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Speak Out
Donation benefits WG soccer team
On behalf of the Willow Glen Boys' Varsity Soccer team, I would like to thank the Willow Glen Resident for its generous donation of 125 shirts to our soccer team. They are the most popular piece of apparel on campus.
Your donation has enabled us to sell the shirts as a fundraiser, which in turn allowed us to purchase warm-ups, balls and much-needed beanies to keep our heads warm and dry during the rain.
I look forward to seeing you at our games!
Sue Parisi
Head Boys' Soccer Coach
Willow Glen High School
Willow Glen lucky to have Yeager
I want to go on record to praise the personal concern and sensitivity to the special needs of his constituents shown by District 6 City Councilman Ken Yeager.
Recently I organized a surprise 90th birthday, Sunday-afternoon celebration at Lou's Village for George Garbarino, who is known in Willow Glen neighborhoods as our unofficial "mayor." Some 90 people attended--friends, family and neighbors who wanted to honor this kindly, gregarious man with a personal show of their affection and regard. Among them was Yeager.
Though he had never met Garbarino, Yeager came to present a Council Resolution his office had secured, commending this lifelong San Josean and 50-year Willow Glen resident for his World War II service and many years of involvement with the community.
From my years of work in the nonprofit sector, I know how these things are usually done. Such resolutions do normally get presented to the honoree in person, but the presenter is invariably a staff person or aide of some sort, not the elected official himself. Typically the staffer is at the function only a few minutes, arriving just before and leaving right after the presentation, unless the honoree is a "mover and shaker." Yeager, on the other hand, arrived early and stayed for the entire party, yet Garbarino is certainly no major business or political honcho.
That Yeager made the extra effort to give hours of his time--on a weekend--to attend the full celebration, as well as to make the presentation, shows the strength of his personal commitment to his community responsibilities. What's more, it speaks volumes about his caring nature and desire to do the best for the people of Willow Glen.
Thank you, Ken. I'm proud to have you as our representative on the San Jose City Council.
Judy Semas
Willow Street
Flags along Lincoln are not a good idea
Despite the good intentions of District 6 City Councilman Ken Yeager, the Willow Glen Business and Professional Association and the Willow Glen Neighborhood Association, as reported Dec. 5, sticking 200 American flags up along Lincoln Avenue was a very bad idea. Here's why.
The flag should not be treated like a decoration, as if it were just one of many multicolored balloons draped along the walls for a high school prom. It deserves a high pole, centered in a courtyard, where people can look up to it with the respect it deserves.
Contrast this with the 200 limp pieces of bunting which we now see on Lincoln Avenue, attached to flimsy rods and sticking out at odd angles from the trunks of trees in which birds roost at night.
Which raises a second point. Proper respect for the flag requires that it be taken down at night, or illuminated by a spotlight to highlight it in the darkness. No such respect is being given to these flags. Those who drive down a deserted Lincoln Avenue at midnight see 200 cold, wet, multicolored rags hanging limply in the flickering light of scattered streetlamps.
The flags should be thinned to no more than three on the side of each block. They should be individually illuminated or put up and taken down each day. If this cannot be done, then the flags should be removed completely. To do otherwise is to continue with the current situation: 200 nightly insults to the flag and an embarrassment to the neighborhood.
Allen M. Rice
Coastland Avenue
Don't shop at SJ boutique
The San Jose Redevelopment Agency is sponsoring a downtown holiday boutique. Why is our tax money being used to run a gift shop?
Redevelopment agency funds are supposed to be used to eliminate blight in designated project areas. How does opening a holiday gift shop fall under this definition?
What about the owners and workers of stores and businesses in the private sector who don't benefit from this government-sponsored marketing campaign? And why are downtown businesses given preferential treatment by the city government? Many of the items offered in the holiday boutique (government store) come from nonprofit enterprises that already enjoy government subsidies.
According to the American Heritage Dictionary, socialism exists when the government owns, manages or controls the means of production and the distribution and exchange of goods. The San Jose city government should not operate a gift shop. Please spend your holiday dollars elsewhere.
Pete Campbell
San Jose
Fewer flags would be an improvement
I travel Lincoln Avenue everyday to get to and from home, and I think the flags along the street are a great idea. But I think it is a little overkill to have so many. It looks gaudy to have one on every tree. Won't someone please reconsider and perhaps only have the flags on every other tree? That would look so much better.
Mary Blevins
Lincoln Avenue
Correction
An article about The Natalie Fund included the wrong email address to contact the Aurelio family. The correct address is dlaurelio@sbcglobal.net.
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Willow Glen, California Since 1992
