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Top Stories: Oct. 30, 2009Reed Rings Biden; Safe San Jose; Downtown Health Clinicby Staff on Oct 30, 2009”Girafa" Graffiti Artist Arrested by SJPD Most people know Steven Free as "Girafa." The 30-year-old San Francisco resident made a name for himself throughout the Bay Area dabbing his trademark giraffe logo on buildings everywhere from Contra Costa to Alameda, but most of all in San Jose. Free was arrested by the SJPD in San Francisco on Tuesday and charged with 10 felony counts of vandalism in San Jose, accounting for some $40,000 in damages. Police are now seeking additional information from the public before proceeding with the case. Read More at the Mercury News. Forbes Lists San Jose as Nation's Eighth Safest City San Jose has reason to be proud. Forbes magazine listed the city as the nation's eighth safest. The list was based on four specific factors: violent crime, workplace fatality rates, traffic death rates, and natural disaster risks. The city scored relatively high in the first three categories—it was ranked the second safest city for violent crime, after Portland. The greatest problem it faced was "natural disaster risk," in which it placed 38th. The safest city in the country, according to Forbes, is Minneapolis-St. Paul. San Jose is ranked slightly above New York—while we may have our earthquakes and fires, they have far more violent crime. Read More at Forbes. Search Starts Over for New Health Clinic Location The Chavez Building seemed like the perfect spot for a new clinic in downtown San Jose. The 10-story building is centrally located, spacious, and best of all, it had already been used as a hospital in the past. But it has also been out of use since 1996, and Gary Graves, the COO of Santa Clara County, decided that it would be much too costly to refurbish. Instead, he has the county looking at four alternative sites, and is even considering putting up a new building instead of fixing up an existing one. With the $50 million allotted to the project from the passage of Measure A, that may seem like a reasonable alternative, but at $900 per square foot, it may prove too costly too. Part of the difficulty finding a location is meeting all the necessary conditions for a property to be considered. Not only must the building be located downtown. It must also be adjacent to public transportation and have adequate parking. The minimum size is 40,000 feet, with at least 15,000 feet per floor. Most important, it must meet public health requirements. After investigating almost 30 possibilities, the county has identified at least four properties that meet these prerequisites, as well as several vacant lots. But selecting a site is just the beginning of the difficult task of putting up a health clinic in the heart of downtown San Jose. Though the county will operate the urgent care facility, it still has to choose a community-based organization to run its primary care operations, and that will take some time as well. Read More at the Business Journal. City's Smart Grid Plan Gets the Juice Cut When the Department of Energy released its list of cities and towns that would receive federal stimulus funding to install a smart grid system, there was one notable omission: San Jose. The city and PG&E had applied for money to cover half the cost of their $85 million proposal, and already arranged partnerships with some leading high tech companies, including Cisco, IBM, and the Precourt Energy Efficiency Center at Stanford University. Now that the bid has been rejected, the effort will have to be cut back. Instead of installing 75,000 smart meters in homes and businesses throughout the city, the number will be cut back to 10,000. The participating companies have declared their commitment to pursuing the project despite the grant proposal's rejection, but that did not lessen Mayor Chuck Reed's frustration. "I don’t know why we’re not getting it," said the Mayor, "but when you look at the fact we’re not getting the funding, we need to complain." And complain he did, in a conference call to Vice President Joe Biden, just hours after the news was released. In that call, he argued that California was getting less than its fair share of federal stimulus finding, even hinting that other state's, including Biden's own Delaware, were using stimulus funds to draw businesses away from California—Fisker Automotive of Irvine recently announced that it would refurbish a former GM plant in Delaware to produce hybrid vehicles. Meanwhile, Reed and the other smart grid partners are looking for alternatives to fund the project, which is central to San Jose's "zero emissions" goal. Read More at the Business Journal. San Jose Judge Finds in Favor of Facebook A U.S. District Court judge in San Jose took another bold step in the war against spam by awarding $711 million dollars to Facebook. The company had sued "Spam King" Sanford Wallace for damages, after he accessed the accounts of Facebook members and posted messages on their Walls, in an effort to involve them in a giant phishing scheme. Wallace has since filed for bankruptcy, but a Facebook spokesman said that the company's real objectives—fighting spam—were achieved. Last year Facebook won $873 million, the largest anti-spam judgment ever—from a Canadian spammer who used the site to promote male enhancement drugs. Read More at SFGate. Mom and Baby Kicked Off Flight No one likes a crying baby on an airplane, so when the crew of Monday's Southwest Flight 637 from Amarillo to San Jose asked Pamela Root and her two-year-old child to get off the plane, many people sitting around them smiled. Not Root though. The 38-year-old San Jose resident was furious at the airline and demanded that they compensate her, not only for the flight, but also for the supplies she had to buy because she stayed an extra night in Amarillo. She claimed that she had a "foolproof" way to quiet him down once the flight took off, but that the flight attendants were not willing to listen. Southwest spokeswoman Marilee McInnis said that it was extremely "unsual" to ask a passenger to get off a flight, and that the airline company was looking into the matter. Read More at the Mercury News. by Staff on Oct 30, 2009 |
 The graffitti artist "Girafa" was arrested by San Jose police for defacing public property with murals such as this. |
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