Visitors who tour the Silicon Valley Advanced Purification Center in Alviso get a firsthand look at the technology used to turn recycled wastewater into water purified to a level that meets California’s drinking standards.
At the end of the tour, guests receive a sample of wastewater-turned-purified-drinking-water. Time and again, the Valley Water tour guides hear the same message: This water is as good, if not better, than people’s current drinking water.
I was recently asked, “How did the Los Altos History Museum get land in the middle of the civic center?” This is a very relevant question amid all the happenings on the civic center campus.
I want to say thank you for the honor and privilege of serving as mayor of Los Altos this past year.
I was looking over my goals when I first ran for Los Altos City Council in 2012 and again in 2016. What did I recognize as problems, and where did I want to focus my energy? And what has been accomplished since then? I will touch on seven areas.
As parents who care deeply about our local public schools, we entrusted the Los Altos School District to run a fair and representative community engagement process around facilities. We were told that the process would help result in solutions to address the long-term facilities needs for all district students, including finding a permanent site for Bullis Charter School. We attended info sessions, participated in charrettes, listened to others, shared our opinions and participated in workshops. As we near the end of the process, we are becoming increasingly concerned that its flawed design works against true community engagement.
This process of voting on proposals was stacked against the charter school. Bullis Charter School may be the largest public school within the district, and the only school with a fully integrated K-8 teaching model, but together we make up only 20% of the district public school population. Bullis Charter School parents, by percentage, were quite engaged at the workshops and charrettes. No matter how many showed up, we were always going to be outnumbered.
It’s that time of year for walking along forest trails, parks, streets, the backyard or anywhere in the neighborhood. Who doesn’t enjoy kicking up piles of newly fallen foliage and hearing the crunching, crackling sound made by dried leaves or the schhlurpp of the wet ones?
The first Starbucks opened in Seattle in 1971. Today there are more than 20,000 stores, and business is growing around the globe. Lines form from Brooklyn to Botswana waiting on their orders of demi, grande, venti or trenta of mocha, espresso, dolce, flat, skinny, salted, blonde or latte with triple shots, soy, half-caf, super-heated, iced, room-temp or decaf. If you are in a nanosecond hurry, just shoulder past the peons for your day-starter at the mobile-order mosh pit. The java mumbo jumbo has unfortunately moved into our own Waterworld.
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