Local News

The annual Obon Festival will take place July 21 at the Watsonville Buddhist Temple. Open to the public, the event will include entertainment, a vendor’s market, childrens’ games and an array of traditional foods. The festival culminates in a dance, known as Bon-Odori, which participants practice...

In the decade between 2013-23, volunteers and nonprofits picked up 439,358 cigarette butts from Santa Cruz County’s beaches and natural areas, accounting for a quarter of all litter found here. That’s according to Save Our Shores (SOS), a Santa Cruz-based nonprofit that works to support...

Riverside Drive was closed to traffic and two homes were evacuated Wednesday afternoon between Union  Street and Marchant Street after construction crews ruptured a natural gas line. Watsonville Fire officials said the pipeline break was reported at 2:29pm in a section of the road that...

Watsonville police arrested two men on July 3 after they were found with more than 4,500 pounds of illegal fireworks. The bust is the largest in Watsonville Police history, and the biggest on the Central Coast this year, police spokeswoman Michelle Pulido said. Luis Martinez and...

A fast moving brush fire charged up a steep hillside on South Green Valley Rd. Near Melwood Way Friday just past noon. Watsonville Div. Chief Corey Schaefer said the blaze torched about 75 feet of a 6 foot wood fence and came within about...

The Fourth of July has long been a time of celebration in Santa Cruz County, a height-of-summer fete that draws hordes of people to local beaches to indulge in picnics, swim in the ocean, soak up the sun and, for some, trash the place. But...

Thousands of people lined the main streets of Watsonville and Aptos Thursday to watch the parades that have become a tradition stretching back decades. The Spirit of Watsonville parade kicked off at 12:30pm, two hours after the Worlds Shortest Parade, which takes place in Aptos...

A California Highway Patrol Officer confers with a tow operator at the scene of a solo-vehicle crash on Highway 1 in Watsonville Wednesday.  The CHP said a male driver was traveling south on Highway 1 around noon in a Rialto recreational vehicle. As he approached...

A Santa Cruz County justice program that places reconciliation over punishment has helped more than 240 people keep criminal convictions off their record since its inception in 2020, with just one case of recidivism. Now, the Santa Cruz County Neighborhood Courts program is seeking volunteers...