Politics

The Hollister City Council this week appointed Ana Cortez as the new city manager, following a three-month search for a new staff leader at City Hall. Cortez will begin her new position in Hollister on Feb. 2, with an annual base salary of $265,000. She...

Two South Valley communities this week received federal funds for road safety improvements, says an announcement from Rep. Zoe Lofgren’s office. A total of $8,634,928 was awarded to California’s 18th Congressional district from the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Safe Streets and Roads for All (SS4A)...

The San Benito County Board of Supervisors narrowly rejected a petition to recall one of its members and labeled the effort “illegal” due to allegations that signature gatherers misled local voters.  Some of those voters said during a public hearing at the Nov. 18 board...

Millions of people across the U.S. gathered in thousands of cities Oct. 18 to protest the Donald Trump Administration. Known nationwide as the “No Kings” protest, demonstrators included hundreds in San Juan Bautista and Hollister. Local protesters displayed handmade signs criticizing the Trump Administration’s...

Voters in San Benito County Supervisorial District 5 will have a chance to vote whether to recall their incumbent in the June 2 election.  The local registrar of voters’ office has consolidated the recall election of Supervisor Ignacio Velazquez onto the statewide 2026 gubernatorial primary...

San Benito County has recovered nearly $700,000 stolen from a recent vendor payment fraud scheme, according to the county Auditor-Controller’s Office.  The recovery of the funds will allow the county to “issue proper payment to the legitimate vendor,” Auditor-Controller Joe Paul Gonzalez said in a...

Two minutes after the polls closed in California, CNN called the Prop 50 race at the starting gate, predicting that voters had approved the change in the state’s Congressional Districts. At 8:15pm Nov. 4, with nearly 4,000 of the state's 18,399 precincts counted, about 21%,...

San Benito County and the First Amendment Coalition reached a settlement in a case involving a social media page that posted content that was allegedly threatening toward local officials and their families.  Under the settlement, which was announced Dec. 5, the county agreed to withdraw...

Days after a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer shot and killed a U.S. citizen in Minneapolis, Californians across the state took to the streets to voice their opposition against federal immigration enforcement tactics and President Donald Trump’s mass deportation campaign. Over the weekend thousands...

Ken Griffin is San Benito County’s first agricultural commissioner since 2021, following a recent interview and vote by the board of supervisors.  Griffin has served as the county’s Acting Agricultural Commissioner for about five years. The board voted to remove “acting” from his title on...