Santa Clara County fairgrounds leaders caused an uproar this year for pushing the annual fair date to keep vendors happy and – as a consequence – some youth farmers out of contention for junior livestock shows.

The parents’ response: Fine, we’ll organize our own.

Preparations for an alternative fair are now underway among farmers in South County, one of the South Bay’s last remaining agricultural vestiges, as a form of protest against the county fair’s new Aug. 19-23 dates this year. All elementary through high school age students participating in two agricultural student programs – 4-H and Future Farmers of America – can show their cattle, sheep, goats, pigs, horses and chickens at the new “South Valley Ag Fair.” The alternative event will run July 27 and July 28 at Thorson’s Arena in San Martin with an auction on Aug. 1 at Rancher’s Choice Stockyard in Aromas, off Highway 101.

“I grew up in San Jose and have attended the Santa Clara County Fair since the late 1970s,” Megan Davies, a parent of three Gilroy High School farming students who’s supporting the new fair, told San José Spotlight. “(The county fair) is not an event my family will be supporting moving forward.”

Organizers didn’t have the details yet on operating costs, funding or expected attendance for the alternative event. But they said sponsorships are steadily flowing in with official backing from Future Farmers of America and support from Cal Poly San Luis Obispo students and faculty who run the Western Bonanza Junior Livestock Show – considered the “Best in the West” for such events – in Paso Robles every year. They added the Cal Poly Livestock judging team will be involved.

“Many of the livestock families and FFA chapters as well as some local 4-H clubs have come together and we have created our own ‘Fair’ as a solution to our current situation,” Monica Simon, a former FFA member whose child is in the program in Morgan Hill, told San José Spotlight. “I think the Santa Clara County Fair will look much different this year as well as in the future as a result of our new fair and community support we are receiving.”

Santa Clara County Fairgrounds Executive Director Salene Duarte is taking the alternative fair in stride.

“We really don’t see the South Valley Ag Fair as competition,” Duarte told San José Spotlight. “Instead, we think it’s another great place for young people to show their animals and keep building their skills—whether that’s caring for animals, being a leader, keeping records or speaking in public.”

 

 

The county fair has traditionally happened in the month of July. Duarte has said the new August dates are meant to accommodate post-pandemic shifts to fair vendors’ schedules, and will likely be the date for future years. The change was announced last December, months after youth farmers — some of whom will start college out of town by the new date — had already purchased cattle and bred sows. Parents said that would have forced youth farmers to balance their participation in the junior livestock shows with their first week of school. Parents said the date change would also affect some youth finalizing their farmer degrees. It also possibly meant three extra weeks of financial burden to feed and care for livestock.

“These kids and teens are our future farmers, ag teachers and veterinarians,” Davies said. “It is with pride that I fully support this amazing coming together of the community for our agriculture youth.”

Contact Brandon Pho at brandon@sanjosespotlight.com or @brandonphooo on X.

 

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Hollister City Manager Ana Cortez’s use of her own private firm to recruit a Human Resources and IT director has drawn criticism from at least one community member and raised questions about whether it represents a conflict of interest.

Cortez has defended her use of her firm Munitalent for city recruiting by pointing out that she is not charging the city and is providing the services pro bono.

A government ethics expert said even though the practice is questionable because of the potential value to Cortez’s firm, even though the services were being provided at no charge, and because the process appears to involve less transparency than a more typical approach, it’s on the “the very low end” of ethical risks or conflict of interest.

Cortez used Munitalent to recruit for a human resources, risk, and technology director after she took over as city manager earlier this year.

“It’s pro bono,” Cortez said. “I’m not getting paid to recruit my own [employee].”

Cortez told BenitoLink that using her firm benefits the city because the service was provided for free and because the firm’s social media network is larger than the city’s. She also noted that she is the only member of the firm.

“I think it’s great the city manager can provide consulting for free after we’ve spent millions in the past,” she said.

But at the April 20 Hollister City Council meeting, community member Andres Builes questioned Cortez’s use of her own firm for city business.

“I’m concerned as to why our positions within the city are made public through different channels than the hiring HR system that the city of Hollister has,” he said.

Though the position was being advertised by Munitalent and posted on the city’s website starting in March, it wasn’t until May 4 that the City Council approved the human resources, risk, and technology director position.

Asked about the issue, Cortez declined to answer what she called “personal” issues.

When the position was approved by the council, Cortez said the recruitment “went through all the processes according to governmental procedures, regardless of what the Facebook environment may say,” in an apparent response to criticism on social media.

Santa Clara University’s Markkula Center for Applied Ethics Director Davina Hurt said even though Cortez is not charging the city, the issue “shouldn’t be dismissed lightly.”

“It’s still a commodity,” Hurt said. “It still has value.”

Hurt added that while Cortez ultimately chooses who to hire, whether recruiting through the city’s channels or Munitalent, the latter has less oversight and accountability because she has control of both recruiting and hiring.

“There’s just no guardrails in this recruitment process because of her business involvement,” Hurt said. However, she added, “Of all the things I speak about and review, this is on the very low end of being concerned about ethical risks.”

Hurt said the issue is more about whether the city has a hiring policy that places ethical boundaries that can be applied no matter who is the top administrator.

“Guardrails and framework of governance are just so important so no one ever questions, ‘Did she profit? Did the brand profit? Did the firm profit? And who does the firm ultimately serve?’” she said. “Did it serve her, or did it ultimately serve the community?”

Asked to comment on the conflict of interest concerns as well as a complaint filed against Cortez by former city employees, councilmember Rolan Resendiz said it’s “not something I’m prepared to talk about.” 

Mayor Roxanne Stephens and the other three council members did not respond to BenitoLink’s requests for comment.

The city’s personnel rules and regulations set a broad policy on recruiting, stating that vacancies “shall be publicized as determined by the Human Resources Department” for at least 10 days before the final application filing date without providing additional details on the recruiting process.

The city manager’s job description and municipal code say the top administrator has the duty to hire, discipline and dismiss personnel. The municipal code exempts the city attorney and city treasurer positions from being disciplined by the city manager.

When she got approval from the City Council to create the director position, Cortez said she basically had been acting as HR director because the department was “very thin” with the equivalent of less than three full-time employees. 

She noted that the city had already interviewed a candidate but the panel, consisting of two city directors and a member of the business council, did not choose the candidate.

The position is still advertised on Munitalent and the city’s websites.

Since joining the city of Hollister in February, Cortez has reorganized several departments, resulting in the elimination of three positions. The three employees who were let go later filed a complaint against Cortez.

Cortez’s actions have received staunch support from the City Council and a group of contractors who have said the city has vastly improved the building permitting process, which was a source of widespread frustration before Cortez’s arrival.

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MENDOCINO CO., 6/6/26 — On the Mendocino coast, the question isn’t whether you can bring the dog. It’s to which beach. The rules change every few miles: off-leash at a couple of spots, a 6-foot leash at most, and a few stretches closed to dogs entirely to protect harbor seals and a threatened shorebird.

Here are eight, Elk to Ten Mile, with the rule you’ll actually find when you get there. The off-leash beaches come first.

