The city of Soledad celebrates its centennial today, Tuesday, March 9 with some creative Covid-safe festivities. There’s a cake contest at 2pm…
The idea last year was two-fold: The government would pay restaurants, serving as a bit of an economic stimulus for an industry in need, to co…
Darla Barnes Smith sees the best of people, and the worst of people. And she sees the saddest of sad situations that only sometimes have a hap…
Former congressman, CIA director and White House chief of staff Leon Panetta has a lot of friends in high places to draw from in putting toget…
Playgrounds and courts were restricted areas in the city of Salinas but since the case rate in Monterey County has dropped to 10.1 cases per 1…
At least 20,000 doses of the Covid-19 vaccine have been administered by Montage Health on the Monterey Peninsula as of Friday, March 5, accord…
In the Before Times, Angelina’s Bakery was a morning destination, offering coffee alongside an impressive pastry case, plus some modest breakf…
Thank you, all 7,576 of you, for your generosity.
On a windy and sunny Wednesday afternoon, several families were at Natividad Creek park in Salinas. Some kids were playing soccer in a cohort;…
Thanks to social media, we’ve all seen the pictures: Parties at private homes that spill into the neighborhood, large gatherings at local park…
Centerpiece
We asked readers to share their pet stories, and photos, with the Weekly. Read on to meet some of the furry friends living among us…
“The main benefit of equine-assisted psychotherapy is that it reduces the stigma to access to mental health services…”
Lo que no sabíamos hace un año y lo que sabemos ahora.
Mary Duan here, with remembrances and requests.
Tajha Chappellet-Lanier here, trying to remember the last time I went out, at night, to a bar. Nearly one year into the pandemic, and my new r…
There is a thriving world of community banks, and a growing number of opportunities to be a local investor.
Black and Latino populations should be prioritized for the Covid-19 vaccine. According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control, Black American…
How to cope with hitting the pandemic wall, again.
Francisco Luevano keeps his gaze focused downward at the chess boards of his five competitors, who are seated in an L formation. He’s playing …
Covid-19 has taken a toll on everyone, but some are experiencing it harder than others.
Centerpiece
The 30-second ad begins with melancholy music, and scenes of a Wall Street trading floor. “Remember when greed was good?” a voice intones. “Wh…
For John Wineglass, his first piece as the first-ever composer-in-residence of the Monterey Symphony had to be about another first – living th…
At the Correctional Training Facility in Soledad last July 20, a group of agents from the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitat…
Keeping up with California's rules for reopening schools can feel like it requires an advanced class in and of itself. New metrics and guideli…
The rumor started flying locally the morning of Monday, Feb. 22, that Gov. Gavin Newsom was about to announce more Covid-19 vaccines for Monte…
Featured
It’s a toss-up between a waiting game and a guessing game for Covid-19 vaccinations in Monterey County. With limited vaccine doses flowing in …
Dealing with harsh conditions that included smoke-choked skies from last year’s wildfires and the constant fear of getting Covid-19 was how Ma…
Kea Yengst is a 17-year-old junior at Carmel High School and an entrepreneur who started a nonprofit, KEACares, two years ago. It provides fre…
Paradoxically, locked-down pandemic life can open up different possibilities.
The “cautious” part of “cautiously optimistic.”
The Monterey County Health Department announced yesterday that up to 70 percent of the Covid-19 virus circulating in the county is the L452R v…
Omira was hesitant about bringing someone into her Monterey Peninsula home of 25 years, where she’d lived alone since her mother passed away. …
When Covid-19 nixed birthday parties, graduation celebrations and other festive gatherings last spring, people got creative with drive-by even…
American flags, each representing one of the 313 people in Monterey County who have died from Covid-19, decorated the lawn at Lovers Point Par…
Centerpiece
MY FATHER IS AWAKE BEFORE THE SUN RISES. MY MOTHER, UP BEFORE BOTH OF THEM, LABORS AT THE STOVE. Breakfast is a plate of chilaquiles, a cup of…
A cautiously optimistic view of the Covid-19 vaccination situation.
