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Top Stories: July 27, 2010Medi-Pot Tax Debated; Ly Tong’s Bail Reduced; Foreclosure Auction Draws Buyersby Danny Wool on Jul 27, 2010SJPD Chief Davis to Retire SJPD Chief Rob Davis announced that he will be retiring from the police force at the end of October after 30 years of service. Davis served as Chief of Police for the last six years. Having served thirty years on the force, Davis will be eligible for 90 percent of his $261,000 salary, a total of $215,000. In his resignation letter, Davis noted that the personnel and resources available to the SJPD are the lowest for any major city in the country, but that nevertheless San Jose continues to be ranked as one of the safest cities in the nation. In a letter to City Council, City Manage Debra Figone enumerated many of Davis’s achievements during his tenure. It was the first major police department to make crime data available online and to provide head-mounted cameras to all officers, and it was among the first to issue tasers to all on-duty officers. She also noted his contributions to community cohesiveness, which included allowing social researchers to access data to research questionable practices such as racial profiling and the use of force, his Citizens’ Academies in Vietnamese and Spanish, and the training videos about various minority communities, including Muslims, Sikhs, Jains, and Vietnamese. Figone concluded her letter by stating that she would be launching an immediate, nationwide search for a replacement for Davis, and hopes to have found one by the time his retirement goes into effect in late October. Mayor Chuck Reed was quick to praise Davis for rising to the challenges posed to the SJPD under difficult economic conditions: “Despite having to continually do more with less, his leadership has ensured that our police department remains one of the finest departments in the country.” Davis says that he plans to use his retirement to spend more time with his family. He is the father of two children, ages five and eleven. Read More at KCBS. Read More at NBC Bay Area. Read More at ABC 7. Activists Protest Proposed Tax on Medical Marijuana “Outrageous.” That was the term used by Dave Hodges to describe a proposed 10 percent tax on medical marijuana that could appear on the November ballot. Hodges, who heads the Cannabis Buyers Collective, says that the tax is much too high, though he believes that a 3 percent tax would be reasonable. Hodges argues that a high tax would drive consumers out of town or back to the street to purchase their medial marijuana. The idea of taxing medical marijuana was first proposed by City Councilmember Pierluigi Oliverio. Oliverio originally advocated a 3 percent tax, but has since said that he has no preference regarding how high the tax rate should be. Read More at KCBS. Read More at the Mercury News. Ly Tong’s Bail Reduced A judge has reduced bail on Vietnamese activist Ly Tong from $100,000 to $75,000. Tong, a local celebrity in the Vietnamese community for his anti-communism antics, was charged with pepper- spraying Vietnamese singer Dam Vinh Hung during a concert on Sunday. If convicted, Tong could be sentenced to six years and eight months in prison for a variety of felony and misdemeanor charges related to the attack. Over 100 people crowded the courtroom in support of Tong during the hearing. Read More at ABC 7. Homes Auctioned off in Santa Clara About 100 foreclosed homes were up for auction in Santa Clara Monday night as banks made a bid to rid themselves of the unwanted properties. The auction lasted about four hours, and many of the homes, scattered across the Bay Area, sold for less than half of their value. One Oakland home, originally valued at $810,000, sold for just $350,000. Some of the properties could be financed, while many others were cash only. The auctions are a regular event, popular among both potential homeowners and investors. They have been going on for the past three years, but given the high rate of foreclosures, there are still plenty of homes about to hit the auction block. Read More at ABC 7. Yahoo Picks Google … in Japan There’s some good news for Google. Yahoo Japan, which is 35 percent owned by Yahoo Inc., had decided to use Google for its search and advertising technology. Yahoo Inc. recently announced a partnership with Microsoft to incorporate its search technology. While Yahoo Japan investigated the possibility of following Yahoo Inc.’s lead, CWO Masahiro Inoue stated that “in the end we determined that Google was the better choice.” But not all news for Google has been good recently. The company recently missed an important deadline in its $7 million contract to replace the email system for the City of Los Angeles. The problem, says Google executive Jocelyn Ding, is that it failed to meet all of the LAPD’s requirements to keep data secure. Read More at the Business Journal. Read More at ABC 7. by Danny Wool on Jul 27, 2010 |
 Rob Davis makes a presentation about gangs at a San Jose Rotary event last year. Photo courtesy SJRotary on Flickr. |
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