On a mild summer evening at a vineyard in Cottonwood, Joanna Francescut stood proudly in front of a crowd of around a hundred.
The former Shasta County assistant registrar of voters was hosting a party — not to celebrate her recent win for ROV, but to honor the work of her campaign team during her run for election.
“You stood up for integrity and stability, and I’m excited to bring that to the table in January,” she said in an uplifting speech to her supporters, one that drew teary eyes and wide smiles from Francescut and the audience alike.
Francescut, who has about 17 years of election experience, won by nearly 60% in the June 2026 primary election after having been passed up twice for appointment to the position by the county’s board of supervisors. Last year, after Shasta’s board majority appointed an attorney who was outspoken about mistrust in election systems and had no prior experience in election administration instead of Francescut, she was angry. One of her first thoughts was about her family and what this moment meant for her as a mother.
“I needed to step up and show my daughter to not allow people to determine what your worth is,” she said.
This June, Shasta County voters rejected several incumbents who rode a pandemic-era wave into office, either by election or appointment. Now, a question has emerged: Do the recent election results signify a political shift in the county — one that’s made national headlines for being a hub of the so-called far-right movement in California — or were voters simply tired of the leadership tactics that have defined some in their local government over the last few years?
Lisa Pruitt, a rural law professor at the University of California, Davis, who’s familiar with Shasta’s political landscape, thinks it’s likely the latter.
“Maybe what’s really prevailing for people when they’re deciding who to vote for is, ‘Who do I think is actually going to deliver the services that I expect from my school board, from my board of supervisors?’” she said.
Interviews with about two dozen sources for this story — including former, current and future county leaders — indicate that many of Shasta County’s residents remain steadfastly conservative, even as voters are rejecting a way of governance they found too chaotic and not in line with their values.
Among their grievances over the last few years, sources cited decisions including overlooking Francescut’s election experience two years in a row to appoint ROVs with no election administration experience, removing fees that helped pay for infrastructure development, signing a contract with a local Tribe despite the financial concerns of county department heads, opposing a widely supported behavioral health campus and implementing changes to election processes, including a significant reduction of ballot drop boxes.
Sources also took issue with local officials’ behavior and tone when it came to their interactions with the public and other officials, such as the repeated instances when board members publicly ridiculed community members at meetings.
“There have been so many hostilities and anger over the past few years that I think a lot of people have had enough,” said Happy Valley resident Tammy Cole, who’s part of a group called Civil Shasta that was formed during the pandemic to decrease polarization and improve civility in the county.
For former Shasta Supervisor Leonard Moty, a self-proclaimed Reagan Republican ousted from the county board during the pandemic revolt, the June election results are a glimmer of hope.
“Maybe enough people finally realize that these people have done nothing but be destructive, to get rid of good people who help the county function,” he said, referring to outgoing county leaders ushered in by a wave of dissatisfaction with him and other long-time Republicans in office several years ago. “Maybe people realize this isn’t getting us anywhere.”
Some sources say the shift away from pandemic leadership began in 2024, when Supervisor Matt Plummer beat out former Supervisor Patrick Jones, who was among those who rode a wave of outside funding into office over recent years. Plummer, a self-described conservative with a Yale education, won with almost 60% of the vote.
His approach to governance, focused on data-driven policies and evidence-based practices, has been its own form of disruption to the status quo under the new wave of leadership since 2021.
“I think we’re just seeing the continuation of that disruption now,” said former Shasta Health and Human Services Agency Director Donnell Ewert of the latest election results, which will reshape Shasta’s board majority come January and shift it closer toward Plummer’s conservative, data-driven approach.
Deeply conservative politics have been prevalent in Shasta since long before the pandemic started. Around 65% of the county’s registered voters chose President Donald Trump in the past three presidential elections. The region’s history of anti-government agitation set it apart from other rural areas across the country, Pruitt said, noting the ongoing presence of the Cottonwood Militia and State of Jefferson movement as part of what makes Shasta distinctive.
“Shasta County is just this hub, or this very core of government skepticism, anti-government sentiment,” she said.
Underneath this sentiment lies real struggle: Shasta residents often feel unheard in a state dominated by urban interests, and the county faces persistent challenges: among them a health care provider shortage, high suicide and opioid-related death rates and deep scars left by the 2018 Carr Fire.
Erin Resner is a Redding City Council member who beat incumbent Shasta Supervisor Kevin Crye in the recent election, toppling the board’s current majority. Like Moty, who was removed from office by local activists in the wake of the pandemic, she describes herself as an old-school Republican.
Referring back to 2020, she said a lack of communication and public engagement, as well as the long tenures of several county supervisors, led some residents to feel their local government had grown complacent. By the time the first confirmed case of COVID-19 hit the county that spring, two supervisors had been serving on the board for a decade, and another had just finished serving for 20 years. Resner said the combination of these factors created a perfect storm.
“We came sort of out of this era of the community really rallying to support each other and very quickly moved into this space [where] those wounds aren’t necessarily healed yet,” she said. “Then we moved into a period of isolation.”
The pandemic gave oxygen to the sparks of discontentment in Shasta County under long-standing conservative leadership: Lockdowns angered local business owners, mask mandates enraged civil liberty advocates, school closures forced overwhelmed parents to be teachers and impeded children’s educational and social growth, and new vaccine requirements drew intense scrutiny. Many Shasta residents grew angry with the county government for not pushing back more against California’s strict regulations, arguing that the county should defy what they saw as the liberal infiltration of their freedoms.
Simultaneously, Trump’s claims that the 2020 election was stolen combined with local government mistrust ignited cries of election fraud in the county.
A group of Shasta County residents — relatively small but outspoken compared to the county’s population of nearly 180,000 — began taking out their frustration on the local government. Agitated residents banged on the doors of the county board chambers during meetings they were barred from physically attending, and threats of violence were made to various public officials ranging from county supervisors to the heads of Shasta’s health and election departments.
Richard Gallardo, a local conservative activist, attempted to perform a citizen’s arrest on all five supervisors in October of 2020 for their response to the pandemic. He used the public comment period to make a fiery speech before being escorted out by police. Since then, he’s unsuccessfully run for three elected positions, including against Crye and Resner in the June 2026 primary. Gallardo received only 663 votes, or about 7% of the total vote.
The state’s pandemic restrictions gave conservatives a reason to blame Gov. Gavin Newsom — and anyone who followed his orders — said former Supervisor Moty, who was on the board from 2009-2022 and is a former Redding police chief.
“A lot of people who were unhappy with the state, they wanted something to latch onto [and] lash out, and this gave them something,” Moty said. “We were a fairly conservative board, and we weren’t conservative enough to the people out there who were upset.”
An effort began in April of 2021 to recall three of the five supervisors on the county board — Moty, Mary Rickert and Joe Chimenti — largely due to their adherence to state COVID regulations. Only enough signatures were received for Moty to be considered by voters for a recall, and in early 2022, nearly 56% of voters recalled him. He was replaced by Tim Garman, a former member of the Happy Valley Union School Board who had led a resolution opposing vaccine requirements for children.
