November 4, 2005

LETTERS2theEDITOR

Evergreen community reaches out to autistic child

Dear Editor,
I was pleased to finally see the article on Sai [Oct. 22-Nov. 4 Evergreen Times] and his need to make friends and was even more pleased with the community’s response. My family feels a part of this community now, knowing that there are plenty of people out there who are in a similar situation or able to empathize or simply willing to listen.

It has been heartwarming to hear from kids willing to play with Sai, from parents willing to set the time aside in their busy lives to give them a ride and from teenagers wanting to make a difference in the community. I also heard from special interest groups who were willing to make Sai a part of the group.

Kudos to you and your paper for making the community aware of the needs of this hugely growing population of autistic individuals.

Madhuri Jagadeesh (Sai’s mom)
Evergreen Hills

Evergreen’s growth like a cancer

Dear Editor,
My name is Andrew Ford, and I am a 19-year-old Evergreen resident who is excited to see all the options for new growth in my community, but at the same time, I am concerned that the growth is starting to become a cancer, eating away at the very land that gives the community its namesake.

I was excited to receive my “Notice of Public Scoping Meetings” flier in the mail. A lot of the documentation of the EIR, the EDP, and the general plan has been well presented and easily accessible online, which I have been very appreciative of.

However, what I have observed from all the documents is there seems to be more housing and high-end retail development going in, rather than nice family restaurants and kid/teen friendly places to “hang out.” In other words, yes we might be drawing new residents to the Evergreen area, but those new families or couples have to leave the area in order to find appropriate entertainment and dining opportunities.

Rather than planting new residents into a community that is warm and friendly in a cutting-edge nostalgic way, full of history, we shove them into cookie cutter development areas full of houses and shops that don’t really fit their needs.
When I look at my community at large, I love it. I love it because I live here and my family and I are a part of it.

Through various neighbors, we’ve enjoyed farmer’s markets and EVHS football games, exchanged kids for sleepovers and science projects, and sold gift wrap and chocolate ‘till the cows come home.

Our neighbors wave to us as they drive off to work in the morning and my brothers wave back as my father drives them to school. I smile because of the relationship that has grown over the years. But even though our relationships have stayed strong, they’re not as strong as they used to be.

When we moved deeper into Evergreen 10 years ago, one annual neighborhood event that brought us closer together was watching the fireworks go off over the Mirassou Vineyards. We’d sit there in our lawn chairs, chat, smile and listen to the “ooos and awws” in simple amazement and feeling of community.

The next year, the Mirassou family started selling off their land. No more fireworks. No more block party. I still remember riding my bike up to the end of the street, and the only reason it was the end of the street, is because the grape vines started. The only thing between me and the vines was a white ranch fence.

A few months ago I rode my bike up to the beautiful Evergreen Village Center, built on old Mirassou land, and surveyed my wonderful community. I could still enjoy a smaller version of Mirassou that seemed to blend seamlessly with the beautiful and nostalgic architecture of the quaint shopping center.

However, now Mirassou Vineyards has a chain link fence around it. Most of the remaining vines have been bulldozed, and who knows if any of the buildings, central to our community’s history, will be around in 10 years time. If they disappear, will the Mirassou history and connection to Evergreen be buried and covered under the foundation of homes? Will it just be another name and article in the “Paths to Evergreen” column in the Times?

I’d like to think not, but in reality, how many residents know about Evergreen’s fascinating and rich agricultural history? How many know about an Evergreen Jewel, Villa Lomas Azules, commonly known as Wehner mansion, built by the famous Chicago architectural firm Burnham and Root, who had many buildings at the famous 1893 Chicago World’s Fair? Luckily, it is still patiently waiting continued preservation deep in the foothills.

Is Evergreen striving to become a San Francisco or a Saratoga?

Now how about entertainment? Finally the long-awaited Eastridge Shopping Center renovation is under construction.

Now I won’t have to do all my Christmas shopping at Oak Ridge or Valley Fair. But besides shopping, there will finally be a local bookstore! Going through high school English, living in Evergreen, having Walden’s Books and B. Daltons close almost simultaneously, and the nearest Barnes and Noble being out at Valley Fair, made locating required reading books a huge hassle!

Then of course there is eating out. I know Taco Bell, Wendy’s, and McDonald’s might be considered by some quality restaurant food for a Friday night, but when you eat it on the way to band on Monday, Boy Scouts on Tuesday and choir on Wednesday, then possibly eat at home on Thursday and Sunday, it would be nice to go out as a family and relax, have somebody else cook and clean up on a Friday.

But where to go that’s close, within a 10-minute drive? Red Robin out at Eastridge, and that’s about it. Chili’s, Applebee’s, BJ’s, Chevy’s, Olive Garden, are all off in other communities. Wouldn’t it be nice to allow our community members access to quality family dining entertainment, in addition to the romantic country club restaurants and charming bistros that already exist?

I understand that this situation is a delicate one. With just a few large parcels of land available for mass consumption in Evergreen, the decision must be a careful one.

We as a community must not be so hasty to add so much new housing development that we forget about entertainment and community connection, but at the same time, we must not create so much new development in general that we find ourselves suffocating and forgetting the difference between an apricot and a peach, and that a peach is not supposed to be crunchy like an apple.

I know that the common expression is to go and ask your neighbors to borrow a cup of sugar, but I don’t know if I feel comfortable having houses so close together that I am able to pass my neighbor some toilet paper through my bathroom window. I’ll leave you with one last illustration.