This memorial installation at Lovers Point in P.G., sponsored by the Pacific Grove Chamber of Commerce and The Paul Mortuary, honors the lives…
As of Feb. 16, the adjusted Covid-19 case rate in Monterey County has fallen below 25 per 100,000 people. This means K-6 schools and transitio…
It's a bright, sunshiny day in Monterey County today with an afternoon temperature of around 60 degrees, but almost everywhere else outside of…
Featured
It’s a toss-up between a waiting game and a guessing game for Covid-19 vaccinations in Monterey County. With limited vaccine doses flowing in …
Featured
With words like “social distancing,” “isolation” and “quarantine” becoming a regular part of everyone’s vocabulary, it may be natural to assum…
One of the main stars at a child’s birthday party – besides the birthday kid, of course – is the cake. Seeing a child smile and the spark of j…
In Seaside, actual housing is actually being built.
Centerpiece
When it came to sniffing out quirky but potentially lucrative business opportunities, John Osborne had the nose of a sophisticated bloodhound.
A guy in my office is fond of saying that perfection is the enemy of the good. While nobody was expecting perfection from the expansion of vac…
KNOWHERE, MAN… For a brief time in the early 2000s, Squid flounced off to work for Patch, an alleged community journalism site founded by thre…
On Feb. 8, the board from Salinas City Elementary School District denied Oasis Charter Public School’ 5-year petition renewal to operate throu…
IT GOES WITHOUT SAYING, BUT LET’S SAY IT ANYWAY: THE AT&T PEBBLE BEACH PRO-AM WILL LOOK VERY DIFFERENT THIS YEAR. With Covid-19 restrictio…
FREE SPEECHThe nonprofit news organization Open Vallejo launched last July in spectacular fashion, with a story detailing how a secretive cliq…
Tajha Chappellet-Lanier here, thinking about how our differences show up in what we choose to prioritize. During this afternoon’s Monterey Cou…
Tajha Chappellet-Lanier here, thinking about the people we turn to when we need support with our health. For residents of the wild, winding co…
There are 67,000 veterans enrolled in the VA Palo Alto Health Care System. The highest concentration of senior veterans in the system live her…
The Papillon Center for Loss and Transformation has, since its launch in 2013, used butterflies as a metaphor for helping people face the loss…
Lily Perry was a broke college student completing her capstone project at CSU Monterey Bay when she found herself in a bind: She had a printer…
After an intense surge of Covid-19 cases after the holidays, Monterey County's numbers are falling and hospitals are seeing a decrease in pati…
On Feb. 1, just a few hours before a jury in Dept. 5 of Monterey County Superior Court was to hear final arguments and begin deliberations on …
The negative reaction to news on Tuesday that two of the cities in Monterey County least impacted by Covid-19—Monterey and Carmel—were getting…
Mikaela Arista, a three-sport athlete from Alisal High School, is bummed she hasn’t been able to compete this year. But when she’s not in Zoom…
Centerpiece
AT THE SHINY, NEW MONTEREY CONFERENCE CENTER, THE STEINBECK BALLROOM TRANSFORMED INTO A JAZZ CLUB. Complete with moodily lit stages, young mus…
When you use the word “equitable” people expect things to be, well, equal.
A troubled attorney who resigned from practicing law while facing multiple disciplinary proceedings. A suspect in a notorious 2016 Salinas mur…
Special Report
That the rugged, shape-shifting edge of North America is in motion is not surprising. What is more remarkable is that humans, beginning in 191…
OUTDOOR DINING, IN WINTER… The state of California lifted its Covid-19 regional lockdowns on Jan. 25, which means outdoor dining is allowed ag…
Local school districts have been ready to re-open schools for in-person learning, but Covid-19 case rates in Monterey County keep pushing the …
You know that feeling you get when you find a stray $20 bill in your coat pocket? Imagine finding $20 million. That’s what happened to Montere…
The supply of Covid-19 vaccines coming into Monterey County is still limited but Montage Health isn't waiting to launch two vaccination clinic…
Health has been on all our minds a lot in the past year.
Tired after working an eight-hour shift in the fields under hot sun or cold rain is how many farmworkers feel when they get to the United Farm…
Any tenant behind on the rent due to the pandemic who's been worried about getting evicted after Jan. 31 now has five more months to remain in…
The biennial homeless census is a massive undertaking. For a single day, usually around February, the census enlists approximately 200 volunte…
It's still a work in progress, but the Monterey County Health Department has launched a Covid-19 vaccination registration site, currently only…
The deadliest jobs in this past pandemic-driven year were not to be found in health care or first responders. They were to be found among rest…
“We’ve got this big crisis and you’re telling me to open up a window? Yes, I’m telling you to open up the window…”
Centerpiece
“The next three to six months will be key in determining how many gyms can survive and how many people will want to go back.…"
FREE SPEECHCall it The Purge, social media-style. In the aftermath of the Jan. 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, the social media platform T…
‘I’m not saying our products prevent the flu, but what I can say is this is what the research says.…’”
There are now about 10 or so tests on the market with authorization by the Food and Drug Administration that are either PCR or antigen, all requiring a prescription…
It's the word many of Monterey County's residents over age 75 and their families have been waiting to hear for weeks: As of today, Jan. 25, th…
Debbie Aguilar devoted much of her life to advocating for those who had died and the family members who outlive them. After losing her own son…
And just like that, the California Department of Public Health ended the Covid-19 regional stay-at-home order today, Jan. 25, with almost no n…
There is an apt analogy for the current situation that is the Covid-19 vaccine rollout: We’re building the plane as we fly it.
