Letters: S.J. leaders must keep downtown construction rolling

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Keep downtown S.J.
construction rolling

Re: “Developer hoping downtown gets ‘it’” (Page E1, Nov. 2).

I find the amount of unutilized potential that exists in downtown San Jose frustrating. This is particularly concerning given the continually worsening housing crisis facing the Bay Area.

Surface-level parking lots, decaying fenced-off structures and countless signs promising projects that continually face delays litter the downtown landscape. This under-utilized land makes for a great place to build housing units, where new towers can slide in among the existing surroundings and provide a boost to downtown commerce. I believe our elected officials need to better understand the issues facing the development and construction industry and work toward policies that aim to make building quicker and cheaper.

We, the voters, need to be wary of supporting politicians and initiatives that threaten to add costs to or draw out the building process. Keeping the construction of new units continuing is a key element to overcoming the housing crisis.

Liam Saunders
San Jose

Bay Area must plan
for more robotaxis

Plan Bay Area 2050+ does not take sufficient account of the impacts that shared robotaxis will have on public transportation. The Plan’s executive summary’s first page mentions “more autonomous vehicles”. However, I found no other reference to either autonomous vehicles or robotaxis in the Draft Transit 2050+ Report nor in the Plan Bay Area 2050+ Draft Transportation Project List Report.

Shared robotaxis with four passengers each trip could reduce rush hour commuter vehicles. That vehicle traffic reduction would have significant impacts on other public transit (Caltrain, BART, light rail, etc.) and on reducing the need for additional road construction projects.

Mike Forster
Palo Alto

Paying Congress during
shutdown is wrong

Re: “Historic shutdown finally concludes” (Page A1, Nov. 13).

During the 43-day shutdown roughly 670,000 employees were furloughed without pay, and roughly 730,000 continued to work without pay. On the other hand, the legislators who brought about the shutdown continued to be paid.

What is wrong with this picture?

Cheryl Ritchie
Redwood City

Feds should focus
on lowering cost of living

Re: “Historic shutdown finally concludes” (Page A1, Nov. 13).

Now that our politicians have opened the government, and the health care subsidies are probably not going to be extended, how will the unaffordability problem be fixed? More and more young people are unable to afford housing, food, health care and college. The middle class is finding that home ownership and insurance are too expensive. Low-income people are working only to pay their bills and are usually living in crowded housing.

Fifty years ago, my middle-class parents were able to buy a house in San Francisco on one income and still pay the bills and raise a family. This doesn’t exist anymore unless you are wealthy or working in a highly paid industry. More has to be done to bring down costs so that more people can prosper and avoid poverty. Not everyone is rich like Elon Musk.

Patricia Marquez Rutt
Redwood City

Ultimately, the shutdown
punished Americans

Re: “Historic shutdown finally concludes” (Page A1, Nov. 13).

Even the stone faces on Mount Rushmore are scowling at this latest government shutdown. You can almost hear, “I said government for the people, not government for punishing the people.”

The federal workers who keep our country functioning were going without pay. Meanwhile, members of Congress continued to receive their paychecks, which is both hypocrisy and a breach of public trust.

This shutdown even threatened public safety as air traffic controllers, our unseen guardian angels, worked without pay. Some couldn’t afford groceries, rent or child care. In a job that requires total concentration and flawless judgment, financial stress can be the enemy of safety.

Congress should have let its members live under the same terms. Let Congress forgo their own paychecks, and better yet, redirect their money to the air traffic controllers and other federal workers who are keeping us safe.

The government is supposed to serve the people, not punish them.

Curtis Panasuk
San Jose

No accomplishments
to distract us from

Re: “New links to Epstein continue to roil Trump” (Page A1, Nov. 13).

To 34-time convicted felon, twice-impeached, unapologetic homophobe and transphobe, racist, failed businessman and pathological liar, can we now add alleged pedophile to President Trump’s bona fides? To the more than 77 million voters who returned this national embarrassment to the White House, this is your guy, and you got what you voted for.

As for White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt’s statement — “These stories are nothing more than bad-faith efforts to distract from President Trump’s historic accomplishments,” — I say, where is the evidence of those accomplishments for the American people?

Barry Goldman-Hall
San Jose