Oliverio for Supervisor 2018

Independent - Transparent - Fiscally Responsible

  • HOME
  • ABOUT PIERLUIGI
  • WE KNOW PIERLUIGI
  • COMMUNITY LEADERS
  • ISSUES
  • CONTACT
    • CONTACT
    • MAP OF SUPERVISOR DISTRICT 4

Santa Clara County shelves $1M rebranding campaign

April 12, 2017 By PO2012

County executive holds off approving additional funds pending further review.

A proposal to add nearly $1 million to a Santa Clara County rebranding campaign was shelved on Tuesday. – Staff Photo

San Jose >> Santa Clara County has shelved a million-dollar branding effort — think matching logos on billboards and online ads — aimed at ratcheting up its profile and presence to the public.

The item, buried in the board of supervisors’ consent agenda — where noncontroversial items are automatically approved without discussion — was pulled Tuesday by County Executive Jeff Smith and postponed indefinitely.

“I took it off to see if we need to change it up, to reassess what’s needed,” said Smith. “We now know we have a marketing problem. How we approach it is another question.”

Some had questioned whether marketing was the best use of public money.

“There are great needs within our county such as mental health services,” said Pierluigi Oliverio, a former San Jose city councilman who is looking to replace Supervisor Ken Yeager when he terms out. “In my view it would be more prudent to allocate those tax dollars towards mental health care.”

But Board President Dave Cortese agreed the county has a marketing problem — people often don’t know what services the county provides them.

“You look at San Jose, they have a logo, and people know when they see it that they’re dealing with the city,” Cortese said. “We have people coming in and out of here from all over the world — business and tech people from Korea or India — and they need to know who we are, what
we do and where to find us.”

Said problem was analyzed for the county by Keating Co., a New York City-based firm that specializes in branding. The company “interviewed department heads, employees and clients and tried to get an idea of what they thought of how the county is communicating,” Smith said, and “came back with a lot of problems.”

“Look at a county parks advertisement next to a hospital ad,” Smith said. “You can’t tell from looking at them that these are both county services. We want to centralize our marketing, and have a centralized logo that’s common to all departments.”

He pointed to a recent ad campaign by Valley Medical Center that urges residents to “Go Public,” meaning choose the county as a health provider.

“The message doesn’t come across very well,” Smith said, adding that important services — and who provides them — often go unrecognized.

“From a client’s perspective, they get confused,” he said. “‘Is this the county? Who is doing this?’”

The initial contract with Keating was for $150,000. To fix the problems, Keating would have been hired through June of next year for an additional $850,000. Keating would provide “strategic brand and communications services and will develop a brand and narrative that incorporates the County’s point of view, including its focus on social reform and deep concern for the well-being of each and every citizen in the County of Santa Clara.”

Smith said there are a number of reasons he wanted to reassess the branding campaign.

“The whole process was started many months ago,” he said, “before there was clarity of what the budget would be like and even before the election and threats to our funding.”

But Mark Hinkle of the Silicon Valley Taxpayers Association said he was “flabbergasted” at the notion that county money would be spent on branding.

“People want a local government to provide police and fire and fix roads, and they can’t even do that,” he said. “You ask anybody who doesn’t work for the government how important their logo is, it’s concern 999 out of 1,000.”

By Eric Kurhi, ekurhi@bayareanewsgroup.com

POSTED: 04/11/17

Filed Under: A-News

Vicious Attack of Pierluigi Oliverio Unwarranted

Ones’ good name and reputation is a most prized possession. It is unconscionable for any person or entity to maliciously endeavor to destroy another persons reputation The lack of integrity the public special interest groups showed recently when they maliciously sought to destroy the reputation of Pierluigi Oliverio, candidate for Santa Clara County Supervisor, is […]

Op-Ed: How to make Santa Clara County government more effective

Residents should hold supervisors accountable for how efficiently core services are deployed to meet stated goals Federal, state, county, city, school and special districts all have distinct and important roles to play in community governance, and each body has a primary set of responsibilities. Elected officials, and especially candidates, will often urge action on hot […]

Op-Ed: Helping the mentally ill is good for public safety

After every mass shooting, we have a public discussion about mental illness, but what about the rest of the time? 25 to 40% of police calls nationwide are related to the behavior of someone who is mentally ill, and such instances include a higher risk of injury and death to those involved. This is a constant […]

Op-Ed: Tired of trash along roads? Get Santa Clara County inmate crews to clean it up

Our streets are filthy. I cannot recall a time when there has been so much trash on our roads. Traveling extensively for work I am amazed how other thoroughfares in the state and country are so clean, in contrast to Santa Clara County. This blight is highly visible, and seems worse than ever with no […]

Letter to the Editor: Labor bill would hurt Santa Clara County

State legislation AB1250 would negatively impact Santa Clara County.  It would not only increase the cost of county government unnecessarily, but would also inflict harm on our most vulnerable residents. Fortunately for taxpayers and recipients of county services, the bill stalled ​this month , but will likely be reconsidered in January. Passage would remove the flexibility of […]

Merc News condemns Unions

Your browser does not support the audio element.

Councilmember Davis Supports Pierluigi

audio

Your browser does not support the audio element.

Mayor Reed Supports Pierluigi

audio
http://fromhereforus.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/Oliverio-for-Supervisor-Chuck-Reed-043018.mp3

Like Me On Facebook

Facebook Pagelike Widget

Copyright © 2025 Paid for by Oliverio for Supervisor 2018 ----------- FPPC# 1394828-- Phil Rolla, Treasurer · Log in