Local News

Gail Groves and Dinah Phillips, the first same-sex couple to be married in Santa Cruz County in June 2008, will lead this year’s Pride festivities alongside Assemblymember Gail Pellerin, who officiated their wedding. In being named for this honor, they bring attention to the importance of LGBTQ+ love being normalized and validated.

Watsonville High School senior Chris Delgado has transformed childhood trauma into success, earning a statewide courage award and a scholarship as he prepares to attend college. He’s sharing his story in hopes of encouraging other young people to speak up and persevere through adversity.

This story was originally published by CalMatters. Sign up for its newsletters.

For all the talk of a governor’s race between two Republicans, or even two Democrats, it’s looking like voters are in for a typical partisan matchup in November.

In predictably Democratic California, there’s no need for a political science degree or a crystal ball to confidently predict the result of a general election face-off between Xavier Becerra, the current Democratic front-runner, and former Fox News host Steve Hilton, a Republican.

Despite the top-two primary system in which the two highest vote-getters advance to the general election, regardless of party, likely Democratic cakewalks abound further down the ballot after Tuesday’s election. 

So why is it so rare in California, which hasn’t elected a Republican to statewide office since 2006 and where Democratic voters outnumber registered Republicans almost 2-to-1, to put two Democrats on the ballot in the general election?

For all its political reputation as the left coast, California is simply not overwhelmingly Democratic enough to regularly advance two Democrats to the general election, said Andrew Sinclair, a political scientist at Claremont McKenna College who has studied the effects of California’s top two. 

With Democratic candidates regularly earning roughly 60% of the statewide vote, the electorate is sufficiently left-leaning to make the outcome of Democrat-versus-Republican general elections fairly predictable. But Democrats don’t make up quite enough of the vote share to push two Democratic candidates through the open primary except in somewhat unusual circumstances, he said.

“After about 60% to 65% Democratic vote share, it starts to get much more likely to get D-on-D races,” he said. In recent statewide races, the percentage of votes cast for the Democratic candidate has hovered around 60%, “right in the electoral dead zone,” said Sinclair. 

The promise of top two

It wasn’t supposed to be this way.

California’s unusual “top two” election system puts every candidate on the same primary ballot; the first and second place winners progress to the general election. The idea, approved by voters in 2010, was advertised as an engine of both political moderation and more meaningful choice. Both the Democratic and Republican parties were opposed.

Proponents argued that pulling candidates out of a purely partisan primary system would encourage them to appeal to voters across the ideological spectrum, rather than just the party base. 

Former Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger speaks during an event hosted by the Sacramento Press Club in November 2023. Credit: Miguel Gutierrez Jr. / CalMatters

The new voting scheme would “change the dysfunctional political system and get rid of the paralysis and the partisan bickering” in California politics, Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, who championed the proposition, said at the time.

In districts where one party dominates the field, allowing multiple candidates from that same party to compete was meant to make general elections competitive.

But if current election results hold — and with so many ballots still left to count, they may not — Californians don’t appear likely to see many competitive statewide races in November. 

In Tuesday’s races for lieutenant governor, attorney general, controller and treasurer, a series of high-profile, well-financed Democrats are competing against Republicans who range from long- to longer-shot. In congressional contests in West Los Angeles and Napa Valley, where upstart progressives challenged moderate incumbents, the upstarts appear to have been boxed out, leaving the two veteran Democratic representatives, Mike Thompson and Brad Sherman, to face ill-fated Republicans. 

A notable exception is the insurance commissioner’s race, in which two Democrats — Jane Kim and Ben Allen — hold the two top spots. The 2018 lieutenant governor’s race was also a Dem-on-Dem contest. It’s happened a few times in U.S. Senate races. But in most cases, a reversion to the polarized partisan norm is the rule. 

That’s in part thanks to the primary electorate itself.

Fewer voters tend to turn out in June elections, and those who do tend to be committed partisans prepared to vote for one party or another. Though the top-two system is officially nonpartisan, Democratic voters treat it like a partisan primary, herding around the person they consider the strongest representative of their party, with Republicans doing the same, said Eric McGhee, a political researcher at the Public Policy Institute of California.

There might be a handful of “pure independents in the middle” who will swing between parties, moderating the outcome and potentially crossing party lines to put a centrist over the top. 

But such voters are rare — especially in June.

Case in point: Matt Mahan, the moderate Democratic mayor of San Jose who ran for governor criticizing “extremism on both sides.” With his focus on pocketbook issues and promises to limit his own party’s state spending, Mahan was the “poster child” for a top-two system designed for “all those so-called people who are going to come to the middle,” said Democratic consultant Steve Maviglio.

“He got 4%,” said Maviglio, a top-two critic who voted for Mahan. “Voters are partisan, at the end of the day.”

Does the system create more moderates?

Californians are much more likely to see same-party general election contests in local races, where an individual district is more likely than the state as a whole to be overwhelmingly dominated by one party.

In congressional races in the San Francisco Bay Area, Sacramento and across Los Angeles and in legislative races in liberal enclaves across California, two Democrats are on track to head to November. 

USC political science professor Christian Grose said over the last decade, about a third of legislative general election races have been between two members of the same party.

Removing the choice between parties from the general election can have benefits like allowing voters to choose based on true policy differences or perceptions of competence rather than simply siding with a party, he said. But it can also invite voters to make choices based on “things not related to governance,” like gender or race. 

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In a 2020 paper, Grose found that congressional candidates in top-two states have an incentive to tack toward the center, suggesting the top-two system works as intended whether or not the candidates end up competing in a same-party general election. 

And in a newly created purple district that runs northeast of Sacramento, former Republican turned independent Rep. Kevin Kiley appears to have claimed first place in his race. Running without official party backing might be easier under a nonpartisan primary system.