The arc of history is long and it binds us to each other.
You’ve seen them: the man perched on the hood of his car in Carmel, eating a burger. The couple (and a seagull, naturally) sitting on a bus st…
Third party food delivery services like DoorDash and Uber Eats have grown in popularity during the pandemic among people who are doing exactly…
Here’s a selected list of questions and answers…
Centerpiece
Vaccine supply is low. The rollout has been marked by disconnects, missteps and miscommunications…
The city of Seaside is deciding how to use a second round of federal coronavirus relief funds. The roughly $340,000 grant adds to the previous…
When can I get vaccinated? and other questions (and answers) about Covid-19 vaccinations in Monterey County.
A new variant of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes Covid-19, has been identified in Monterey County and other counties using genetic sequenci…
Along Highway 1 in Big Sur, the Point Sur Lighthouse is among the most iconic features. Here, the coastline abruptly changes from high, windin…
Vaccine town hall attendance shows how many people are clamoring to be vaccinated.
FIELD FRESH… With Covid lockdowns still in full effect, many people are turning to grocery pickup and delivery services. One local option incl…
In spring of 2020, the wave of cancellations for events large and small kept coming as it became clear the pandemic was not a few-weeks or eve…
Helpful Parker Lusseau bakery manager needs a little help of her own.
What if a self-driving car could operate with the skill and reflexes of a professional driver? This is the future the Toyota Research Institut…
Aloha Coffee & Cafe owner Richard Dunnuck tried to claim that his status as a "living, breathing, natural-born citizen of this land" meant…
The Monday before Christmas was, as expected, a busy one at Parker Lusseau, the Monterey-basked patisserie that come the holidays draws hundre…
Centerpiece
It is the most dangerous lie of Trump’s presidency – that our bedrock system of free and fair elections is not to be trusted – and it is likely to outlive his term. How we rebuild trust in the system that defines our country and our government remains to be seen…
FREE SPEECHIt came from the mouth of someone who should have known better. On Jan. 7, veteran Fresno-area radio host Ray Appleton opined that …
Like a SARS-CoV-2 virus spreading from person to person, an email invite from Monterey County officials for the vaccine against the disease it…
Any hope for some businesses to reopen and outdoor dining to return on Monday must be put on hold yet again. The California Department of Publ…
Centerpiece
Remember back to the early days of the pandemic, before the scale of the public health crisis – and the ensuing economic crisis – was made cle…
2020 was an unusual year in the California Legislature, too. The Covid-19 pandemic sent lawmakers home (and onto video conferencing software) …
Almost exactly two years ago the idea for the Monterey Peninsula's first permanent homeless shelter was proposed using a portion of $12.5 mill…
Salinas Mayor Kimbley Craig is frustrated—and not just because she’s still dealing with painful Covid-19 symptoms. Craig is trying to be a goo…
Progress starts with respect—and a shared acceptance of reality.
At Aloha Coffee & Cafe in Monterey, online reviewers laud it for its coffee ("very flavorful, smooth, and just the right amount of sweet,"…
Up until theaters had to shut their doors and eateries were limited to takeout and outdoor dining options because of Covid-19, Cafe Lumiere an…
FREE SPEECHThat journalism can be a dangerous profession is not a new idea, but reporting in the field during a global pandemic has created a …
The Merced City Council meeting of May 18, 2020, opened with a prayer. And given the meeting was held in person and nobody on the dais was mas…
Sweden has attracted a lot of hostility due to its refusal to implement draconian lockdowns in response to Covid-19. Since March, articles hav…
Salinas City Council is expected to appoint Steven Carrigan as the new city manager, the top city employee, and approve his employment agreeme…
It started the night of Jan. 1 with an unrelenting headache and morphed into joint pain so bad that sleep was out of the question.
