Hear up, sports activities followers. The Bay Space’s soccer and baseball seasons are of their winter slumbers now — and our NHL and NBA groups solely appear to be sleeping at occasions — however sports activities are nonetheless massive enterprise round right here. And shall be for some time, with the Tremendous Bowl and World Cup video games coming to Levi’s Stadium subsequent 12 months.
It’s no shock then that the San Jose Chamber of Commerce shall be getting out its foam fingers and jerseys for “Leaders and Legacy” — its annual member gathering on Jan. 30.
“Professional sports teams are vital economic engines for the South Bay,” mentioned Robert Lindo, the brand new chair of the Chamber’s board of administrators and vice chairman at On line casino M8trix in San Jose. “Of course, games bring direct revenue, but these teams create a ripple effect throughout our business community — attracting businesses, boosting visitation, and benefiting every sector of our local economy.”
The night’s massive present shall be a panel dialogue among the many valley’s prime sports activities execs — San Jose Sharks President Jonathan Becher, Earthquakes President Jared Shawlee, Bay FC CEO Brady Stewart and Stephanie Dittmer Rogers, the manager vice chairman of selling for the 49ers. (Solely a type of groups made the playoffs of their most up-to-date seasons, by the way in which, and I tip my hat to all of you who knew it was Bay FC).
The dialog shall be moderated by San Jose State President Cynthia Teniente-Matson, who can be the chief of a reasonably large Bay Space sports activities operation within the Spartans. Tickets can be found at www.sjchamber.com.
OPEN SPACE CHAMPION: Garnetta Annable closed the guide on almost three a long time of service to the Santa Clara County Open House Authority final month at her closing board assembly.
One of many company’s founding board members, Annable served on its board for a cumulative 20 years, beginning again in 1994, and in addition spent 9 years on its Residents’ Advisory Committee. A number of of her fellow founders confirmed as much as give her some well-deserved applause at her “graduation” assembly Dec. 12 together with Eric Carruthers, Don Weden, Rod Diridon Sr., Virginia Holtz and Larry Ames.
Garnetta Annable, middle, stands with Marc Landgraf, assistant common supervisor of the Santa Clara Valley Open House Authority, left, and Basic Supervisor Andrea Mackenzie. She’s holding a framed {photograph} she acquired as a present upon her retirement from the company’s board on Dec. 12, 2024. (Picture courtesy of the Santa Clara Valley Open House Authority)
“In so many ways, I think Garnetta is the mother of open space here in Santa Clara Valley,” Open House Authority Basic Supervisor Andrea Mackenzie mentioned. I don’t assume anybody’s going to place up a battle over that.
Kathy Sutherland, who had served on the Residents’ Advisory Committee since 2013, was sworn in on the similar assembly to take Annable’s place on the board. Coincidentally, it was Annable who recruited Sutherland to use for a place on the residents’ group greater than a decade in the past.
READING LIST: There’s hope for the way forward for studying, and that’s actually true when you like “Dog Man” books. I used to be shopping the San Jose Public Library’s listing of the highest borrowed books for 2024, and was tickled to see that writer Dav Pilkey’s 2023 guide, “Twenty Thousand Fleas Under the Sea” was not solely the highest kids’s guide checked out, it was probably the most borrowed title interval.
What had been grown-ups studying? Britney Spears’ memoir “The Woman in Me” topped the grownup studying listing, with Nita Prose’s novel “The Mystery Guest” coming in second. Teenagers had been taken by “The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes,” Suzanne Collins’ 2020 follow-up to her “Hunger Games” sequence that was actually boosted by the discharge of the film in November 2023. As I discussed, Pilkey’s “Dog Man” guide topped the child lit chart, however right here’s a bizarre stat: He was certainly one of simply two authors, together with “Diary of a Wimpy Kid” creator Jeff Kinney, on the kids’s prime 10 listing.
ON POINTE: San Jose Dance Theatre is bringing a brand new pair of ft into the combination with the addition of Nicole Haskins as the corporate’s new creative director. She’s been dancing across the West Coast throughout a two-decade profession with stops on the Sacramento Ballet, Washington Ballet and Smuin Up to date Ballet.
Haskins, who can be an achieved choreographer, says she is honored to affix an organization with such a wealthy legacy and appears ahead to creating transformative experiences for the dancers and the audiences. She’ll be working with Govt Director Elizabeth Sweeney and can oversee all of San Jose Dance Theatre’s creative endeavors, from its annual manufacturing of “The Nutcracker,” its participation within the Ballet Alliance Pageant and its premiere of a “Wizard of Oz” ballet in March.
BEST-SELLER: It seems being Invoice Gates nonetheless means so much in Silicon Valley. A Feb. 11 look at Mountain View’s Laptop Historical past Museum by the Microsoft co-founder turned polio fighter and philanthropic gajillionaire rapidly offered out of in-person tickets. And that’s even with it beginning at 1 p.m. on a Tuesday.
However if you’re nonetheless actually involved in listening to Gates speak about his new memoir, “Source Code,” with Stripe CEO Patrick Collison, you may be part of a waitlist www.computerhistory.org or watch it on the museum’s YouTube channel. By the way in which, if this has given you a hankering to go to the museum’s new Chatbots Defined AI exhibit or any of its different choices, you’ll have to carry that thought for a few extra weeks. It’s closed for amenities upgrades till Jan. 28.