1. Noyo Beach, Fort Bragg

Rule: Off-leash

This is the one the locals send you to. It sits beneath the Highway 1 bridge at the end of North Harbor Drive, where the Noyo River meets the ocean — a small pocket beach where dogs run off-leash. It’s tucked out of the worst wind, so it holds up even when the open coast is blowing.

2. Seaside Beach, about 10 miles north of Fort Bragg

Rule: Off-leash, north of the Ten Mile River only

A wide, pale-sand beach owned and run by the Mendocino Land Trust. Dogs are off-leash here — but stay north of the Ten Mile River at the south end. South of the river is closed: it’s nesting habitat for the western snowy plover, a federally protected bird. Keep dogs out of the river itself, too. Stay on the north sand, and it’s one of the best off-leash runs on the coast.3. Big River Beach, Mendocino

Rule: 6-foot leash onlyBelow the village, where the Big River meets the sea. Easy to reach by car off Highway 1 or down the bluff trails, with room for a long walk and an estuary to follow afterward. The currents at the river mouth are dangerous — this is not a swimming beach.

4. Mendocino Headlands State Park

Rule: Leash

The grassy bluffs that wrap the village, laced with paths and ocean on three sides. Leashed dogs are welcome on the headland and the paved path. The cliff edges are unfenced and can crumble, so keep the leash short to prevent accidents to you or your pup.

5. Van Damme State Beach, Little River

Rule: 6-foot leash only

A sheltered cove just south of Mendocino, popular with kayakers and abalone divers. Dogs are allowed on the beach and in the campground on a conventional-length leash. As at every California state park, dogs must stay off the inland trails — here that means Fern Canyon, the Old Logging Road and the Pygmy Forest.

6. Pudding Creek Beach and the Haul Road, Fort Bragg

Rule: LeashCross the restored Pudding Creek Trestle off Elm Street — a 515-foot former lumber-railroad bridge, reopened to walkers and bikes in 2007 — and you can walk a leashed dog for miles on the old Haul Road, the abandoned logging route that now follows the bluffs. It connects to the Fort Bragg Coastal Trail to the south and runs about three miles north toward Cleone. Flat ground, easy on an old dog.

7. MacKerricher State Park, Cleone

Rule: Leash, with closures — read the signs

The big one: boardwalks, tide pools, a headland and more of the Haul Road. Leashed dogs are fine on the beach, the boardwalks and the Haul Road as far as Cleone. Two areas are closed to dogs even on leash — the Seal Rocks harbor-seal pup nursery, and the Inglenook Fen–Ten Mile Dunes natural preserve north of Ward Avenue, which is snowy plover habitat. The closures are posted; follow the signs, and you’ll have no trouble.

8. Greenwood State Beach, Elk

Rule: Leash

A driftwood-and-sea-stack beach in the small town of Elk, down the southern coast at 6150 Highway 1. Day-use only, leashed dogs, rarely a crowd. No cell service in Elk, so plan ahead.

Before you go

A few habits matter more here than in most places.

Carry a leash everywhere, even to the off-leash beaches — rules and conditions shift, and a leash is your reset. Honor the closures; the plover and the seals were here first, and the closed zones are small. Bring bags and pack out what your dog leaves, because the wind scatters everything.

And watch the surf — Mendocino’s sneaker waves and rip currents are no joke, so keep small or older dogs clear of the heavy water.

Get those right, and the open beaches stay open. And that benefits everyone.

Detailed blueprints show an ICE facility with detention and processing space is planned in South Santa Clara County.

The 111-page document obtained by this news outlet, dated Sept. 17, 2025, illustrates plans for a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facility with detention areas, detainee processing areas, interview and holding rooms, spaces for mothers with infants, visitation rooms, weapons and ammunition rooms, tactical equipment storage, offices and a fitness center planned at 7240 Holsclaw Road. Certain pages of the document bear the logos for ICE and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS).

The planned facility is located in an unincorporated area right outside Gilroy.

San José Spotlight obtained the blueprints after first reporting on public records that gave an incomplete picture of the planned facility. The records originally suggested there would be a 4,000-square-foot detention center with office space. The total square footage of the project is roughly 20,000 square feet, with construction already underway and workers spotted on-site with fencing around the property.

Santa Clara County leaders are reviewing their legal options to stop the project, which they said is being built in an area not zoned for such a facility and without any notification or procedures in accordance with local laws.

“We oppose any effort to build an immigration detention facility anywhere in our county or across the Bay Area,” County Counsel Tony LoPresti told San José Spotlight. “Our County Counsel’s Office has a long track record of protecting our immigrant community against unlawful attacks by the federal government. Our office has been evaluating this project closely since activity began on the site in recent weeks. We are in touch with the Attorney General’s Office and are reviewing legal options. We will seek to prevent any effort to disregard or flout any applicable law to build a detention facility.”

Community organizers said they’ve been monitoring the site for months. They’ve also been holding meetings on how to oppose the facility and protect their undocumented neighbors.

“We oppose any expansion of ICE regardless of what it is,” Rebeca Armendariz — a former Gilroy councilmember and organizer with Bay Resistance, the ICE OUT Coalition and Community Agency for Resources, Advocacy and Services — told San José Spotlight. “Hundreds of community members, from the Central Coast to the Bay, have already been activated and we are going to mobilize. If ICE is listening — get out.”

ICE previously denied plans for a facility at the location. After San José Spotlight asked about the project blueprints, the agency described the project as an “ICE office” and denied it being a detention facility.

“The new Gilroy office will enable ICE to support local operations and enhance coordination with regional partners to ensure the enforcement of federal immigration laws at the operating standards of other offices nationwide,” an ICE spokesperson told San José Spotlight.

When reached for comment, a DHS spokesperson repeated a prior statement circulated to media.

“As with any transition, we are reviewing agency policies and proposals,” the spokesperson told San José Spotlight. “As Secretary (Markwayne) Mullin said in his confirmation hearing: ‘I will work with the community leaders and make sure that we are delivering for the American people what the president set out … We want to work with community leaders. We want to be good partners.’”

Representatives for Long Beach-based Environ Architecture, a firm identified in the blueprints, did not respond to requests for comment.

A DHS representative previously declined to confirm the plans, but generally said it will be expanding detention space nationwide.

The revelation of the facility has sent shockwaves through neighboring regions. Monterey County officials in May voted to review their land use policies to block any future proposed site within their jurisdiction. They also voted to join any lawsuit Santa Clara County files against the Gilroy project — and to send a letter to federal authorities opposing it. Most recently, the Gilroy City Council unanimously approved a resolution opposing the facility at its Monday meeting.

Federal procurement records show a contract for the facility was awarded Jan. 8, 2025 to an LLC with the same mailing address as Elmwood Capital Group, a Beverly Hills-based real estate firm tied to another immigration facility proposal in Texas. The notice identified Holsclaw Road as the Santa Clara County facility’s location. County property records show Elmwood Capital Group assumed ownership of the Holsclaw Road address last year, just weeks after the federal contract award. The company website lists the Holsclaw Road location — incorrectly labeled as San Jose — in its portfolio of projects.