Monterey installs the county’s first touchless pedestrian buttons on a busy Fremont Street corridor.
Hesitating to touch shared surfaces in public places has become common during the Covid-19 pandemic, and people have gotten creative to avoid …
On Wednesday, Gov. Gavin Newson proposed a plan to safely reopen elementary schools in the state. The focus will be among young students from …
We all know that 2020 has been an incredibly difficult year—we need not belabor that point. And neither the Covid-19 pandemic nor the deep ine…
What an abjectly and objectively awful year you’ve been, 2020. I don’t know that any of us are better for having met you, and I don’t know any…
Self-driving cars will soon be roaming around the south tarmac of the Marina Municipal Airport. On Dec. 15, Marina City Council approved a con…
FREE SPEECHIt’s been a wild year in a lot of ways, including for journalists in the United States. Based on data compiled by the U.S. Press Fr…
In a normal year, veteran First Night volunteer Diane Dahm would coordinate over 100 volunteers throughout Monterey. She lists their assignmen…
Yes I will get the vaccine.
JUST SAY ALOHA… In this year of weird, Squid thought nothing could surprise Squid anymore. But then came news, published in the Ecological Soc…
Overwhelmingly, Covid-19 has not been kind to the restaurant industry. Across the country – and close to home – restaurants have closed in dro…
When Covid-19 forced the Monterey-based nonprofit children’s museum MY Museum to close, Executive Director Lauren Cohen knew she needed to fin…
Frank Doss pushes an empty red cart across the parking lot of Good Nite Inn after unloading belongings in his second-floor unit. It’s not a ho…
With more than 12,000 Covid-19 vaccines arriving in Monterey County since early December, nearly all hospital employees have had the opportuni…
Alerts in English and Spanish pinged on cell phones all over Monterey County Wednesday as health officials sought to remind people that ringin…
This is exactly the kind of showdown that health officials had hoped to avoid, hence repeated visits to businesses in violation of health code…
All Jeffrey LeTowt, owner of Carmel's Tuck Box restaurant, had to do was obey a June 12 court order for earlier violations of the shelter-in-p…
In a special council meeting on Dec. 17, Marina City Council approved to extend its small business loans and residential loans programs to aid…
When Covid-19 forced the Monterey-based nonprofit children’s museum MY Museum to close, Executive Director Lauren Cohen knew she needed to fin…
There is a new high-speed internet hub, exercise space and community garden in East Salinas, as of Dec. 14.
FREE SPEECHOn Dec. 15, CSU Monterey Bay students gathered in a Zoom meeting with local journalists and communications experts to talk about th…
FANCY TAKE OUT… A Michelin-starred restaurant offering to-go plates? My monocle almost fell out from the shock, but it’s true. Due to Covid-19…
Cannabis testing labs in California face a plethora of regulations. Those go down to the minutiae of requiring that every single line of a shi…
While the pandemic has many local businesses struggling to survive, the sales of a small farmer from Watsonville have flourished.
With no visitation since the start of the pandemic and only sporadic communication through letters or other inmates, K. is receiving very litt…
Here’s an easy Christmas wish list: stuff I miss doing. Going out to dinner, hosting dinner parties for friends, reading a newspaper at a coff…
Monterey County health inspectors have paid a whopping 1,971 visits to businesses since September. Their inspections include the routine stuff…
On finding ways to appreciate what we have this holiday season.
Here’s what it’s like to own a Christmas tree farm during a pandemic.
Concerned that three months would not be enough time to train and effectively deploy 100 community health care workers in the neighborhoods wi…
With a sense of urgency to combat Covid-19 among the Latino neighborhoods where the virus has wreaked the most havoc, the Monterey County Boar…
Radiological Technologist Matthew Wafford had trouble sleeping Thursday night, beset with a mixture of nervousness and excitement knowing he w…
Opening up today's Monterey County Covid-19 Daily Situation Report probably dropped a few jaws and caused some people to do a double take. The…
In a unanimous decision on Wednesday, Dec. 16, the Carmel Unified School District Board of Trustees approved hybrid in-person learning for ele…
Applause and cheers followed the first few Covid-19 vaccinations administered today, Dec. 17, at Salinas Valley Memorial Hospital.
FREE SPEECHDoes Facebook have too much control? According to Dec. 9 lawsuits filed against the social media giant by the Federal Trade Commiss…
A Seaside brewery is doing what it can to keep afloat during ever-changing Covid-19 restrictions. Like many businesses, Other Brother Beer Co.…
Centerpiece
By the time the good news about lettuce was announced, some of the bad news had already arrived, and a lot more was on the way.
