Stay Engaged to Preserve Your Interests

A few years ago no one would have thought that CUSD would close schools even though: 

• CUSD has the most crowded schools in the area
• 30% of primary school classrooms are non-permanent portable structures
• The district is projecting a $39M surplus over the next five years
• And the savings from school closure are minimal

Why do our elected leaders take such decisions?

Part of the reason is that they do not face repercussions for their decisions.

And that happens because they have well-oiled machinery to misdirect residents.

One leg of that machinery is media outlets which spread fear, uncertainty and doubt (FUD) among residents; and the other leg of that is suppression of dialogue among residents which challenges that FUD.

In this email, we focus on the second aspect: the suppression of free dialogue by the coterie of ex-mayors to harm residents’ interests. 

Kent Vincent and Censorship on Nextdoor

Kent Vincent has been living in Cupertino for more than 40 years. He worked at HP Labs where he (co)authored more than 50 patents before his “retirement”. For the past 15 years, he has been organizing large travel groups to destinations all over the world.

Earlier this month, Kent wrote a post on Nextdoor challenging the premise of the editorial published by San Jose Mercury News about the Cupertino elections.

Kent’s post was marked as disrespectful, and deleted, twice, from the platform by Nextdoor lead. 

Not surprisingly, the six leads who deleted Kent’s post, are vocal cheer-leaders of investor interests on various forums and curtail any discussion which challenges the investor’s narrative.

We are sharing the screenshots of those who voted to delete Kent’s post to suppress discussion, and also the content of the original post below.

Kent Vincent’ Post

Jollyman/Faria • 3 Nov

There is a dynamic in the Cupertino Council race that bothers me. As in recent past elections, our six candidates are marketed by two PACs, three candidates supported by a pro-development PAC of past Cupertino mayors predominantly residing on the west end of Cupertino and three candidates supported by a “sensible growth” development PAC of individuals predominantly residing on the east side of Cupertino. 

Virtually all of the high rise, high density, high traffic generating “big city” development that has been built or planned for Cupertino in recent years has been approved exclusively for the east of Hwy 85 east side and its residents by the Councils of the west end PAC mayors. This includes the ill-fated amendment of a Vallco General Plan in 2014 having no building height limitation that now allows the build of multiple 20-story skyscrapers on that site via SB35.

 What bothers me is that most of those pro-development PAC leaders personally live in neighborhoods isolated from the impact of their development decisions, areas of low traffic where significant development has not occurred for 40 years nor is planned. It is very easy to be pro-development altruistic when development you approve always occurs in someone else’s neighborhood and doesn’t negatively impact you personally. 

I have good fortune to know most of the leaders of both PACs and view all as very decent, well-meaning leaders and residents that I respect and applaud for their commitment to our community. I am bothered, however, that the west end PAC and its influenced San Jose Mercury News editorials have labeled the east side PAC and its slate of current Council members and candidates as “nimbies” (not in my back yard) on development. 

That’s “calling the kettle black” in my opinion. Always approving “yes in your backyard” development is just a different form of “not in my back yard” (NIMBY). Fact is, virtually no one wants high rise, high density, traffic impacting development in their neighborhood. We’re all NIMBYs in that sense. In my view, any candidate running on a platform of pro-development (altruistic or otherwise) should state willingness to bear the negative impact of their approvals in the part of the city where they live.  

I know the PAC leaders read Nextdoor and I look forward to their comments. Do I have a valid concern?

A reminder of how desperate the coterie of ex-mayors was to label our Harvard and Princeton educated resident focused council members as “bums” and “scoundrels” since they resisted the deep-pocketed investors.