League of Women Voters of California Education Fund
Santa Clara County, CA November 6, 2007 Election
	Dean J. Chu Answers Questions Candidate for Council Member; City of Sunnyvale; Seat 4

The questions were prepared by the the Leagues of Women Voters of Santa Clara County and asked of all candidates for this office.
Read the answers from all candidates (who have responded).

Questions & Answers

1. What experience related to city government would you bring to the City Council?

I have the relevant education to be an effective councilmember:

• Finance MBA
• BA Political Science specializing in Public Administration and Public Policy
• National League of Cities' Silver Leadership Executive Award

I have the local experience to be an effective councilmember:

• past Mayor, Vice Mayor, Councilmember
• Sunnyvale Planning Commissioner, two years
• Leadership Sunnyvale Graduate
• Leadership Sunnyvale Board Member, four years
• Northwest YMCA Board member
• Financial Background as a Banker and Lender, over 20 years

I have the demonstrated collaborative leadership skills to be an effective councilmember:

• Division President, Peninsula Division, League of California Cities (LCC)
• Chair, Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority
• Commissioner, Metropolitan Transportation Commission

I have helped shape state and federal public policy as committee member of the:

• National League of Cities CityFutures Panel on Community and Regional Development
• National League of Cities Policy and Advocacy Committee on Transportation Infrastructure and Services
• League of California Cities State Policy Committee on Transportation, Communications and Public Works

2. What concerns are of particular importance to the city and how would you address them?

1) Finish Downtown Redevelopment. We finally have a local developer who is moving quickly to rebuild our downtown core while preserving Murphy Street. We need to work diligently to make sure that the project opens on time and is what the residents want.

2) Maintain our Quality of Life. When I elected to the city council in late 2003 it was clear that the city was headed in the wrong direction. The Quality of Life index in the Resident Survey had declined from a score of 75 in 2002 to 72 in 2003. I am proud to see that the changes I and the rest of the council have made has reversed the decline and we hit a high score of 78 this year.

To maintain the quality of life of residents I plan to continue to focus on:

• Traffic Congrestion - I have worked diligently as a councilmember and regional leader on the Valley Transportation Authority (VTA) and Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC) to get federal and state money into Sunnyvale and Santa Clara County to reduce traffic congestion, traffic noise and, optimize our public transportation such as buses, Light Rail and BART to Silicon Valley. I have been advocating for the electrification of CalTrain for years which will reduce noise and vibration along the entire rail line.

In Sunnyvale I have helped secure state and federal monies for street repairs and the North Sunnyvale ramp to the Caltrain station as as increased transit service priorities.

• Crime - We continue to be the safest city of our size in Northern California and have one of the lowest crime rates in the county (bested by cities much smaller than us like Los Altos). This has been because the city puts the resources where it's needed to fight crime. I pushed the council to increase funding to drug prevention and traffic cops when we saw increased problems. We saw a surge in auto break-in so a concentrated effort was put together resulting in a sting operation with many arrests.

• Environmental efforts - There are a whole series of initiatives from reducing greenhouse gases in city buildings to changes in building guidelines. As Mayor in 2005 I signed the Mayor's Climate Protection Act endorsing the Kyoto Accords to reduce greenhouse gases.

3. How would you balance the needs of the City as a whole with groups' interests?

Listen to the entire community.

Many people believe that council members only listen to those who come to council meetings. I listen to everyone from those in the community such as the parents in the parks, my kids' school, neighborhood associations, business groups, unions, and the applicant. I balance these views with the city staff report and input as well as my own extensive education and expertise in order to make a decision.

I also make it a practice to visit the site on land use issues so that I can visualize the changes that are proposed.

I also explain why I vote one way or the other on controversial votes as well as when I think I will be voting in the minority.

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Responses to questions asked of each candidate are reproduced as submitted to the League.  Candidates' responses are not edited or corrected by the League.

Read the answers from all candidates (who have responded).

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Created from information supplied by the candidate: October 30, 2007 08:22
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