Winter is typically a slow time for resorts and hotels in Monterey County, except the week between Christmas and New Year’s. Pebble Beach Reso…
Special Section
Science can be intimidating, but a nonprofit in Greenfield aims to change that. The Greenfield Community Science Workshop started 10 years ago…
Outside the emergency room department at Salinas Valley Memorial Hospital, between 30,000 and 40,000 patients have been screened in a tent in …
2020 hasn’t given us too much love, but it doesn’t mean we should do the same.
A new bill introduced in the California Assembly on Monday, Dec. 7 is making a new attempt to close the state’s digital divide. Many details o…
2020 hasn’t given us too much love, but it doesn’t mean we should do the same.
Every year we go around the sun, but very few can say they’ve done it a 100 times or more.
Compared to the first stay-at-home and shelter-in-place orders enacted in March, there are some plot twists to the latest stay-at-home order. …
In California, your smartphone can now alert you if you’ve been in contact with someone who has Covid-19. That’s if you opt in—the notificatio…
On Wednesday Dec. 9, the state of California decided playgrounds could remain open even with new restrictions after parents and lawmakers urge…
In less than five years, Salinas residents will have access to more affordable homes, after the City Council on Dec. 1 unanimously approved th…
FREE SPEECHIf you’re in a public-facing job that gives you the ability to mess with people’s freedom, do you carefully consider the consequenc…
On Nov. 17, the Carmel Unified School District obtained a waiver for students to return to class at Captain Cooper, Carmel River, Tularcitos a…
When people think about trauma, they usually think about one big life-changing experience, usually associated with death. Christina Whitton, a…
British grandmother Margaret Keenan, 90, made history on Dec. 8 as the first person in the world to receive the Pfizer/BioNTech Covid-19 vacci…
It’s become commonplace to refer to the “dark winter” that this Covid-bedeviled country is about to experience. That is an understatement.
The county’s four hospitals have reached their capacity due to Covid-19, doctors told the Monterey County Board of Supervisors on Dec. 8, with…
Attorney and volunteer mediator Brion Berkley sometimes has to serve as a kind of translator when he’s trying to get two angry neighbors to wo…
A new stay-at-home order takes effect, and history repeats.
Monterey County will be under the new state stay-at-home order as of 10pm, Sunday, Dec. 13, until at least Monday, Jan. 11, Health Officer Edw…
Just a few weeks into the pandemic, a group of local defense attorneys began wondering how the Monterey County Superior Court system planned t…
ICU beds are full or nearly full in three hospitals in Monterey County, while a fourth rural hospital is struggling to find enough staff to ta…
Monterey City Council members signaled in a meeting on Dec. 1 that they're ready to follow a roadmap created by City Manager Hans Uslar to hel…
Cesar Chavez inspired a generation of local activists.
The Monterey County Health Department is not immediately following several other Bay Area counties that announced today they are imposing stay…
Faced with an expected surge of Covid-19 cases and deaths that could overtax the state’s hospitals, Gov. Gavin Newsom said today he is “pullin…
Walter Deyerle, captain of the F/V SeaHarvest IV, explains the basics of the process he and his crew undertake to land sablefish in the waters…
FREE SPEECHIt’s a fact that on Nov. 24, just two days before Thanksgiving, Salinas Valley Memorial Hospital had a record number of patients – …
On March 13, King City High School senior Dominic Conricode went to class, said hi to his friends and walked through the halls. It was like an…
Since shelter-in-place started in March, thousands are working and studying from home in Monterey County. Streets and highways look less conge…
On Dec. 8, the city of Salinas will swear in a new mayor and three new councilmembers that represent a generational change for the council. Wi…
There’s now data to back up what’s been known anecdotally in Monterey County for months: More needs to be done to safeguard farmworkers, among…
BY ANY MEASURE, 2020 HAS BEEN A ROUGH YEAR. Nationally, personal income decreased by 0.7 percent in October, according to the U.S. Bureau of E…
As Covid-19 spikes again, health officials have some dire predictions.
A daily nonstop flight between Monterey Regional Airport and Seattle-Tacoma International Airport grounded by Covid-19 is set to take off star…
As part of an effort to increase opportunities for residents to get tested for Covid-19, a new state-supported testing site is open at the Cas…
The same Pacific Grove Police Officer who was put on administrative leave in May for decals connected to anti-government groups he placed on h…
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