Shutouts and cynical games

There are obvious downsides.

Tom Charron, co-founder of the California Ranked Choice Voting Coalition, says the top-two primary system is vulnerable to “cynical gaming” in which one candidate boosts the candidate they consider easier to beat in the general election.

Newsom did that in 2018 by tacitly steering Republican voters toward Republican John Cox, whom he viewed as a weaker opponent than fellow Democrat Antonio Villaraigosa. 

Likewise, in the 2024 primary, a super PAC backing Democratic U.S. Sen. Adam Schiff put millions of dollars behind Republican candidate Steve Garvey, undercutting Democratic former Rep. Katie Porter’s chances.

Another possible problem popped up early in the life of the reform. In 2012, the first cycle after voters approved the top two, four Democrats crowded into a race to represent San Bernardino in Congress. Two Republicans did the same. The Democrats ended up slicing up the left-of-center vote so thinly that the Republicans won the top two spots, despite Democrats holding a modest voter registration edge. 

A more egregious example took place 10 years later when too many Republican candidates vying to represent a deeply conservative state Senate district east of Fresno divided the GOP vote, leaving Democrats in the top two.

From left, Katie Porter speaks as Chad Bianco, Antonio Villaraigosa, Xavier Becerra and Matt Mahan listen during a California gubernatorial debate hosted by CBS Bay Area and the San Francisco Examiner in San Francisco on May 14. Credit: Godofredo A. Vásquez / Associated Press, pool

That perverse outcome was top of mind for many Democratic voters earlier this year when a glut of Democrats running for governor threatened to leave the top two spots to Hilton and Riverside County Sheriff Bianco.

With Becerra and fellow Democrat Tom Steyer well ahead of Bianco in the vote count, the shutout didn’t happen, showing how unlikely it was, said Claremont McKenna’s Sinclair. 

“In some sense, the Democratic Party did everything they possibly could to make [a shutout] happen,” Sinclair said. He pointed to a “low-quality field of candidates” likely to divide the vote evenly, the abrupt exit of front-runner Democratic Rep. Eric Swalwell and the failure of the party or any of its California luminaries to endorse anyone.

If nothing else, the fear among highly engaged Democratic voters may have led a decisive number to vote strategically to avoid a shutout, Sinclair said.

Changes on the way?

Even though it was eventually averted, the prospect of a Republican governor in California in 2026 has led some to reconsider the top two.  

Maviglio has filed a proposed ballot measure to repeal the top-two system and return to partisan primaries. 

“The fact that there are any [same-party general elections] is simply undemocratic,” Maviglio said. “People have the choice between only one party, like they’re in the Soviet Union?”

In theory, Democrat-on-Democrat races are supposed to give voters a choice between distinct ideological options within the same party — a business-backed moderate, say, and a Bernie-boosting progressive. 

In practice, voters are quite bad at making such distinctions, said McGhee at PPIC.

“The evidence we have of how voters view these contests is that they don’t have a clue who the moderate or the liberal is,” he said. “It’s always a good bet that voters are way way way less tapped into the nuances of what’s going on than you are if you’re interested in politics.”

Others are pushing for a third option — ranked-choice voting. 

Charron, with the Ranked Choice Voting Coalition, said his group is advocating for California to move toward an Alaska-style voting system in which the top four or five primary finishers advance to a ranked-choice general election.

Ranked choice allows voters to rank their candidates by preference. If a voter’s top choice doesn’t receive enough votes to win, their vote goes to their second preference, then third, and so on. Several California cities already use it for mayoral contests, including Oakland and San Francisco.

Charron said the system encourages a more diverse field of candidates and gives voters more choice, since few would worry about being a “spoiler” for a fellow party member. 

In May, the nonpartisan nonprofit Independent Voter Project launched a group aimed at bringing ranked choice to California via a constitutional amendment that could go before voters in 2028.

“It’s very exciting for us right now that these conversations are coming up because of some of the risks that we’ve seen in this primary season, in particular,” said Charron.

Kate Wolffe contributed reporting for this story.

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Have something to say? Lookout welcomes letters to the editor, within our policies, from readers. Guidelines here.

A UC Santa Cruz student recently sent a request for available housing to Nextdoor after she and her seven roommates were out on the streets because the owner sold the property without warning them. 

It’s the university’s job to provide housing for its students and it hasn’t lived up to this job for years. I advised the students to voice their situation to the chancellor. If not, I told them I would. The UCSC admissions office keeps signing up too many applicants for whom there is not enough housing. 

When will they stop? If the students can find other students in the same situation, I suggest asking them to protest in front of the chancellor’s office and the housing office.

UCSC has a lot of property (which it refuses to develop) on which temporary housing could be erected in time for fall term 2026.  

Kathy Cheer

Santa Cruz

The post Letter to the editor: UCSC should build more housing for its students appeared first on Lookout Santa Cruz.

California regulators passed a rule in January 2024 that they said would protect communities from one of the state’s most popular, and dangerous, pesticides.

For decades, they knew that 1,3-dichloropropane, or 1,3-D, causes tumors in multiple organs in laboratory animals, which led the state to flag it as a carcinogen in 1989. Yet regulators allowed growers to fumigate fields with large volumes of 1,3-D to kill anything living in the soil before planting strawberries, almonds, grapes and other billion-dollar crops.

But now, a year after regulators implemented a rule they said would reduce cancer risk by decreasing the amount of 1,3-D in the air, applications of the highly volatile compound have spiked, state records show. 

PESTICIDES IN THE PAJARO VALLEY: Read Lookout’s news and Community Voices opinion coverage here

Growers applied a million more pounds of 1,3-D last year than they did in either 2023, before regulators enacted the “residential bystander” rule, or in 2024, after they implemented it. 

