difference between them and between the city council?
Frank,
Are we talking about the school board election or the city council election?
I can understand your frustration about the state of our economy that affects all of us. We will have to do the best we can to survive, but we're discussing the politics of Cupertino right now. I hope that your daughters will find a good job. The young generation is very resourceful like my son who's making money online while attending Babson college.
I have to reiterate that it's the parents of Cupertino who make the schools excellent. They are involved and you gave an example of the $3M donation to the CUSD. It was possible because of the parents. Do you remember when CUSD decided to create Lawson middle school? The residents on the borderline got very upset saying that they paid big bucks for their houses to attend Kennedy and not a new school. They started a movement to recall the school board. Look at today. Lawson is one of the best middle schools. So I always have faith in the parents who are very concerned about their children as you do.
When it comes to politics, don't get too emotional unless the candidates want to get the sympathy votes like Nixon and Hillary Clinton. We need to stay focused and discuss about the issues. Unfortunately most of the voters do not pay much attention to the issues.
This is a popularity contest. If a candidate has a name recognition, he'll have a good chance of being elected regardless of his views. If he's unknown, he needs to work harder to get noticed. He needs to go door to door and introduce himself. Whatever ideas he comes up with are very important in defining his leadership skills as a councilman.
It's quite normal that the candidates who serve on the planning commission receive contributions from the developers. They know each other. For sure they have an advantage with a big war chest. So it's up to the candidates who don't have a lot of money to express clearly their views.
All the candidates do not provide any solutions. For example on the Vallco case, they are vague and say the same thing about helping the developers. They should give an ultimatum to the developers if they want to keep things moving.
The developers were given the permits to build Mainstreet. So what are they waiting for?
I don't have anything to prove. I'm not a candidate. I'm here to help the candidates bring the best out of them to convince the voters why they should be elected.
Here are two articles documenting Gilbert Wong's blatantly irresponsible code enforcement violations as a landlord:
http://mytown.mercurynews.com/archives/cambrianresident/20081002/news4.shtml
http://www.metroactive.com/papers/metro/04.08.99/hellerway-9914.html
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