The Sunnyvale Sun

Community

Lights, Santa arrive downtown

By Cody Kraatz

About 1,000 people packed Murphy Avenue on Dec. 8 to kick off the Christmas holiday season in a celebration put on by the Sunnyvale Downtown Association, a group of businesses in the city's downtown core.

The cozy, tree-lined avenue was blocked off for the evening, and the association set up with a 25-foot screen to show the 1966 version of How the Grinch Stole Christmas.

Per tradition, Mayor Otto Lee flipped the switch to turn on all the decorative lights on the avenue, as well as on the Christmas tree, and then Santa Claus--played by former mayor Fred Fowler--rode in on a Sunnyvale Department of Public Safety fire engine.

Other activities included arts and crafts, a Fremont High School choir performance and hot chocolate--the only thing that wasn't free.

"We lose money on it every year," said Joel Wyrick, executive director of the SDA. "But that's not the goal. The goal is to give back something to the community."