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Milpitas makes Dagupan City an official sister city

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:00:04 GMT

Philippines sister cityA delegation from Dagupan City in the Philippines visited Milpitas last month to officially mark the continuation of their sister city relationship. On Nov. 27, representatives from both cities signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) to solidify their commitment to collaboration and cultural exchange.Visiting dignitaries included Dagupan City Mayor Belen Fernandez; city councilmembers Michael Fernandez, Dennis Canto and Jeslito Seen; several members of Dagupan City’s executive team; student council leaders; and local representatives from the Dagupan City Association of Northern California.Milpitas hosted the delegation from Dagupan for two days. The itinerary included Milpitas city facility tours, information sessions led by the city’s department directors and student interactions at Milpitas High School.New HR directorMilpitas City Manager Ned Thomas has appointed Kelli Parmley as human resources director, effective Jan. 8, 2024. Parmley served as assistan...

Cupertino’s shuttle making stops in Santa Clara

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:00:04 GMT

Hop over to Santa ClaraSilicon Valley Hopper, the Via-Cupertino on-demand shuttle service, now offers trips to Santa Clara. As of last month, riders can travel from Cupertino to popular destinations such as Westfield Valley Fair, Santa Clara University and Santa Clara Town Center.The Santa Clara expansion will occur in two phases. Phase 1 includes an 8.5-square-mile area south of El Camino Real, and Phase 2 will expand the service area beyond Levi’s Stadium while increasing the number of fleet vehicles. In addition to expanded coverage, Cupertino has upgraded to an environmentally friendly fleet, transitioning to all-electric Kia Niro vehicles.A Silicon Valley Hopper app is available on Apple’s App Store and the Google Play Store. Fares for the expanded service will remain unchanged at $3.50 for a one-way trip, with 50% discounts for seniors, students, low-income individuals and disabled riders. Wheelchair-accessible vehicles are also available. For more information, visit svhopper....

Midpen gets $2.1M state grant to help newts get safely to breeding grounds

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:00:04 GMT

Midpeninsula Regional Open Space District (Midpen) was awarded a $2.1 million state grant last month for the Alma Bridge Road Newt Passage Project, aimed at protecting the health of local newt populations and promoting habitat connectivity.The grant from the California Wildlife Conservation Board will allow preliminary designs to be completed for newt passage improvements along approximately 5 miles of Alma Bridge Road near the Lexington Reservoir. Santa Clara County owns and maintains the road, and Midpen is working with the county and other partners to help implement the project.Each year during the rainy season, California and rough-skinned newts migrate from their dry-season habitats in Midpen’s Sierra Azul Open Space Preserve to wet habitats beyond the preserve boundaries where they breed and lay eggs. The migration path for this population of newts includes crossing Alma Bridge Road to reach Lexington Reservoir, resulting in high newt mortality due to vehicle strikes. The issu...

Gifts from lavish Murphy family wedding on exhibit in Sunnyvale

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:00:04 GMT

Society wedding exhibitThe Sunnyvale Historical Society is exhibiting gifts from the wedding of Martin Murphy Jr.’s granddaughter, Mary Genevieve, as well as photographs, dinner sets and books the family collected at the Sunnyvale Heritage Park Museum through February 2024.Mary Genevieve Murphy had a lavish wedding to Henry Ward Wright at her father B. D. Murphy’s opulent residence in San Jose in 1890. The wedding was covered by no fewer than four local newspapers. The San Francisco Bulletin featured a full-length article on the occasion, including a minute description of the many costly gifts the couple received. According to one newspaper’s account, “Society was joyous in the expectancy of an event of such brilliancy as has never been witnessed before and would not again very soon.”This brilliancy was reflected in the wedding gifts. The exhibit includes an old grandfather clock, tapestries and collections of silver and china, including service pieces from famous porcelain manufact...

World champion Almaden Valley team hosts Lego League qualifier

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:00:04 GMT

Twenty-four First Lego League (FLL) teams from eight Bay Area cities came to Leland High School last month to compete in the FLL Quixilver Qualifier. The event, hosted by the Leland’s FIRST Robotics Competition Team FRC 604 Quixilver, attracted 135 students and their parents and coaches.There are 550 FLL teams in NorCal, the fourth largest region in the US and Canada. The FLL season starts each August when a new challenge is released. The teams build and program robots using the Lego Education robotics kits that have motors, sensors and gyros.Teams could enter their robots in up to 15 “missions” during the competition. In addition, team members worked on a research project based on the year’s theme, “Masterpiece,” showing how STEM and technology are used in the arts. At the competition, teams met with judges who evaluated their robots’ design and programming, their research project and how the students demonstrated the six core values of the FLL program: discovery, innovation, impac...

