Public safety, development, infrastructure, revenue are topics in March 13 speech

Published in the March 27 – April 9, 2019 issue of Morgan Hill Life

Morgan Hill Mayor Rich Constantine

Morgan Hill Mayor Rich Constantine gave his first State of the City address March 13 at the City Council Chamber in front of an audience of about 100 people. The following are excerpts of his speech highlighting his points.

  • Morgan Hill is known for our beautiful, safe, and friendly community and great city facilities. But … did you know, Morgan Hill collects the least amount of taxes per person in the entire county? It is remarkable that we can provide a highly desirable community at a lower cost than any other city in Santa Clara County.

 

  • When the Redevelopment Agency went away, we had a short window to make some smart investments. And this community rose to the challenge. With our $25 million dollars of public investment in a parking garage and other street and infrastructure improvements, we were able to attract over $130 million in private investment.

 

  • We are also working closely with the county to make sure the DePaul Center is used for healthcare services. We need to have access to basic services and resources such as urgent care and imaging services.

 

  • The state is overruling local control. The state wants communities to build their fair share of housing and those that are not meeting their quotas are getting penalized. Developers have increasing ways to build housing. Morgan Hill has been building its fair share of housing. We have been growing at a 2 percent pace, and we are building more affordable housing per capita than other communities.

 

  • We need to continue to implement smart and sustainable development that protects the character of the community. This means being strategically urban and developing the housing densities required in the appropriate places. This will require tough choices.

 

  • We need to continue to create jobs — all sorts of jobs and businesses. Businesses help our community, either by generating revenue, bringing good paying jobs, or simply adding amenities to our community. We need to welcome our businesses that contribute to the fiscal health of our community. Bringing jobs to Morgan Hill will allow our residents to have choices to work right here. This will help to alleviate traffic and improve congestion and air quality.

 

  • We have aging infrastructure that needs repair. We are asking the community to support a rate increase for our wastewater system. This is not because we are growing too fast or adding development, this is simply due to the regular wear and tear of our system over time. Just like the roof or the pipes in our own homes, these systems need to be replaced at some point. This is true for our roads as well as our underground facilities. Our roads need upkeep and in some cases replacement. The cost to replace the 129 miles of roadways in our community is more than we collect in gas taxes or other revenues.

 

  • We also need funds to invest in our public safety resources. We need more police officers and firefighters to support our community. We also need to find ways to support a new fire station and the staffing for it in order to continue to provide the high level of service our community deserves and expects.

 

  • The rising costs of retirement are requiring greater contributions to our city’s retirement system. We are sharing this burden with our employees. But these costs will continue to put pressure on our long-term financial sustainability.

 

  • As you can see, we have significant work ahead of us. Our city council recently had a two-day goal setting workshop and fiscal sustainability was a theme for the entire two days. We are concerned with protecting our quality of life and local land use control. We continue to worry about the potential impacts of the High-Speed Rail through our community and ensuring the redevelopment of the DePaul Medical Center as a healthcare facility.

 

  • We continue to look for ways to reduce expenses and increase revenues. We carefully manage and evaluate our staffing levels and today have lower staffing levels per capita than we had 10 years ago. We recently approved two hotels that will contribute local transient occupancy tax. We worked with the hotels to establish a Tourism Business Improvement District that will generate over $400,000 to promote the area for tourism, and we are implementing a campaign to attract jobs and companies to our community. Additionally, you the voters in Morgan Hill, approved an increase to the transient occupancy tax in this past election. A tax that is paid by visitor who stay in our hotels.

 

  • I conclude by sharing with you that I am very hopeful and energized about Morgan Hill’s future. We have challenges ahead. But this community has shown resiliency and thoughtfulness in the past and I trust we will unite to continue to maintain our clean, beautiful, and thriving community. I look forward to working with you and my colleagues as one team with the same purpose and goal — to choose Morgan Hill.