Research has shown that communities near ICE facilities see upticks in enforcement activity and higher rates of arrests. Research also shows it creates a chilling effect on the public life of undocumented people — be it reduced school attendance or missed medical appointments for immigrant families and mixed-status households.

“Santa Clara County will vigorously fight in court any proposal to build the machinery of mass deportation in our community,” District 1 Supervisor Sylvia Arenas, who represents the area where the project is planned, told San José Spotlight.

Advocates have raised similar alarms in Dublin, where federal officials are preparing to transfer ownership of a former East Bay prison. The move raises concerns that Dublin might also be the site of a facility for federal immigration enforcement.

Santa Clara County has historically been a leader on local jurisdictions’ resistance to federal immigration crackdowns. The county led a coalition, which included San Francisco, suing to stop attempts to cut funding to cities and counties who declare themselves sanctuaries for people without citizenship. The county has also taken steps to coordinate real-time responses to ICE operations and ban immigration authorities from using county property for enforcement activity.

“Any type of ICE facility — whether it be a processing center or a large-scale warehouse-style detention center — in Santa Clara County endangers our neighbors and threatens our shared values of welcoming and belonging,” District 2 Supervisor Betty Duong told San José Spotlight. “We oppose all efforts to fast-track this administration’s deportation machine, and we will fight together with and for our community to protect the well-being of all those who call the Bay Area home.”

Contact Brandon Pho at brandon@sanjosespotlight.com or @brandonphooo on X.

Story updated June 4 at 9:24 a.m. Original story published June 4 at 8:30 a.m.

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New rules and work requirements for Medi-Cal and food stamps imposed by the federal government could strip benefits from thousands of people in Santa Clara County.

As of Monday, work requirements for people receiving food stamps, known as CalFresh in California, have expanded to include adults ages 18 to 64, raising it from the prior cap of 54. It also requires individuals previously exempt from work requirements — homeless people, veterans and those aged out of foster care — to work 80 hours a month. In addition, new work requirement hours will be imposed on individuals receiving Medi-Cal starting Jan. 1, 2027. These changes are the result of H.R.1, the federal spending bill passed last summer, that severely cut Medi-Cal and CalFresh benefits.

CalFresh and Medi-Cal recipients can also volunteer, participate in job training and enroll in education as part of the work requirements.

About 665,500 people are poised to lose their CalFresh benefits statewide due to these expanded work requirements, according to the Legislative Analyst’s Office. In Santa Clara County, where more than 132,000 people relied on CalFresh last year, about 55,000 people are expected to lose their food benefits due to the changes.

For those on Medi-Cal, the University of California, Berkeley Labor Center estimates nearly 3 million fewer Californians will have Medi-Cal in 2028 due to the various rule changes, with 129,000 losing benefits in Santa Clara County. About 460,000 county residents were enrolled in Medi-Cal last October, the latest data available.

“The work requirements were not put in place to encourage people to work. The work requirements were put in place so that people would be thrown off of Medicaid,” Bob Brownstein, strategic advisor for nonprofit Working Partnerships USA, told San José Spotlight. “The budgeting is done based on the assumption that the work requirements are going to reduce the cost. If everybody met the requirements, there’d be no savings.”

The new Medi-Cal rules also call for renewals to happen every six months rather than annually, a change that increases the burden for people dependent on health care services such as cancer survivor Julie.

Julie, a county resident who asked to only use her first name for privacy reasons, was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2024 and has been cancer free since last year. But her life still revolves around doctor appointments to monitor any recurrence, a regimen of medications and regular blood work.

Though people with disabilities are exempt from work requirements and can continue to renew benefits once a year, Julie is unsure if she falls under that category. Because Medi-Cal is her lifeline, she will do whatever it takes to keep the benefits, she said. But she worries the new rules will make it harder for her to maintain continual service.

“Something that she’s worried about is not receiving their notice (of renewal in the mail) on time,” Julie told San José Spotlight in Spanish through a translator.

Jamie Winslow, 43, anticipates the new rules and work hours reporting will complicate a process that’s already challenging to navigate.

After losing her job last year, she enrolled in CalFresh and Medi-Cal, which was a long application process requiring various documents, she said. She simultaneously applied for unemployment. Since her son is younger than 14, she is exempt from the new work requirements.

Regardless, Winslow said work requirements add an extra burden to people with families.

“If you’ve got kids, 20 hours (a week) is really tight if you are also responsible for getting them to school and picking them up,” she told San José Spotlight.

Six months into her food benefits, Winslow had to complete a form to report a change in income. Despite her meticulous review of her application, a missing document led her benefits to stall in May, and Winslow is unsure when they will be reinstated.

“They haven’t been able to process (my paperwork),” Winslow said. “They said ‘We’re just behind.’”

Winslow’s monthly food benefits — a mere $24 a month — is not enough to cover even a week’s worth of food. She relies on the food bank every week.

“Whenever people fall off of CalFresh, our lines get longer,” Second Harvest of Silicon Valley CEO Leslie Bacho told San José Spotlight. “We cannot possibly replace CalFresh. The value of that benefit is $32 million a month across just the two counties we serve. We are going to be doing our best to meet the increase in need.”

The food bank provides 11 million pounds of food monthly to roughly 500,000 people across Santa Clara and San Mateo counties.

Betzabel Estudillo, chief engagement officer with Nourish California, a statewide nonprofit pushing anti-hunger policy initiatives, said these work requirements add more red tape for people who are already vulnerable and were previously exempted. That includes homeless people who may not have the technology or the ability to report their hours worked.

“Seventy four percent of people subject to the time limits already work, but they face unstable hours because of the labor market,” Estudillo told San José Spotlight. “These cruel (work) requirements are going to cause these populations to lose benefits, because it is very challenging for people who are unhoused or veterans to find stable employment.”

Contact Joyce Chu at joyce@sanjosespotlight.com or @joyce_speaks on X. 

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Lea este artículo en español aquí.

Less than a week before election day, 11.6% or more than 4,500 of San Benito County’s registered voters (about 40,000) had cast their ballots as of May 26, Deputy Clerk-Recorder-Elections Ana De Castro Maquiz told BenitoLink. The figure, De Castro Maquiz said, is typical for a primary election.

More than 39,000 ballots were issued for the June 2 primary election.

Voters can cast ballots in person at two voting centers: the Elections Department at 1601 Lana Way in Hollister and the San Juan Bautista Community Center. Both locations are open from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. through June 1, and from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. on Election Day.

Starting May 30, three additional voting centers will join them: the Community Foundation for San Benito County, Hollister High School and Gavilan College. All five locations will have the same hours.