The new Bay Area suburban starter home comes with an elevator, shared walls

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:00:04 GMT

The homes Brookfield Properties is building in Dublin are typical of those that draw first-time buyers to the suburbs — 2,200 square feet, two-car garages and enough bedrooms to support a growing family.But there’s one major difference: shared walls.In the Bay Area, the single-family home hegemony of the suburbs is crumbling under the weight of prices. As land costs increase, developers looking to rein in expenses must build up and attached, rather than outward.Welcome to the condo era — the Bay Area’s new starter home.“We’re going vertical,” said Emily Boyd, director of land acquisition at San Francisco-based Brookfield.In 1995, single-family detached homes made up 75% of newly built housing units in the Bay Area. Now, that number is just 37%, according to U.S. Census Bureau data.“Anything in the core Bay Area, we’re really relegated to doing infill projects,” said Josh Santos, president of Landsea, a developer building condos in Alameda, Sunnyvale and Dublin.For many, the si...

Former Los Gatos Chamber head opens Centerpiece Floral Shop

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:00:04 GMT

For Catherine Somers, her job as executive director of the Los Gatos Chamber of Commerce was the culmination of a long-held dream. After leaving the Chamber earlier this year, Somers is fulfilling yet another dream.“I always wanted to work for a Chamber of Commerce and have a flower shop,” she said.To check the second box, Somers recently opened Centerpiece Floral Shop in the original Grocer + Goddess location across from Trent Pottery in downtown Los Gatos.Somers’ first foray into flowers was with a floral company in Boston called Winston Flowers, where she worked for seven years, where she helped put on large-scale events, a skill that came in handy in her eight years with the Chamber. After stepping down as executive director, she worked briefly for Bunches in Los Gatos before finding a spot to open her own shop.Her background in event planning came into play when setting up shop in the former Grocer + Goddess, which is being converted into a salon for corporate meetings and even...

Latest line: A good week for Kamala Harris, a bad week for Kevin McCarthy

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:00:04 GMT

Kamala HarrisOakland-born vice president, the nation’s first female and Black VP, makes history again by casting her 32nd tie-breaking vote in the US Senate, breaking the record of John C. Calhoun, a South Carolina slavery advocate who served from 1825 to 1832.    Kevin McCarthyBakersfield Republican, who was Speaker of the House for only 10 months before being ousted by his hard-right colleagues in October, announces he will quit Congress, leaving Republicans with only a 2-vote, dysfunctional majority.   Gavin NewsomAnalysts report California faces a $68 billion budget deficit next year due to declining tax revenue. Meanwhile, a new poll shows 68% support for Prop 1, the governor’s March ballot measure to fund mental health facilities for homeless people. 

Is an $800M boost from the state helping solve homelessness in the Bay Area?

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:00:04 GMT

Hillview Court was designed as a place where some of the Bay Area’s most vulnerable homeless residents could gain enough stability to piece their lives back together. But since the Milpitas housing site opened in 2021, the former hotel has experienced hundreds of emergency calls, repeated reports of insect infestations and multiple overdose deaths.Earlier this year, the decomposing body of one tenant went undiscovered for days until a neighbor reported an overpowering odor seeping from the apartment. The coroner’s office determined Ricardo Mendoza, 38, had died of an overdose.“They opened the door, and that smell, you will never forget that smell,” said Bijou Crayes, a neighbor who had requested the wellness check. “It hurts my heart because that was my best friend.”Hillview Court Apartments resident, Bijou Crayes, with a card from the memorial service for former resident, Ricardo Mendoza, 38, who was found dead of a drug overdose in his apart...

Share the Spirit: This San Mateo man — a former inmate — is now saving lives

Published Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:00:04 GMT

SAN LEANDRO — He hadn’t yet made it through the doors when his body crumpled to the ground.There lay André X. La Monte-Lee, a 58-year-old man, a gentle man, a kind man, a musician who had once played gigs across the Bay Area but had gotten his heart broken, turned to drugs, became addicted to crystal meth and found himself living on the streets.He made it to the doorstep of the Cherry Hill Sobering Center just before his body gave out. It was maybe his 50th time there. He lost count. Folks at the clinic knew him by name.“André?” asked a familiar voice. “You good?”“Yeah,” he said. “I just want to lay here.”The familiar voice was Anthony Bass, an addict since he was 11 years old, when he got hooked on the same drugs his family members were using.He ran away from his San Mateo home when he was 11, and spent his adolescent years living on the streets and bouncing in and out of juvenile detention too many times to count.“I put my hands on a lot of people I shouldn’t have,R...