Increases were highest in Kern and San Joaquin counties, where it was used mostly on almond and grape plantings. Notably, the “adjusted total pounds”—which accounts for different application methods, weather conditions and other factors that affect how much of the volatile pesticide escapes into the air—nearly doubled in both counties and increased by almost 20% statewide.

“Their new regulations are failures,” said Mark Weller, the campaign director for the statewide public-interest group coalition Californians for Pesticide Reform. “They put in new regulations and 1,3-D use went up.”

The Department of Pesticide Regulation (DPR) enacted new rules in 2024 to restrict the use of 1,3-D to protect residential bystanders by implementing setback distances, requiring deeper injection in soil with higher moisture content, along with new fumigation methods and tarp requirements to reduce fumigant emissions into the atmosphere, said agency spokesperson Amy MacPherson. “DPR specifically developed methods that could allow for comparable levels of use while reducing overall emissions.”

Anne Katten, pesticide and work health and safety project director for the nonprofit California Rural Legal Assistance Foundation, analyzed emissions detected at an air monitor in Delhi, California, one of six monitors operated by DPR. Katten found a 30% increase in average levels of 1,3-D in the air during the first three quarters of 2025 (the most recent publicly available data) compared to the same period in 2024.

Delhi is a largely Latino town in Merced County, where the $10 billion agriculture industry employs one in five residents and farmers primarily use 1,3-D to grow almonds and sweet potatoes. Merced is also where regulators detected alarmingly high levels of 1,3-D at a junior high school in 1990 and suspended its use for five years.

Public health policy assumes that there is no safe level of exposure to a carcinogen, to account for disparities in exposure and variable susceptibility across different populations. Fumigants like 1,3-D can also produce severe short-term symptoms, including respiratory distress, chest pains, eye irritation and dizziness.

A sign at a Watsonville strawberry field warns of pesticide use. Credit: Liza Gross / Inside Climate News

In 2023, researchers in China reported what they believed to be the first death from inhaling 1.3-D, which commonly causes nausea, dizziness and headaches in exposed California farmworkers. A 50-year-old Chinese greenhouse worker died of renal failure and brain swelling more than a week after a brief encounter with 1,3-D in a poorly ventilated workspace.

1,3-D is now banned in 40 countries, according to Pesticide Action Network International.

The whole point of the regulations was not necessarily to reduce 1,3-D use but to reduce emissions, said Caroline Cox, a retired pesticide scientist and former research director at the nonprofit Center for Environmental Health. “It just doesn’t seem like the regulations are really doing what they were designed to do.”

Farmworker communities and their allies have tried lawsuits, media campaigns and die-in protests to compel pesticide regulators to protect them from 1,3-D. In February, they returned to court to seek relief from DPR’s “continued failure to meet its legal obligations to protect farmworkers and other members of the public from … a toxic, cancer-causing fumigant.”

DPR now has two separate safety levels for the same chemical, the 2024 residential bystander rule and another rule for occupational bystanders, which went into effect at the beginning of 2026. Having two different 1,3-D regulatory targets for residents and workers does not account for the fact that farmworker communities, where people live and work next to treated fields, typically face much higher exposure risks from childhood to old age. 

“Both regulations miss the mark and allow for the continued use of 1,3-D in a way that neither satisfies DPR’s mandatory legal obligations nor sufficiently protects public health,” farmworker and community advocates argued in their legal brief.

Before enacting the new rules, DPR capped the amount of 1,3-D growers could apply within a roughly 36-square-mile area called a township. DPR did not include a township cap in the 2024 regulations because agency officials expected the setbacks and other additional requirements to mitigate both acute and cancer risks. Still, the cap remained in place, due to a court order, until January, when the occupational bystander rule went into effect.

One township in Kern County already exceeded the previously required annual township cap, and several in Kern and Merced counties are approaching it, in just the first quarter of this year, state records show. As a 2024 Inside Climate News analysis found, the disproportionate burden of pesticide exposure falls on immigrants with limited English proficiency—which describes the majority of California’s farmworker population.

DPR’s MacPherson attributed increased applications of 1,3-D to “unusually high replanting of vineyards and orchards in Kern County, which only occurs about once every 10 to 20 years.”

DPR is monitoring areas with relatively high use in the first quarter, she said, but needs to see a full year of data before drawing “meaningful conclusions.”

DPR released a plan to accelerate sustainable pest management in 2024 with a top goal of eliminating the adverse human health and environmental impacts associated with pesticide use. It does not include a list of priority pesticides.

Seeing elevated emissions of 1,3-D after regulators removed the cap troubles Katten at the California Rural Legal Assistance Foundation. “They were saying everything was going to be OK because things were on a downward trend, and they clearly aren’t,” Katten said. “Their sustainable pest management efforts are not bearing fruit yet.”

At a recent meeting with DPR, Weller told staff members the agency used to be committed to reducing fumigant use in California. “Are you still interested in that?” he asked.

No one answered yes, he said.

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In a letter to the editor, a Santa Cruz resident expresses doubt over the future of local passenger rail under the current leadership of the Santa Cruz County Regional Transportation Commission.

Watsonville Municipal Airport is one of our community’s most unique assets. 

While many people may think of airports simply as places where aircraft take off and land, our airport has become so much more. Today, it serves as a hub for education, innovation, community engagement, and future opportunities for Watsonville residents of all ages.

I appreciate how our airport continues to connect directly with the community.

Throughout the year, the airport hosts events and partnerships that invite residents onto the airfield to experience aviation in exciting and meaningful ways. From blood drives and community events to educational programs and family-friendly open houses, the airport continues to find ways to bring people together.

