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Mayor Bob Taylor began his State of the City address to the Brentwood Chamber of Commerce last Thursday acknowledging a regional newspaper article slamming Brentwood as the “poster child for the foreclosure crisis.” He also read a letter in the same paper from a former Novato resident extolling the virtues of Brentwood, and then, with balance struck, made a vow:
Taylor’s annual address, delivered at Nines Restaurant, ran through the highlights of what’s occurred in the last year. Points included:
• Housing. The number of homes sold in April, 93, was the highest since April of 2007. Prices were also slightly up that month from the previous month. A pair of new ordinances regarding property maintenance and inspection of rentals are helping to deal with blight.
• Retail. Vacancy rates are up slightly in retail properties, but rents have begun to drop. Some retail construction has slowed, but more than 200 commercial licenses and 200 home-based business licenses have been pulled in the last year. Office Max and Tuesday Morning are among stores expected to open soon. The Streets of Brentwood upscale shopping center will open this fall. Taylor said, “Sorry, Antioch. Brentwood’s gonna take some of your money.” The center will include the city’s first police substation.
• Civic Center. “We will not break the city to build a city hall,” Taylor said. “We will watch every step, and we will phase things in if we don’t have the money.”
• Dining. A Vic Stewart’s restaurant is coming to Balfour Road near the John Muir Medical Center.
• Water. The city’s new $62 million water treatment plant will be on line this summer, and no water rationing is expected this year.
• Downtown infrastructure. Utility work for the downtown streetscape improvements will soon get under way, and be completed by next spring. A half-dozen businesses have taken advantage of the grant program to upgrade their buildings’ façades.
• With the help of Brentwood Police manpower (paid for by a state grant) and money from Brentwood development, improvements to Vasco Road have resulted in no deaths and only three collisions on Vasco Road so far this year.
• Police issued 8,200 traffic citations in 2007, up 72 percent from 2006. The result has been a decrease in collisions and complaints from neighborhoods. Taylor, to police Cheif Mark Evenson: “Chief, if a tail light flickers, I want ‘em pulled over.” Taylor is also working on a possible ordinance to quiet the ear-splitting sound coming from some automobiles. “I want to hear my radio, not theirs.”
• Ramped-up efforts to keep parks safe have resulted in increased police patrols and a 20-percent increase in citations for curfew violations.
• More than 40 Neighborhood Watch groups are active in the
city, comprised of more than 3,000 members. In the Shadow Lakes
and Deer Ridge areas, five arrests have been made possible by the
groups’ vigilance.
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