Palo Alto is seeking to earn a pro-housing designation from the state of California this year, a label that would mark a major shift in the way the city has responded to growing regional housing needs amid significant resident pushback to new development. If the city’s application succeeds, Palo Alto would join 74 other cities — including...
Silicon Valley lawmaker favors AI tech partnerships over regulations
With artificial intelligence threatening to upend workplaces throughout Silicon Valley, the area’s representative in Congress has an idea he hopes will reduce anxieties about the revolutionary technology: nudge tech companies to take a central role in educating the workforce of the future. The tense relationship between recent college graduates and AI has been on display...
Palo Alto poised to restore crossing guard funding after public uproar
Despite ongoing budget challenges, Palo Alto is preparing to restore some of the funding it was planning to cut from the city’s crossing guard program and ask the school district to help pay for the popular service, according to a recommendation the City Council Finance Committee approved May 19. As part of its final hearing...
Mountain View public golf course to end affordable memberships
On a recent Sunday afternoon, golfers hit balls that sailed past a gaggle of geese and a lone duck resting on the yellowing fairway of Mountain View’s Shoreline Golf Links. The 18-hole course is part of a 750-acre wildlife refuge and recreation area, a feature that many players say is what makes the course memorable...
Mountain View OKs temporary closure of 13 downtown parking spots
More than a dozen public parking spots in downtown Mountain View are slated to be temporarily unavailable to make way for a construction project on Castro Street. The City Council unanimously approved the closure of 13 parking spots in Lot 2 at its May 12 meeting. The item was part of the council’s consent agenda,...
Palo Alto leaders approve 183-apartment complex
Palo Alto city leaders have enthusiastically backed a housing project that would have likely been dead on arrival just two years ago: an 85-foot-tall apartment building in the Ventura neighborhood. The proposal from Vittoria Management is one of about 10 projects that the city received through the “builder’s remedy” process, which allows builders to circumvent...
Palo Alto transitional housing site celebrates long-awaited opening
Tasheana Price used to sleep in the door frame of a building near the Palo Alto Caltrain station. Now, she works with homelessness nonprofit LifeMoves to manage volunteers at the organization’s drop-in service center downtown — the same place where she received case management herself about 10 years ago. During the May 14 ribbon-cutting ceremony...
Mountain View approves new rules to cut down on traffic
Looking to cut down on pollution, Mountain View approved a citywide policy Tuesday that seeks to reduce the number of vehicles on the road. In a unanimous vote, the City Council backed major updates to a policy that requires developers to encourage sustainable forms of transportation, such as offering transit subsidies, bicycle facilities and carshare services. “I...
Former Palo Alto cannery celebrates history with new chapter
Few buildings epitomize the evolution of Silicon Valley better than the sprawling, lofty structure on Portage Avenue, which began its life as one of the nation’s largest fruit canneries and later evolved into one of Palo Alto’s major retail destinations, best known for Fry’s Electronics. On Tuesday, the 73,000-square-foot building that was once known as...
Months after opening, Palo Alto police headquarters is largely empty
It’s been nearly six months since Palo Alto leaders celebrated the grand opening of the city’s new public safety building, a $123.5-million facility near California Avenue that took decades of planning and five years of construction. Most of the work on the three-story building at 250 Sherman Ave. was completed by the summer of 2025,...