Guest column by Marie Blankley: Gilroy mayor looks back at 2021 and forward to the new year

“As we enter 2022, consider more frequent and safe participation in venues that bring us face-to face and make us feel part of our own community again.”

By Marie Blankley

Marie Blankley

With every passing year we find remarkable events to look back on. With the COVID-19 virus and its variants still present, 2021 was  an exceptional year.

We started the year focused on vaccinations. Both the city of Gilroy and Gilroy Unified School District were key players with the County of Santa Clara to fully vaccinate residents as quickly as vaccine supply would allow. We continued with remote work environments where possible and virtual city council meetings through the end of August, hoping to gradually return to in-person life again.

At the end of 2021 and with the ever-present virus, some jurisdictions continue with virtual formats, while others, like the city of Gilroy, are as in-person as we can be with required safety protocols.

The pandemic aside, there is much to be proud of as I reflect on 2021. Amid a tricky and unusual financial predicament that included where best to allocate relief funds, we passed a two-year budget that not only considered our city workforce but also the needs of our community at large.

We helped struggling residents and small businesses, improved safety measures at City Hall and installed equipment in council chambers to allow for translation and hybrid options.

We committed to a five-year street maintenance plan with enough funding (for the next two years, anyway) to stop the decline of Gilroy’s Pavement Condition Index (PCI) score, a rating that has sadly been declining since 2017 with exponentially increasing costs to restore.

It is my goal, with the support of the city council, to repeat this funding in the next two-year budget cycle, bringing a total of four years of funding to our five-year maintenance plan and lasting throughout my mayoral term.

We committed to a stronger and more collaborative working relationship with Valley Transportation Authority to realize the potential of the Gilroy Transit Center as a transportation hub not only for South County but also for our surrounding and growing communities with residents who must still drive north to access jobs. Gilroy city staff will work more closely with VTA staff and engage on issues that directly improve commuter access to public transportation from Gilroy.

As state-wide housing laws go into effect in communities like Gilroy with disproportionate job growth, viable public transportation options are key to managing the increased demand for driving that floods our highways.

Also of note for 2021 is the progress we’ve made toward further development of the Gilroy Sports Park with Sharks Ice, and the possibility of a recreation center. We end the year with the puck on their side of the rink, so to speak, working toward a term sheet that will set parameters agreed upon by both the Sharks and the Gilroy City Council. From there starts public outreach and the process of determining what specifically Gilroy residents would like to see besides ice rinks within the complex and at what cost.

Further development of our sports park and the potential for a recreation center are exciting possibilities for Gilroy and things to look forward to in 2022.

It’s been another tough year, yes, but from hardship we learn more about ourselves. We see our neighbors and communities with a different lens, try harder to keep ourselves going and to help those without a means of support. We become more resilient, more practical in our decisions, and more willing to accept setbacks with the confidence and faith that good will ultimately prevail.

While social media has allowed us to continue conversations virtually throughout a pandemic, it also causes us to lose touch as people. In August, I attempted to combat this by hosting in-person conversations that have continued each month with a different topic of interest. I will continue these “Conversation and Coffee with the Mayor” events into 2022 and encourage everyone to join the conversation that brings us together as a community. Gilroy is still a relatively small town, and with full transparency, we manage to enlighten each other and feel a sense of togetherness. As we enter 2022, consider more frequent and safe participation in venues that bring us face-to face and make us feel part of our own community again.

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Here’s to 2022. Happy New Year, Gilroy!

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Marie Blankley is the mayor of Gilroy. She wrote this column for Gilroy Life.

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