{"id":95,"date":"2008-07-12T08:19:45","date_gmt":"2008-07-12T16:19:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/dianafoss.com\/blog\/2008\/07\/slough-of-despond\/"},"modified":"2009-05-05T15:11:32","modified_gmt":"2009-05-05T23:11:32","slug":"slough-of-despond","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/dianafoss.com\/blog\/2008\/07\/slough-of-despond\/","title":{"rendered":"Slough of Despond"},"content":{"rendered":"


\nDick Santos has had it up to here.<\/small><\/p>\n

Paul Rogers has written a good article<\/a> in this morning’s Mercury<\/i> about the Alviso Slough Restoration Project, in the run-up to Wednesday’s public meeting. I would go farther in stressing that the strong feeling among Alvisans in support of this project seems to come from their living sense of historical grievance. I do understand how a community that has been flooded so many times in recent memory might not trust the powers that be, but why involve hydrological engineers at all if you don’t accept their findings?<\/p>\n

I think that the important thing for Alviso has become the mere spending of large amounts of money on Alviso. The proposed Gold Street Education Center is another example: the discussion at the Board meeting on 24 June focused on what a wonderful amenity it would be for the community, with no mention of the programs it’s supposed to foster, or who would provide or even attend them.<\/p>\n

Although the charges of neglecting Alviso are usually aimed at San Jose, it’s the Santa Clara Valley Water District that has the big bucks. As the article says, spending $22 million on this project is taking away from other, county-wide flood protection priorities. Everyone who lives in Santa Clara County has a stake in this, and I encourage everyone to attend the public meeting on Wednesday the 16th at 7:00 at George Mayne Elementary School.<\/p>\n