Politics

The City of Hollister will be charging higher fees for a wide range of services following an Aug. 20 unanimous vote by the City Council. The fees applied to four departments; the city Recreation Division, Fire Department, Police Department and Development Services Department. Many classes through...

Election season has officially begun in San Benito County, with the filing period ending Aug. 10. Topping the list of hotly contested races will be the race for mayor of Hollister, where two-term incumbent Ignacio Velazquez faces three challengers. Velazquez filed his candidacy paperwork days...

A wide range of fees that are paid out of pocket to government agencies by San Benito County residents may be raised. A new schedule of fees, set to be approved at a Board of Supervisors meeting Aug. 21, outlines what residents pay for...

With the filing period for candidates set to close Aug. 10, voters likely will have choices in all of the races for Hollister City Council and San Benito County Board of Supervisors. As of July 31, several candidates had filed to run for mayor and...

Eight months after a Superior Court judge ruled that San Benito County Board of Education Trustee Mitchell Dabo violated California probate laws when he transferred more than $640,000 from a charitable trust to his person accounts, the fate of an ongoing criminal probe could...

San Benito voters approved Measure C on Tuesday,with 58 percent in favor of setting up a tax structure for future expansion of the county’s budding cannabis business into unincorporated San Benito County. With citizens of Hollister and San Juan Bautista excluded from the vote, the...

Early returns from the four counties in the sprawling 30th Assembly district left no doubt about the front-runner, San Benito County Supervisor Robert Rivas. He will likely face first-time Republican candidate Neil Kitchens in a November runoff, as fellow Democrat and Gilroy City Councilman...

Labor rights icon Dolores Huerta, who received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from Barack Obama in 2012, was in South County and San Benito County last week campaigning for her preferred candidate in the 30th District State Assembly race. On Thursday, May 24, Huerta stopped...

For Rep. Jimmy Panetta, whose 20th District includes some of the nation’s biggest farm producers, voting against the most recent Farm Bill was difficult but necessary. “The failure of the Farm Bill on the House floor last week was due to a flawed process and...

The state’s petroleum industry is spending $320,000 in the District 30 State Assembly race to defeat fundraising frontrunner Robert Rivas. The San Benito County supervisor hopes to succeed Anna Caballero, who is running for state senate this year and represents a district that stretches...