OUT & ABOUT WEEKLY CALENDAR COVERAGE STARTS THIS WEEK IN SOUTH VALLEY MAGAZINE
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Friday, August 4, 2017
gilroydispatch.com • Vol. 150, No. 31 • $1
BUSINESS: New taco shop bets on old gambling hall P2
An effort to stop Gilroy from cutting 235 trees is postponed
LOCAL SCENE Winning and winning Chef Carlos Pineda, of Kneaded and Rebekah's Culinary Academy, won the Garlic Showdown on the Cook Off Stage last weekend and he announced on stage that his $3,000 prize would be donated back to the Gilroy Foundation's Jay Minzer and Peter Ciccarelli Memorial Fund that benefits Rebekah's Culinary Academy--a win-win. Margene Peterson won a local contest that brought her and daughter Melissa to center stage with Food Network's Giada DeLaurentiis.
TREE SUIT SHOT DOWN IN COURT Brad Kava and Roseann Hernandez Cattani
separate play structures for 2-to 5-year-olds and for 5-to 12-yearolds, a turf play area, off-street parking and lots of landscaping. Workers from Creative Builders this week began installation of the latest in playground equipment and a landscape designer checked the fine points of a winding warren of concrete pathways that connect the park to sidewalks along Third Street and the Uvas Creek Trail. The park abuts a portion of the
A Santa Clara County Superior Court Judge shot down a Gilroy woman’s attempt to prevent the city from cutting down 235 trees, which she says are healthy. Judge Helen Williams sided with the city, saying that because some trees have fallen and damaged property, the city should be allowed to cut trees it deems dangerous. Gilroy resident Camille McCormack invested $15,000 of her own money to fund a suit asking the city to stop cutting the trees. She hired an arborist, Moki Smith, to assess the trees the city was planning to fell and he found that only one was truly dead. The others could be revived with watering, fertilizer and trimming, he said. However, that didn’t weigh in the judge’s decision. Williams agreed that cutting the trees could do irreparable harm to McCormack and the city, however, she didn’t grant the restraining order because she didn’t think McCormack could win the case in court. It’s a decision that shows how difficult it can be to get a preliminary injunction, said McCormack’s attorney, Laura Beaton. McCormack’s suit also asked the court to stop the cutting because she said it was done as a violation of public records laws. The city council’s agenda item about the trees said only that it was considering tree maintenance, not a major purge of 235 of the city’s 18,000 trees. “Although this description did not expressly state that ‘removal’ of 235 trees was included in the budget allocation being considered, the court concludes that in the circumstances of this case, the City substantially complied with notice requirements,” the judge wrote. A bigger issue is the fact that the city used the same firm to decide whether
➝ Dog Park, 12
➝ Trees, 12
Man sentenced for illegal roach killer
Leave your mark downtown
GARLIC FESTIVAL ‘LOCALS DAY’ ISN’T JUST LOCALS Friday may have been Local’s Day at the Gilroy Garlic Festival, but that didn’t stop people from all over the country from celebrating the “stinking rose.” Sure it was hot and dusty, but the 39th Garlic Fest was another success, according to guests and promoters. The festival drew 102,667 customers this year a 20,000 rise over last year. They came for celebrity chefs,
cooking contests, food, drink and entertainment. And they traveled from all over the country. “It’s like spicy and sweet, but it’s kinda good though,” said Allison Pfeffer, of Hollister, as she and Kate Butler who is from Los Angeles, shared a scoop of garlic ice cream served in a halved cantaloupe. “I was forced to get it; my mom said I had to get it.” For Butler, the Garlic Festival is a family tradition. It was Pfeffer’s first time, despite her local roots. “We’ve been coming for 10 years,” Butler said. “I love eating all the food. The food is definitely the best part.”
Sal and Jane Espinoza waited underneath the wires of the zipline as their son Joe, 27, glided from the three-story tower to the ground. Despite being lifelong residents of Gilroy, this was their first Garlic Festival. Once they were there, though, they had their fill of everything garlic. “We had the garlic wine, the garlic ice cream and the garlic bread,” Jane Espinoza said. “It was pretty garlicky,” said Sal Espinoza in a guarded review of the garlic wine. Some people just can’t get ➝ Garlic Festival, 14
Who’s letting all those dogs out?
AUGUST 4, 2017
Abundant Harvest
GILROY GETS ITS FIRST OFF-LEASH DOG PARK
A Garden Grows in Gilroy
A section of the Gilroy Dispatch & Morgan Hill Times
2017 Fest was much bigger Reporter
THE LIFESTYLE MAGAZINE OF MORGAN HILL, GILROY & SAN MARTIN
T OUT & ABOU OF CALE NDAR EVEN TS
Inside this issue:
18TH BARREL P17 | PEANUT CACTUS P18 | REALTOR SEAN DINSMORE P21
By Jack Foley Senior Editor
It’s not even completed yet, but the newest park in Gilroy’s award-winning system is already going to the dogs. Make that, dogs’ park. The new Hecker Pass Neighborhood Park, located at the far reaches of west Third Street along Uvas Creek, will be the first
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BIG LEAGUE Emmy-award-winning celebrity chef, author and Food Network star Giada De Laurentiis instructed two lucky audience members in making her favorite dishes Penne with Corn and Spicy Sausage and Burrata and Strawberry Bruschetta. She also hosted the $3,000 Garlic Showdown won by a Gilroy local.
By Bryce Stoepfel
How proud you would be to stroll down the beautiful Downtown Paseo and see your family (or business) name imprinted on a brick, forever outlining the walkway of this wonderful addition to the community. The deadline to purchase a Paseo Brick is August 4. Only 26 bricks are available now for $250. Purchase online or download the form and mail it at GilroyFoundation.org
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Contributed
A San Jose man was sentenced today to six months in jail by Judge Arthur Bocanegra for selling a dangerous pesticide for several months in 2016 that he re-bottled, resold, and promoted as safe to use inside the home to kill cockroaches and bedbugs. Julio Pino Reyes, 46, was convicted on May 30, 2017, of three felony charges, including dishonest dealing of a misbranded pesticide. At least three people, including two small children, went to the hospital after exposure to the powder. Bottles of the powder were sold at flea markets and through ads on Facebook and OfferUp, and in the Spanish-language magazine El Avisador. Testing showed a high concentration of Acephate, a pesticide that is not approved for indoor residential use. Exposure can cause nausea, shaking, dizziness, rapid heart rate, and confusion. It was sold under the names "El Mejor Remedio" and "El Mejor Polvo".
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in the city’s history to be built with an off-leash dog park in the mix, according to Claudia Moran Garcia, a civil engineer with the city’s engineering department. Although originally scheduled for opening at the end of July, the wet winter delayed the start of construction, according to Moran Garcia. A late August opening is now expected but a date has not yet been decided, she said. Besides the fenced dog park, other amenities will include a special children’s playground with