Fire blazes through San Martin
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ADx-2RCaTi0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5zRjC_ltUR4
A fire that ripped through southeast San Martin burned 20 acres of vegetation and multiple homes, displacing 21 residents of the rural unincorporated community.
The blaze started about 4:15pm July 25 as a vegetation fire in the area of the 12100 block of...
State OKs $485M for new Pacheco Reservoir
The California Water Commission on Tuesday, July 24 approved $484.55 million to dramatically expand the Pacheco Reservoir in southeast Santa Clara County for drinking water reserves and improved protections for steelhead salmon.
The money comes from the state’s Proposition 1 approved by California voters, and...
Four school board seats up for grabs in Nov.
As a retired Gilroy Unified School District educator and current Board of Trustees president, Linda Piceno has helped sculpt much of the local education landscape.
And she’s not looking to change that anytime soon, as she confirmed with the Dispatch last week that she will...
Gavilan hires new VP of Academic Affairs
Gavilan College announced July 11 the selection of Denee Pescarmona as the local community college’s new vice president of academic affairs.
Pescarmona will oversee the academic divisions of Gavilan College: Liberal Arts and Sciences, Career Education, Community Education and Noncredit Instruction.
For the past four years,...
Garlic is big business
What started in 1979 as a small community food festival centered on the small, stinky, cousin of the onion has since turned into a world-recognized, Guinness record-holding, multimillion-dollar destination that helped put little Gilroy on the map. The Garlic Festival is a non-profit, but...
Opposition to Islamic center continues
South Valley Islamic families are beginning to see their long-awaited plans to build a mosque and community center in San Martin come together, but some vocal San Martin residents continue to oppose the project.
The pros and cons of building the proposed Cordoba Center were...
Child rapist gets 34 years
A Gilroy man was sentenced earlier this month to 34 years in prison for repeatedly sexually molesting two young girls over a 10-year period.
Anthony Duran’s victims, now adults, said in court that the abuse deeply impacted their mental and physical health as they grew...
Plans for $1 billion reservoir advance
The Santa Clara Valley Water District is moving forward with plans to build a new Pacheco Pass reservoir in Santa Clara County, which the district describes as a “game-changer” to ease the impact of future droughts in the Bay Area.
If $485 million in state...
Ten fires light up the sky, block 101
To say that Gilroy’s firefighters have been busy since July 4 would be an understatement, as the city department responded to 10 fires in less than 24 hours during the Independence Day holiday.
The action continued through the holiday weekend, as a Sunday afternoon truck...
