The Santa Clara County Board of Supervisors passed the second and final reading of an ordinance that will ask voters to increase the sales tax by one-eighth cent in November, increasing the local tax rate from 8.375 percent to 8.5 percent. The board voted 4-0 Tuesday, with South County’s Supervisor Mike Wasserman absent.
Joshua Valdez, 22, the Morgan Hill resident who was critically injured in a hit-and-run accident last month, is no longer comatose and recently started speech therapy at San Jose Regional Medical Center.