Posts by Take Back San Jose

Political analyst Kira Davis explains, via X, why SCC is (you heard this right) still counting ballots and determining winners a week after Election Day. Since CA legally prohibits ID verification at the polls, volunteers must painstakingly—and often subjectively, Davis claims—verify signatures, one at a time. A lot of people ask why it takes California…

Image by Apionid on Flickr California has enough rainfall to address local droughts, claims CPC’s water policy director Edward Ring—but the State regularly and wastefully dumps water into SF Bay to try to save the Delta smelt fish. Why, decades after this program began, is the smelt fish population no better off—while Bay Areans are…

Palo Alto councilmember Greg Tananka says that local governments should not ignore the real message of the November 5 election: The People want lean, efficient government. An Opp Now exclusive. The recent presidential election signals a growing demand for government efficiency at all levels. With the President-elect establishing the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) at the…

Image by Wikimedia Commons San Francisco Mayor London Breed recently celebrated new data showing that the number of people living in tents in the city has hit its lowest point in six years. This comes after Breed—in response to SCOTUS’ Grants Pass decision—began more vigorous encampment amelioration. KCBS reports on the latest numbers. In August,…

Image by Bearrobotics.ai The data re: the impact of the State’s and Silicon Valley’s increased minimum wage for fast food workers is in, and it’s grim: jobs are down a net 5,400 this year, and employees have actually lost earnings amounting to $37 million. 93% of employers say they’ll need to further raise their prices…

As a TCN member, you get to read the same news briefing Tucker Carlson does every weekday. Here’s today’s roundup. The Latest  TRASH TALK: Trump Flaunts Garbage Vest, Truck Following Biden Smear Donald Trump held an impromptu press conference from inside a Trump-branded garbage truck Wednesday, leaning into Joe Biden’s slanderous characterization of MAGA supporters…

Gustave Caillebotte: The House Painters, 1877 Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association’s Susan Shelley, in the OC Register, analyzes the State’s $10 bn Proposition 2 for school building repairs. Sneakily in its ballot language lies the promise to use a “Project Labor Agreement,” a.k.a., collective bargaining contract that’s widely known to increase wage expenses and privilege union…

Image generated using Dall-E Looks like the ABC’s of our regional agencies all end up spelling MTC. If Prop 5 passes, Bay Areans can expect to see massive tax hikes to pay for BAHFA’s next multi-billion-dollar housing bond. But who runs BAHFA—and ABAG, for that matter? Marin Post’s Bob Silvestri argues that the MTC is…

Friends, This is the time. The time for D3 to come together.  To collaborate and put differences behind.  And to unify around a new beginning for our community’s politics. I’m talking, of course, about the sad collapse of local faith for our elected councilmember, Omar Torres.  His authority as our representative has been fundamentally compromised by revelations…

Image by Sunshine Profits Prop 5 will release a massive infusion of affordable housing bonds into local elections, like the Bay Area’s dead-but-not-forgotten RM4. Yet what does “affordable” mean? In his comprehensive post-mortem of that $20 billion boondoggle, Marin Post’s Bob Silvestri examines how BAHFA’s cure for housing is worse than the disease. Lower-income property…