At first, Garman was part of an ideologically driven majority on the board, often voting in a bloc with former Supervisors Jones and Les Baugh. In May of that year, the three supervisors voted to fire Shasta Health Officer Dr. Karen Ramstrom, who led the county’s COVID response.
But after spending some time on the board, Garman began making decisions in opposition to Jones and Baugh — a shift typified by his decision to sport a shirt supporting the recall effort against Supervisor Crye, who was elected in 2022 and often fell in line with Jones.
Today, Garman said he feels his one mistake was voting to fire Ramstrom, who worked for HHSA since 2018 and implemented COVID restrictions that “were never more restrictive than the state required,” she said.
“I did not give her a fair opportunity,” Garman said. “I met with her one time — that wasn’t enough.”
About a month before Ramstrom was fired, Shasta’s HHSA Director Ewert retired after more than two decades with the county. Now a board member of the California Endowment, he said he left due partly to the political turmoil, as well as the deaths of his daughter and a close friend. Retiring gave him agency, he said, when others — like Ramstrom — weren’t afforded such a choice.
“I’d rather go out that way than have [the board] have some big meeting and fire me for doing the right thing,” Ewert said.
Something that made Shasta distinctive when it comes to this era of local politics, multiple sources noted, was the financial influence of Reverge Anselmo, a wealthy donor from Connecticut with prior grievances with the county. Within less than four years, Anselmo gave nearly $2 million to Shasta candidates and political action committees, including the effort to recall Moty and the campaigns of Garman, Jones, Crye and current Supervisor Chris Kelstrom.
“We were a rich person’s little puppet game,” Ewert said of Anselmo’s financial influence, which was distributed through the efforts of local activists.
Anger over COVID became a vehicle to achieve other political means for many in the county, Ewert added. Amidst the push against COVID restrictions, there was also a movement against Shasta’s elections office, with some community members making claims of voter fraud that were fanned by national flames. Former Shasta ROV Cathy Darling Allen said she spent the final year or two of her career responding to attacks, lies and verbal abuse. She retired in 2024 due to an onset of heart problems, something she thinks was exacerbated by the stress she was put under during this time.
“It wasn’t my choice to retire,” she said,” but the situation became untenable.”
In November of that year, former Supervisor Rickert was voted out and replaced by Corkey Harmon, a local business owner who joined Supervisors Crye and Kelstrom to form another ideologically-driven majority. Supervisors Plummer and Allen Long, elected in 2024 and typically seen as the more moderate voices on the board, often push back against the current majority — but are regularly outvoted.
In the years following the start of the pandemic, the county board made several controversial decisions — raising questions about the role of ideology and self-interest.
In early 2023, Shasta supervisors voted to end the county’s contract with Dominion Voting Systems, citing unproven concerns over voter fraud. It sparked a scramble by Darling Allen, who was left in charge of planning and implementing elections for a constituency of more than 100,000 registered voters, this time without machines. The decision to cancel the Dominion contract prompted the state to pass a law prohibiting hand counting in jurisdictions as large as Shasta. It also sparked an unsuccessful recall movement against Supervisor Crye, who voted in favor of terminating the Dominion contract. Due to legal constraints, including federal laws protecting voters with disabilities, the board soon learned it would have to sign a new contract for voting machines, pivoting to work with Hart InterCivic, instead.
Later that year, the board approved a controversial intergovernmental agreement with the Redding Rancheria that set a price for allocating county law enforcement and fire resources toward maintenance and safety on roads leading to the Rancheria’s new casino. Sheriff Michael Johnson and District Attorney Stephanie Bridgett opposed the contract. But it was still ratified by supervisors — several of whom received significant campaign support from the Rancheria. Critics argued the agreement didn’t cover costs, essentially diverting resources from county services, like the DA’s office and jail. In 2025, the contract was found unlawful by a superior court, a decision the board is trying to appeal.
Supervisors voted in 2024 to eliminate impact fees — one-time charges levied on builders during new development that generated hundreds of thousands of dollars in annual revenue — leaving a gap in the county’s budget. It was a decision questioned by some of the county’s fiscal conservatives, including supervisor-elect Resner, who has pointed out that the cost of development should be borne by those who most stand to benefit from it.
That same year, despite growing budget strain, supervisors voted to increase their own salaries from about $53,000 to more than $78,000 annually, triggering a wave of opposition that’s still active, as members of the public continue to advocate for a small raise for some the county’s lowest-paid workers: in-home caregivers. Supervisor Plummer, who opposed the vote to raise supervisor salaries, made a public pledge to return some of his salary to the county.
In 2025, the board majority voted to send a letter to the state opposing a proposed behavioral health campus in Shasta, despite widespread local support for the project. It was a decision opposed by deeply conservative leaders including the county’s sheriff, who would have been among those most affected by the creation of crisis beds to divert mental health patients from the jail and local emergency rooms. The board later reversed course and sent a letter of support, but the project ultimately did not receive state funding.
The county board also made several appointments and hires that critics said prioritized ideology and personal connections over qualifications. Toward the end of 2023, supervisors appointed Dr. James Mu as the county’s public health officer, a family medicine doctor who had no public health credentials and actively opposed state COVID mandates. Early last year, the board hired Chriss Street, a former Orange County treasurer, as a temporary health care consultant despite his lack of experience in the field.
One of the most controversial appointments came in May of 2025, when supervisors — for the second time — passed up former Assistant ROV Francescut for the county’s lead election role, appointing attorney Clint Curtis, instead.
Years ago, Curtis famously made claims that he could develop software capable of changing election results. Though living in Florida, Curtis had already made his presence known in Shasta by the time he sought the ROV role in 2024 and again last year. In March of 2023, Curtis spoke to the county board in an activist role, advocating against voting machines and claiming California’s deputy secretary of state had provided the public with “a massive amount of misinformation” about hand-counting votes. A year later, when Darling Allen stepped down for medical reasons, he interviewed for Shasta’s ROV position but didn’t get it when the board selected Redding attorney Tom Toller instead.
When Toller resigned less than a year later, in the spring of 2025, Curtis had another chance for the role. The board voted 3-2 to appoint him in a similarly ideologically driven interview process. Despite the fact that Francescut had successfully worked with Toller as his assistant ROV after being passed over for the ROV role, Curtis fired her within his first few days on the job, a decision she said disappointed her.
“I would always say, ‘What do I have control over?’ And it was always myself and always my integrity,” Francescut said. “I was very disappointed that I was let go, not given the opportunity to really even have a conversation with him.”
In the year following his appointment, Curtis made sweeping changes to Shasta’s election system in the name of increasing transparency and improving security. One of the most visible changes he made was in the appearance of the elections office, including taking down a security gate and creating a new observer space filled with American flags and TV screens intended to show livestreams of ballot processing.
Curtis removed most of the county’s ballot drop boxes, several of which served isolated voters in the rural stretches of the county. He also ceased the use of electronic poll books, saying he believed the devices could add voters to the registration system all on their own, an unproven claim. The change slowed poll processes and affected voter access.
A slew of new election staffers have been hired under Curtis, including some who are involved in a political movement to partition California, along with one of the central proponents behind Measure B, a controversial ballot initiative being challenged by the state. He also added positions he refers to as “poll closers” in the June primary, a new process involving dozens of paid staffers that was described as chaotic by multiple poll rovers who have served the county in volunteer positions for years.
