This Week with the Mayor: March 4-10

Its been another busy week in Mountain View, which is not unusual. In addition to meetings with City Staff to deal with a number of administrative issues, responding to questions and phone calls from all of you and attending the Council Meeting on Tuesday, there were a few unique events.

Speaking of the Council Meeting, we heard a report on the results of the polling we undertook to evaluate whether a parcel tax to support affordable housing was viable.

Not surprisingly, there was not two thirds support for such a tax, but what was interesting was that almost 60 percent of those polled supported the concept, which seems to indicate that there is a lot of support in Mountain View for affordable housing so that we continue to have a diverse community. The Council also decided to continue evaluating an impact fee to be assessed on new apartment developments to provide for the creation of affordable rental housing.  The Council also considered referring several potential projects to the Planning Commission for preliminary evaluation and then began the annual goal setting process for the coming year. More on that in the future.

During the course of the week, I attended the City Managers State of the City presentation to the City Staff. It is an interesting presentation that highlights "A day in the life of the City" and while it is chock full of facts and details, it was still very interesting. It was proof positive of just how much is happening in our town.

Later that day, I had the opportunity to attend the Synopsis Competition of the Santa Clara Valley Science and Engineering Fair.  There were over 500 students from 8th through 12th grade presenting their experiments and projects for judging. I was awed by the depth and breadth of the work being done. This is the same competition that was featured at the White House earlier this winter. Based on what I saw, our technological future is in good hands!

The day ended with a preview of what the new Packard Childrens Hospital will look like. In order to help with planning, the hospital created mock ups of the patient rooms and operating theaters to see how everything worked together. While not an inexpensive venture, planners learned a lot during the process which will save time and money during construction. While not in Mountain View, Childrens Hospital is a great regional asset, and in fact, Packard has one floor at the new El Camino Hospital.

The week drew to a close at NASA Ames with our quarterly meeting with the Center Director, Pete Worden. The City and NASA Ames have a great relationship and we work closely with the director and his staff. Needless to say, a lot is happening at NASA and the Research Park. Following our meeting, NASA opened the Science Expo which again highlighted the International Space Station and the opportunities to conduct research on the Space Station.

That about wraps up the week, although this weekend is Arbor Day and Opening Day!