I appreciate your concern for taxpayer dollars. I have always believed that the residents of our community deserve to know how their money is being spent.

I use this opportunity to correct some misinformation and clarify issues raised in Sandy Brundage's July 15 article, "City invests $2.6 million for fields--no oversight":

1. The headline is wrong. The city has not invested this amount, and there is plenty of oversight of the project.

2. $2 million has not been set aside in the District 10 Parks Fund for the McKean Road Sports Complex. This park fund does contain a line item, "Reserve: Sports Field Development," for $650,000.

3. The McKean Road Sports Complex has more oversight than any public project I have ever been involved with. At least twice monthly, representatives from the city manager's office, city attorney's office, planning department, parks & recreation department, the Santa Clara Valley Water District, and my office meet with the Almaden Youth Association to discuss the progress of the project.

4. The $150,000 Healthy Neighborhoods Venture Fund grant has not been given to the AYA. The city still holds these funds and they will not be disbursed to the organization until we have a signed contract on file. In addition, the grant can be used for construction of the fields.

5. To date, actual public investment in this project totals $444,000 (not $594,000 as the article states):

* $50,000 in October 2002 as initial seed money for the project;

* $100,000 in May 2003 for the initial EIR;

* $294,000 in November 2003 for the EIR amendment to address community concerns.

Parks and sports fields represent a significant public investment in our youth. These fields play a critical role in keeping our children healthy and from participating in unhealthy or dangerous activities. Under the public-private partnership with the AYA, San Jose will be able to leverage a small amount of public money to help the community invest in themselves.

Such arrangements are very successful. The recent renovations to Parma Park (Jake's Play Lot) cost nearly $1 million, but more than 40 percent of the money came from grass-roots fundraising efforts by the local community.

Youth sports bring us all together. Spending Saturdays at the park watching children play sports forms friendships among players and their families that often last for years. As a vibrant city, San Jose needs to continually provide and upgrade amenities for its growing population, especially its youth.

Pat Dando

San Jose Vice Mayor

The Almaden Resident stands by its story. --Editor

Transparency, integrity
would have helped

It took me a few days to respond to you about the article about the Almaden Youth Association and the effort to build the McKean Road Sports Complex. I was in a state of disbelief that reporter Sandy Brundage was able to put together such a well-written, thorough article, especially considering the runaround she was up against. So congratulations are in order for asking the questions that no other media has asked and for taking the time to make this article something of substance.

Several people have sent me notes saying they want to write a letter to the editor, but they're so stunned they feel like they need time to absorb what's been published first.

I think about when the Almaden Resident first began this investigation several months back. Thanks so much for sticking with it and not taking the shortcuts that produced the multiple "nothing" articles that have preceded this one. Really, the only other very good article on this did come from the Resident when Anne Ward Ernst wrote one. It was refreshing to read another article that wasn't merely a "he said, she said" piece.

You know, if this project was handled in a reasonable manner--with transparency, integrity and truthfulness--the whole community would be in a better position today. All the opposition did was speak out about issues that were so accurate that those same issues were the reasons that the first two environmental reports failed. Yet, the South Almaden Valley Rural Alliance, as one of the primary opponents, has been labeled NIMBY, as well as being met with hostility and disregard from the proponents. If the sports complex proponents had handled the project reasonably and with integrity and truthfulness, however, they would have stopped wasting public money when county officials told them that this project does not conform to the open space reserve land-use designation and cannot be developed here.

It's a shame for everyone, and more so for the many who could have put all that wasted money to good use.

Nancy Lascola

President, South Almaden Valley Rural Alliance

Financial situation
requires fast action

As the treasurer of several organizations in the past, and as a current treasurer of a family charitable foundation, I was appalled to read about the apparent financial mismanagement of the Almaden Youth Association organization.

A rather weak excuse is offered that this is a volunteer board and they don't have time. Hello! "You take a job; you do the job," volunteer or paid.

I am also a member of a community board, which is made up entirely of volunteers. We know what our financial status is because we have a capable treasurer who issues monthly cash-flow and financial-position documents.

If our board was experiencing the same treasury condition that AYA is apparently facing, the required action would be clear; the treasurer would have to be replaced. If our board did not take this action, it would be irresponsible and it itself would need to be replaced.

Bob Boydston

President, Almaden Valley Community Association

Who will pay for city's
gross negligence?

Thank you for bringing to light the lack of financial oversight by the city and the AYA on this community project. AYA donors should certainly be outraged for the lack of financial disclosure coming from the AYA board. But donors can ameliorate the situation by not contributing to the AYA and making contributions to nonprofit organizations that prove worthy of support.

The taxpayers, unfortunately, have no options. We must continue to support government that is increasingly unaccountable for gross negligence. Examples abound: No one was fired or resigned in the East Side Union High School District when audits showed improper use of the district's funds by school board members; and no one, to my knowledge, was fired or resigned over the continuing obscene cost overruns on the new San Jose City Hall project. When improprieties or irregularities come to light, everyone involved just wants to "get this behind us and move on."

I wonder if common standards of right and wrong have become a casualty of today's emphasis on multiculturalism, where one set of values is just as good as another, so therefore, there are no values.

Jerry Mungai

Fall River Drive

Overflowing with ID
theft opportunities

I read your article about identity theft in the July 8 issue of the Almaden Resident ("ID thefts investigated at Almaden post office"). On Tuesday, July 6, I was at the Almaden post office at 9:15 a.m. to drop off my credit card payment. As I drove up to the blue boxes in the parking lot, I saw that all three of them were full to the brim with mail. They were so full, in fact, the mail was bulging out. A postal worker was taking the mail out of the box along Crown Boulevard, and I mentioned to him that the mail was almost falling out of the boxes in the parking lot. He looked annoyed with me and told me that he was there to pick it up.

I decided to take my payment envelope inside, where it was safer to drop it off. When I returned to my car, the postal worker was finally getting to the parking-lot boxes. As he was scooping the mail out of a box, he dropped a piece of mail and it landed underneath his cart. I spoke to him again, to tell him he had dropped a piece of mail. Again he looked annoyed, but told me to have a nice day (through his teeth).

Your readers should consider dropping their mail inside the post office. Someone could have easily taken a handful of mail that day and then driven off. Also, the time of pickup on the box says 9 a.m., and clearly the postal worker was late--all this after the Fourth of July holiday.

Linda York

Firewood Court