Curtis brought a partisan approach to the elections office, from sponsoring an event in support of a specific ballot measure to hosting a tour of the elections office for political candidates, using the opportunity to accuse his predecessors — including his opponent Francescut — of election fraud without evidence. He called his partisanship honest, saying everyone has a political opinion. Francescut has steadfastly taken a different approach, saying her personal political views should be kept private in order to protect the trust of diverse voters.
In an interview with Shasta Scout this week, Curtis said he feels good overall about the changes he’s made and his leadership while in office. He’s slated to hold the role through the end of this year until Francescut assumes office in January.
He said his biggest struggle was working with long-term staff who were hired at the elections office before he started, saying it was hard working with people who didn’t want him there. Several staffers threatened to quit shortly after he came into office, he said, adding that their departure would’ve been preferable to the “hostile work environment” he feels they created.
“It was difficult because I didn’t have a crew that wanted me to succeed,” he said. “It would have been easier if I had come into a blank slate, like everybody had actually walked out.”
While he accuses long-term staff of creating a hostile work environment, it’s Curtis who the county says engaged in abusive conduct against staff. Two separate investigations over the last year have resulted in substantiated findings of verbal abuse, including threats of violence. He’s denied those findings, calling them a “hit job.”
Curtis saw his role in the county as something bigger than Shasta, saying the changes he made had national and even international relevance and will continue to do so, in a more sympathetic environment.
“I am dedicated to making sure that the elections work perfectly and that we set the example for the world,” he said. “I can do that somewhere else with someone who wants to cooperate.”
Referencing the dual investigations into Curtis, former Shasta Supervisor Rickert said she believes Curtis’ behavior, along with his sweeping changes to the local election system, were what made people start paying attention to their local government.
“As painful as it was to have Curtis come here, he was the tipping point,” she said. “I think he was the one person that really started getting people’s attention.”
For Supervisor Crye, several sources pointed to his aggressive opposition to the behavioral health campus — a project he said he wanted to kill because it was evil and would infect the county — as what ultimately turned voters against him.
“The desire here really is chaos, and not to actually serve the community,” supervisor-elect Resner said of his opposition to the project.
Crye did not respond to multiple requests to interview for this story.
On Election Day in June, Shasta Scout spoke to voters who had come to cast ballots at the Market Street elections office. Those who agreed to interview expressed frustration with the direction the county had taken. One said the local push around elections had been “a lot of drama over nothing.” Another said she was against the changes the county has made to elections.
“I did see an impact on the last election and how much it slowed things down, and that was disappointing,” said Katie Middlebrook, a Redding resident who works in mental health. “I know it feels like there’s been a little bit of a waste of county funds in order to dismantle previous voting systems that maybe didn’t need to be dismantled.”
Election results were certified last week. Curtis lost to Francescut, and Crye lost to Resner. Supervisor Kelstrom, who mostly votes with Crye, is heading to a runoff election in November after receiving almost 800 fewer votes than his opponent, Mike Gallagher.
When asked if this election marks a political shift in Shasta’s voters, ROV-elect Francescut said she thinks it may take another election cycle to determine whether voters are shifting politically. But she said this election marks “a shift with what people will tolerate,” in terms of behaviors.
Similarly, Resner believes Shasta’s conservative values haven’t changed — voters just want less chaos and more policy-driven approaches.
“They’re probably experiencing and witnessing that the things they were told in 2020 and in 2022 are not necessarily impacting their daily lives in the way that they thought,” she said.
Former ROV Darling Allen said she feels if voters had been paying more attention years ago, the progression of Shasta’s conservative extremism would’ve been brought to a “screaming halt.”
Pruitt, the rural law professor from UC Davis, said these results are telling, but not because voters are becoming more moderate. The swing may simply be cyclical, she said, a natural correction when politics lean too far in one direction. Or it may reflect something more visceral: voters exhausted by combative personalities that they believe did not serve them properly.
“I think it’s probably analogous to what you see nationally, which is a lot of disaffection right now with Trump and the whole MAGA lot,” she said.
Garman, the supervisor who replaced Moty when he was recalled, resonated with that sentiment. When he first joined the board, he aligned with the board’s staunchly conservative majority — at first composed of Supervisors Jones and Baugh, then Crye and Kelstrom. But once he had a chance to learn the facts about some of the misinformation that had spread in the county, he started voting against them, such as when he voted in opposition to terminating the contract with Dominion Voting Systems.
He said he still considers himself very conservative, but he’s tired of people like Trump and Shasta’s board majority contributing to political polarization and a lack of civility.
Kelstrom thinks the personalities and behavior of Curtis and Crye are what drove the results in this election — something multiple voters on Election Day, including Middlebrook, also expressed. He said while he agrees with Crye on 99% of subjects, “he comes off sometimes as not the kindest, most polite person in the world, even though he’s got a heart of gold.”
As for Curtis, Kelstrom said it seemed “like he couldn’t do anything without causing a ruckus.”
“He’s done some things that we brought him in here to do, and I’m happy for the things he’s done,” Kelstrom said. “With that being said, some of his behavior is not acceptable.”
He added that he has to own his decision to appoint Curtis as ROV, with the resulting fallout.
When it comes to his own performance in office, Kelstrom said he feels his tenure has been a success, pointing to his focus on public works, resource management and relationships with department heads. When asked about the public’s dissatisfaction with the board majority and whether he’ll attempt to set himself apart from the ousted Crye ahead of the runoff, he said he has to consider every issue on a case-by-case basis.
He added that he feels confident heading into the November runoff. But he understands what the primary results mean for the board’s balance of power moving forward, even if he wins.
“I will probably be on the board minority, I’m guessing,” he said.
The decisions of the past few years have left Shasta in a precarious financial position. In an email sent to community members across the county, Supervisor Plummer warned last month that the county’s financial cushion — or money leftover in the general fund that’s used for public services — is shrinking, calling it “scary low.”
Several departments are, or will be, facing financial strain, including social services, mental health and county fire. Local leaders warn that public safety funding isn’t keeping pace with expenses — a gap that could force the county to draw even more heavily from its already strained general fund.
Department heads and community leaders are also bracing for the impacts of H.R. 1, or Trump’s Big Beautiful Bill, which is expected to significantly affect local social services.
Multiple local leaders also said Shasta’s political turmoil and years of negative media coverage have made it difficult to attract experienced professionals. It’s an issue taking root in several areas of the county: a prosecutor vacancy crisis worsened by the board majority’s hardline on funding the district attorney’s office has forced the department to reduce case filings, and a health care provider shortage has impeded access to medical care.
Law professor Pruitt is concerned about what Prop. 50 means for Shasta’s congressional representation. It’s a part of the North State that was previously represented by the late Rep. Doug LaMalfa, someone she said genuinely understood the rural area’s needs — but under new district lines, the county is likely to be represented by a Democrat beginning next year.
“I find that regrettable because it’s only going to make them feel more embittered and disenfranchised,” she said of Shasta’s conservative population.
