News

Grocery shopping is a different experience than what it was before the Covid-19 pandemic. Between long lines and being in close-quarters, navigating an indoor store can be a challenging and not altogether comfortable experience.  This is why many farmers markets across the Monterey Bay campaigned...

SANTA CRUZ COUNTY—Gyms, barbershops, beauty salons, places of worship and shopping malls across Santa Cruz County will all have to close their indoor services on Tuesday, county health officials announced Monday. Retail and existing outdoor restaurant operations are unaffected by the new county health orders...

SANTA CRUZ COUNTY—Two Santa Cruz County residents died Tuesday due to complications from the novel Coronavirus, Santa Cruz County Health Officer Gail Newel announced during a Wednesday press conference. The fatalities bring the county’s death toll to six. Newel said Covid-19 was the leading factor...

SANTA CRUZ COUNTY—A partnership between UC Santa Cruz and the County of Santa Cruz—and funding from the Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security Act—will allow the county to expand its Covid-19 testing capacity to as many as 800 tests per day, county spokesman Jason...

WATSONVILLE—The Covid-19 pandemic has hit businesses hard, from the largest of companies to the smallest mom-and-pop shops. Rules continue to change as cases flatten and then spike, leaving business owners dealing with back-and-forth openings and closures. But for those who made their living off of...

WATSONVILLE—The Pajaro Valley Unified School District Board of Trustees on Wednesday unanimously approved new job descriptions for several teachers, administrative workers and a principal that will staff the new Virtual Academy, an all-online school approved July 23. The trustees also heard a budget report that...

SANTA CRUZ COUNTY—Santa Cruz County health officials announced Friday that two more county residents have died of Covid-19 complications, bringing the local death toll to eight. One was a man in his early 60s and the other was a woman in her late 90s. Both...

WATSONVILLE—The developer behind a 150-unit housing project off Ohlone Parkway is asking the Watsonville City Council for a one-year extension on the project’s approval. First approved by the council in 2018 as Sunshine Vista, Hillcrest Estates was set to transform an 11-acre junkyard at 511...

SCOTTS VALLEY—Santa Cruz County’s chief law enforcement official, and its District Attorney, had a message for anyone thinking about burglarizing homes in evacuated communities: if you are caught, you will be arrested and prosecuted. Law enforcement officials have increased their numbers by almost tenfold since...

WATSONVILLE—The County of Santa Cruz announced Saturday that it has distributed thousands of N-95 masks—and plans to hand out thousands more—to farms across the Pajaro Valley to help protect farmworkers from hazardous smoke currently polluting the air. Several fires across the Central Coast and greater...