While 2006 was a year of great growth and learning for me, both personally and professionally, I am happy to see it go. It was a tough year for many locally as we struggled with the (in some cases, very) premature loss of some beloved members of our community due to malice or inattentiveness, and nationally, as we struggled through the loss and injury of soldiers involved in wars on two fronts that become ever more difficult to sustain, financially, practically, and morally.
Perhaps it is because of my distress over this past year that I look forward to 2007 without my customary pessimism and jaundiced view, and instead, for the first time in seven years, actually devised some goals and resolutions.
An unlikely impetus for this was provided by the death of former President Gerald Ford. I first started paying attention to national politics in middle school during the second term of Richard Nixon, ignited by the Watergate hearings and Ford’s subsequent ascension into the top job. For people my age, what we knew of Ford came through Chevy Chase’s frequent head-first dives in various opening skits during the inaugural year of Saturday Night Live than anything we might have read in the papers. My memories of his presidency are not of anything Ford did as President (beyond pardoning Nixon), but what his wife, Betty did and said.
She struck me as sophisticated, but unmanageable in the best sense. She must have given the White House handlers fits, because hers was a refreshing candor, bringing to the forefront of the public discussion many subjects that were before swept swiftly under the rug when talked about in the context of average-American family life: Cancer (in the … can we say it? Breast!). Abortion. Pre-marital sex. Addiction.
So, back to resolutions for 2007, this year, I’d like to see us:
- End homelessness in South County. In my work in different communities across the county on working on the problem of chronic homelessness, under-resourced Gilroy has been the most open to actually addressing the problem of reducing the numbers of street-based homeless people. While the rest of the county dithers and decries its lack of money or political will, folks in Gilroy are actually trying to figure it out and put something into place. It may take a while, but I foresee some major headway made this year. I’m looking forward to spending tens of thousands of dollars less per person. I hope you are, too.
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Preventing homelessness in South County. While frequent letter writer Joe Thompson is worried about the infiltration of Marxism in our community with housing and transportation policies, the facts are our community suffers more from problems caused by an unchecked housing market and inefficient support systems with more cracks than my mirror. The thing is, with rents and housing prices out of control, we need something that is affordable. So, don’t like inclusionary zoning (I agree, it doesn’t provide enough units … but market rate housing doesn’t address the problem) or government subsidies? Then what else can work? In this community, which has demonstrated an extraordinary volunteer spirit not seen in the rest of the county, what ideas can we come up with together?
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Increase resources in South County to prevent a host of other expensive problems through the placement of intervention and prevention services locally. The Gilroy Dispatch has provided some coverage recently on the dearth of mental health and addiction recovery treatment and prevention services. Again, we will hear again and again that there is no money.
Complaining is just the first step. Public budgets are much like our private ones at home: our public decision makers, both local and national, spend money on the things and places that are their priorities. We have a confluence of circumstances – a board of supervisors chair, new local leadership, a generous community and incredibly talented youths that are inspired to be part of the solution – that could, if we capitalize on them, help South County emerge as a priority.
In the past week, Ford has been described as a gentle man and a gentleman, who healed a nation with his unpopular action, and impressed even more with his unwavering support of his bold wife. This year, let’s follow the Fords’ examples: Let’s be bold and unwavering, sometimes saying things that are hard to hear, and even doing the unpopular thing, if it’s for the good of all.
Columnist Dina Campeau is a wife, mother of two teens and a resident of Morgan Hill. Her work for the last seven years has focused on affordable housing and homeless issues in Santa Clara County. Her column will be published each Friday. Reach her at
dc******@ch*****.net
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