Supervisor-elect Resner knows she’s stepping into a challenging role. She and other sources pointed out that she’ll be the first female on the board in several years, adding that this area seems to have a habit of ousting women and labeling them as enemies — a reference to leaders like Ramstrom and Darling Allen, among others. She said watching Francescut — and her campaign manager, former Shasta Acting CEO Mary Williams — take on this election has “felt like a real redemption sort of moment.”
Resner wants the county to start tackling its financial problems with an efficiency study, something currently being executed in Redding. She’s also hoping to rebuild Shasta’s standing in the California State Association of Counties, a statewide body representing the state’s 58 counties whose relationships former Supervisor Moty said he spent years cultivating.
As of yesterday, Francescut is fielding a new opportunity: a potential return to her assistant ROV role in the months leading up to her swearing-in next year. She hasn’t decided whether to take the role if it’s formally offered.
As she takes her seat next year, Francescut said she doesn’t plan to immediately reverse all of Curtis’ changes when she takes over as ROV; she wants to analyze every operation at the elections office carefully, weighing costs and removing processes that are duplicative or slow the counting of ballots. She said a lot of changes will be dependent on how Measure B is handled in the courts. The office will also be prioritizing preparation for the next presidential election cycle in 2028, she said.
Through it all, one of her central goals will be repairing public trust in elections after years of damage. She plans to start with leaders and community members in the political middle ground, then work her way outwards to improve relationships across the political spectrum.
“There’s wounds here, and we’ve got to figure out how to heal this,” she said.
A year from now, Francescut’s hoping to not have to speak to reporters often — that will be a sign, she said, that the elections office has returned to the quiet stability it’s supposed to have. If her wish becomes reality, it would mark a stark contrast to the years of national headlines and political warfare that consumed Shasta’s elections office — and the county.
“I’m here for the voters; I’m here for the community,” she said. “I’m not here for myself. I think that’s the biggest win — that people can see that and trust that.”
While Shasta’s future leaders are looking ahead to what’s next, former leaders, who experienced firsthand the major shift the county initially took six years ago, are wary about the ongoing toll of decisions made over recent years. Former HHSA Director Ewert captured the mood of many who lived through this tumultuous era.
“It takes a short time to destroy,” Ewert said. “It takes a long time to rebuild.”
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As thousands of bikers rolled into town for the Hollister Independence Rally, Hollister Police Chief Carlos Reynoso for the second straight year expressed serious concern about the lack of adequate law enforcement and event security, and potential liability to the city, as well as the presence of biker gangs at the city’s largest gathering of the year.
In his post 2025 rally report, Reynoso stated that: “inadequate law enforcement, security and communications led to a failure to control armed criminal gangs, illegal weapons possession, and the unlawful sale and distribution of alcohol in downtown Hollister during the two-day rally.”
During this year’s rally, Reynoso told BenitoLink he was still concerned because he had been purposely excluded from the process of selecting a security company and the local chapter of the La Verdad motorcycle gang, which was present in 2025, had returned, possibly in larger numbers.
“They are affiliated with the Nuestra Familia cartel,” he said, noting the U.S. Department of Justice identifies the cartel as a prison gang.
Reynoso said he was also concerned about the return of the Hell’s Angels and other motorcycle gangs that “have a tendency not to be law-enforcement friendly and public-safety friendly.”
BenitoLink saw several members of La Verdad walking among this year’s rally attendees along San Benito Street and entering Johnny’s Bar and Grill. Outside of the bar, owner Peter Lego told BenitoLink he understood Reynoso’s viewpoint, but said he considered the bikers, “customers, neighbors, and even company owners.”
Earlier this year, Hollister City Manager Ana Cortez contracted for rally security with Citiguard Inc., headquartered in Woodland Hills and owned by Sami and Gharzi Nomair, according to its business profile, for $219,999.
Most of the guards patrolling along San Benito Street were wearing arm patches that identified them as Black Eagle Secure Solutions, headquartered in Stockton and owned by Abdul Satar Hakimi, which operates in California and Texas, according to its website.
The council sanctioned the return of the rally, claiming it would provide an economic boost to local businesses and provide opportunities for economic development.
BenitoLink last year reported that while the city said it cost about $200,000 more to hold the rally than it had raised in revenue, the rally actually cost about $450,000 more than it had raised and only counting an Amazon donation as “savings” resulted in the lower cost overrun number.
Reynoso told BenitoLink the security company was providing nearly 100 guards for traffic control and overnight security for the two days, and that 40 of them were armed. However, he did not know any details about the selection of the company or the qualifications of the guards.
Asked if the armed guards had been vetted regarding their certifications and weapons training, he said, “I hope so.” He added that the decision to choose a company for its ability to provide security was, instead, more of “an economic development matter that this is good for business, good for the city.”
Three of the armed guards, who all said they were from Modesto and worked for Black Eagle, said they carried their own weapons because they preferred them rather than what the company might issue. One, named Kyle, who preferred not to give his last name, said he was hired to provide traffic control but wasn’t sure how he might react should violence break out, or even what authority he had to respond.
“I just hope a cop is close by,” he said.
In California, armed guards have very limited authority during violent incidents, according to the California Bureau of Security and Investigative Services (BSIS). They are no different than private citizens and can intervene only through a citizen’s arrest when a crime occurs in their presence, according to the BSIS “Power to Arrest” training manual.
BSIS rules allow reasonable force, with deadly force permitted only when the guard faces an imminent threat of death or serious injury. Furthermore, according to BSIS, the guard must yield to law enforcement when officers arrive or are already on scene.
“I have not been given any list of who’s here and whether they’re certified or not,” Reynoso told BenitoLink. “My understanding is that [rally organizers] are supposed to get armed guards that are all vetted and properly licensed.”
He added that even though the company has appeared to be transparent about the vetting, communicating with them has not been easy.
“I’m having difficulty, once again, to communicate with someone who doesn’t speak English,” he said.
Actual sworn officers at the rally included nine from Hollister, plus the chief and a captain for each day of the rally, along with several from the San Benito County Probation Office, two police officers from Dos Palos, four from Kingsburg, and three officers from the California State Parks Department, according to Reynoso. He said the San Benito County Sheriff’s Department could not provide any officers.
“State parks are fantastic,” he said. “They’re doing it out of a straight partnership. They’re not even contracting with the city, so they have state jurisdiction. They can work anywhere. They saw the need we have and agreed to come and help us out.”
Rather than being involved in the selection process, he said he was informed that the city parks and recreation director would be spearheading the 2026 rally. He had been involved during previous rallies before the new mayor and city council took office in 2024.
“I was given directions to find as many cops as I could,” he said. “I did warn them [city council], as I’ve warned them in the past, that it’s almost impossible to do that, especially when the city won’t cover their workman’s comp of the agencies that come here.”
Reynoso said even though he has been excluded from the process, Cortez did give him the flexibility to set aside some money to try to pay the salaries of officers from other agencies to reimburse their cities. He said he didn’t have an exact dollar amount but only could say that it was “flexible.”
He said all law enforcement agencies throughout the state are working understaffed.
“It’s really difficult for them to spare people on a busy holiday weekend to assist us,” he said. “I was able to find a little less than two dozen people for the whole weekend. Usually for a rally, when we had this event in the past, we had anywhere from 80 to 100 officers.”
