City helps clean up, will be sending a bill to the cannery
Hollister – Thousands of processing tomatoes spilled out on to city streets near San Benito Foods Cannery and had residents seeing red Monday while attempting to drive through the slippery, paste-covered streets.
The tomatoes, which were apparently spilled by delivery trucks, nearly flooded East Street in Hollister Monday. Smashed, run-over clumps of tomatoes could be found several blocks away from the main spillage Monday night after residents and delivery trucks drove over the mess during the day, spreading the red fruit throughout the city.
Several residents called police and county officials throughout the day while city workers and cannery employees attempted to clean the mess, said Hollister Police Officer Rosie Betanio. The pulpy mess angered some motorists and homeowners near the cannery but didn’t cause any traffic accidents or injuries, Betanio said.
One Sally Street homeowner, who declined to give her name, said it was the “worst spill” she had seen during her two decades of residence near the cannery.
“I’ve never seen it this bad, this is disgusting,” she said. “It could ruin cars, tomatoes are really acidic.”
As of Tuesday, there had been no reports of car damage to the Hollister Police, Betanio said.
One motorist, driving through the mess, said the cannery needed to “clean up its act.”
Hollister City Manager Clint Quilter said city workers and a street sweeper were sent to clear the street, and the city would be sending a bill to either the cannery or the trucking company, depending on which was responsible for the mess. The total cost of the city’s cleaning bill is not yet known, Quilter said. Quilter said he had talked with cannery officials and they said they had a new trucking company, but were taking efforts to prevent future spills.
“Today it looks like they’ve cleaned up their act,” Quilter said on Tuesday, after the majority of dried tomato pulp had been removed from the roadway.
Cannery officials did not return phone calls for comment by press time on Tuesday.
Hollister Mayor Robert Scattini said he was going to bring up the spill at the city council’s meeting next week.
“Clear water and chicken feathers are the only two things that you can legally drop on streets,” said Scattini, who also serves as the San Benito County Marshal. “We’re going have to do something about this to make sure it doesn’t happen again.”
Monday’s tomato spill marks the beginning of the cannery’s peak season, which lasts about 10 to 12 weeks.
The cannery has been operating in Hollister since the 1900s, under various owners. Subsequent owners have battled with the city over waste-water usage, noise complaints and other issues for the last decade.
