Chabot-Las Positas Community College board member Dr. Luis Reynoso recently came under fire for reposting an allegedly offensive meme on LinkedIn. After being investigated and censured in what he calls an unprofessional “witch hunt,” Reynoso speaks exclusively with Opp Now about the precarious state of protected free speech—and his vision for reforming college education.
Read MoreSan Jose’s Director of Housing will retire this July, with the City still in crisis mode regarding affordability and homelessness. According to Scott Beyer, head of the Market Urbanism Report, the City should look for a replacement with a dramatically different approach—one that rejects a hyper-regulated land-use and rental management regime, and embraces instead a deregulatory approach. Simply put: How about working with—not against—the market? An Opp Now exclusive.
Read MoreExperienced researcher of CA community colleges Christopher Jepsen breaks down Calbright: the emergent virtual-only CC institution making waves across the Golden State. Jepsen argues that despite online learning's benefits, local Bay Area brick-and-mortar CCs shouldn't be too concerned about "stolen" enrollment. An Opp Now exclusive.
Read MoreOne of the narratives that's been repeated over and over by local media since Mahan's mayoral win is this: He won't be able to lead a Labor/Left-aligned council. That narrative crashed at the end of April when the moderate council bloc won a 9–2 vote to reject COPA—one of the nonprofit Left's most sought-after policy wishes. Former councilmember and current Planning Commissioner Pierluigi Oliverio breaks down the politics of it all in an Opp Now exclusive interview.
Read MoreAny hopes that Sylvia Arenas' exit from the SJ City Council would signal the end of wild comments from the dais were dashed on 4.25 as District 5's CM Peter Ortiz picked up Arenas' mantle with gusto. Ortiz proclaimed that votes against a memo to expand SJ's housing preservation efforts were "violence against working families." Mayor Matt Mahan took exception to Ortiz' incendiary claim, but Ortiz was undeterred. In an Opp Now exclusive, the team unpacks Ortiz’s falsehoods and reframes them to reveal unreasonable hyperbole and unseemly bullying.
Read MoreThe Fallon statue is gone; the Americana painting that arguably glorified violence against the police has similarly disappeared from the Public Square. Good riddance, says Opp Now co-founder Christopher Escher, who posits that the city shouldn't even be in the business of funding political art at all. An Opp Now exclusive.
Read MoreZoila Herrera Rollins ran for Union School District Board this past November to advocate parents' rights and transparency to families. Here, Herrera explains that budgetary accountability within the USD means getting rid of pointless positions (hint: the USD's paying $100k/yr for a DEI expert). After Stanford's free speech disaster, many others, too, are questioning if Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion jobs belong in education. The first of two Opp Now exclusive comments.
Read MoreNonprofit advocates and SJ Housing Department staff (oops, did we repeat ourselves?) have struggled for three years to get Council approval for their flawed proposal to privilege local nonprofits when it comes to buying up older properties (it's called COPA). Since a Council economic committee rejected the latest COPA version on 3/27, the spin machine from city staff and nonprofits has shifted into high gear in an effort to restart the broken-down concept. The Opp Now team examines their rhetorical maneuvers in this exclusive.
Read MoreWhat does it mean to criminalize homelessness? An expert concludes that Mayor Mahan's proposal to enact no encampment zones across the City doesn't violate unhoused individuals' rights, as some wonder. Jeff Rowes, senior attorney at the Institute for Justice, breaks it down in this Opp Now exclusive: Reasonably regulating public health/safety in no way penalizes homelessness, as long as people are offered alternative housing options (as is integral to Mahan's strategy).
Read MoreLocal housing provider Dean Hotop cuts to the chase: If SJ wants to preserve its greenbelt (which it should), we need to find ways to build upwards within our Urban Growth Boundary. Outdated ordinances like the Ellis Act—which make it economically infeasible to densify older, low-density properties—stand in the way of an abundant housing supply and common sense, and have to go. An Opp Now exclusive.
Read MoreWhile some local news sites are making outrageously false claims about Senate Bill 31's anti-street squatting stance, Senate Minority Leader Brian W. Jones sets the record straight in this Opp Now exclusive. He explains how SB 31, along with CARE Court, can provide much-needed services to the unhoused while mitigating the negative neighborhood impacts of runaway encampments.
Read MoreA recent article in local news labels proposed Senate Bill 31 as “criminalizing homelessness” by making it a misdemeanor to take up residence on sidewalks and streets 1,000 ft. from “sensitive areas.” Past SJ councilmember Johnny Khamis clarifies why effective law enforcement, substance abuse/mental health, and housing solutions must be blended to keep our community's families safe. An Opp Now exclusive.
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