There is still time to sign up for Silicon Valley Turkey Trot, the country's largest Thanksgiving Day race. Proceeds fund affordable housing and food for low-income families in our community. Learn more and register. 

San José Police Department Continues to Make Progress Rebuilding its Ranks
 
Last month, the San José Police Department celebrated the launch of another 50-plus person academy, representing the latest milestone in the SJPD's resurgence. SJPD has now welcomed about 140 new police recruits in 2017 and pushed total sworn staffing over 1000 officers for the first time in years.

These optimistic numbers create a stark contrast from just a few years ago, when Police Department staffing and recruiting hit new lows after economic turmoil and years of pension battles left deep cuts among its ranks. However, since the City reached a comprehensive pension resolution with its employees, and secured voter approval last November, the Department has started down the track toward a brighter future. 

Read more on the SJPD's recovery, and learn how Chief Eddie Garcia is employing creative recruiting strategies to return the department to previous staffing levels.
Celebrating Progress on Housing our Community's Homeless Veterans 

This Veterans Day, Mayor Liccardo stood proudly with Supervisor Dave Cortese and a group of "All the Way Home" community partners to celebrate the significant progress  made to-date housing our homeless veterans in Santa Clara County.

With the support of nearly 10 partners and 24 faith-based organizations, All the Way Home has housed 891 homeless veterans in just over 2 years. In this time, nearby jurisdictions have seen double-digit increases to veteran homelessness, while Santa Clara County watched numbers decrease.

Learn more about the campaign, or  read the press release detailing the progress.
 

City of San José and Santa Clara County Water District Jointly Approve Emergency Action Plan

On November 3, the City of San José and Santa Clara Valley Water District jointly approved a robust and comprehensive Emergency Action Plan to improve our emergency preparedness and response efforts ahead of the upcoming storm season.

The new plan reflects City leaders' commitment to fixing the problems that emerged from February's devastating floods. In addition, the City and Water District have already completed a number of significant flood protection and response improvements, including:
  • The water district board has approved new operating parameters at Anderson and Coyote
    reservoirs which will create more storage space, further reducing the chance of flooding.
  • To improve its capability for emergency notification, the City has enabled Wireless Emergency Alerts, which reaches mobile devices in geographically targeted areas, and invested in three long range acoustical devices (LRADs) that can be driven through neighborhoods and transmit emergency messages at a high volume.
  • In the Rock Springs neighborhood, the water district is constructing two short-term flood
    barriers to help reduce the risk of flooding.
  • The City and Water District have implemented improved water level measurement systems and infrastructure in Coyote Creek to better track and monitor flood threats.
Mayor Liccardo's Chief Innovation Officer Testifies Before U.S. Congress

Last week, Mayor Liccardo's Chief Innovation Officer, Shireen Santosham testified before
Congress in Washington D.C. to advocate for the equitable deployment of 5G technology.

Her testimony comes at the heels of a pending effort at the FCC to gut local authority and oversight of publicly-owned light poles. These proposals, similar to recently-vetoed legislation in California, would allow big telecom corporations to affix their private wireless equipment to publicly-owned poles at below market-rate value. This, in essence, would provide these private corporations publicly-subsidized, utility-like access, without the requirement to serve all residents as any other utility would.

Watch Shireen's testimony, or  read Mayor Liccardo's New York Timed Op-Ed on why these kinds of deregulations hurt residents. 

Sign Up for #BeautifySJ Updates

When Mayor Liccardo launched his #BeautifySJ campaign last February, he sought to not only clean up our city, but to empower and support residents to reclaim their public spaces. With the help of over 16,033 volunteer hours, cleanup efforts have collected the equivalent of 111 full-sized school buses of trash to-date. Still, our work is far from over, and we hope you will join our campaign to make San José a cleaner, safer, and more vibrant city.

To join Mayor Liccardo in his efforts to beautify our city, sign up for #BeautifySJ email updates, and receive alerts on volunteer opportunities.
Events Around San José  
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