Elections officials have also installed eight drop boxes throughout the county, available until 8 p.m. on June 2, all with 24-hour video surveillance. The locations are:

• The San Benito County Free Library
• Community Food Bank on San Felipe Rd.
• Ridgemark Office Parking lot
• Fire Station #2 off Valley View Rd.
• Windmill Shopping Center in San Juan Bautista
• Aromas Fire Station
• Elections Department
• True Value Hardware

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MENDOCINO CO., 5/27/26 — For 104 years, the rainbow trout in the cold tributaries above Scott Dam have carried a secret they could not use. Pearse and Kannry’s genetic work, summarized in Friends of the Eel River’s 2025 comments to the state water board, shows the resident fish still hold much of the code for a sea-run life: the chemistry to slip downstream as smolts, turn silver, run to sea and come back heavier as summer steelhead, the southernmost ghost of Northern California’s runs. Two concrete plugs have kept that code from being tested. Once those plugs are removed, the trout can live out their code to run to the sea.

That is the smallest, strangest fact in the Potter Valley Project’s dismantling. Two rivers will live different lives once the dams come down. The Eel, bled for more than a century through a 9,257-foot tunnel under the divide, starts to regain itself; the Russian, drinking imported Eel water since 1908, learns to live thinner. The critters on both rivers are about to get the news.

This tour runs from the bare bottom of what used to be Lake Pillsbury down to the harbor seal haul-outs at Jenner: eight stations across two watersheds. Some critters win, some lose, and most will have to learn a different river.

Station 1 — the drained reservoir

Scott Dam holds back the upper Eel into Lake Pillsbury, a 2,300-acre reservoir completed in 1922. Under PG&E’s surrender and decommissioning plan, removal could begin as early as 2028. The lake bottom will be exposed, and what lived in the lake mostly does not live in the river.

Largemouth bass, bluegill and crappie, the warm-water fishery that draws Bay Area weekenders, are gone from this place, or reduced to whatever side ponds managers maintain elsewhere. None of those fish are native to the Eel. They were put there because there was a lake.

The bald eagles and ospreys that nest around Pillsbury lose a grocery store. Eagles can adjust; ospreys have a harder time of it. Neither species will disappear from the stretch, but the reservoir buffet does. In time, a returning salmon run could feed them on a different schedule.

The tule elk lose open water but not the valley-bottom forage. The exposed bed won’t become paradise overnight; it will pass through mud, weeds and raw ground first. But willow, cottonwood, sedges and meadow plants are the long game, and elk know how to use a river bottom.

The pikeminnow may be the loss nobody is grieving. Sacramento pikeminnow were introduced to the Eel in 1979, supposedly through an illegal bucket-stocking into Pillsbury, and from that warm slack water, they spread through the basin to become one of the most damaging nonnatives in the system, a major predator on juvenile salmonids across the mainstem and South Fork. Pat Higgins’ Eel River Recovery Project has documented their spread for more than a decade.

Pikeminnow thrive in the kind of water dams make: slow, warm, simplified. Take the slack water away, and the cool, fast post-removal river is, finally, the wrong river for them. They won’t vanish overnight and may not vanish at all, but the Eel’s most notorious nonnative finally will lose ground.

Station 2 — the 12 miles between the dams

From Scott Dam down to Cape Horn Dam is about 12 river miles of canyon, hemmed by the Mendocino National Forest. For a century this stretch has been a controlled river: flow set by upstream releases, sediment held back by the same dam.

The first years of removal will be hard on the river. Studies estimate Lake Pillsbury has accumulated roughly 21 million cubic yards of sediment, with about 12 million potentially available for downstream transport, and however the work is staged, those years bring turbidity, burial and a moving bed where a reservoir held the river still.

Aquatic insects get hit first. Caddisfly larvae build stone cases on cobble, so bury the cobble in silt and the caddis go with it. Mayflies and stoneflies take the same hit, and any remaining native freshwater mussel beds are vulnerable to burial too. The lower Eel has survived great sediment violence before, including the 1955 and 1964 floods, but survival was never easy.

This is also where Pacific lamprey begin a quieter return. The larvae are wormlike, blind and ancient; they burrow into fine sediment and filter for years before they run to sea, and when the first pulse passes and the new bed sorts itself, some of that new sand becomes the material they need.

Tribal restoration programs call lamprey a forgotten keystone. The adults carry ocean nutrients deep into the basin, and their bodies feed everything from black bears to belted kingfishers. Lamprey were here when these mountains were rising, and they are about to have a much larger upper basin to work with again.

The foothill yellow-legged frog lays eggs on cobble bars in spring as flows drop, and a dam that releases cold or high water late can drown or chill the clutches. The post-removal pattern of natural snowmelt and rain recession through May and June is closer to what this frog evolved with. The first year is rough on the frog; after that, spring runs closer to the rhythm it evolved with.

Station 3 — Cape Horn to Outlet Creek, the dewatered decades

Below the Cape Horn diversion, the upper mainstem Eel has been running a half-river for generations. In recent decades, roughly 60,000 acre-feet a year has been pulled through the tunnel into the East Fork Russian, and in dry summers the reach from Cape Horn down past Hearst to the Outlet Creek confluence at Dos Rios has run nearly bone-dry, what remained warming past salmonid comfort and sometimes past survival. Native Fish Society’s 2015-16 monitoring clocked the mainstem at 78 degrees Fahrenheit at Bloody Rock Roughs, above what juvenile steelhead can ride out for long.

Dam removal won’t give salmon cooler or fuller summer water, which is the common expectation. Lake Pillsbury catches winter rain and releases it slowly through the dry months, so when the lake is gone, the summer release goes with it. The pre-1922 Eel ran low and warm by August on its own, and that is the river the salmonids evolved with. What dam removal restores is passage and timing, not August volume.

In the first years after removal, the upper mainstem may even run drier in late summer than it did with managed Pillsbury releases, which makes the cool tributary refuges — Tomki Creek, Outlet Creek above Dos Rios, cold springs and shaded side channels — more important, not less. Juvenile steelhead and Chinook will hold in those refuges through the worst stretches.

What’s new is that they can move. The Cape Horn fish ladder, 434 feet long with 49 pools, was never enough. Van Arsdale’s counting station logged 9,528 steelhead in 1944-45. By recent years the count had fallen to the single thousands, some years to near zero. With the dam gone, the ladder no longer matters, and the counting station, which has been on this river since 1933, will close.

Above the former Scott Dam site, the upper mainstem opens to sea-run fish for the first time since the early 1920s. River otters get a whole reach to work: they key on lamprey, suckers and salmonid juveniles, and all three prey bases should change as passage returns. American mink follow the same edges. Belted kingfisher and American dipper, both tied to live streams, gain water that behaves more like a stream, and common merganser, which times broods to fry emergence, gets a different nursery.

Of all the upper-basin returns, the summer steelhead matters most. Charlie Schneider, CalTrout’s connectivity program manager, has put it plainly in public interviews: the wild trout already up there show where fish want to be, and the door just has to open. Pearse and Kannry’s genetic work suggests the door is real, and the first wild summer-run adult to swim past the former Scott Dam site will be the loudest critter event in the modern Eel.

Station 4 — mainstem Eel, South Fork to Pacific

Below Dos Rios the Eel takes in the South Fork and runs to the sea at Centerville. The sediment pulse follows months to years later, through the lower river, estuary and nearshore ocean. Muddied water at the mouth is a real cost for a year or two.

