In a region that speaks roughly 100 languages, non-English speakers often find themselves unable to follow Santa Clara County government meetings. That might finally change. The problem was on painful display last week, when the $11 billion agency had no one on hand to simultaneously interpret the April 16 Board of Supervisors discussion about the...
Editorial: State should step in to save San Jose trauma center
Four months. That’s all the time Santa Clara County officials have to try and prevent a health care crisis in its public hospital system when Regional Medical Center shuts down its trauma center. By August, the only remaining trauma centers in the county will be at Stanford University Medical Center and Santa Clara Valley Medical...
Santa Clara County board to seat a woman majority next year
Santa Clara County is closer to retaking its storied but challenged title as “Feminist Capital of the World.” After November’s general election, women will outnumber men 4-1 on the county’s powerful Board of Supervisors for the first time. While policy decisions don’t always boil down to gender, current and prospective supervisors say a supermajority of...
Santa Clara County may fund safe parking for homeless residents
Santa Clara County officials may help finance San Jose’s multimillion-dollar safe parking efforts and set up more sites on unused public property for the region’s homeless residents. The Board of Supervisors unanimously agreed on Tuesday to look into both possibilities and requested more information by May. Debate ensued over whether the funding could be justified...
Fact check: Why did Madison Nguyen move to Las Vegas?
An advertisement against Santa Clara County Board of Supervisors candidate Madison Nguyen is calling out her loyalty to the county. The mailer, paid for by the South Bay AFL-CIO Labor Council, compares Nguyen, a former San Jose councilmember and vice mayor running to replace District 2 Supervisor Cindy Chavez, to one candidate it endorsed in the race...
Santa Clara County deputy overtime contributes to ballooning deficit
This year, a multimillion-dollar deficit won’t just threaten Santa Clara County’s essential public services — it will force county leaders to reckon with a decade-long overspending crisis in the Sheriff’s Office. Since 2013, the Santa Clara County Sheriff’s Office has exceeded its budget by millions of dollars annually — and roughly $20 million last year...