Our first try at endorsement of Gilroy City Council candidates was modestly successful with the election of two of our four candidates. We are so proud of Carol Marques who received 8141 votes

Gilroy Growing Smarter’s own vice chair, Carol Marques, announced she will be running for city council for the 2-year term. Voters will be able to vote for one candidate for the 2-year term.
 
Regular observer in GGS meetings and Chair of the Planning Commission, Tom Fischer, announced he will be running for the 4-year term

Downtown: Carol and Linda are currently meeting with the council members again to see how things are moving along since they last met. After meeting, they will publicly publish their document of ideas to reflect the progress

In early February, members Linda West and Carol Marques, met with the mayor, city administrator and all council members individually to discuss six action items that GGS wanted to see accomplished. We cannot take full credit for these action items as the GDBA (Gilroy Downtown Business Association) is responsible for many of these ideas. The City Council, at their annual strategic planning session this past February, addressed our concerns and set goals listed at the end of this document.

Our goal, with the GPAC, is to help guide the commission towards the realization that a healthy city has to have a thriving center and well-utilized land.  All over the city you can find shuttered buildings, open

Carol led the discussion about why more businesses are not moving into downtown- the answer is that the planning department is not user friendly. They found out that there is 90 -day turnaround and other requirements after initial steps are completed.

Our purpose was to preserve prime agricultural land, focus development inward and promote the revitalization of our historic downtown core. We strongly feel that compact development will benefit the City of Gilroy in many ways and that having the High Speed Rail station downtown (adjacent to our historic Caltrain depot and multi-modal transportation hub) will stimulate economic development in Gilroy through Transit Oriented Development.

Carol Marques and Linda West have also been meeting with city staff to see what can be done about the empty buildings, façade improvements, keeping the area clean and the implementation of Main Street USA. Carol asked the group for approval for them to state that GGS also wants to see improvements made in the downtown. The unanimous consensus was that Carol and Linda could state that GGS is in agreement as they continue to meet with those involved with the downtown.

At a Council Study Session on Dec. 6th two topics will be discussed: the Highway 101 CHSR alignment options that have been analyzed by the High-Speed Rail Authority, and staff's comments on the three other alignments currently under consideration by the Authority (East Gilroy, Downtown Viaduct and Downtown Embankment). Staff comments do not 

The meeting was called to order by Chair, Connie Rogers at 7:00 PM at the Gilroy Library. Introductions were made and guest, Paul Ledesma, from the Committee for Green Foothills was welcomed