Once the pulse passes, the lower river gets something it has been denied for a century: a natural sediment and wood supply from the upper basin. Rivers build bars, riffles, floodplains and estuaries with the material mountains give them. A century of trapped gravel, sand, wood and organic matter cannot be released without harm, but the river also needs that material to heal.

The half-pounder steelhead, the Eel’s signature subadult, returns to fresh water after one rather than two saltwater years. It gets better passage and a river stitched more closely to its own seasonal cues. Fall Chinook gain upper-basin habitat in numbers; a 2024 run estimate cited in California Sportfishing Protection Alliance field reporting put more than 18,000 adult Chinook in the watershed that year, a reminder that the river is constrained, not dead.

Green sturgeon are a slower story. The Eel has nearly lost them, and their recovery runs in human generations. Dam removal is not primarily a sturgeon project, but a healthier estuary, restored sediment process and stronger salmonid runs can only help the lower-river food web they belong to.

At the mouth of the Eel, the Wiyot Tribe and restoration partners have been working the Ocean Ranch Unit and the Eel estuary, where young salmon fatten before the ocean and returning adults gather before the run upstream. The estuary has been scoured, diked, drained and simplified by a century of damage, and it now gets a real chance to work as an estuary again. Federally endangered Tidewater goby belongs in this story, as do juvenile salmon, steelhead, longfin smelt and the invertebrate soup that feeds them.

Harbor seals at the mouth depend on more than fish; the sediment supply that builds and reshapes the beach also shapes their haul-outs. Shorebirds on the mudflats are mostly on the edge of this story, with sea-level rise their bigger concern.

Station 5 — the disconnect

On the Russian side of the divide, the 9,257-foot tunnel that has carried Eel water under the ridge since 1908 will no longer run year-round. The 2025 Water Diversion Agreement transfers PG&E’s diversion right to the Round Valley Indian Tribes and authorizes a smaller run-of-river facility near the old Cape Horn site, to be built and operated by the new Eel-Russian Project Authority. PG&E wants it built during dam removal, not after, so the East Branch Russian goes less time without Eel water.

The new facility does not replace the old project. It would divert only under seasonal rules and Eel flow floors. In wet periods some water still crosses the divide, but in dry summers, when the old diversion mattered most for downstream agriculture, storage and recreation, the Russian River should expect little or no Eel subsidy.

The wildlife on both sides of the divide are facing different futures. On the Eel side, the river regains passage, sediment and natural process. On the Russian side, the system loses a summer cushion that has quietly underwritten it for three human lifetimes.

Station 6 — Lake Mendocino and the East Fork Russian

Lake Mendocino is not coming down. The late-1950s Coyote Valley Dam is a separate U.S. Army Corps of Engineers structure, not part of the Potter Valley Project. But its inflows drop sharply when a run-of-river facility replaces year-round plumbing—less water means less water stored and less flexibility to release in summer.

The lake’s own ecology is reservoir ecology: smallmouth bass, bluegill, crappie. Lower lake levels mean less reservoir habitat in dry years, and the ospreys nesting around the lake, the bald eagles wintering on it, and the white pelicans and double-crested cormorants working the surface all see less working water in dry periods. None of these are at-risk species, and the lake will still be a lake, just a smaller, thinner one in the years when water matters most.

Summer baseflow on the East Fork below the dam — and on the mainstem Russian below Hopland, where the East and West forks meet — depends on releases from Lake Mendocino. Those releases are shrinking: recent state flow orders have set lower minimums. Sonoma Water, the regional water agency, and Russian Riverkeeper, the watchdog group, are publicly at odds over how to manage the watershed. Riverkeeper wants earlier water-use cuts to protect the lake’s carryover storage and cold-water pool.

Station 7 — Russian mainstem, Ukiah to Wohler

The Russian carries two sea-run populations listed under the Endangered Species Act: Central California Coast steelhead and Central California Coast coho. Steelhead spawn across the basin; coho hang on in cooler tributary refuges such as Mill Creek above Healdsburg, Dry Creek below Warm Springs Dam, Green Valley, Mark West and the shaded side water where summer still gives them a chance.

These populations have been holding on inside a flow regime that included a steady Eel subsidy through the East Fork all summer, and taking much of that subsidy away brings the concern into focus around juvenile rearing from July through October. Juveniles need cool water, cover, food and depth enough to hide, and lower flows can mean shallower, warmer, more fragmented habitat and more concentrated predator pressure from nonnative bass.

The flow number alone doesn’t tell you what the fish are dealing with. Federal regulators have cut summer minimum flows on the Russian so cold water stays banked in Lake Mendocino for release later, when fish need it most. Where the cold water sits, when it gets released and which area it cools matter as much as the gross volume.

The foothill yellow-legged frog faces different conditions on the two rivers. On the Eel, removing the dam restores the natural spring drop in flows that the frog evolved to spawn with. On the Russian, the picture is mixed: less imported Eel water means shallower summer flows in some stretches, hurting tadpoles, while changed release patterns may help in others.Western pond turtle, California’s native freshwater turtle, basks on log jams and rock outcrops along the Russian. It tolerates a wide range of flows but needs pools deep enough to overwinter and connected water to move, so fewer deep pools in dry years would be bad turtle news, slowly rather than dramatically.

North American beaver have been quietly recolonizing the lower Russian and its tributaries. They are flow-tolerant by trade, building their own pools, but a thinner mainstem makes that work harder and pushes the action toward tributaries and side channels with enough gradient, wood and water to hold a dam.

River otters do roughly the same thing on both rivers: they make a living wherever fish, crayfish and cover remain. The urban edges from Ukiah down through Healdsburg suit them better than people expect, and they may be the one species that comes through this transition about even.

Station 8 — the estuary at Jenner

The Russian does not run to the Pacific in a straightforward way. It hits a sandbar at Jenner that closes in summer when wave energy exceeds the river’s outflow, opens when the river rises, and functions as a lagoon when closed. Sonoma Water has spent years writing and revising the management plan for this estuary, balancing flood risk to Jenner homes against juvenile steelhead and coho habitat, harbor seal pupping and the haul-outs on and near Penny Island.

Under a thinner-flow regime the bar can close earlier and stay closed longer, and by itself that can be good for lagoon-rearing fish; the lagoon becomes a warm, productive, food-rich nursery for juvenile steelhead and coho, fattening them before they smolt. A closed lagoon that stays brackish and oxygenated raises young salmonids well. The same lagoon, if it gets too warm or too cut off from tidal exchange, can kill them. Water quality decides which it becomes.

For harbor seals, the picture is mixed. Seals pup on the river bar and nearby beaches from spring into summer, and a stable closed bar can be good pupping habitat, while a sudden mechanical breach during pupping season is not. Lower flows tighten the management trade-offs because flood risk, fish habitat and seal disturbance all have to be balanced on a smaller water budget.

