Opinion

George Washington in our City Plaza I found it interesting to read Greg Caput’s recent column about the current debate that our community is having about whether to remove the sculpture of George Washington from our City Plaza. This debate of removal appears to be...

By Greg Caput, County Supervisor To what standards are we held or judged by? If the standard is perfection, then everyone fails. A symbol of George Washington is under scrutiny at the Watsonville City Plaza. He was a victorious hero of the revolution 245 years...

By Rebecca J. Garcia, Watsonville Mayor Soon after I was elected to the Watsonville City Council I had the opportunity to visit several farmworkers’ housing conditions. What I found was five adults and four children living in a 2-bedroom duplex, eight adults living in a...

First Lady was sincere, dazzling  I felt that First Lady Melania Trump’s speech at the Republican National Convention was completely sincere and her words were bursting with dazzling light. She strikes me as being a person who truly and deeply cares about the wellbeing of...

Memo from Pastor Rene: There they were, side by side, helping to feed evacuees in our church parking lot last week: A true red-state conservative and a deep blue Democrat. I knew this about the two men from previous conversations, but as I watched them...

By Felipe Hernandez, Watsonville City Councilman We face a sobering reality.  For those of us who came of age in the 20th century, the existential threat of climate change that we debated theoretically and at great length will be lived by the children being born...

Memo from Rev. Mathews-Johnson “For God alone my soul waits in silence; from him comes my salvation.  He alone is my rock and my salvation, my fortress; I shall never be shaken.” (Psalm 62: 1-2, NRSV.)  The question is whether we really believe it.  A priest and...

MEMO FROM REV. SHINSEKI “There are causes for all human suffering, and  there is a way by which they may be ended, because everything in the world is the result of a vast concurrence of causes and conditions, and  everything disappears as these causes and...

By Steve Trujillo  In consideration of a badly-needed name change for Cabrillo Community College, there are three considerations that should be paramount:  1. If it is to be an individual, what personal characteristics and accomplishments make the individual worthy of putting that name to a community...

By Denise Elerick, of the Harm Reduction Coalition of Santa Cruz County Substance use disorder is now widely recognized in the medical community as a chronic illness which responds to treatment. Similar to other chronic diseases such as diabetes or heart disease, remission and recurrence...