Teaching Youth the Power of Voting

Every generation has grown up being told that they, the youth, are the future. In American society, this means that the youth (theoretically) have the power to sway elections once they are of voting age. Unfortunately, the youth vote has not always met its potential in elections due to low turnout rates among young people. The most recent elections, however, have fostered some hope for higher youth voter participation long term. The November 2022 election had the second highest national voter turnout among voters under 30 in at least the past three decades, with about 27% of voters between the ages of 18-29 casting a ballot. The City of Gilroy’s recent housing plan revealed that 38% of Gilroy’s population is 24 years and younger, making this a powerful demographic in our elections and in shaping the future of our community. Yet, it’s difficult to focus on increasing the youth turnout in Gilroy when our overall turnout rates have been alarming.

It was revealed after the June 2022 election that Gilroy had some of the lower voter turnout in Santa Clara County in a primary election. Turnout in Gilroy ranged from 15.6% to 37% of registered voters while most precincts saw rates below 30%. This low turnout is representative of a need for greater emphasis on voter registration and civic engagement in our local community. It is known that voter turnout is always higher in general elections compared to primary elections, but this disparity only strengthens the case for increased efforts to educate the community- youth and adults alike- on the necessity of voting in every election. The primaries are just as important as the general elections; important measures are decided on by voters in the primaries and “nearly 90% of congressional elections are decided in the nominating contests.” If overall turnout in Gilroy is so low, how can we expect our youth to understand and act on the weight of their vote? We as a community must be united under a collective effort to have our voices represented in every election.

Amidst national debates around increasing or decreasing the voting age requirements, it is critical that the youth understand their rights and responsibilities as members of our local, state, and national communities. In California, youth are able to pre-register to vote as early as 16 years old, automatically registering them to vote when they turn 18. Despite this, California youth voter turnout (ages 18-29) of those eligible to vote in the 2022 midterm elections was disappointingly low at only 22.1%. As we approach another election cycle, more in-school and at-home efforts must be made to support the youth in the registration and voting processes. 

This year, I helped bring back on-site voter registration at Christopher High School and Gavilan College, an effort that had not occurred since the 2020 election season. Students were able to register to vote and receive information on how to vote during lunch time on October 3 to celebrate National High School Voter Education week, the last two weeks of September and April. Gilroy High School is also planning similar programming for later this year. This effort can and should be easily applied at all high schools. Teachers can allocate time in class to students checking their voter registration status and registering to vote. School districts should provide students with the information about how to be poll workers in their county and receive both monetary compensation and valuable civic experience. Students should receive guidance on how to receive a state seal of civic education at graduation; only slightly over 1% (5,369) of high school seniors received the seal in 2021, the first year that the seal was awarded.

These efforts have the potential to create a strong collective dedication to civic engagement among newer generations. The key is to not only get youth pre-registered and registered to vote, but to raise youth with the understanding that being civically engaged is a core responsibility as a member of society. If newer generations are able to better embody this dedication to civic engagement than our older generations are, who knows what the state of our democracy will look like in 20 years.

Now The Work Truly Begins on Housing

I am proud of the future housing plan that Gilroy City Council, Planning Commission, Staff, and the Public have approved. We commit to advancing the 40 opportunity sites for multi-family homes, downtown expansion district and first street mixed-use corridor flexibility program, 429 corner lots for the middle income housing program, housing for farmworkers program, inclusionary housing ordinance, and each program listed below. Through incentives, funding, local control, and programs we can offer with other partners, this will further a Gilroy that’s livable for all.

Gilroy places a high priority on providing quality housing opportunities for all residents. The creation of a focused Division within the Community Development Department, and establishing the Housing and Community Services Manager position, will enable the city to make more concentrated efforts on affordable housing production, preservation, and protection of residents. The Housing and Community Services Manager will provide a higher level of expertise and lead a division focusing on housing functions. With the division consisting of the Manager and Technician position, the division will implement projects and programs to address housing needs for a diverse community and provide assistance to families and individuals that are experiencing, or at risk of, homelessness. 

Now is where the true work and evaluation will take place. Empowered through our local control, we will implement these programs and follow through with what we have promised to our residents. By doing this we will become eligible for funding towards implementing our programs and provide housing for all. We are now pulling in the same direction as our regional partners too. The region's long-range plan for housing, transportation, economy and the environment is known as Plan Bay Area 2050. It calls for creating compact walkable communities by promoting high-density housing and mixed-use development near transit stations and in existing urban areas. This aligns the state to local level planning and it's developed by the Metropolitan Transportation Commission and Association of Bay Area Governments, which is made up of our local and regional elected's. 

Through Valley Transportation Authority, which is made up of our local elected’s, Gilroy’s programs will work to advance all three business lines in VTA’s Strategic Plan through growth in ridership and farebox revenues that support increased transit service and generate funding to sustain enhanced service in Gilroy. Our General Plan 2040 Mobility Element and VTA’s Parking Policy aim to grow ridership through ensuring properly sized parking, facilitating access for all mobility needs, and maximizing multimodal access to transit stations through tools that encourage alternatives to the automobile. Transit-oriented communities enable people to access and use transit more often for more types of trips by centering housing, jobs, services and shopping around public transit. They are places where people of all ages, abilities, income levels, and racial and ethnic backgrounds can live, work and thrive.