Tidewater goby is important in some North Coast bar-built lagoons, including the Eel estuary and nearby Salmon Creek, but there’s no current survey confirming it at Jenner. The lower Russian’s reliable estuary fish are jacksmelt, surfperch, starry flounder and other natives that respond to water quality, salinity and food.

The estuary’s birds track those fish: great blue heron, snowy egret, belted kingfisher, osprey, double-crested cormorant, the wintering common loon and red-throated loon, the brown pelican in fall. The shorebirds on Goat Rock Beach, the sanderling and killdeer and willet and marbled godwit, care less about the river than about the ocean and the beach. They stay mostly on the edge of this story, watching the rest of the critters sort out a smaller river.

What the ledger says

Step back from the eight stations, and the picture isn’t symmetrical.

One of the clearest winners is Pacific lamprey, which regains access to a much larger upper Eel. The Eel’s summer-steelhead life history, reduced to a remnant possibility for a century, gets its first real chance in 100 years, and fall Chinook gain habitat in numbers. A 2020 peer-reviewed modeling by Cooper et al. projects between roughly 1,000 and 10,000 returning adult Chinook above the former Scott Dam site, a wide range that points toward recovery either way.

The clearest loss is the Pillsbury reservoir community: the bass and bluegill, the lake-edge foraging patterns, the human summer lake culture, which ceases to exist as a habitat type. It is a loss even if the fish themselves are not native to the Eel.

Between those two clear cases, the picture is harder, and most of the difficulty is downstream of the ridge. The lower Russian River, cut off from more than a century of imported Eel water, runs thinner in summer. Its steelhead and coho juveniles, its frogs, turtles, pool fish and aquatic mammals were already under pressure, and the pressure just got worse. Sonoma Water and Russian Riverkeeper will spend years politely arguing  over flow and demand. The critters don’t get to weigh in on the modeling.

The Eel goes back toward being itself. The Russian learns to be smaller. The plumbing that connected them for more than a century comes apart, and the two rivers, which were never really one river even when the tunnel ran year-round, finish the slow uncoupling that began when the old two-basin compromise stopped being financially or safely sound.

The lamprey won’t know anything happened. The summer steelhead, if it returns, will know only that the door is open. The Pillsbury bass will be gone. The seal pup born at Jenner, on a bar that closes earlier than it used to, will live a slightly different summer.

Two rivers, two futures, and a lot of critters working it out.

Lea este artículo en español aquí.

Three former city employees have filed a complaint against Hollister City Manager Ana Cortez alleging retaliation, hostile work environment and improper practices. The complaint is dated the same day that the Hollister City Council approved Cortez’s departmental reorganization plan.

The three complainants, former assistant city manager Rod Powell, building official Gabriel Martinez and cannabis affairs manager Maria Mendez, were recently laid off. Cortez stated that this was a result of department reorganization. As part of the complaint, they request that the City Council suspend any personnel actions and to conduct an independent investigation into their allegations.

The former employees also request the city preserve all communications and documents related to their allegations. They also asked that the city attorney be involved in matters of legal risk.

Cortez, Mayor Roxanne Stephens and three Hollister City Council members did not respond to BenitoLink’s multiple requests for comment. Councilmember Rolan Resendiz did respond, but said, “It’s not something I’m prepared to talk about.”

The complaint was dated April 6 and addressed to City Attorney Jennifer Thompson, Human Resource Officer Stephanie Brown and Stephens. It alleges that since Cortez’s arrival in February, staff has been subject to intimation, implicit and explicit threats of job security and arbitrary reassignment of duties.

“This conduct has created an atmosphere of fear, instability, and diminished morale, and appears retaliatory in nature toward staff who attempt to provide context, raise concerns, or adhere to established procedures,” the complaint says. “We have collectively observed and experienced these conditions within our respective roles and departments.”

The former employees allege that Cortez has made repeated references and comments to preferring the hiring of younger employees because more experienced or older ones cost the city more. They claim she expressed a preference for hiring women for certain positions. 

“These statements, when considered in context with hiring decisions and personnel actions described above, raise concerns regarding compliance with applicable anti-discrimination laws and the city’s obligation to ensure fair, merit-based employment practices,” the complaint says. 

The former employees also say they are concerned with pay-to-play implications, noting that Cortez directed staff to solicit “‘large’ or ‘big’ sponsorships or donations from the city contractors” because the city pays them “substantial sums” for their services. 

The complaint also states that Cortez has excluded and discouraged the city attorney from attending certain meetings, which the complainants say raised concerns of increased legal exposure for the city in matters involving agreements, litigation and regulatory compliance. 

At the April 20 City Council meeting, when asked to report on an April 6 closed session item titled “conference with legal counsel” for “significant exposure to litigation,” Thompson said she did not attend the meeting, at which point Cortez said there was nothing to report. The city contracts with the firm Lozano Smith for legal services, including Thompson’s employment, and it is unclear if there was another attorney from the firm at that meeting. 

Since Cortez received approval from the City Council to reorganize the departments, she’s said she is looking at further reorganizational moves. More recently, she won approval to create a new Human resources position that would also oversee the information technology department.

The complainants linked their allegations against Cortez with her previous employment as city manager in Carnation, Washington, where the Snoqualmie Valley Record reported she resigned months after a third-party arbitrator ordered the city to reinstate four unionized employees with full back pay in a wrongful termination case.

The newspaper also reported she left with a $120,000 severance package.

Before that, Cortez had also resigned as the city manager for Helena, Montana, weeks after she was placed on administrative leave following staff complaints involving harassment, KRTV Great Falls reported. Although she was cleared of the allegations, an outside investigation recommended the city work on improving communications between Cortez and staff, according to the report.
While Cortez is facing a backlash from a group of community members, she receives support from a group of business owners and contractors who laud her for addressing their frustrations with the city’s permitting process.

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Three candidates are in the race to become the Fresno County Superintendent of Schools (FCSS), a key supporting role for over 30 school districts in Fresno County.

Incumbent Michele Cantwell-Copher, elected in 2022, is in the race along with challengers Johnny Alvarado and Eimear O’Brien. All three bring decades of experience in administrative and leadership roles in education within Fresno County.

While the county is home to Fresno Unified, the third largest school district in the state, many of its school districts are positioned in rural areas that serve a total of over 200,000 students across the county.

Fresno County faces similar problems seen statewide and nationwide. Among them are low literacy and mathematics achievement levels in early grades, with nearly 55% of all third graders not meeting SBAC test standards for both subjects last year.

Moreover, schools in and around Fresno face declining student enrollment and low attendance attributed to the COVID-19 pandemic, declining birth rates, higher costs of living and concerns over immigration enforcement near schools.

What does the Fresno County Superintendent of Schools do?

The FCSS is a state mandated position that provides support for vulnerable student groups to school districts, professional development for teachers and administrators and oversees the fiscal stability of districts by reviewing and approving Local Control and Accountability Plans (LCAPs). 

LCAPs are three-year plans that outline a school district’s funding priorities using state funds to districts and schools based on the number of high-needs students served.

The county superintendent is also responsible for the education of students in juvenile court schools and ensuring district compliance with state laws and mandates, including the Williams legislation, which mandates that schools provide all students equal access to learning materials and resources. 

