The Santa Clara County Board of Supervisors overwhelmingly established a new office to coordinate business operations outside the county’s cities as part of an effort to draw more resources and attention to the area outside Silicon Valley’s tech-heavy city.
Supporters claim that the initiative might provide a previously underserved area and its people with an economic lifeline.
We have to make the most of our own backyard. Supervisor Sylvia Arenas, who suggested the new position and whose district includes a large portion of the southern, agricultural part of the county, stated, “I’m hoping to really continue to elevate our south county.” South County has not received enough attention. Given how far behind we are, my district needs to receive more funding than other districts.
According to US Census Bureau data from 2022, the county’s unincorporated areas support more than 20,000 jobs, greater than Gilroy or Morgan Hill and comparable to Los Gatos. In 2023, the county’s agricultural generated over $371 million.
The majority of cities had an office devoted to supporting their economic development, but towns like San Martin and Los Altos Hills, as well as unincorporated areas like agricultural property, did not have that function. The new office would assist in leading and organizing initiatives to support business in the unincorporated areas, particularly in the fields of agritourism and agriculture.
Over time, the county’s office that was tasked with coordinating activities in unincorporated areas shrank to a single employee who was primarily responsible for overseeing the county fairs.
The new office, according to a number of people who lived and worked in and around the unincorporated areas, could be crucial to reviving the southern part of the county overall by bringing tourists to the nearby cities and open spaces and luring them to the farms and wineries.
Agritourism in the area is an unexplored potential that might boost our local economy overall, according to Joe Raineri, owner of Terra Amico farms near San Martin and creator of a year-round farmers market and food hub coming to Morgan Hill.
Before it was dubbed Silicon Valley, many people remembered the area as The Valley of Heart’s Delight, so named because of the profusion of flowering trees that dotted the agricultural center of Santa Clara Valley. (The area was one of the world’s major centers for fruit production and canning prior to the 1960s.)
Laura Chmielewski, vice-president of Visit San Jose, stated that even if we have embraced technology, we cannot afford to undervalue our agricultural heritage. We would have the resources to make sure these roots thrive in (this office).
Given the possible expense of opening a new office, there was some initial apprehension about the plan, but Arenas pointed out that the county had made a commitment to agricultural economic growth in its 2018 Agricultural Plan.
The office might function as an extension of the county’s social safety net services, according to Supervisor Joe Simitian. According to Simitian, a lot of employment in agriculture allow people with low incomes to make at least a respectable living and possibly give their families hope for the future.
Arenas contended that in keeping with the county’s resolve to oppose some of Trump’s policies, the office could give ag workers, who are disproportionately immigrants and frequently undocumented, an additional economic boost in light of president-elect Donald Trump’s pledge to deport immigrants.
In order to lay out the specifics and possible financials for the new office, the Board is anticipated to review the plan again by February.
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