The City must monitor and report on the results of these and other programs through the annual progress report. State Housing and Community Development will review any action or failure to act by a local government that it determines inconsistent with an adopted housing element or housing element law. This includes failure to implement program actions included in the housing element. HCD may revoke housing element compliance if the local government’s actions do not comply with state law. Gilroy must continue timely and effective implementation of all programs including but not limited to the following:

• Program A-1 (No Net Loss Inventory and Monitoring)

• Program A-2 (Surplus Lands/Affordable Housing on City-Owned Sites)

• Program A-3 (By-Right Approval on “Reused” RHNA Sites)

• Programs A-6 through A-9 and A-15 (Facilitate ADU Production)

• Program A-10 (Facilitate Missing Middle)

• Program A-11 (Inclusionary Housing Policy)

• Program B-3 (SB 35 Permit Processing)

• Program B-6 (Objective Standards)

• Programs C-1 and C-6 (Monitoring and Preservation of At-Risk Units)

• Program E-3 (Emergency Shelter Standards)

• Program E-4 (Low Barrier Navigation Centers)

• Program E-7 (Development and Conservation of Housing for Farmworkers)

• Program E-10 (Housing for Persons with Disabilities)

• Program E-11 (Extremely Low Income and Special Needs Households)

• Program E-13 (Permanent Supportive Housing)

• Program F-3 (Place-Based Improvements in Downtown Gilroy)

• Program F-4 (Housing Mobility and Choice in Higher Opportunity Areas)

Don’t Expand City Limits for Single-Family Homes

On August 2nd, joined by my daughter, I spoke at the Santa Clara County LAFCO Public Hearing in support of LAFCO's staff recommendation to deny an application to expand the city limits in order to build more single-family homes. What has Gilroy been doing over the last 150 years and since 1963 when LAFCO was formed? We built out our city well beyond the currently available density around our downtown and transit corridors to allow only single-family homes, and now 75% of our land is zoned for single-family homes. We zoned our city where our own children can’t afford to buy a one-million-dollar single family home and have spaces to rent. We are decades behind in our housing production because of past constraints, lack of programs, policies, and funding. 

In the last 150 years we have built 56 farmworker housing units and 39 supportive housing units. This may have worked in the past, but now that these homes are out of reach for most families, we need to course correct and continue to create a diversified housing stock to meet the needs of our residents. Data from our Housing Element shows 21% of households are considered extremely low-income, making less than 30% of AMI. 38% of our population is 24 years old or younger and they live, play, go to school, and work in Gilroy. 

Our current Draft Housing Element (Gilroy’s 8 Year Housing Plan) that was approved by the Gilroy Planning Commission and Gilroy City Council, will create programs to build missing middle housing (this translates to rental opportunities, duplexes, triplexes, and fourplexs). This is in addition to staff’s efforts in developing an inclusionary housing ordinance requiring a percentage of affordable homes in each development. I commend Gilroy staff for making corrections and strengthening programs, while implementing them into our future work plan since our 1st Draft Housing Element was released last year. 

We have 40 opportunity sites identified in our housing element that were approved by our Planning Commission and City Council, where we will build multi-family units. We have the current capacity to build over the next eight years, with more sites that were not listed in the site's inventory, and the Wren Investors project is not listed in the housing element. 

We are working on breaking down barriers and not adding to them, making it impossible for us to maintain our streets, and collect enough property taxes on single-family homes to fund basic public services and infrastructure. Having a Community Facilities District Fee added to the Wren Investors project property taxes because the city can’t afford to maintain them, will only further push out the natural affordability of these units. 

Gilroy Fire Departments average response times are well above the standards that the city has adopted. LAFCO’s Countywide Fire Service shows we have an average response time of 00:10:54. It's high because of staffing shortages and our 3 primary stations leapfrog calls across the city to cover portions of the city that we don't have coverage for. That leaves gaps in coverage with extended response times because they are out of position. The temporary 2-person fire unit often gets browned out of service to save money because we have to mandatory all ranks to fill our vacancies. On July 15, 2023 the Gilroy Fire Department battled another multi-alarm fire took all the resources of the Gilroy Fire Dept (9 Firefighters covering 3 Stations, plus thankfully the Santa Teresa Unit was in service and added an additional 2 Firefighters) and South Santa Clara County Fire Dept. That left the city with a gap of coverage for any Fire/EMS calls for service until San Jose Fire Dept and Santa Clara County Fire units could provide city coverage. During the initial attack emergency traffic was called out for a "firefighter down" due to extreme heat exhaustion (the outside temperature in Gilroy was 97 degrees). 

It took us decades to reach this imbalance of single-family to multi-family and it’s going to take us decades to balance that out, for the needs of our next generation, my daughter’s generation, the 38% of Gilroy’s population that is 24 years and younger. What we've promised our residents and State Housing & Community Development is that we will focus on maximizing our current land in Gilroy that’s not focused on expanding the city limits to build more single-family homes.