Opinion

In 2014, two-thirds of Watsonville’s voters approved the Measure G one-half percent sales tax to fund police, fire and youth violence prevention services for five years. This year, it will provide almost $5 million in funding to the police and fire departments—more than 10...

What is normal? I thought things would return to normal following the three-year Covid pandemic and devastating Santa Cruz Mountain fires. I thought we’d survived the worst. But nothing could have prepared me for the first three months of 2023 and the meteorological disasters...

Watsonville Mayor's Update, January 2018

Letters to the Editor, Nov. 11, 2017

Distributing limited resources fairly and equitably in a way that best serves students, staff, families and the community is an ongoing challenge for any school board. On July 21, the Pajaro Valley Unified School District Board of Trustees will review and discuss the Elementary...

My long-time friend Don White has died. If the name escapes you, he was the friendly man whose photo I ran in the R-P each year for the past 10-plus years tending his vast collection of bonsai trees in the back yard of his Carmel Street home.

I didn’t know Feliciano Martinez Perea but his story is not foreign to me. It’s a story that many Watsonville residents know. It’s the immigrant’s story. Martinez Perea hailed from the small town of San Martín Peras, Oaxaca, Mexico. He came to Watsonville to...

By Mercedes Garcia These are the messages I received from Geraldine Ridgway’s op-ed published in Nov. 20 edition of the Pajaronian: “Why can’t you Mexicans be like all the other ethnic groups that were mistreated in the past? Why don’t you just grin and bear it...

I’m here today to give you a pitch, A burning desire, It’s more than an itch, Underscoring the fact that this valley’s so rich Painting a picture imagine this course Make a reality Our place mighty force. The nature, the earth, the sea, and the sloughs The farms, and the people, so good and so...

Looking over the suffering of his people, the prophet Jeremiah cries out in grief and dismay, "Is there no balm in Gilead? Is there no physician there?” (Jeremiah 8:22) That is, is there no comfort for the suffering? Is there no relief for the...