Ed Tewes, Morgan Hill City Manager speaks at Realtor's Meeting

Morgan Hill City Manager, Ed Tewes, Speaks at South County Realtor’s Meeting

Today at our weekly County Realtor’s meeting, Ed Tewes, the City Manager for Morgan Hill spoke on several issues:

1) Downtown – City’s goal is to improve downtown by creating more residential opportunities and creating better retail spaces. There will be a vote on whether to allow 500 units to proceed (downtown) without having to compete with other building projects (right now with the controlled growth in Morgan Hill, only a limited number of building projects are allowed). There are currently two new restaurants in downtown Morgan Hill and one new retail place. Downtown is being promoted as a place to meet your neighbors.
2) While today’s population is about 39,000, the projected goal for 2020 is 48,000.
3) There are three fully funded projects to build the city infrastructure including:
a) Tenant Avenue will be widened at the 101 interchange with 4 lanes over the freeway (clover leaf). This is scheduled to start in 6 months and be completed within the year.
b) Butterfield Blvd will be extended south to Watsonville Road near Monterey and subject to a Citywide Traffic Analysis as to whether 4 or 6 lanes are needed. The Analysis should be completed by January 2009.
c) Santa Teresa is also subject to the Analysis as to whether there should be 2 or 4 lanes in the development from Spring to Main Avenue. There will be neighborhood and community meetings to discuss these projects.
4) There is currently 8 ½% unemployment in Morgan Hill
5) Measure G will be voted on in the upcoming election as the whether to add a 2% utility tax to increase police staffing.
6) There will be discussion about the annual competition for building projects which previously allowed 250 units and is now at 225 units and must be spread over various categories. The Housing Element Task Force will discuss the breakdown and the needs of the community. They will be meeting this Thursday at 6:45 PM in the El Toro Room at the Community Center. They will examine whether to reduce the cost to housing fees and relax the requirements of Below Market Housing opportunities. This is open to the public.

For more information about the City of Morgan Hill, you can go to http://www.morgan-hill.ca.gov/ and explore their website. Ed visits our Realtor Meetings a couple of times a year to give up updates.