Jim's Sunnyvale Blog | Former Sunnyvale Mayor Jim Griffith

12/09/2014 Council Preview – Housing Mitigation Fees and Public Safety Staffing

Posted on December 8, 2014 by Jim Griffith

Pretty full agenda.

We start the evening with the annual performance review for the City Manager in closed session. This is followed by yet another study session about how Council works together.

The general meeting starts with a special order recognizing the 100th anniversary of the Sunnyvale Public Library. This is in advance of Sunday’s celebration event – hope to see lots of you there. The consent calendar is pretty small since we just had a meeting last week – a MTC grant to finish the update of the Precise Plan for El Camino Real, an annual report on development fees and how we’ve spent the money, the annual update to public safety salaries, and second reading of the ordinance changing the land use appeals process rules.

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“Java with Jerry” – Senator Hill in Sunnyvale Saturday 12/6

Posted on December 2, 2014 by Jim Griffith

State Senator Jerry Hill
13^th Senate District

Cordially invites you to:

“Java With Jerry”
Saturday, Dec. 6
9 to 10 a.m.
Sunnyvale Art Gallery & Café
251 W. El Camino Real, Sunnyvale

Join Senator Jerry Hill for a cup of coffee and conversation. Bring your ideas, questions and concerns about legislative issues affecting the community. He’ll provide coffee at no taxpayer expense. Sit down and stay awhile, or just drop in for a brief chat. No appointment or RSVP necessary.

For information, call the District Office at 650-212-3313

Sunnyvale Public Library Centennial Celebration Sunday, 12/14

Posted on December 1, 2014 by Jim Griffith

December 14th marks 100 years of service for the Sunnyvale Public Library, and to commemorate this, the City of Sunnyvale will be hosting centennial events on Sunday December 14th from 12-6 p.m. The full schedule of events can be found here, starting with a kick-off speech by yours truly and a cake-cutting at noon. I hope to see you all there!

San Jose/Sunnyvale/Santa Clara Ranked 8th Most Educated

Posted on December 1, 2014 by Jim Griffith

In yet another of those ubiquitous lists, the National Center for Education Statistics ranked the San Jose/Sunnyvale/Santa Clara metro area the 8th most educated in the nation, tops in the state of California, and having the highest median income in the country. From the list, here are our stats:

• Bachelor’s degree or higher: 46.7%
• Median household income: $91,533 (the highest)
• Median earnings – bachelor’s degree: $74,727 (2nd highest)
• Poverty rate: 10.5% (27th lowest)

The income statistics plus our extremely low unemployment rate are the primary drivers for the growth issues that we’ve been experiencing in the past two years. The article states “Many highly paid area residents are employed in the information sector, where wages are more than four-and-a-half times higher than information sector jobs nationwide“.

11/25/2014 Council Preview – Climate Action Plan

Posted on November 25, 2014 by Jim Griffith

We’re down to our last three meetings of the year, which means we’ll be stacking up a bunch of pending issues in our next two meetings. This one is pretty light.

We start the evening with a single study issue to discuss next years intergovernmental relations (IGR) assignments. These are our committee assignments, mostly to outside bodies. Usually, in a year like this, there will be little to discuss, as the council isn’t changing due to an election, and assignments will likely only change if councilmembers choose to drop them or challenge colleagues for an assignment. We don’t have a history of those kind of challenges, though.

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