News

Gov. Gavin Newsom signed almost 1,200 new laws this year, though not all of them took effect Jan. 1. One that did go into effect Jan. 1 was another $1 increase in the California minimum wage. For employers with 25 or fewer employees, it increased...

The annual San Benito High School AVID (Advancement Via Individual Determination) community service homeless gift bag drive “was a complete success,” according to teacher Charlene Hernandez, who said Baler students put together and donated 100 bags of items to My Father’s House shelter in...

San Benito High School Environmental Science and Biology teacher Ryan Shorey, who is also an adviser with the campus Environmental Club, recently was one of 18 teachers around the state awarded a $100 mini-grant from the California Resource Recovery Association’s K-12 Technical Council. Shorey, whose...

The Mabie Northside Skilled Nursing Facility at Hazel Hawkins Memorial Hospital likely will remain closed until late January to repair damage caused by a flash flood Dec. 4 that forced the emergency evacuation of patients. In a statement, the hospital reported that the 46 skilled...

In split votes, San Benito County supervisors and Hollister City Council members this month agreed on a new formula to divide property tax revenues from some new residential developments. While the amounts are relatively small—limited to only some of the explosive new growth in the...

In Spain, the summer solstice is celebrated with San Juan Day bonfires. In San Juan Bautista, the bonfire lights up at the winter solstice.  Each December San Juan Bautista residents gather at the Annual Holiday Bonfire/Hayden Christmas Celebration beginning at sunset. The annual bonfire...

Police arrested a 31-year-old motorist who allegedly struck and killed a pedestrian in east Hollister, then fled the scene without reporting the accident.

Three proposals at Hollister’s north end would allow construction of more than 1.1 million square feet of cannabis-growing greenhouses and other production facilities, establishing Hollister as an epicenter of cannabis production in the southern Santa Clara Valley and California’s Central Coast. The planned commercial cannabis...

The San Benito County Board of Supervisors, hearing concerns of theft and odor after the first hemp growing season, placed a 45-day moratorium on operations Dec. 10 to give the county time to revise its ordinance by late January. The county’s hemp ordinance went into...

Spring Grove Elementary School just north of Hollister has been honored as the only California Distinguished School in San Benito County, one of 323 K-8 schools honored across the state this month. The school will be honored at an awards ceremony Feb. 10 at the...