Dear Friends of Better Cupertino.
We would like to invite everyone to join the Second Better Cupertino forum on regional planning on Sunday October 29, 2017 from 3pm to 5pm, to be held in Cupertino Community Hall, 10350 Torre Ave, Cupertino, CA 95014. Register at BetterCupertino.org.
The panelists include Assembly Member Kansen Chu, San Jose City Council Member Chappie Jones, Palo Alto City Council Member Tom Dubois and former Planning Commissioner and Chamber president of Sunnyvale Richard Bernhardt, who Is also the CEO of Berhardt Communications and Strategies Co. The moderator will be Yang Shao from Fremont Unified School Board in the city of Fremont. The second hour will be Q&A to accept questions from the audience.
Although many housing bills have passed this year, are they enough to help with housing crisis if there is still a lack of regional planning? Housing crisis is a symptom of deeper problems caused by a lack of regional planning, in my opinion, on office growth and transportation. Building more affordable housing is only a band-aid. Band-aids won't be sustainable if the root problem is not treated and continue to get worse.
We hope that a dialogue on regional planning could help us face the root cause of the housing crisis today so that we can start addressing them. We have a balanced panel with an independent moderator for a much needed discussion on regional planning for office, housing and transportation.
Besides those on the panel, the follow elected officials or their representatives will also attend.
Tom Pyke, representative of Congressman Ro Khanna, CA-17Yvonne Chao, representative of Jim Beall, SD15Patrick Ahrens, representative of Evan LowLydia Kou, Palo Alto City CouncilSteven Scharf, Cupertino City CouncilMichael Goldman - Sunnyvale City CouncilRishi Kumar, Saratoga City Council (most likely)
Teresa O’Neill - Santa Clara City Council