Opinion

While the Gilroy education community can celebrate the astonishing achievement of its second-year charter school, the news also lends itself to vast encouragement for Hollister.

This week, panelists answered the question: Do the political party conventions serve a purpose in the presidential election?

The relocation of three county departments to an office building on Technology Parkway reflects slow movement toward what are necessary and inevitable - bolder steps toward consolidation among local governments.

The following are links to guest views submitted by the four candidates for mayor. They answered the question: What is your plan to spur economic development in Hollister? 

My name is Keith Snow. My vision on creating a SPUR in the economic development for the city of Hollister – for one I will be an honest and loyal mayor for my city to me that is important. I want to boost the economic development by, creating local jobs. I want to bring back the idea of Wal-Mart which would create lots of jobs. I want to bring lots of businesses to our city we all know more businesses mean more customers more people will stop here instead of passing us by and more businesses mean more jobs! Which has taken a large hurt on the people since the big economic depression around the world? I want better business marketing programs to go in and work with the businesses so they can stay in business and prosper. We need to help each other not let each other fall short by any means. We definitely need to stop wasteful spending we need to prepare and be punctual with our budget it should be a priority to maintain. I received a phone call on Aug. 28th about the budget and I want to help as much as I can, there is a lot of resources out there. Such as a company called Moody’s which is a financial company from all over the world that helps in all sorts of way like budgets, financial advisors, helps cities to prosper up to 40 years longer, it has lots of useful tools and helps save cities money.

The first and most important step in securing our future is to place the goal of increasing private sector jobs and economic activity at the top of the priority list alongside public safety. That is the only way we can prosper without regressive taxes and fees. Things that have the attention of leadership usually get done.

As a candidate for mayor of Hollister I've been receiving many phone calls on my ideas and views on many of the current hot-button issues, such as Measure E and the dire financial straits that the city is currently facing. I'm also asked for my thoughts on the other candidates running for mayor of Hollister. But the top question I get is – are you crazy? Why would you want to do something where people will just criticize you and dig up everything about your life? The answer is always the same; if I don't try to do something those same people that complain about everything and everyone will continue leading us down the wrong road. Besides my life has always been an open book. Yes, like most business owners in Hollister and most residents I took a financial beating over the last several years. I struggled to keep my businesses open, I had my pay cut by 60%, I had to fight banks that wanted to close lines of credit and I even had trouble paying my mortgages and property taxes. Tough times to say the least, unfortunately many other local businesses couldn't make it through these tough times. I will use the lessons I learned over the last few years to help get us back on track. It's time we work together to support our local businesses so that they can support us.