All county superintendents are elected and serve four year terms with a limit of two terms.

Currently, incumbent Cantwell-Copher receives an annual salary of around $350,000.

Click below to jump to:

Johnny Alvarado | Michele Cantwell-Copher | Eimear O’Brien

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Johnny Alvarado

• Job: Retired, previously Assistant Superintendent, Parlier Unified and Chief Academic Officer, Selma Unified
• Age: 60
• Residency: Lives in Fresno, raised in Sanger
• Key Endorsements: Mayor Matthew Tuttle of Reedley, Mayor Frank Gonzalez of Sanger, Sanger City Councilmember Michael Montelongo, Dr. Toulu Thao of The Hmong Inc., Selma Unified Trustee Narinder “Nick” Sahota, President Faith Bautista Tamashiro of The National Diversity Coalition

Alvarado has served in education for over 30 years, starting off as a middle and high school teacher in Sanger Unified in 1995. According to Alvarado, he worked as an elementary, middle and high school teacher, a college professor and served in assistant principal and principal roles at Fresno and Clovis Unified schools before becoming director of charter schools at the FCSS office around 2013. He then served as Selma Unified’s Chief Academic Officer from 2021 through 2024 and as assistant superintendent in Parlier Unified for three years before retiring and joining the race for county superintendent.

What’s his approach to the duties of the superintendent?

Alvarado says that he agrees that the county superintendent is not supposed to meddle in the work of district superintendents and local school boards. However, he noted that part of the county superintendent’s role is to evaluate, support and hold schools accountable, explaining that he’d like to create a system that tracks student performance across all grades throughout the school year.

What are his objectives for the tenure?

Alvarado explained that he would like to develop and implement a common assessment throughout the county at each grade level along with progress monitoring cycles to help educators identify what areas students need help with before they move onto the next grade. Through this, Alvarado says, the county would be able to address social promotion.

Alvarado said that he would like to bring all district superintendents together through meetings similar to professional learning communities (PLCs), where educators of similar subjects and grade levels get together to share best practices.

Alvarado says that the data gathered regarding a student’s performance would allow for specific interventions to be made. Part of his objective as county superintendent would be to share this data with parents in large community conferences while also creating more opportunities for families to be mentored on how they can help their students after the school day.

“I want to change that, if we have common assessments, including 9th, 10th, 11th and 12th throughout the school year, now we’re going to hold all of us accountable to what those results are and when the results aren’t good, it gives us time to respond,” Alvarado said. 

On top of this, Alvarado wants to train all educators with social-emotional learning strategies and expand mental health and behavior support in schools, saying that he would like to create more supportive learning environments for students.

“I want to make sure that academic achievement is improving every year and I made a challenge to myself: I want double-digit figures,” Alvarado said.

How will they address parent/students concerns about immigration enforcement?

Alvarado said that he could educate parents about their rights and resources in his planned community meetings to help quell concerns over immigration enforcement near schools. 

Alvarado said that he would like to get more parents involved in volunteering for activities like crosswalk duty to have more community eyes around campuses. 

“It’s communication, it’s making sure parents are knowledgeable and making sure that they’re feeling safe and that we have a plan to be able to ensure that,” Alvarado said.

What is his approach to artificial intelligence use in classrooms?

Alvarado said that he wants to use the position to help train students, educators and parents alike on how to properly create prompts for AI.

He also noted that he would collaborate with school districts to understand what parameters should be considered on AI use in schools to ensure it is being used safely and efficiently.

“AI should support learning but not replace student effort or teacher judgement,” Alvarado said.

What are their thoughts on potential school closures in the county?

Alvarado described school closures as necessary evils, saying that communities should be informed about school funding processes and about the possibility of closures well in advance.

“The more that parents are involved and educated in this process, the easier it is when it does actually have to happen,” Alvarado said.

“We try to do everything first to avoid it; that might mean moving students to different school sites, but again, if it has to happen, it has to happen, but we need to be humanistic about it,” Alvarado added.

Who is funding his campaign?

According to campaign finance documents, the following organizations and individuals have donated to Alvarado’s campaign:

• Ro’s Precise Painting, Inc. – $30,000
• Christine Barcus – $2,500
• Faith Bautista – $1,000
• Jodie Garabedian – $1,000
• Toulu Thao – $1,000
• Jeffrey Scott Agency – $720 and $332.50

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Michele Cantwell-Copher

• Job: Current Fresno County Superintendent of Schools
• Age: 58
• Residency: Lives in Fresno, raised in Riverdale
• Key Endorsements: Fresno County Sheriff John Zanoni, the California Teachers Association, Fresno County Supervisor Buddy Mendes and Brian Pacheco, Mayor Vong Mouanoutoua of Clovis, Mayor Victor Martinez of Mendota, Mayor Brandon Pursell of Kingsburg, Fresno City Councilmember Annalisa Perea, Fresno Chamber of Commerce

Cantwell-Copher currently serves as the county superintendent. She previously served as an administrator at the FCSS office for 14 years and as an assistant superintendent at Central Unified for 12 years. 

In her re-election campaign, she highlights steady improvements to English Language Arts (ELA), Math and English Learner achievement along with investments in community and charter schools since being elected in June of 2022 with 68% of the vote.

What’s her approach to the duties of the superintendent?

Cantwell-Copher explained that while the county superintendent provides fiscal oversight to Fresno County’s school district, she respects the independence of the districts and their elected boards.

“I’m the liaison between the state and the local districts, but the local districts each have their own elected governing boards,” Cantwell-Copher said, adding “I love how diverse and different our school districts are in Fresno County, respectfully, so I’m going to be of support to those boards and I’m not going to be intrusive in their governance.”

What are her objectives for the tenure?

Cantwell-Copher says that on top of continuing her office’s momentum in improving student performance and test scores, she’s looking to expand the office’s presence in Sacramento to support legislation impacting Fresno County.

“For the first time in many, many years, our office is supporting 16 legislative bills in Sacramento,” Cantwell-Copher said. 

Cantwell-Copher said that legislative support is new territory for the office, explaining that she has used the last two years to understand how the office could influence decisions taking place at the capitol.

Additionally, Cantwell-Copher says she hopes to expand early care and education, specifically transitional kindergarten, and to grow dual enrollment and career technical education opportunities for students in the county.

“We’re working intentionally to mitigate barriers to kids’ success, so that when they get to school, they are prepared and equipped well-enough to be students and learn in their classrooms,” Cantwell-Copher said.

How will she address parent/students concerns about immigration enforcement?

Cantwell-Copher explained that her office felt the impact of immigration enforcement concerns from parents and students almost immediately, noting that there were dips in attendance. In response, she said her office offered mental health services for students who feared potential ICE enforcement and partnered with Centro La Familia to be able to communicate with families about their rights.

For the future, Cantwell-Copher says she plans to continue to support students with mental health services and transportation in case families are impacted by immigration enforcement.

