My Goal is simple -- to make San Leandro BETTER

There are 5 areas that are priorities to reaching this goal:

Police Services: I support adding sworn and non-sworn police staff to increase services and public engagement leading to crime prevention. I support a strategic plan to set a course for our department that will lead us to a safer city each year. I support a complete renovation or rebuilding of the Police Administration building. The current building has not been renovated in 40 years; it is too small, the construction is aging, and it does not give our police all the resources they need to fight crime in San Leandro. Reducing Crime will make San Leandro Better.

Development: The Transit Oriented Development and downtown area will be revived in the next 4 years. I want to make sure that commercial, retail, and housing units are all included in the revitalized downtown to make it Better. Kaiser Hospital will be planning and designing for the next 4 years. A retail development will be located next to Kaiser. I will make sure those developments are planned for San Leandro in a way that makes things Better. Finally, the Marina Shoreline must be renewed to become a destination site again, for residents and guests of San Leandro. What the City does at the Marina should make it Better.

Streets: Our streets used to be slurry sealed every 5 years. Due to increasing costs and decreasing revenues from gas taxes, we have scaled back on our street maintenance. And it shows. San Leandro has the lowest Pavement Management Index score in Alameda County. We need to find a way to fund the repair of our worst streets and get back to a maintenance plan for all our streets. At the same time, we should look at a way to underground the utilities along those streets. By combining these efforts, we see construction efficiencies and the final results are neighborhoods that look many times Better.

Destinations: A farmers market downtown, a revitalized Marina Shoreline, a Senior Center, a Competitive swimming pool, attractive retail at Bayfair- many of our projects will become destination sites for our residents and guests. This brings people to San Leandro to spend money and to enjoy our many places to play. Plus, they all improve our quality of life to make our time spent here Better.

Business: From development to redevelopment, San Leandro must look at encouraging more businesses to do business in our City. Business provides an overwhelming majority of the City's revenue and so it is vital to becoming Better. We must continue marketing our downtown, Bayfair, and West San Leandro as business-friendly and great locations. We must continue to have the lowest Business License fees and the easiest permitting processes. And we must prove that our residents have the demographics that any retailer would envy. San Leandro citizens are not flashy, but we do like to shop. A small community that cares about increasing business will lead us to making San Leandro Better.

Please vote for Joyce Rutledge Starosciak on June 3, 2008.