Reynoso remarked that the city would be in deep financial trouble should any of the sworn officers be injured or if there was a major incident. He said that because the city no longer covers other cities’ worker’s compensation they are reluctant to send their officers.
“All the way up to 2013, when we had a rally the city was covering the workman’s comp because you had to,” he said. “You can’t ask these agencies to let you borrow their officers, and if they get hurt, they’re on their own.”
Regarding the rally itself, Roadshows Inc. promoter Randy Burke told BenitoLink, “Friday was soft and Saturday was great. I was busy managing the rally, so I wasn’t counting noses. Numbers would come from the city.”
BenitoLink’s requests for comments to the Cortez concerning Reynoso’s claims and rally statistics were not returned. Hollister Police said any incident reports or attendance numbers would not be available until later this week.
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The hustle and bustle of the Hollister Downtown Association Farmers Market is a far cry from the Panoche homestead where Mitch Hammond grew up and where, in 1965, his father, Jerry, founded Hammond Ranch.
Today, as a successful beef producer who also oversees an on-property campground and Airbnb, Mitch fondly remembers growing up there.
“There was a lot of solitude,” he said, “but I was riding dirt bikes every day and playing with the horses and the cattle and the dogs. I had thousands of acres of backyard to goof around in, and I took full advantage of that.”
Jerry served in the Pacific Theater during WWII, built a successful insurance business in Menlo Park, and developed office buildings in Palo Alto before the lure of rural life became irresistible.
“He also had a horse ranch up on Skyline above Highway 92,” Mitch said, “and was a partner in a ranch in Gilroy. He sold all of it, quit his job, bought this ranch and moved the whole family out here. He always had a passion for horses and a farm country lifestyle.”
That lifestyle led Hammond to attend the one-room Panoche Elementary School under the instruction of longtime teacher John Light.
“There were eight kids in the whole school,” Hammond said, “kindergartners through 8th. John Light was my teacher for the whole nine years, and he got to know me. He pushed me to my limits and really helped raise me. It was more than just going to school; it was part of my life”.
After making the transition to Hollister High School and “learning how the big schools work,” and working for a while on the ranch with his father, Hammond eventually found himself in the Bay Area construction industry, a more satisfying career for the young man.
“You fix barbed wire and water lines and then move these cattle,” he said. “At the end of the day, I worked 12 hours, and I felt nothing was accomplished. In construction, you can look back and go, ‘Yeah, I just framed that house.’ It’s a lot more immediate gratification.”
After 40 years, Hammond returned to the ranch three and a half years ago with a primary goal of modernizing and diversifying the operation to ensure its survival for future generations.
“My son Matthew is really the most cowboy of the bunch,” he said. “He would very much like to go and continue on this ranch and hold on to it for generations. So, I’m in a very, very unique situation where my job now is to wake up in the morning and help to build that legacy.”
But in the current agricultural climate, Hammond said, that legacy is a hard one to sustain, particularly for an independent ranch.
“It seems to be an uphill battle,” he said, “between these corporate entities that are buying up the land to build these large mega-ranches. It used to be that about 85% of American beef came from ranches of 80 head of cattle or less. And that’s changing.”
Hammond Ranch consciously works to break that pattern, Hammond said, by finding its own niche in the market, focusing directly on what he calls a “happy cow” approach.
“With steak production,” he said, “corporations will buy calves in California and move them to summer grasses in Wyoming. Then back to feedlots in California. And every time you ship cattle, it’s more stress. More bumps and bruises. And if one gets sick, they all get sick.”
The cattle on Hammond’s ranch, he said, are born in the mountains, and they grow up and spend their lives there. Less stress? Better meat.
“They have one bad day at the branding,” Hammond said, “and then I feed them grain and hay every day for 90 days. It is like they are eating candy for the last 90 days of their lives. And I think that you can taste the difference between a happy cow and a not-so-happy cow.”
It is a belief that is expressed very simply in Hammond’s brochure: “We love ranching, and it shows on the plate.”
The ranch offers a wide variety of premium beef cuts, including classic steaks such as ribeye, filet mignon, and New York strip, as well as one of my favorites: tenderized cube steak, which is perfect for country-fried steak. They also carry roasting choices, including London broil, rump roast, and juicy picanha cap.
Using every part of the animal, he also offers liver, heart, kidney, beef cheeks, beef tongue and oxtail, along with marrow bones and beef knuckles for soup stock or as a reward for a hungry dog.
Hammond has also developed his own take on an ancestral ground beef blend, adding a percentage of heart and liver to the grind.
“You get supplements like iron, magnesium and phosphorus from that,” he said, “that you really can’t get in any other way. You can’t taste the difference between that regular hamburger, but you get the nutrition.”
Sourcing his beef from Paicines to a local market offers a few logistical issues, as might well be imagined. Meat can be ordered online for pickup at the ranch or can be purchased at the Farmers Market.
Hammond is currently working out the logistics for pickup spots in several locations, including Alameda and Paso Robles, and is considering direct delivery to customers in Hollister for a small fee on Wednesdays, before the market opens.
If taking the drive to Paicines to pick up an order seems to lack allure, there is the ranch itself to consider, with two one-bedrooms plus cabins listed on Airbnb, and a few campsites listed with Hip Camp. There is also a Class 5 rock-crawling creek bottom occasionally used by local adventurers.
Hammond is also planning an outdoor kitchen and a meeting area for hosting larger events, such as corporate team-building or cooking classes, all to broaden the ranch’s future viability in a changing agricultural economy.
“My parents’ ashes are up on the hill,” he said, “underneath the big beautiful oak tree. I hope to join them up there someday. Before then, I hope to make the ranch able to sustain itself and create the backbone of where this ranch is going to go.”
But at its heart, the ranch is still the business his father founded, and Hammond says he takes great pride in feeding his customers far and wide with a quality product.
“The ranch living is just unbelievable,” he said, “the beautiful sunsets and the good hard work that you put in every day. And there’s something to be said for being a steward of the land, caring for the property, for the livestock as well as wildlife.”
Cast Iron Skillet steaks, à la Hammond
Two Hammond Livestock trimmed boneless ribeye steaks (1-pound, 1-1/4″ inches thick)
Kosher salt and pepper
Two tablespoons vegetable oil
20720 Panoche Road, Paicines
510-867-7954
Hammond Ranch beef can be ordered online or picked up on Wednesdays from 3 p.m. to 7 p.m. through Oct. 21 at the Hollister Downtown Association Farmers Market.
Recommendations for future Eat, Drink, Savor articles can be emailed to roberteliason@benitolink.com.
BenitoLink thanks our underwriters, Hollister Super and Windmill Market, for helping expand the Eat, Drink, Savor series and for giving our readers the stories that interest them. Hollister Super (two stores in Hollister) and Windmill Market (in San Juan Bautista) support reporting on the inspired and creative people behind the many delicious food and drink products made in San Benito County. All editorial decisions are made by BenitoLink.
