March Meeting Minutes
March 2023 Meeting
After a pizza dinner with neighbors, WONA President Daphna Woolfe kicked off the March 23 meeting at the Cypress Senior Center. The agenda included Federal Realty and District 1, the Pulte Property Line Dispute, Stevens Creek Corridor Study, the Mayor's Budget Message, and the Cypress Bike Lanes. Please click the arrows to read each agenda item.
Federal Realty – Scott Valley, Sr. Vice President of Development
Federal Realty is the developer for Santana Row and Santana West, which is the new office building that is on Winchester Blvd. at the former site of the Century theaters. Scott provided the following update:
On Saturday, March 25th from 10AM- 12PM, there will be a spring event for families at Santana Row. This free event includes a petting zoo, balloons, bubbles, arts and crafts, the Easter Bunny and more!
There are a few new stores/services at Santana Row, including Carbon Health, Momasan Ramen & Sake, and a new Yeti store opening in 2 months.
There is a new apartment complex (256 units) at Lot 12, which is next to the Villas. The permits have been pulled to start this building.
The office building at Santana West, which is 8 stories tall, is finished. They are providing tours for prospective tenants, and will start building out the floors soon. They are waiting for the building to be occupied before they break ground on the 2nd building on the site.
No updates for the Century 21 dome. There have been several possible ideas for the building, but nothing concrete yet. They are continuing to look for partners willing to fund. WONA VP Chris Giangreco mentioned that someone had found a box of historic documents and it reignited his vision for a theatre/community center. He suggested that Federal conduct a neighborhood study group to generate ideas.
Scott and team have also started a study to envision the future of Santana Row in the next 10-20 years to identify what’s next.
The pavement on Stevens Creek Blvd. will finally be repaired once the rain lets up. It is expected to be re-paved in the next few months.
District 1 Update
JR Fruen, Policy & Legislative Director:
The Costco proposal at Westgate is currently in the EIR process and there should be another neighborhood meeting soon.
At the El Paseo project, the developer is currently working through issues (like parks), and they will host another meeting when they’re ready.
There is funding available for another urban village project in West San Jose. They are looking for possible sites. If anyone has any suggestions, please email JR.
At each SJ council, District 1 has to report how much housing was developed. For the current cycle, D1 met 62% of the goal.
David Gomez, Chief of Staff:
They have heard our issues with Stevens Creek especially around the holiday time. They will continue to study and review the traffic issues prior to the next holiday season.
Progress is being made at Stevens Creek Imports car dealership at Stevens Creek & Rosewood. Because there was no defined concrete sidewalk from the first residence to that corner, the dealership took advantage by parking their cars over the asphalt sidewalk. This caused a safety issue with people having to walk onto the Rosewood roadway. A new sidewalk has been poured. DOT still needs to finish up by back filling the roadway form gap with asphalt, and painting the curb red. Additional "No Parking" signage should come as well. David said the requested property line review found that the actual property line exists 9 feet from the lip of the new roll curb.
Overall Signage in WONA needs to be updated. The Streets team will be identifying needs, and Daphna is also identifying and consolidating signage needs. Please contact Daphna if anyone has an signage requests.
The light signals on Stevens Creek have a few issues. D1 will be working with Siemens to get it corrected.
The D1 website is currently down, but will be connected through the city website soon. WONA will provide links to the site once complete.
There was concern among residents about how the 2 hr parking limit on Stevens Creek is not enforced. There are auto transport carriers and other vehicles parking on Stevens Creek that is causing vision issues with residents making turns onto Stevens Creek. David acknowledged that there is a shortage of staffing with parking compliance, and that SJ’s goal of Vision 0 (0 traffic and pedestrian death goal) is not being met.
Property Line Issue with Pulte
Daphna and Chris have been very focused on the property line issues with Pulte (Winchester Ranch Developers). Essentially, in the last month, 10 residents that have homes that border the future Winchester Orchard Park, have been informed that Pulte will be removing their fences and moving their property lines up to 3 ft. This means that they will be losing part of their properties.
Daphna and Chris acknowledged that this is a very big and complex issue with Pulte, and it will have negative impacts to our homeowners if not dealt with swiftly. The issue of exactly where the official property line is, is not clear. The majority of fences that they are replacing have been there at least since the mid '70s when the mobile home park went in, and there are differing property records between Pulte and each affected homeowner.
The 10 homeowners have partnered together and have engaged resources to help them with this issue, with WONA being there to support. We will provide updates on the WONA site to keep the neighborhood informed of this issue. If you have concerns, please contact Chris Giangreco at vicepresident@winchesterorchard.org.
Steven Creek Corridor Study
WONA has been invited to participate in a focus study on the future of the Stevens Creek Blvd. which spans from Cupertino (Highway 85) to San Carlos (Highway 880). This study will look at the future of the boulevard over the next 10, 20, and 30 years, with an emphasis on safety improvements that can be implemented in the short term. Community meetings and focus groups will start soon.
Bike Lanes on Cypress
You may have noticed that the bike lanes on Cypress Ave. are nearly complete. This is part of San Jose’s Better Bike Plan 2025. The City of San José is transforming into one of the most bike-friendly communities in North America. The plan seeks to make bicycling safe and convenient for all ages and abilities in all parts of the city. This will be accomplished by building new bikeways, enhancing existing bikeways, and implementing supportive programs and policies. Some concerns were mentioned to city staff about incorrect placement of some of the bike lane signage, with some blocking sidewalk access.
Mayor's Budget Message
WONA board member Emily Lansing provided an update on Mayor Matt Mahan’s budget message. Mayor Mahan’s priorities for San Jose are:
Community Safety – increased police officers, license plate readers, etc.
Homelessness – investing in basic shelter, new strategies for housing
Clean Neighborhoods – Keeping all elements of our city clean, cash for trash for unsheltered, upgrading the 311 app.
He will be presenting his budget for council approval on March 21. WONA will keep updated on this and provide updates via our website and social channels.
Closing
Thanks to everyone that attended, and signed up as block representatives that will help pass out newsletters. Our spring newsletter is coming in early April. Our next neighborhood meeting is in May, and we will be holding a special raffle. We have some fun neighborhood events that we are planning in spring/summer, like Make Music Day at the Cypress Center on the summer solstice, Wednesday June 21st 2023. Please stay tuned for more information!