First candidate declares for fall LASD board race

Los Altos resident Martha McClatchie, mother of three Bullis Charter School students, is the first candidate to declare her intent to run for a seat on the Los Altos School District Board of Trustees in the November election.

Three seats will be up for grabs – the terms of Trustees Tammy Logan, Doug Smith and Mark Goines expire this year.

Read more...

Council rejects $88,000 request for additional wayfinding signs

Ellie Van Houtte/Town Crier
Los Altos councilmembers last week rejected additional funding to replace some of the city’s older directional signs.

The Los Altos City Council last week declined to sign off on $88,000 in additional funding for the first phase of the city’s Wayfinding Sign Program.

The request came after the council originally approved the first portion of the two-phase project last summer with a slimmer $165,000 budget – cutting nearly $300,000 from its proposal. The project calls for the replacement and, in several cases, the addition of more streamlined-looking signs that direct motorists to the downtown triangle and other business districts.

Read more...

Local cities flex muscles to promote saving water

It might seem like a drop in the bucket now, but subtle pushes by local governments to implement systemic change in how residents use water are growing.

Joining 37 counties, cities, tribes and districts across California that have already enacted emergency proclamations during the ongoing drought, the Mountain View City Council April 1 activated Stage 1 of a four-stage Urban Water Management Plan. On the same day, state snowpack measurements registered 32 percent of normal. Although the ordinance does not mandate cutbacks, residents are asked to reduce water consumption by 10 percent voluntarily.

Read more...

Open space bond labeled Measure AA

A coalition of community leaders and volunteers has rallied behind a bond measure to provide public access and preserve open land throughout the Midpeninsula Regional Open Space District, which covers 550 square miles and 17 cities from Los Gatos to north of Half Moon Bay.

The $300 million bond – Measure AA on the June 3 ballot – championed by the Yes for Open Space campaign would improve and enhance 25 open-space areas throughout the district, including four in the region encompassing Los Altos, Los Altos Hills, Mountain View, Palo Alto and Sunnyvale.

Read more...

Police Blotter

Child endangerment charges dropped

The Santa Clara County District Attorney’s Office is no longer pursuing child endangerment charges against two 18-year-old males arrested in connection with the March 16 arson fire on Fordham Way in Mountain View.

Deputy District Attorney Sumerle Davis told the Town Crier last week that she’s no longer moving forward with charges against Brandon Pak and Gilbert Gomes after reviewing the “information provided at the time.”

Read more...

Al the barber bids farewell : Downtown icon spent 67 years cutting hair, trading jokes

Ellie Van Houtte/Town Crier
Al Galedrige is retiring from Al’s Barber Shop after more than six decades in Los Altos.

The business Al Galedrige built is older than Los Altos itself. He opened Al’s Barber Shop in 1948 – four years before Los Altos was incorporated.

But no one can claim that Galedrige cut his career short by retiring last week at age 88.

Read more...