Opinion

Looks like this was championship week when a final two met for a showdown. Each was a league best. Now was the test of mental and emotional endurance. Odds were chancy. One team, let’s say Team A, represents the Hazel Hawkins Memorial Hospital Board of...

How does it feel to have something special ripped away so a developer can reap profits at the expense of the community? How does it feel to know insider politics and cronyism live on?

“When you win you're reborn, when you lose you die a little bit.” This is a quote from George Allen, a former football coach who never had a losing season. I picked this quote because after reading about the state of California deciding to go back on its requirement for 8th graders to take Algebra. I have felt for many years that the educational system is literally and figuratively killing our children. From the hopelessness of some kids in the inner cities, to the honor students in Palo Alto jumping in front of trains. Although I don't have any hard data to prove it, my gut tells me that most of the people who have walked into schools and shot innocent students, teachers, administrators and others have been students who didn't “fit in” or may have been bullied. What I am trying to say is that in the educational systems rush to “leave no child behind”, they are leaving more behind than ever.  The message is clear from the first day that you attend school that you have to go to college, (not just a community college), but a 4 year college, and that everything you do must in some way set you on a path towards a 4 year university.  The A to G requirements.  The message is also very clear that if you don't accomplish these goals you are a “loser”, and that you can never be part of “successful society” if you don't go to college.  

When the elderly die, we don’t mind so much but we do mind when the young die. Cancer deaths of the young break our hearts, but war deaths of healthy young agonize us. Memorial Day reminds us of these tragedies. Yet after the marching,...

As a retired Registered Nurse (R.N.), I read with great dismay the letter to the Free Lance by Louis Wilmington dated Aug. 11.  Wilmington stated that the financial crisis at Hazel Hawkins Memorial Hospital can be “traced back nearly two decades of questionable management and...

Data shows that Hollister is a bedroom community and half of the city's workers leave the county for their job. Yet, to create a sustainable and thriving community, creating more business opportunities within San Benito County is critical. What should local and county leaders do...