We need your help. Support local, nonprofit news! BenitoLink is a nonprofit news website that reports on San Benito County. Our team is committed to this community and providing essential, accurate information to our fellow residents. Producing local news is expensive, and community support keeps the news flowing. Please consider supporting BenitoLink, San Benito County’s public service nonprofit news.
The post Eat, Drink, Savor: The family heritage of Hammond Ranch appeared first on BenitoLink.
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There will be no fireworks display in Hollister this Fourth of July, no grand parade with multiple brass bands playing patriotic music, no dramatic oratory on the Great American Experiment delivered from a grandstand to an enthusiastic crowd.
The idea of not holding that kind of celebration would have been unthinkable to those who resided in the area during California’s early decades of statehood. Then it was an event that began in the morning and continued for hours after the last of the fireworks exploded.
But times change….
The earliest coverage of a July 4th Celebration in San Benito County appears in the first archived year of the Hollister Free Lance, 1887, beginning with an announcement on May 17 that the Hollister Fire Department, founded 12 years before, had taken the lead in planning.
Ten days later, the editors described the upcoming event as a “genuine, old-fashioned celebration,” saying “Everyone is determined to shake off the depressing influences of a dry year” — the area had been experiencing a severe drought that lasted through 1888.
There are earlier accounts of Fourth of July events in the surrounding area, beginning with an article in the 1856 Santa Cruz Pacific Sentinel. While the Santa Cruz papers were usually reliable in mentions of the goings-on in San Juan Bautista (then San Juan), the July 5 edition of the paper only mentions celebrations in Santa Cruz and Monterey.
This trend continued until the Free Lance was founded. The 1864 Pajaro Times, for example, mentions San Juan in a second-page column on July 9, next to the paper’s endorsement of Abraham Lincoln for president, saying only that “Monterey, San Juan, Salinas, Corralitos, Soquel and Santa Cruz furnished representatives [visitors] in abundance” to the celebration in Watsonville.
But the Free Lance coverage was, of course, more extensive, detailing the many committee meetings, preparations and fundraising for the 1887 event, including a June 7 announcement that $800 had been secured to “insure a credible demonstration,” and the Portuguese Union had hired the 20-piece San Leandro Brass Band to head the parade.
On June 28, for example, there was a report that Ben Gould and Joe Scranton were tasked with finding the main attraction for the greased pig competition, the right kind of “porker” for that occasion.
“They want an animal of the true razor back breed,” it read, “strong in wind and limb; beauty and grace will cut no figure in this business. Scranton will attend to shaving the brute, and Gould will apply the grease. Lord help the pig.”
Another important committee gathered participants for the “Horribles,” a separate procession following the main parade that closely resembled the modern-day antics of E Campus Vitus at similar occasions and was an expected part of any Fourth of July celebration nationwide.
The tradition began in the 1850s as a parody of Boston’s elite “Ancient and Honorable Artillery Company.” This was twisted into “Antiques and Horribles,” with participants in comical masks, mismatched clothes, and painted devil outfits, often riding outlandishly decorated goat carts and playing broken instruments.
The “best sustained character” was eligible for a $10 prize.
By the morning of the 4th, according to the Free Lance, flags were floating everywhere, and almost every home was decked in “bright colors.” And the crowds began to arrive.
Everyone was there, the July 8 account read. “The back country must have been practically deserted. One, two, four and six-horse teams came into town, representing every district, every settlement, and almost every ranch in the county.”
The parade began at 10 a.m. at Monterey and Seventh Streets and proceeded to San Benito Street. Turning left, it continued onto Second Street, where it countermarched (made a U-turn) and, turning again onto South Street, ended at the recently completed county courthouse at the intersection of Monterey and Fourth Streets, across from the current courthouse.
The order of the procession was as follows:
1. Grand Marshal R. P. Lathrop.
2. Town Trustees, Supervisors, Orator M. T. Dooling and Rev. C. S. Lathrop.
3. The Hazel Brass Band.
4. The Car of Liberty.
5. The Guard-Echoes of the Republic.
6. Chief Engineer Alex Eaton and assistants G. M. Wood and A. P. Carr.
7. The Pioneer Hook & Ladder Company.
8. The Alert Hose Co. No. 1.
9. The Wide Awake Hose Co. No. 2.
10. The Excelsior Hose Co. No. 3.
11. The Old Soldiers’ wagon.
12. San Benito Lodge No. 90, Ancient Order of United Workmen
13. The Native Sons of the Golden West.
14. The Union Portuguese Association.
15. Citizens in carriages.
16. Citizens on horseback.
Though not mentioned, President of the Day T. S. Hawkins, founder of Hazel Hawkins Hospital, was likely among the people marching in the second group. Later accounts of these parades mentioned that “citizens on foot” ended these processions.
The “Guard-Echoes of the Republic” were local members of the Grand Army of the Republic, an organization composed entirely of Civil War Union veterans. As reported on July 1, they had agreed to join the procession after the local military volunteers “revolted” against participating, thus, in the words of the newspaper, saving the event from “utter disgrace.”
The Car of Liberty was a float on which May Wheeler, the “Goddess of Liberty,” rode with Edward Nash and John Haley, representing the Army and the Navy. Surrounding her were 38 children dressed in white, representing the States of the Union.
(A later announcement in the newspaper asked the kids to return the badges worn to designate their state to the organizers.)
The procession took about an hour to make its course, after which the Goddess and her entourage were seated at the dais, located in front of the small county jail. They were joined by the Hazel Brass Band, which played “Colombia, the Gem of the Ocean,” Mrs. A. D Shaw performing “The Star-Spangled Banner” with a choir, a reading of the Declaration of Independence by Professor A. Leggett that “brought forth the full meaning and grandeur” and a host of officials, including the county supervisors, the city trustees and all the event dignitaries.
M. T. Dooley, while promising in his speech to “not detain you for any great length of time” or “enter upon a subject either novel or curious,” proceeded to do so, offering a 20-minute-long oration on the history of the human race, the foundation of a government by free people, labor and capital, education, and the promise that the United States would become “the wonder of the world.”
It is fair to imagine the crowd’s relief at his conclusion, as Hawkins announced that the distribution of barbecue and fresh bread was next on the agenda, as prepared by “Uncle” Johnnie Robinson and “Sailor Jack.”
“Thousands of slices” of beef, pork and lamb, along with 600 loaves of bread “disappeared as if by magic in an hour’s time.”
At two o’clock, the races began, starting with a four-contestant bicycle race on San Benito Street won by Al Hawkins, with a gold-headed cane as a prize. We know the other races and the prizes, but not the winners: the Three-Legged Race ($5), the Fat Man’s Race (for men over 200 lbs, $10), catching the Greased Pig ($5 and the pig).
As remarked earlier, Lord help the pig….
After the races came a baseball game pitting the McMahon House club, sponsored by a local hotel, against the Advance Club, composed of older, more experienced players.
“Advance counted confidently in victory,” according to the July 8 account, “with some of them backing up their opinions with coin. In fact, considerable money changed hands on the results of the game.”
The play-by-play goes on almost as long as the transcription of Dooley’s speech. The McMahon team proved victorious, scoring a close 20-17 triumph and winning $25. Singled out for praise were McMahon players Burt Swan, catcher, and Cory Biggs, second base.