One of the most exciting efforts happening at the airport right now is its investment in the next generation. Through partnerships with local schools, educators, pilots, and aviation professionals, students are gaining hands-on learning experiences that can help shape future careers and opportunities.

A great example is the partnership with Pajaro Valley Unified School District’s new aviation pathway program, part of its Career Technical Education curriculum. Students are receiving hands-on exposure to aircraft maintenance, aeronautical engineering, and flight systems while learning directly from industry professionals. Earlier this year, students even began assembling a functioning aircraft at the Watsonville Aviation Education Center. It is an incredible example of what can happen when education, industry, and community partnerships come together.

The airport’s outreach efforts also extend to younger students. This year marks the fifth consecutive year of the annual “Day at the Airport” program in partnership with PVUSD. Since 2022, more than 2,000 fourth-grade students have had the opportunity to experience aviation firsthand through interactive demonstrations and behind-the-scenes activities hosted by local aviation businesses, pilots, maintenance crews, and volunteer organizations. Students have explored law-enforcement drone operations, learned about emerging electric aircraft technology, watched parachute-packing demonstrations, and even experienced a working wind tunnel.

These programs are about much more than aviation. They are about inspiring curiosity, creating opportunities, and showing young people that exciting career paths and possibilities exist right here in Watsonville. At the same time, our airport continues looking toward the future. Watsonville Municipal Airport is helping position our community as a leader in emerging aviation technologies and clean-energy transportation. In partnership with nearby airports, Watsonville is exploring opportunities connected to Electric Vertical Take Off and Landing (eVTOL) aircraft and next-generation aviation infrastructure. These efforts have the potential to support innovation, strengthen workforce development, and create new economic opportunities for our region.

Community engagement remains at the center of everything the airport does. One of the biggest examples is the airport’s annual Fire in the Sky Open House celebration, returning Saturday, July 4, 2026. Every year, thousands of residents and visitors gather at the airport to experience everything the airport has to offer. This year’s event will feature aircraft displays, demonstrations, music, food, family activities, and a Kidz Zone, all culminating in an exciting fireworks show to close out the evening commemorating our nation’s 250th anniversary.

As City Manager Tamara Vides shared, “Our airport offers the perfect venue for the citizens and community to come together to recognize the value of our airport while celebrating our independence. The annual Fire in the Sky Open House continues to be an exciting opportunity for residents and visitors to experience Watsonville’s airport and what it has to offer.”

I am proud of the role our airport continues to play in supporting education, innovation, and community connection here in Watsonville. Whether introducing students to new career opportunities, supporting emerging technologies, or creating memorable experiences for families, our airport continues proving that it is far more than aviation infrastructure. It is an important community asset that helps shape the future of

Watsonville.

Pesticide use in the Santa Cruz county 

Pesticides are not only harming farmworkers but also us. Pesticide use is a huge problem that is especially affecting us since we are surrounded by agriculture. It is very important to find new ways to control invasive pests, a way this can be accomplished is by using natural pesticides. An article titled “A focus on agricultural pesticide applications” states that agriculture is the second highest income generator in the county, bringing in $1.5 billion in overall economic impacts. The use of harmful pesticides used near us is not a coincidence, this is a form of environmental racism. The same article states that “The director of the center for farmworker families, Ann Lopez, said ‘you would not find this in the north county of Santa Cruz, or if it was there, there would be such an uproar that you would hear about it all over the country.’” 

My grandpa worked in the fields, and he says that when he and all the other workers would be picking the strawberries there would be other people spraying chemicals just a few feet away. Due to this, my grandpa got diagnosed with cancer. 

He is not the only one. His situation is an ongoing issue among farmworkers. 

Santa Cruz County has the second highest rate of childhood cancer in California, 36% higher than the state average. It’s not surprising, because agricultural corporations like Driscoll’s and California Giant Berry Farms spray an estimated 5,060 acres of cancer-causing pesticides in the Pajaro Valley every year, including near schools and homes where children spend most of their time.

Andrea Palmerin Alfaro

Watsonville

•••

Inflammatory rhetoric is not the way

The Pajaro Valley School District and the various unions that contract with the district have reached an impasse since they have not agreed to terms. The state has a process for resolving the disputes in an attempt to avoid a strike. First is mediation, and if that fails, there is a fact finder who will sort out the facts from the hype. It seems that the unions want to avoid that impartial fact finder by staging demonstrations and disruptions at board meetings in the hopes of intimidating the board to acquiesce to their demands.  

With the process already in place, let’s see if mediation will bring the sides together.  If that does not resolve the dispute, then a neutral fact finder will determine whether the district’s proposals have merit and whether the union’s demands are reasonable.  

The public has a right to know which side is justified in their demands. Publicity stunts and political theater like we have seen are not necessary, and only serve the union leadership and not their members. PVUSD is not in good financial shape, and they need to act responsibly as do the unions. Hopefully a strike can be averted, but inflammatory rhetoric is not the way to proceed.

Gil Stein

Aptos

•••

The hard truth: Understanding and overcoming Depression 

The people who tend to struggle with depression are the ones who can be the brightest people in the room. They are the ones who find it easier to make you smile rather than themselves. 

Oftentimes, people who struggle with depression find it difficult to reach out for help. I have dealt with a lot of pressure as a student athlete, and in trying to maintain the level of expectations I have set for myself. 

Throughout my entire life, I have dealt with adversity with family and friend issues and extreme stages of grief. The absolute worst of all was the sudden passing of my older brother. That event really played a major role in my life in many ways. Being a student-athlete means there will always be people keeping their eyes on you, whether it is for the student part or the athlete part. Regardless, you will always have the added pressure. Preparing for sporting events over many years can take a lot out of athletes. It’s a fight for seconds, minutes, points, heights, the most wins, or the most successful season. 