Early one Sunday morning around 8 a.m., I was headed for church with my mom. We were coasting down White Road, with our Starbucks in hand and our McDonald’s breakfast already satisfyingly eaten. It was a quiet, still morning, in the late summer, but not quite near fall. It was one of those beautiful California mornings where the sun is beginning to shine through a lightly clouded sky—meaning the day is going to be stupendous.

We stop at the Tully light for a short second and then it turns green and we begin to drive by the closed Pleasant Hills Golf Course. As we drive by, I am completely taken aback by the tranquil beauty of this golf course that is beginning to return to a natural state, unaltered by gardeners and sprinkler systems.

The mist is still hugging the trunks of softly stoic trees. The well-manicured grass is now longer and appears free and rejoices in various lengths of pale sour apple green, hay bale tan, and barley brown. The gentle slope of the remaining golf course is irrelevant to the heron that flies over and lands in a small pool, no longer a water trap.

For the 30 seconds it takes to pass by those open grasslands of Evergreen, I cannot look away. I feel as if I have been transported to someplace in Maine or looking out into the English moor and wood. It is a scene I can never before remember seeing, and one I sadly think I will not see again.

For a brief moment it is as if I am looking through a window that someone has pulled back for me to look onto my community’s past. I feel transported into a time long forgotten, when Rancho Yerba Buena was first being divided, which has long since been traded for commercialism and the race to be the biggest.

Conversation resumes as my view is left behind me, but the memory of that hauntingly beautiful image I have just seen will never leave me. I feel privileged to have seen what I saw and hope that others will be as lucky someday 10 years in the future. I hope our community can continue to grow in different ways, but not at the complete sacrifice of all the surrounding beauty.

Sincerely,

Andrew Ford
San Felipe and Aborn Roads

[Editor’s Note: Chili’s and Macaroni Grill are scheduled to open at Eastridge in the summer of 2006.]

Proposition 77: A guide for the curious

The advertisements opposing Proposition 77 are so duplicitous, disingenuous and divorced from the proposed text, it is amazing that a substantial minority is planning to vote for it.

The political fog that surrounds the opposition to 77 depends on voters who have not studied it. It is not a perfect document, but is a very worthy one, and deserves a few minutes of your time.

Gerrymandering is the practice of designing Assembly, State Senate or Congressional districts so that only a member of one particular party can win there. California is thoroughly gerrymandered—not a single one of these districts changed political parties in the most recent elections.

Therefore, the representatives of these districts worry very little about being unseated. Therefore, the representatives of these districts are less attentive to the needs of the voters in their districts. Why be attentive if you can’t be unseated?

Another consequence of gerrymandering is that a candidate can take positions which appeal only to the majority party within his or her district, with little regard to minority or moderate views. Therefore, when the Legislature tries to solve California’s problems, there is no one to bridge the divide between right and left, so those problems get patched (at best), not fixed.

Proposition 77 is designed to end gerrymandering by taking the power to make district boundaries away from the Legislature and giving it to three retired judges. These three judges must survive several steps designed to ensure that the boundary plan they produce is as unbiased as is humanly possible—contrary to the utterly false assertions of several political ads.

First, the initial pool of 24 judges must be balanced between Republicans and Democrats. Second, the pool is reduced to 12 as each of the four legislative leaders—two Republican, two Democrat—gets to nominate three of these judges for further consideration, but the judges picked by each of these four must be from a party different from his or her own.

That is, the two Republicans can’t pick Republicans, and the two Democrats can’t pick Democrats. This step alone will remove most bias, but the protections don’t stop there. Next, each of these four leaders gets to remove one of the nominated 12 (thereby leaving eight judges), making the possibility of a biased remaining judge even more remote.

From these eight, the final three judges are drawn by lot, and each of the two major parties must be represented. Ex parte communications are restricted, public hearings must be held, the effect of the plan on current legislators and parties must be disregarded and the selection of any plan must be unanimous.

The plan must produce districts which are contiguous, compact and follow existing city and county lines to the extent practicable. Finally, the voters get to approve or disapprove the plan selected, after its first use.

If you think gerrymandering is a serious problem, and if these protections against bias are satisfactory to you, Proposition 77 deserves your vote.

Charles Berry
Mendocino, Calif.

Iraq war is the new “widowmaker”

Dear editor:
Loggers call large branches that fall from tall trees “widowmakers.” These branches typically fall butt down. If they hit a logger, “ZAP,” a new widow has been made.

The Iraq war is a new “widowmaker.” Must we continue to make widows to ‘honor” those who have already given their lives?

While in some wars it may be appropriate to honor those who give their lives by making more widows, etc., the pre-emptive Iraq war with its changing purpose/justification is not one of them.

Mike Zimmerman
The Villages

Thank you to the “Good Samaritans” at Chisin Street

Dear editor:
I would like to take this opportunity to express my gratitude to all the people who helped rescue me when I had an accident last September. My family and I would like to thank all the men and women who showed up, called an ambulance and took me out of my car!

I’m so thankful for their concern toward helping other people in need of help—it is so genuine. Their camaraderie is so amazing! May God bless you all for having good hearts, including your whole families.

To the owner of the house that I crashed into, I’m deeply sorry that I landed into your house. I hope you understand that I did not mean to do this. I thought it was the end of my life, but thank God, I was saved.

A BIG THANK YOU TO ALL and ditto to the Evergreen Times for offering a space to the people to write to the editor. More power to you all!

The Rivera Family,
Evergreen residents

Have an opinion?

Let the Evergreen Times hear from you. In order to be considered, letters must be signed by the author or come with the name in an email and have author’s phone number, which will not be printed. Send letters to bea@timesmediainc.com, or via mail to:

The Evergreen Times
1310 Tully Road, Ste. 107
San Jose, CA 95122