As for the Advance Club? “Some of the Advance nine need to pay less attention to their good looks, graceful posturing, etc., and more to the game.”
A grand ball at the Wells Opera, sponsored by the Hollister Fire Department, concluded the evening, beginning at 10 p.m., with a “supper quadrille” at midnight catered by McMahon House and the French Hotel, which “vied with one another in their endeavors to set a good table.”
Dancing then continued until 3 a.m., at which point “the many labors of the day had fairly tired out the dancers.” Although planned, fireworks are not mentioned in the account and were perhaps canceled in deference to the dry season.
The finances of the celebration were not reported, but what was published for the following year gives a hint. If the committee really took in $8,000, they did well—the following year’s report notes $650 in receipts and $622 in expenses, with the balance donated to the fire department.
The biggest expenses were the barbecue at $188 and the music at $104. Another $62 was awarded in prizes, $38 was spent on the Liberty Car, and $41 was allotted to costumes for the Horribles.
Today, with the community focused on the motorcycle rally, this year’s celebration might have fewer events than that of 1887. But the backyard barbecues are still there, as well as the kiddie parade down San Benito Street on the morning of the Fourth, and a display honoring the nation’s 250th anniversary at the San Benito County Library.
And the spirit expressed in Dooley’s speech is also there: that as we celebrate the nation’s birthday, we also “trust in the growth, development, and improvement of American ideas, which shall make our country what it should be, a blessing to its citizens through all future generations.”
Related story
‘Betsy Ross’ leads way on patriotism with 4th of July Kiddie Parade, 250th anniversary exhibit
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Separated by a distance of a little more than three miles in Hollister, the fate of two local apricot farms is stunning. One is experiencing a bumper crop of plump, ripe fruit, and the other’s crop has been decimated by hot weather and unrelenting winds.
This time of the year, Jim and Mari Rossi’s B&R Farms, family-owned since 1927, would be expecting upwards of 500 people from as far away as Los Angeles to visit its store on Fairview Road to buy fresh and dried fruit, along with preserves, scone mix, chocolate bites, and frozen puree, or to pick their own fruit from the rows fully-laden trees on the 50-acre farm.
This year, though, Mari Rossi announced on her Facebook page June 17 that B&R had to cancel its 2026 U-Pick event.
“Due to the unpredictable weather this spring, our apricots ripened much earlier than expected and simply won’t be able to remain on the trees until our scheduled U-Pick dates,” she wrote. “To save as much of this year’s crop as possible, our crew has already begun harvesting. We are truly devastated.”
However, there was a glimmer of good news.
“Fresh Blenheim apricots are still available,” she wrote. “We currently have pre-picked fresh apricots available.”
Rossi also wrote that this season B&R will be honoring its U-Pick sliding scale pricing on pre-picked fresh apricots.
“Mother nature hit us hard,” Rossi told BenitoLink. “We were affected by heat in March, along with these winds. The fruit did not size up, and the winds are causing them to get bruised.” She said the constant winds caused the small fruit to drop to the ground.
“We’re actually very fortunate, though, to be able to have a cannery that’s willing to take the fruit,” she said. “They do a process with the dicing to use it in the canned fruit.”
Rossi said even though the fruit is small they can sell it as fresh or dried out of their store in 1-pound, 3-pound, 10-pound, and 14-pound containers. There won’t, however, be as much dried fruit available.
On the other side of town, though, Apricot King Orchards was more fortunate.
“I’ve got 39 acres and they’re all plumping right up on Union Road,” Patty Knoblich-Gonzales said. “They’re young trees and that makes a big difference. So, we’re going to take 40 tons off the home ranch, which is 27 acres on Westside Road, and then we’ll start picking the bigger crop, but that’s all going to go to juice. And then we’re going to start picking the ones on Union.”
Knoblich-Gonzales said she and her husband, Gary, have been farming for 40 years. She said last year the crop amounted to 800 tons. She wasn’t sure why their farm was doing so well, while across town B&R Farms was not.
“It could be because it gets a little hotter over there,” she said, “so they ripen first and ours ripens next. We’ve been babying it quite a bit and we thought we’re going to have a bunch of peewees [small fruit, not worth picking] but we didn’t.”
Joe Tonascia, who farms about 20 acres of apricots scattered around the Hollister area, including in some residents’ back yards, said he sells apricots at his store, Bertuccio’s Fruit Stand. He said it’s much the same story in most orchards—there is plenty of fruit, but little has “sized up.”
“It’s so expensive to pick small fruit that nobody buys,” he said, adding that people do not support the local apricot market. Instead, he said, they prefer imported fruit from Turkey.
“Ours are better quality but it comes down to price for a lot of people,” he said. “Once they taste our apricots, then they want them. But the crop is small fruit and it’s ugly.”
He said the ugly fruit is caused by a combination of “too few cold days during the winter for the fruit to set right, followed up by a hot March and April, along with intermittent rainstorms.
“A lot of it drops on the ground and then, like in the last few days, we had some warm weather that really brought them on,” Tonascia said. “We’re two weeks or more ahead of schedule. Usually, we’re starting around the 4th of July.”
Apricots and San Benito County
The history of apricots in San Benito County is one of dramatic change. In 1941, according to the county’s crop reports, apricot orchards covered 4,850 acres across the Hollister and San Juan Valley areas. Today, only 500 acres of scattered commercial plantings remain, along with some heritage orchards and agritourism operations. This represents an 80.6% decline over 85 years.
According to the county’s 2024 Crop Report, those 500 acres of apricots produced $4.9 million in sales in 2024. This is quite a bit more per acre than in 1941, when there was just $173 in sales per acre. In 2024, it was $9,800 per acre.
Statewide, according to the California Farm Bureau and the Economic Research Services reports, apricot acreage in California has declined by 65% since 2003. During that same period, San Benito’s decline was 60.3%, according to the crop report.
Several long-term factors contributed to the decline:
Development pressure in parts of San Benito and neighboring counties also reduced orchard acreage over time.
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A questionable security company, a lack of adequate staff accommodations, and the absence of a clear budget are among the issues that hampered the 2025 Hollister Independence Rally, the San Benito County Civil Grand Jury found in its annual report.
According to the grand jury’s 2025-26 report, and previous reported by BenitoLink, the Hollister City Council pursued the rally despite a “short planning window.”
The report notes the city approved the rally in January 2025 and identified a security firm in February, about five months before the historic event. However, the original security company’s bid was withdrawn in May after the firm “adjusted the costs after a complete understanding of the requirements.”
The grand jury report says the original security firm asked for $118,000 per day because it needed adequate hire rates to attract guards with police experience, given that the celebration had “potential dangers involved” and because it takes place during a holiday weekend.
The civil grand jury is convened annually and composed of 19 citizens who are sworn to serve as grand jurors and investigate the operations of various government departments and agencies.
The report notes the city first sanctioned a rally in 1997 to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the movie “The Wild One,” which was inspired by the Hollister Riot of 1947.
The grand jury goes on to say the city contracted with American Global Security in May 2025 for $264,497. The contract was approved less than two months before the rally.