Studies have shown that student-athletes (22.3%) were at risk for depression, anxiety (12.5%), and low self-esteem (8%). 

You are given this certain level of expectations, and you are expected to follow up because you committed to this. You, as a student-athlete, are expected to maintain good grades and attendance while trying to perform at the highest level for your sport. Since the age of 6 years old, I have been playing basketball at an extreme level. From age 6 to now, basketball has been my only passion, and it shows. I play hurt, sick, tired, and I lose sleep, skip meals, and overall destroy myself for the game I “love.” Understanding and overcoming depression is something many people struggle with doing. However it is very much possible to overcome such adversity.

Matthew Grell, 17

Watsonville High School

•••

At-large system right for Capitola

I strongly support Capitola’s transition from at-large elections to district-based elections. This important change will bring fairer and more responsive representation to our community of nearly 10,000 residents.

Under the old at-large system, neighborhood-specific issues often got overlooked. Whether you live near the beach and Wharf, along Soquel Creek, in the residential hills, or in eastern Capitola, each area has its own distinct character, needs, and challenges. District elections ensure that every part of our city will have a council member who actually lives there and understands local concerns like traffic, parking, housing, and preserving our small-town charm.

This new system promotes stronger accountability, makes it easier for regular residents to run for office, and better protects our diverse communities of interest. It also responsibly addresses legal concerns under the California Voting Rights Act, saving taxpayers from expensive lawsuits.

I urge the City Council and demographer to draw sensible, compact district lines that keep neighborhoods intact and respect natural boundaries. With careful implementation, this reform will make Capitola’s democracy more inclusive, equitable, and effective.

Capitola is a wonderful, tight-knit community. Moving to district elections is the right step forward to ensure every voice truly matters.

Mike Lelieur

Pleasure Point

•••

Trouble at Pajaro Middle School

Pajaro Middle School is flooding once again, but this time, instead of water, the campus is drowning in incompetence from the principal causing a lack of safety.

Following devastating flooding, the school reopened in 2025 with a part-time principal. After suffering trauma, relocation, and separation, this was deemed sufficient.  The school needed to rebuild more than just a few classrooms.  

Thanks to dedicated staff, the principal was moved to full-time. Unfortunately, things did not improve as hoped. Failure to maintain safety was so frequent, six teachers filed a grievance with PVUSD.  

This year the hope lasted for a month.  Poor communication and supervision and fights amongst students started the year. Since January the principal has failed to address:

• Selling drugs on campus

• Weapons and threats against a student

• Proper response during lock-down 

• Supporting students after an attack on a classmate

Staff response was a vote of no confidence, supported by 88% of them and 71 pages of documentation. 

Through grievances and complaints, the district never stepped in. The principal has chosen to stay when presented with an opportunity for a fresh start. 

Pajaro deserves a school where they feel confident sending students. However, the loss of trust between principal and staff makes this impossible.  For PMS to rebuild safety and trust a replacement is needed that will put the safety of students first.

PVMS staff

“Threads of Grief, Threads of Love” is the current show at Resource Center for Nonviolence made up of 36 handmade quilts that honor 722  infants killed in Gaza before their first birthday. 

A community gathering was held May 29 to kick off the exhibit, spearheaded by Unhae Landis, where a panel of five speakers addressed the Gaza war. 

The panelists were Palestinian writer, playwright and podcaster Mo Sati, along with Rolla Alaydi, a Monterey County educator who has lost 215 family members. Also included were Lebanese artist and educator Rami Chahine and Unhae Langis, a quilter, writer and community organizer. Multidisciplinary artist Maha Taitano Chamoru-Iraqi also joined the panel.

“My family has been displaced again and again, over and over and their homes destroyed in Gaza,” Alaydi told the sword of around 50 people. “Now they search for food and water that does not exist. [The quilts] “are lives, they are dreams, they are threads woven into the fabric of humanity, and as long as we continue to speak their names and tell their stories those threads will not be broken.”

Twenty-eight quilters pooled their skills, both locally and from around the state, to create the 36 baby quilts, each including around 20 infant names in the design. 

NAME BY NAME This quilt was made by Fatima Dias. (Tarmo Hannula/The Pajaronian)

The exhibit stems from the initial quilt project of September 2025 titled “Know their names; Babies in Gaza Who Never Made It To Their First Birthday” that was the brainchild of Elizabeth Wiliams and Sarah Ringler who were inspired by the AIDS Quilt of 1985. 

The poster for the show reads, “Each name is a whole world: a child who was held, awaited, dreamed over. Each one was killed with weapons our government helped supply. Each stitch holds grief, remorse, and recognition of our shared humanity.”

The show runs through July 31 at 612 Ocean St., Santa Cruz.

Eight bicyclists rolled into Watsonville Monday afternoon on the second stop of the annual Fire Velo bike ride. 

Their weeklong journey started in San Francisco and will wrap up in Santa Monica on June 6.

Fire Velo is a national cycling organization that promotes physical and mental wellness in the fire service and partners in emergency services through cycling and other charity events. It also fundraises to support fire service efforts of cancer awareness and cancer prevention. 

“One of the leading causes of death in the fire service is cancer,” said retired Los Angeles firefighter Jim Berklite. “And we’re trying to change the mentality about cancer and that you can go through this career healthy and protected. We’re out here to advocate and to raise money for our partner organizations.” 

While this year’s ride had eight riders, past events have had more than 40.

“Coming into a place like Watsonvilleit simply doesn’t get any better,”  Berklite said. “Watsonville is the true definition of a brotherhood.”

