League of Women Voters of California Education Fund
	Santa Clara County, CA November 4, 2008 Election
	Candidates Answer Questions on the Issues Santa Clara County Open Space Authority Director; District 7

The questions were prepared by the Leagues of Women Voters of Santa Clara County and asked of all candidates for this office.     See below for questions on Experience, Financial Condition, Collaboration Click on a name for candidate information.   See also more information about this contest. 1. What experience or training do you have which would help the District meet its goals? Answer from Kalvin Gill: I have been an OSA board member since March 2007, working with my colleagues and OSA staff to protect additional land, reviewing OSA's budget, serving as the board liaison to the Citizen's Advisory Committee and learning from the best practices already in place at the Open Space Authority. I have brought the OSA booth to events within the Sikh community such as the Punjabi Mela at Evergreen College attended by over 10,000 people. I have attended many community events within my district to spread the word about the OSA and have visited several potential acquisitions with OSA staff and others. I am ready to continue this work in a full term. Answer from Cy Mann: I currently serve on the Santa Clara Valley Water District Coyote Flood Control and Watershed Committee, the Santa Clara Valley Water District Environmental Committee, the Alviso Water Task Force and the SCCAOR Government Relations Committee. My experience from serving on these committees gives me the ability to better understand environmental and land acquisitions issues. I will seek out community involvement to insure the needs of our district are met. 2. What is your evaluation of the financial condition of the District? Answer from Kalvin Gill: Open Space Authority is currently looking other funding sources beside the usual tax assessment. Answer from Cy Mann: The current financial situation of our district and the entire OSA does not look good due to California Supreme Court Decision where justices found that the assessment violated Proposition 218. The 12-year-old law is known as the "Right to Vote on Taxes Act" because it was designed to limit local governments' ability to raise revenue without voter approval. Therefore I believe we need to come up with alternative revenue sources aside from the voter approved monies to ensure the work of the Open Space Authority continues for generations to come. 3. In what ways would you collaborate with other governmental entities to achieve the District's goals? Answer from Cy Mann: The key to any collaboration is communication. In order to achieve this, partnerships have to be maintained and new alliances need to be forged between our government agencies, environmental groups, our communities and residents this will ensure our district's goals and needs are met. Answer from Kalvin Gill: It is very important to regularly communicate and have meeting with our OSA professional staff, my fellow board members, agencies like the California Special Districts Association, community groups like the Committee for Green Foothills, Sierra Club, Greenbelt Alliance and CLCV among other boards and commissions. Responses to questions asked of each candidate are reproduced as submitted to the League.  Candidates' responses are not edited or corrected by the League. The order of the candidates is random and changes daily. Candidates who did not respond are not listed on this page.