When the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake destroyed much of Santa Cruz’s Pacific Garden Mall, the merchants set up hard plastic “pavilions” and soldiered on in them as repairs were slowly made to their buildings. These relatively cramped hard plastic tents — unheated, uncooled — made for a crappy shopping experience. But Cruzans made a conscious decision to [...]
“Wow. There’s obviously a little different management style here that goes a long way,” Canepa said when it was his turn. “For me that’s a very delicate issue. We broke contracts, we had fiscal emergencies, we had bankruptcy,” he said. “If you want a leader who can cram that down on people and be able [...]
If you find yourself grumbling about the red ink flowing out of Stockton’s waterfront arena, take heart: other cities go way further overboard in their irrational quest to build arenas and land sports teams. Case in point; El Paso, where the city demolished its City Hall (!) to make way for a stadium for its [...]
Although in today’s column I refer to the city’s deal with Assured Guaranty as a win-win deal, there is in fact a loser: the historic City Hall at 425 N. El Dorado St. Few yet realize the deal to adjust the city’s $169.4 million to Assured cements the city’s unfortuante decision to move lock, stock [...]
I mentioned in passing the Victory Park tennis courts today’s column. They were put up as part of the collateral for Franklin Fund’s 2009 loan of $35.1 million to the city of Stockton for fire and police station improvements, parks and other projects. If the city can’t strike a repayment deal with Franklin, the lender could [...]
Sen. Dianne Feinstein has always guarded her political right flank by serving the interests of Big Ag. More an more, though, she is starting to look less like a liberal who serves some right-wing interests than a wholehearted foe of the Delta. Feinstein’s original water bill would have exported more Delta water. But at least it included $300 million “for [...]
With sadness we learn of the death of Ray McPhillips, a blind, wheelchair-bound pianist/singer who was a rolling catalog of the American songbook. He was 69. McPhillips passed away of unreported causes at La Salette nursing home, where he lived for years. His passing was mourned by pianist Gene Hanten, who did paid gigs for [...]
The drought and state water crisis have amplified calls by water exporters for another dam on the San Joaquin River above Friant Dam near Fresno. More storage does sound reasonable. But an economic analsis by Jeffrey Michael at University of the Pacific’s Business Forecasting Center found that the costs of the proposed Temperance Flat Dam will be twice [...]
Marc Corren writes: “Yesterday’s article on John Muir’s old stomping grounds here in Stockton really caught my attention…especially the address of the home mentioned on Park St….as I lived right next door to that house at 427 E. Park St.which I remember very well because both of our front porches were adjacent to one [...]
A robo-call saying Measure A tax money won’t be spent on cops as promised, and urging people to call Council member Kathy Miller to set things right, is political payback by the Stockton Police Officer’s Association. Aside from Bob Deis, the city manager who stood up to Stockton’s hardest-core public employee union, Miller has been [...]
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