Watsonville firefighters threw down the red mat and welcomed the riders with a meal, shared stories and more.

Retired firefighter Marv Williams said he was the oldest rider of the pack at 76.

“The next youngest rider is 75,” he said. “It’s a great thing to be a part of. Watsonville is the best; they show off their families, the mayor often comes out, we get a warm send off. No other city does it like this.”

Why does the Corralitos Cultural Center (CCC) feel like a creative vortex? Could be it is what happens when musicians, artists, builders and scientists keep running into one another – Corralitos is literally a wide spot in the road. Could be it’s the back-to-the-land ethos where collaboration is the common coin. Regardless, the Corralitos Cultural […]

Julie Gill, a volunteer legal observer and school patrol coordinator with YARR, speaks to Santa Cruz Local for an interview. (Amaya Edwards — Santa Cruz Local/CatchLight Local)

LIVE OAK >> On a recent Thursday afternoon, Julie Gill stood watch from a sidewalk on Capitola Road across from Live Oak Elementary School. She wore a high-visibility yellow jacket, and a whistle hung around her neck. 

She was carefully watching for immigration agents, as she’s been trained to do as a legal observer and school patrol coordinator with local pro-immigrant rapid response group YARR, or Your Allied Rapid Response.

“ We came here because the immigrant families in this neighborhood requested it. They were afraid to walk in and walk out” of school, Gill said. The group has maintained daily patrols at Del Mar and Live Oak elementary schools and Shoreline Middle School since January. 

Gill was one of close to a dozen volunteers on call that day, monitoring the roads for immigration agents as children got dropped off and picked up from school. 

If immigration agents arrived, she would alert people nearby by blowing on the whistle, a tactic that has spread as activists respond to immigration crackdowns throughout the country. YARR also has a phone list of hundreds of trained legal observers who would be alerted and asked to show up if immigration agents were present.

YARR formed in 2017 during the first term of President Donald Trump as a hotline to call if ICE agents were seen. The group posts on its Instagram and Facebook pages whether reports of ICE are true or false, and has expanded its work to include proactive patrols like the school patrols.

As the school year ends, the group is hoping to grow its capacity over summer to maintain and expand its school patrols at Live Oak and start patrolling schools in Santa Cruz, especially Gault Elementary where many immigrant families send their children. 

A group unaffiliated with YARR had previously established school patrols in Watsonville, Gill said.

To grow its capacity, YARR is seeking more volunteers to get trained and sign up for shifts, and hopes to train parents to volunteer at their kids’ schools.

School patrols have popped up throughout the country in the wake of President Donald Trump’s crackdown on unauthorized immigrants. Under Trump, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security lifted a ban on immigration detentions and raids in schools, hospitals and churches, stoking fear amongst already vulnerable communities.

Gill said she was hardened in her resolve to step up and volunteer with YARR after seeing the federal actions in Los Angeles, Chicago and Minneapolis, including the killing of two Minneapolis residents who were protesting the immigration enforcement surge earlier this year. 

School patrols are meant to serve as an early warning system for families in the event immigration agents, such as Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, are present near schools. The fear of detention has many immigrant parents staying home, too fearful to drop their children at school, go grocery shopping or even seek medical attention. 

Volunteer patrols can lead to higher attendance at schools and improved mental health of students, school leaders across California told EdSource in a Jan. 16 article.

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YARR’s presence at the two local schools has also served to quickly extinguish false reports of ICE presence at least twice. Misinformation and fake reports on social media can quickly spread unnecessary panic among immigrant communities.

Gill said several months ago, a post on Facebook claimed that ICE was in front of Live Oak Elementary.

“ Nothing was happening. It was just completely fabricated,” she said. “ We were able to knock that rumor down, because we do have a social media and we inform the folks that are scared it’s not ICE.”

Legal observers with YARR where high-visibility vests and a whistle to alert nearby residents in case immigration agents were present. (Amaya Edwards — Santa Cruz Local/CatchLight Local)

Being able to inform people that immigration agents are not present has been as important as being ready to inform people if immigration agents were there, Gill said. 

When YARR started patrolling the Live Oak schools, some parents and staff were confused. But after several weeks of consistent presence, they began to greet the volunteer patrollers and several times brought them snacks. It took time, but eventually volunteers gained the trust of families, Gill said.

“ When we started here, we weren’t sure how it was going to go,” she said. “We had reached out to the superintendent and stuff, and they were kinda iffy about it.”

A representative of Live Oak School District didn’t respond to requests for comment by publication.

Two volunteer patrollers that Santa Cruz Local spoke with asked to be identified by their first names only, due to concerns of political repression of activists.

Janet said she started volunteering after hearing of the shootings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti in Minneapolis.

“This is my neighborhood. This is my community. And I’ll do whatever it takes to protect the parents and the kids,” Janet said. “ Not a lot has happened, obviously, which is a great thing. But I think it’s really great that we all stay pretty vigilant and aware.”

Janet, who asked to only be identified by her first name, patrols around Live Oak Elementary School in Live Oak on May 21. (Amaya Edwards — Santa Cruz Local/CatchLight Local)

Another volunteer, Anita, echoed the sentiment.

“It’s our neighborhood. So [we are] supporting our community and our neighborhood,” Anita said. “ YARR as it currently is, I think has to be really changeable, responsive, and be able to adapt basically to whatever’s gonna come down the line.”

Since the federal surge in Minneapolis and the departure of leadership within the Department of Homeland Security, which oversees ICE and Customs and Border Protection, other cities haven’t seen a similar intensified crackdown. 

“I think tactics are going to start to change, and so I think we need to be really adaptive for that,” Anita said. “Long term, I think it’s building community and I hope that goes on.”