According to the report, the city lacked accommodations during the rally for security guards. Some of them had to sleep in their personal vehicles which, the civil grand jury noted, violates the city’s laws.
The grand jury report also noted that members of the public raised concerns about the security guards’ qualifications, questioning their professional experience and ability to speak English.
The grand jury agreed with American Global Security’s after-action report that Hollister should hire a security firm at least six months ahead of the rally.
Regarding the rally’s budget, the grand jury notes the city used funds from Amazon to “help close the gap” between revenue and costs. BenitoLink has previously reported on the $250,000 Amazon donation which the city had earmarked to remodel the bathrooms at the Pauline Valdivia Memorial Community Center.
While the city claimed a cost overrun of just $200,000 for the rally, according to its own accounting report, the shortfall would have been nearly half a million dollars had the Amazon donation not been counted as “savings.”
The grand jury report said the city failed to provide a true accounting of the costs associated with the rally.
“When pressed for detailed information on the budget vs. actual revenue, final revenue and expenditure figures were not made available, indicating a lack of transparency,” the report said. “Records were requested but not included in documents provided.”
The grand jury recommended the city disclose actual expenditures within three months of the 2026 rally and to disclose all city-incurred costs for events with more than 1,000 people. It also recommended the City Council adopt a realistic budget, including revenue projections, at least nine months before the rally.
Overall, the civil grand jury report said it found a lack of continuity in information between city officials and staff members. It noted that the city’s rally ad hoc committee, consisting of Mayor Roxanne Stephens and Councilmember Rolan Resendiz, made the majority of the decisions for the rally.
It recommended the City Council adopt rules and responsibilities for all ad hoc committees to ensure continuity of information.
Neither Stephens nor City Manager Ana Cortez immediately responded to BenitoLink’s request for comment.
Hollister is required to respond to the findings within 90 days of the report, which was released on June 10. The city’s two-day rally for this year begins July 3.
The civil grand jury report also investigated the San Benito County Sheriff’s Department’s staffing and jail operations, and Sunnyslope County Water District’s process for adopting a new water rate.
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Update June 12, 2026 4:45 p.m.: This story has been updated to reflect responses from Shasta County and from a former litigant against Measure B.
“There can be no serious dispute that Measure B—a voter initiative to establish a county-specific elections system in Shasta County—is unlawful.”
That statement is the opening line of a lawsuit that was filed today in California’s Third District Court of Appeal by California Attorney General Rob Bonta and Secretary of State Shirley Weber against Shasta County.
Measure B is a ballot initiative that was just approved by a majority — 56% — of the county’s voters in the June primary. It seeks to reform local election procedure by mandating voter ID, eliminating most mail-in voting and imposing a one-day election process. If implemented, it would also disconnect county voter rolls from the oversight of the state and require a full hand count of ballots rather than relying on machines, among other changes. The measure appears to be illegal to implement in the state of California.
Earlier this week, as votes were being tallied, the AG’s office told Shasta Scout it stood at the ready “to take appropriate action to protect voters’ rights and enforce state election laws.” Election results are still unofficial, but the vast majority of ballots have been counted, the local elections office said.
The lawsuit names Registrar of Voters Clint Curtis as a respondent and the five central election activists behind the measure as the real parties of interest. They include Laura Hobbs, Deidre Holliday, Kari Chilson, Jim Burnett and Richard Gallardo. Hobbs is employed by Curtis as an analyst at the elections office and helped preside over the election that determined the outcome of the measure she was pivotal in creating.
“That’s the way it works,” Curtis told a reporter today at the elections office, remarking on the lawsuit shortly after the news broke. “The courts are doing what they do,” he added, acknowledging that the proposed federal SAVE Act could present further complications to the impending court proceedings.
Shasta County declined to offer a comment this afternoon. The board of supervisors will be discussing the litigation during closed session during its meeting on Tuesday, June 16.
Measure B proponents have claimed that the county’s status as a charter allows for local election control. The state’s lawsuit contradicts that, saying despite Shasta County’s charter status, such changes to local elections would exceed county authority “because charter counties are not granted any degree of home rule over voter registrations or elections.”
Even if elections were in the bounds of Shasta’s rights as a charter county, the lawsuit said, Shasta cannot enforce laws “that are inconsistent with or impede statewide regulation of the integrity of the political or electoral process.”
The state’s action is only the latest in a number of legal challenges to the measure, all of which have either been pushed back by a Shasta County Superior Court judge, or withdrawn.
Last year, Shasta County’s attorney Joseph Larmour attempted to halt the measure in its tracks, but a judge determined that Shasta’s case against Measure B did not meet the criteria to prevent it from moving forward. Later, community member Jennifer Katske filed two lawsuits against the measure. She was unsuccessful in the first and voluntarily withdrew the other. She reacted to the state’s announcement by continuing to emphasize her concerns about the measure.
“I warned that Measure B would lead to costly litigation and divert public resources away from the real needs of our community,” Katske told Shasta Scout after hearing the news. “Unfortunately, those concerns are now becoming reality.”
Earlier this week, Measure B proponent Burnett said he and others expected a lawsuit, but are prepared to follow through in hopes of succeeding against the state or other challengers. Shasta Scout was not immediately able to reach ballot proponents for comment today.
This is a developing story.
Do you have a correction to share? Email us: editor@shastascout.org.
UKIAH, CA., 6/11/26 — An annexation information workshop hosted by the city of Ukiah Thursday evening answered dozens of questions and addressed comments made by Ukiah Valley residents with more than 60 in attendance.
First presented last year, the city’s proposed annexation would bring areas to the north and south of Ukiah into the city limits, switching responsibility for servicing those areas from the county to the city, like providing law enforcement service and road maintenance.
Among the most common concerns residents had at the 6 p.m. meeting Thursday were whether residents get to vote on annexation, how amounts of property and sales taxes would shift from the county to the city in the areas proposed to be annexed and whether property taxes would go up.
There is a public voting aspect involved in the annexation proposal process, but not until the city’s application to the Mendocino Local Agency Formation Commission is complete.
It’s called the protest vote. After the city presents its annexation proposal to the commission, landowners and registered voters in the areas proposed to be annexed will receive written notification of the protest process and be able to submit their choice of whether they approve of the annexation. If the commission receives more than 50% disapproval, the annexation proposal will be canceled, and the city cannot reapply for a year.
At the meeting, city finance director Dan Buffalo explained that per the Mendocino County’s master tax-sharing agreement with the cities in the county, if annexation goes through, the city would take half of the increment of property taxes on parcels in the areas proposed to be annexed. This means the city would get half the amount of however much a property’s assessed value increases in a year, which since 1978, has been locked in at a maximum of about 2% per year. The county gets the other half of the growth. The amount the city can take will be capped at 15% of total property taxes in the areas proposed to be annexed. Buffalo emphasized that property taxes would not go up because of annexation if it happens.
As for sales tax, every year after the first year of annexation, if it happens, one-fifteenth of a 1% sales tax called the Bradley Burns tax that is normally split among the county and city would go to the city in the areas proposed to be annexed, meaning it would take 15 years for the city to take 1% sales tax that is normally shared with the county, in the new areas of Ukiah, if annexation happens, Buffalo said.