The Sonoma City Council is considering a policy recommendation from the Community Services and Environment Commission to ban smoking in city parks. According to Planning Director David Goodison, the Commission, which advises the council on matters related to the preservation and enhancement of parks, recreational... Continue
What’s Happening
Local Sonoma Valley News
Congressman Mike Thompson (D-CA) advised his constituents last week that spouses of veterans who died after Dec. 31, 1996, are entitled to benefits they may not have received. By law, since 1996, deceased veterans’ spouses are entitled to benefits for the month of the veteran’s... Continue
California has a host of new laws for the New Year. First and foremost on the list is the DMV’s “No Texting” law. Coinciding with the cell phone law of 2007, this law prohibits text messaging with a cell phone or other text-based communications device... Continue
On the eve of the last night of 2008, and 22 days before Barack Obama assumes office, some 64 people crowded into the social hall at Sonoma’s Trinity Episcopal Church to respond to the President-elect’s invitation to communities, extended by the Obama-Biden Transition Project, to... Continue
The advent of a new year is a traditional time to take stock of one’s life, and plan for the future. Returns on financial investments have been disappointing for many, who may want to diversify into more rewarding activities. Perhaps it is appropriate to consider... Continue
Human trafficking – better known as modern day slavery – is a worldwide problem that affects even the bucolic Sonoma Valley. While 70 percent of trafficked victims are women and children who are forced into hard labor or sexual slavery, the plight also hits us... Continue
A s Sonoma Valley and other district hospitals struggle for long-term viability, will the new 70-bed hospital and ambulatory surgery center proposed by Sutter Medical Center of Santa Rosa create new problems? Or, sharing a common set of challenges, could it be part of a... Continue
In an uncontested race this fall, Gary De Smet was selected as the school board’s newest member. A lifelong learner, De Smet has a self-described passion for education. Born and raised in San Jose, he earned both a Bachelor of Arts and a Masters Degree... Continue
The future viability of the American auto industry is becoming increasingly tenuous. But Sonoma’s auto dealers may have a “softer landing” than most -- thanks to our proactive city government. Acknowledging potential local impacts of negative economic news trickling down from the big three automakers’... Continue
Sonoma Valley public schools suffer from declining enrollment, like every school district in Sonoma County. Countywide, enrollment has dropped steadily – by roughly 2,000 students – in the past few years. In some areas, that’s meant closure for low-enrollment schools. Here in Sonoma Valley, the... Continue