One of the next big fights for pro-immigrant groups in the area is the proposal for an immigration detention facility in Gilroy which is under construction and faces opposition from local leaders. 

In the meantime, YARR leaders hope to continue training legal observers, and maintain and expand its school patrols.

“We’re in it for the long haul,” Gill said.

To learn more about YARR and how to get involved, visit their website.

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The post Local volunteers patrol schools for ICE agents. They need more help. appeared first on Santa Cruz Local.

Aptos High was ousted from the Central Coast Section baseball playoffs in heartbreaking fashion following a walk-off 7-6 loss in nine innings to top seed Menlo School in the Division III semifinals at Santa Clara University on May 26.

James Riley, a freshman, finished with a team-best three hits, including one double, two RBIs and two runs scored in the near upset for the No. 5 Mariners.

Teammate junior Cole McGillicuddy had two hits, including one double, one RBI and two runs scored, while sophomore Damien Espinoza had one double and a pair of RBIs.

In the third, Reilly hit an RBI single that gave Aptos its first lead of the game at 3-2. Finn Cormier followed up with an RBI single that drove in Reilly, extending the lead by two.

Junior pitcher Alec Mendoza started on the mound for Aptos, which was coming off a 3-1 win against No. 4 Sacred Heart Prep in the quarterfinals on May 23. He allowed a pair of runs in the first two innings, but he seemed to settle in as the game progressed. 

In the bottom of the third with one out, Mendoza got into a jam with runners on first and second base. He struck out one batter and forced another to hit into a fielder’s choice to second base for the out.

The Mariners had a 5-3 lead going into the seventh inning until the Knights chipped away, knocking in a pair of runs to tie it at 5-all to force extra innings.

Aptos retook the lead in the ninth frame but Menlo responded with two more runs for the walk-off victory.

Aptos, runner-up in the Santa Cruz Coast Athletic League, finished the 2026 spring campaign with a 14-9 overall record. 

No. 1 San Mateo 8, No. 5 St. Francis 4: A late rally in the seventh inning wasn’t enough for the Sharks after they faced a large deficit against the Bearcats in the D-V semifinals at Santa Clara University on May 27.

The Sharks were coming off a 9-7 win against No. 4 Live Oak in the quarterfinals on May 23.

St. Francis, fifth place finishers in the Pacific Coast Athletic League’s Gabilan Division, finished the 2026 spring campaign with a 9-19-1 overall record.

High school softball

No. 7 Alisal 2, No. 3 Aptos 0: Abigail Walker tossed a complete game shutout for the Trojans to stun the Mariners in the D-I semifinals at Hollister High School on May 26.

Walker allowed two hits while tallying four strikeouts for Alisal, which plays No. 4 Hillsdale in the finals on Saturday at 12:30pm.

Alisal jumped ahead in the first inning following a two-run home run by Brooklyn Smith. They never looked back as both teams battled back-and-forth in a pitcher’s duel that favored the lower seed. 

Aptos junior Mya Najera-White allowed two runs on two hits while recording seven strikeouts in seven innings of work in the circle. Teammates junior Kalina Healy and sophomore Gwen Vaca each had one base hit.

SCCAL champion Aptos, which went unbeaten in league play at 15-0, finished the 2026 spring campaign with a 23-5 overall record.

At No. 1 Notre Dame 3, No. 8 Watsonville 1: The Wildcatz were eliminated from the postseason following a narrow loss to the Tigers in the D-IV quarterfinals on May 23.

Watsonville, which placed fifth in the PCAL’s Gabilan Division, finished the 2026 spring campaign with a 3-18-1 overall record.

Boys swimming

MVC’s Alanis wins twice: Monte Vista Christian sophomore Easton Alanis won twice in the Para Division at the CCS Swimming and Diving Championships at Independence High on May 9.

The Mustang swimmer was victorious in the 50- and 100-yard freestyle, winning the races in 30.63 seconds and 1 minute, 10.08 seconds, respectively. 

Alanis qualified for the California Interscholastic Federation State Swimming and Diving Championships at Clovis West High, but he was unable to attend.

Girls swimming

Aptos’ Friedley competes in finals: Aptos junior Adelaide Friedley was a finalist in two events at the CCS Swimming and Diving Championships at Independence High on May 9.

Friedley placed 11th overall in the 100-yard breaststroke in 1:05.36, and took 12th in the 50-yard freestyle in 24.21.

Boys volleyball

Mount Madonna shines in D-II playoffs: The No. 4 seed Hawks battled until the very end but it was No. 2 Carmel that came up victorious in five sets 25-17, 28-26, 19-25, 23-25, 15-12 in the D-II semifinals on May 14.

Mt. Madonna’s Nikowa D’Costa Hemp led the way with a team-best 31 kills and six aces, while teammate David Monclus added 25 kills.  

In the fifth set, the Padres took a 7-1 lead behind their strong blocking. Yet, the Hawks clawed back to within one point at 11-10.

Mt. Madonna couldn’t stop the high hitting of Carmel, getting outscored 4-2 to end the match.

The Hawks were coming off a win against No. 5 Hillsdale in four sets 25-19, 21-25, 25-22, 25-22 in the quarterfinals on May 12. D’Costa Hemp led the Hawks with 28 kills, while Monclus added 25 kills. 

Solomon Coleman finished with 48 assists and served for a team high 15 points. 

Mt. Madonna defeated No. 13 University Prep in five sets 27-29, 20-25, 25-12, 25-22, 15-12 in the teams’ playoff-opener on May 11.

D’Costa Hemp led the Hawks with 33 kills, Monclus had 26 kills and Coleman tallied a team-best 60 assists. 