“I am going to make sure that that school district has our mental health services and that we have maybe participated in some sort of community drive to help care for the child and making sure that the child keeps coming to school, even if they’re living in a neighboring school district,” Cantwell-Copher said, adding, “we’re going to do our part to help with transportation and do what we need to to keep that child as stabilized in the school as possible.”

What is their approach to artificial intelligence use in classrooms?

Cantwell-Copher said that while her office is aware of the risks that come with using AI in classrooms and in the office of the FCSS, she is not afraid of the technology and embraces AI.

“We are fully aware of where the pitfalls are, where the risks are and where the legal aspects are, we’re intentional about and careful about that,” Cantwell-Copher said. “Student Data has got to be protected, parents rights have got to be protected.”

Cantwell-Copher said that on top of using AI in her office to enhance productivity, her office is developing an AI-use road map in partnership with Fresno Unified.

Moreover, Cantwell-Copher says she thinks Fresno County could be a leader in the area of AI use and plans to continue developing guardrails for student use of AI in schools.

What are their thoughts on potential school closures in the county?

Cantwell-Copher said she expects school closures in Fresno County in the future. 

According to Cantwell-Copher, the county has maintained a steady student enrollment count of around 200,000 students for the last decade and says that while Fresno Unified is experiencing declining enrollment, families are not leaving the county.

Cantwell-Copher said that her office will continue to partner with districts to help with budget projections but will respect the decisions of school boards and how they allocate their funds.

“It’s a reality in Fresno County, but it’s a little different than it is in counties across the state of California, and our office is a resource for individual school districts to make their budgetary decisions relative to their enrollment and their ability to frankly, fund and manage their budgets,” Cantwell-Copher said.

Who is funding her campaign?

According to campaign finance documents, the following organizations and individuals have donated to Cantwell-Copher’s campaign:

• Charter Public School PAC – $30,000
• Fresno Teachers Association PAC – $10,000
• Jagdip Dhanda – $5,000
• Fresno Laborers Local 294 – $2,500
• Brad Huff – $1,500
• Francisco Hernandez Jr. – $1,000
• Richesin Holdings (Douglas Richesin) – $1,000
• Shellie Hanes – $1,000
• Fresno Chamber PAC – $1,000

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Eimear O’Brien

• Job: Retired, former Superintendent of Clovis Unified
• Age: 62
• Residency: Lives in Fresno, born in Ireland
• Key Endorsements: Former Fresno County Superintendent Larry Powell, Former Fresno County Superintendent Jim Yovino, Mayor Jerry Dyer of Fresno, District Attorney Lisa Smittcamp, Fresno County Assessor-Recorder Paul Dictos, Clovis City Councilmember Matt Basal, Fresno City Councilmember Mike Karbassi, Fresno City Councilmember Tyler Maxwell

O’Brien has been involved in education for over 30 years after moving to Fresno at the age of 30 from Ireland. O’Brien was a teacher for early grades for a decade in Ireland before teaching another 10 years at Maple Creek Elementary in Clovis Unified. O’Brien then served as vice principal and principal at Valley Oak Elementary and as learning director, deputy principal and principal of Clovis West High School. After, she served as assistant superintendent before becoming superintendent of CUSD in 2017, a position she held until stepping down in 2023.

What’s their approach to the duties of the superintendent?

O’Brien explained that she wants to be a partner of the district superintendent to help share best practices and to listen to districts about how she can support their staff, students and communities.

Additionally, O’Brien says that she wants to be transparent with the community at all times, even if it means admitting that something is not working.

“I’m not afraid to make a decision. I’m equally not afraid to turn it around if I discover I made the wrong decision, right? So I think that communication from the county office is very important. I think the county superintendent needs to be visible. But I also think it’s really important not to overstep their role into the district superintendent roles.”

What are their objectives for the tenure?

O’Brien has identified early literacy, parent and family engagement in education and collaborating with districts to increase student achievement as her main goals for the position.

“Reading affects everything,” O’Brien said, adding “it affects kids’ ability to access other academic areas, math and science, it affects their confidence, it affects their mental health.”

O’Brien explained that she plans to help strengthen parent ties with district superintendents by creating programs to educate parents about their opportunities to be involved in their student’s education and volunteering on campus. She noted that AI could be used to help create modules for parents to learn from.

O’Brien says that her goal is for every child to be able to read by third grade by starting education as early as possible through preschool or transitional kindergarten. Specifically, O’Brien would like to implement phonics-based training and materials for students and educators alike.

O’Brien also says that part of the literacy problem is a lack of access for students in rural areas, something she hopes to support if she wins the race.

“I’ll say this, there are certain things we can’t control: We can’t control poverty, we can’t control if a child’s first language isn’t English, we can’t control if there’s violence in the home, but what we can control is providing a high quality education,” O’Brien said.

O’Brien noted that she also plans to strengthen the position’s presence in legislation from Sacramento, citing her previous experience as a district superintendent as a resource that could help her better represent Fresno County.

How will she address parent/students about immigration enforcement?

O’Brien said that she plans to expand opportunities for parents and families to be educated about available resources through community organization partnerships, informational videos and communications to help meet the concerns of communities who are worried about ICE enforcement near schools. 

“I do not believe that any child should be afraid to come to school, and I believe that every child should be in school every day,” O’Brien said.

What is their approach to artificial intelligence use in classrooms?

On artificial intelligence, O’Brien said that leaders in education need to get ahead of the curve on AI, referring back to the explosion of social media in smartphones in the early 2010s.

“I believe we need to be in the driver’s seat of how AI is going to be integrated into our education system,” O’Brien said.

Specifically, O’Brien says that AI can be used to enhance student learning, but that staff and students need to be trained on how to develop prompts and sniff out inaccurate information.

“It’s not taking over everything, but when the child is in class and there’s six kids with their hands up to ask a teacher, they should be able to put a question in, get the answer and then keep going,” O’Brien said.

What are their thoughts on potential school closures in the county?

O’Brien said that while it can be difficult to predict closures and challenges for schools, she noted that long-term planning can be used to find efficient ways to use resources and staff.

“We have to be good stewards of the public funds, and so it does involve making difficult decisions, but we can mitigate and minimize the difficulty of those decisions through long range planning.”

Who is funding her campaign?

According to campaign finance documents, the following organizations and individuals have donated to O’Brien’s campaign:

• Fresno developer Richard Spencer – $30,000
• Matthew Ruiz – $10,000
• Clovis developer Jerry Cook, via Cook Family LP – $5,000
• Eimear O’Brien – $5,000
• CENCAL Services Inc – $5,000
• C-III Construction, Inc. – $5,000
• Tyler Maxwell for Fresno City Council 2024 – $5,000
• Western Systems, LLC – $5,000
• Associated Builders and Contractors Northern California Chapter Political Action – $5,000
• Ramandeep Basi – $5,000
• Brooke Ashjian – $2,500
• Dr. Joe Lee – $1,000
• Jim Yovino – $2,500
• Doug Richesin – $2,500
• Fresno County District Attorney Lisa Smittcamp – $1,000
• Susan Castro $1,000
• Richard Shehadey – $1,000

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