The Sunnyvale Sun

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Citizens are asked to share a vision for a future Sunnyvale

By ERIN HUSSEY

More than 200 Sunnyvale residents, both young and old, came together Oct. 28 to discuss their city's future at the 2006 Visioning Festival. The most common concerns included a commitment to sustainability and the environment, the renovation of the downtown and the city's schools.

"The comments were all positive," Sunnyvale resident Bruce Carlson said. "No one was griping. They were all talking about the future of the city, which I think is remarkable."

After Mayor Ron Swegles welcomed the crowd, Daniel Iacofano of Moore Iacofano Goltsman, Inc. a Berkeley-based planning and design firm, moderated the group session.

"The visioning process is an opportunity to set the framework for the city of Sunnyvale going into the next 20 to 50 years. It will serve as the foundation for the city's General Plan," he said. "But we expect this process to continue days after the festival. We see this as a launching pad."

Tom Carrig, president of the Heritage District Neighborhood Association, was one of the first community members to voice his thoughts.

"The thing that I envision is a zero -energy development in the downtown," he said. "The other thing I think we should do is put the library downtown. Businesses would have more clientele because there are so many people that come to the library."

He encouraged the city to look into solar power and utilize a resource that is readily available to Sunnyvale: the sun. A number of other community members echoed Carrig's thoughts about becoming a more environmentally friendly, sustainable city.

"I am concerned that we say growth in population is a given. We should control that; we should say no," said 20-year Sunnyvale resident Josh Salans, director of the city's new community garden. "My vision of Sunnyvale is that we take control of our city and say what it is we should be doing to be sustainable."

Salans also warned that in 30 years, the oil that brings food to Sunnyvale might not be available and suggested the city look into creating more working farms instead of more corporations.

Two of the youngest people to express their thoughts were Fremont High School students Linh Hoang and Kim Hoang, who ae not related.

"We both addressed our organizations [DECA and Key Club] about what they want to see in the vision of Sunnyvale, and we have three points," Linh said. "One, of course, is the mall. We want a place to hang out. We also want to talk about the Sunnyvale Library; we don't feel it's adequate for our learning experience. We want to suggest a soundproof room where we can study and not be told to be quiet."

Their third issue addressed the possibility of building a second high school for Sunnyvale.

"There are 1,800 students at Fremont right now, and in the future there will be a population growth," Kim said. "I would suggest a second high school because Fremont is located at one side of Sunnyvale, while there are a good number of students that live on the other side."

Kim added that during her freshman year she had to take the bus to and from school. A number of times she had to wait in the rain and was sometimes late for school because the bus she wanted to catch was too full to board.

Other ideas included building a state-of-the-art sports center; building the downtown with a more Santana Row feel; more community gardens; creating more exciting, young adult-oriented attractive restaurants and activities; and using green building.

To share your ideas about the future of Sunnyvale or for more information about the Visioning Festival, visit visioning.inSunnyvale.com.