News

SANTA CRUZ—The Santa Cruz County Board of Supervisors on Tuesday unanimously approved a new interactive budget website that allows community members to check up on the complex inner workings of the county’s finances, roughly one month before the board begins its annual budget hearings. The...

WATSONVILLE—Drive-thrus will be back on the Watsonville City Council’s menu at Tuesday’s meeting. The council will hear an appeal of a Planning Commission decision from late last year that stopped the development of a proposed business park at Main Street and Auto Center Drive. Boos Development...

A large section of Valencia School Road in Aptos slid down a hillside, taking a PG&E utility truck along with it just past midnight on Thursday. A 50-foot swath of asphalt road and earth gave way, making the road impassable. California Highway Patrol officer...

WATSONVILLE—Pajaro Valley Unified School District teachers are questioning a contract proposal by district officials that hinges a 1 percent salary increase on raising attendance rates to 97 percent. Pajaro Valley Federation of Teachers President Nelly Vaquera-Boggs called that requirement unrealistic. “They are asking us to control...

WATSONVILLE—The historic Porter Building in downtown Watsonville will not be sold to the Pajaro Valley Arts Council—it won’t be sold to the owners of this publication, either.  At least not anytime soon. Ongoing discussions between the city of Watsonville and PV Arts around the vacant city-owned...

A weekly column that celebrates local businesses — especially eateries, watering holes, coffee shops and the like.

WATSONVILLE—A third candidate jumped into the race for the 4th District seat on the Santa Cruz County Board of Supervisors set to be vacated by current supervisor Greg Caput in November. Ed Acosta, a member of the County Office of Education’s Board of Trustees and...

25 years ago on June 11, 1996 The Agricultural History Project’s Farm Implement Shed was completed and ready for dedication. Located just inside the fairgrounds’ main entrance, it is now used mainly for exhibits, but will eventually display large, antique farm implements. They will include...

Highway 1 was shut down for four hours early Monday when a dump truck slammed into the Freedom Boulevard overcrossing to Highway 1 in Aptos.  The California Highway Patrol said the truck was traveling northbound on Highway 1 at an unspecified time. The truck’s bed...

WATSONVILLE—Since 2014 there have been eight unsolved gang-related homicides in Watsonville, according to Watsonville Police Department spokeswoman Michelle Pulido. Many of those victims’ mothers—and those of countless other gang-related homicide victims from the Pajaro Valley—are still holding out hope that one day that will change. Sunday’s...