Candidate for
Mayor; City of Morgan Hill

STEVE TATE

Experience - Summary

1966 BS degree in Mathematics from Cal Berkeley

1966-2003 Marketing and planning positions with IBM

1980-1985 Board Member and President, Homeowners

1988-1990 Morgan Hill General Plan Update Committee

1991-1998 Morgan Hill Planning Commission(Past Chair)

1996-2006 Morgan Hill Rotary Club (Past President)

1997-1998 Morgan Hill General Plan Update Committee

1998-2006 Morgan Hill Chamber Ambassador

1998-1999 Chair, Campaigns - Extend Redevelopment Ag.

1998-2006 Morgan Hill City Council Assignments:

1998-2006 Santa Clara Cty Library JPA (Past Chair)

1998-2006 Santa Clara Cty Emergency Prep. Council

1998-2004 Santa Clara Valley Water Dist. Adv. Comms.

1999-2004 Morgan Hill Economic Development Committees

1999-2004 MH City Council Liaison to Library Comm.

2000-2001 Chair, Morgan Hill Fire Master Plan Update

2001 Chair, Measure P Update Committee

2001-2004 Chair, Library Bond Act Advisory Committee

2002 Morgan Hill Downtown Plan Committee

2002-2006 Morgan Hill City/School Liaison Committee

2002-2006 MH Council Liaison to Youth Advisory Comm.

2004-2005 Morgan Hill Ethics Policy Committee

2005-2006 Chair, MH Council Financial Policy Comm.

2005-2006 MH City Council Public Safety Comm.

2000-2003 Chair, Youth Empowered for Success (YES!)

2001-2006 Committee Member, Independence Day, Inc.

2002-2006 President, Leadership Morgan Hill Board

2004-2005 Co-Chair, Campaigns for Library Parcel Tax

2006 Santa Clara County Housing Trust Board

Experience - Narrative

Summary

I have a vast amount of experience, both on the City Council and apart from it, that qualifies me very well to be your Mayor. I am confident that I have gained the knowledge and that I have developed the skills to provide the dynamic leadership that Morgan Hill deserves.

Career

After graduating form UC Berkeley in 1966 with a degree in math, I started a 37 year career with IBM. I worked in sales and marketing positions in Sacramento and San Francisco, then transferred to San Jose in 1977 to assume a planning role for storage hardware and software products. I had many roles in my San Jose IBM career, and gained extensive management experience.

Morgan Hill Early Involvement

My job move to San Jose also brought me to live in Morgan Hill. I finally had enough spare time from job commitments to allow me to get involved locally, coaching youth soccer and assuming a Board position on my neighborhood homeowners association in Holiday Lake Estates. I served three terms as president in the early 1980s.

When we moved to Morgan Hill in 1977, the first growth control Measure E was just being adopted by voters to address the strain that rapid growth was putting on the infrastructure of the community. In the 1980s, I was involved with Citizens for Orderly Development, CORD, who led an initiative process to update Measure E to Measure P, eliminating certain loopholes and clarifying the original measure. My involvement got me interested in general community planning and I set an objective to be appointed to the Planning Commission.

Morgan Hill Planning Commission

I served on the General Plan Update Committee of 1988-1990, and made several applications to the Planning Commission. Finally, on my sixth try in 1991, I was appointed! I spent seven years on the Commission, an experience I thoroughly enjoyed even though it was more work than I had anticipated. The Planning Commission's dedication and hard work, especially in the Measure P (now C) process, is exemplary.

I was appointed as a Planning Commission representative to the next General Plan Update Committee in 1997 and served on it until I was elected to the City Council in 1998. Then the workload really intensified!

Transition to City Council

I had retired from IBM after 30 years in 1996, and was still working there as a supplemental employee. Fortunately, I had a job that was very flexible, so I was able to meet my Council obligations while also giving IBM the effort they deserved. I re-retired from IBM at the end of 2003, so have become fully retired.

When I was elected to the Council in 1998, the City had recently completed a visioning process where our residents strongly endorsed building community facilities for cultural and recreational purposes. In order to finance the building of the facilities, we needed to extend Morgan Hill's Redevelopment Agency. I successfully led the campaign to secure voter approval for the extension in 1999, my first year on the Council.

City Council Assignments

Serving on the City Council requires also serving on a plethora of other boards, committees, task forces, etc. I've been Morgan Hill's representative on the County Library authority since I was elected, and have served as Chair. My strong affiliation with and affection for libraries has also given me other lead roles in the placement, design and financing of our new library, and also in the eventually successful campaigns for the passage of the extension of the County's library parcel tax.

I chaired the task force that did the update of Measure P to Measure C, as well as the task force that updated our Fire Master Plan. I was Vice Chair of the Downtown Plan Committee and chaired the effort to develop our Economic Development Strategy. I've also served on several Water District Advisory Committees, our City/School Liaison Committee and the committee that developed the City's value-based Ethics Policy.

I currently serve as Chair of the Council's Financial Policy Committee and I am on the Public Safety and Community Services Committee.

In the Community - Beyond the Council

I've been active in the Morgan Hill Chamber of Commerce, serving on Committees and as an Ambassador to welcome new businesses. I've also been involved in planning and putting on many community events. I am a longtime Committee member of IDI who does the annual Fourth of July celebration. This year, I am involved in the Centennial celebration, co-chairing the History Trail Project and supporting the all the events.

I went through the Leadership Morgan Hill program in 2002 and thought it was a terrific experience; a great program to groom future community leaders. I joined the Board and am currently serving my second year as president. With a great Board in place and the support of our growing alumni group, we are improving this already outstanding program!

At the beginning of this year, I was asked to join the Board of Directors of the Santa Clara County Housing Trust. This organization has a fantastic track record, having just recently achieved the one billion dollar mark in leveraged funding too make housing more affordable in the Santa Clara Valley, after only four years in operation. I am proud to be part of this organization.