“I’m so proud of our team for showing the resilience to come back from down two sets,” Mt. Madonna head coach PK McDonald said. “Awesome team effort against a very talented and well coached University Prep Team.”

Mt. Madonna, which placed third in the SCCAL standings, finished the 2026 spring campaign with an 18-14 overall record.

Days after the state’s primary, California voters are in a familiar position – waiting to find out which candidates will go on to the general election in their most high-profile races, for governor and Los Angeles mayor.

It’s not surprising those have yet to be resolved, along with several closely contested congressional races, because the state routinely takes days, or even weeks, to fully tally races. Nor is it unusual for President Donald Trump to complain about the pace of the count and allege fraud, as he did Thursday. It’s something he’s done repeatedly in the past.

What was unusual was that Trump announced that his Department of Justice was investigating the count: “Why the vote counting DELAY???,” the president posted on his social media account.

He suggested that the state’s Democrats were somehow cheating so two candidates he favors — Republican Steve Hilton in the governor’s race and Spencer Pratt in the nonpartisan mayor’s race — would be bumped from the top two slots and therefore ineligible for the November general election.

“You see what’s happening in California, they’re rigging the election,” he told reporters during an Oval Office gathering Thursday.

Trump’s posts prompted a response from Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom, whose press office posted a clip of a CNN video explaining how the nation’s most populous state prioritizes accuracy and accessibility over speed, drawing out the count.

“For the record: we wish the votes were counted faster, too,” Newsom’s office posted.

A spokesman for the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Los Angeles declined to comment about whether it was investigating the ballot counting.

Slow count designed to ensure accuracy, but opens door to election lies

The law in California practically mandates a drawn-out count. Ballots are mailed to every eligible voter — some 23 million of them — and the state has permissive rules for returning them. They will be counted if they are postmarked by Election Day and arrive at an election office within seven days.

Only after the polls have closed and most of the country has gone to sleep can local election workers begin the lengthy process of verifying the legitimacy of the late-arriving mail ballots and then start to tabulate them.

If a voters’ signature on the ballot envelope doesn’t match what’s on file, election officials are required to give those voters a chance to come in and prove their identity so the ballot will count, delaying a final tally further.

County Clerk Tricia Webber (right) training election officials at the county government building Tuesday. Credit: Kevin Painchaud / Lookout Santa Cruz

“We might not like how California administers its elections (and I don’t),” wrote Stephen Richer a former Republican election official in Maricopa County, Arizona, on the social platform X. “But that doesn’t make it fraud.”

Last year, Newsom signed a bill requiring the vote count to be completed within 13 days, rather than the previous 30 days. To get an extension, counties must inform the Secretary of State’s Office that they have a reason for a delay.

That’s not quick enough for the president: “The Dumocrats are at it again!” the president wrote on his social media platform. “They are trying to STEAL THE GOVERNOR OF CALIFORNIA PRIMARY, AND THE MAYOR OF LOS ANGELES, PRIMARY, AWAY FROM TWO GREAT REPUBLICAN CANDIDATES. Here we go with the very late and massive numbers of MAIL IN BALLOTS.”

State Assemblymember Marc Berman, a Democrat who wrote the bill to accelerate ballot counting, said Trump’s comments were disappointing and “a lie.”

“While Trump is laser focused on lying about our elections and undermining voters’ faith in our democracy, so that Republicans can then try to pass policies like Voter ID laws that make it harder for people to vote, our priority is to make sure that every validly cast ballot is counted,” he said in a statement.

Many Democratic voters waited until the last minute to cast their ballot

Some experts warned that the count from Tuesday’s primary might take even longer than after previous elections.

“What compounds things this time around is that Democrats have been holding on to their ballots,” said Rick Hasen, a UCLA law professor.

The state’s millions of Democrats this year were exceptionally slow to send in their ballots, apparently waiting until the last minute to make a selection in the ever-evolving governor’s race. The state operates a primary in which the top two vote-getters, regardless of party, move on to the general election, and Democrats had been fretting for months that having so many Democrats in the race would splinter the vote in such a way that two Republicans would claim the top two spots.

Democratic voters appeared to wait until the end to see which of their candidates were emerging as favorites. The high number of late ballots will likely make the delay in getting final counts even greater.

While millions of ballots have been counted by now, it’s the uncounted ones that loom largest for close races.

Despite being an overwhelmingly Democratic state, California has featured some of the nation’s closest congressional elections, sometimes decided by just a few hundred votes, so there’s often no way to determine a winner until the weekslong ballot count has concluded. In 2024, one House race wasn’t called until December.

Things get even more complicated in a primary election, such as Tuesday’s. That’s because the news isn’t just the top vote-getter but also the second place finisher. To know the true outcome of any race, enough votes need to be tallied to know for certain who finished in first and second.

Later ballots skew toward Democrats, feeding conspiracy theories

Another side effect of the enormous crush of late mail ballots that get tallied last is that the final vote gets more and more Democratic. That’s because Republicans are more likely to return their ballots early or vote in person, on Election Day. Those ballots get counted first.

The gradual shifting of the vote to Democrats as ballot counting goes on has sparked all sorts of conspiracy theories.

Republicans have long complained about the California count, even though the GOP did well in close House races in the state in 2024. The Republican National Committee filed lawsuits in other states challenging the legality of counting mail ballots that arrive after Election Day and the U.S. Supreme Court is poised to rule on the issue sometime this month.

But worries about the California vote count aren’t only a partisan issue. Voting advocates have urged state lawmakers to better fund local election offices so they can process the avalanche of late-arriving ballots faster.

“The Legislature needs to throw a lot more money to get the count quicker,” Hasen said.

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In a letter to the editor, a reader laments the loss of apple trees in the Pajaro Valley.