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Winters Express: Wednesday, July 17, 2024

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CHP hosting Age Well Drive Smart class in Winters News, Page 2

including tax

Discover the western fence lizard Features, Page 1

Volume 141, Number 24 — Locally-owned since 1884

The hometown paper of Maya Wildgoose

Winters, Yolo County, California, Wednesday, July 17, 2024

Residents share mixed feelings at Prop 218 town hall By Raymond Purscell Express staff writer

Crystal Apilado/Winters Express

Surrounded by representatives from the Yolo County Housing Authority, Yolo County Board of Supervisors, city of Winters, Winters Joint Unified School District and PG&E, and his family, a young boy who lives in the El Rio Villas housing cut the ribbon on Wednesday, July 10, to officially open the new playground.

El Rio Villas housing gets new playground The original structure was removed five years ago By Logan Chrisp Express staff writer

EXPRESS

On Wednesday, July 10, officials from the Yolo County Housing Authority, Yolo County Board of Supervisors, city of Winters, Winters Joint Unified School District and PG&E gathered to cut the ribbon in celebration of the newly constructed playground in the El Rio Villas housing community. The new playground sits on the same site as the previous playground, which was torn down for safety reasons. For the past five years, the nearly 100 children in the El Rio Villas community had no play structure to climb on. Yolo County Housing Executive Director Ian Evans detailed why the construction of a new playground took such an extended period. “So one of the challenges that we have as

a housing authority is that our funding for public housing comes from HUD and we get very limited funding for capital improvement projects. So we have to prioritize those projects. And it’s part of the reason why it took so long to get something like this done. Because we have had to prioritize things like HVAC replacements to make sure people had cooling and heating in their units.” said Evans. The largest hurdle to clear in the construction of the new playground was finding the funding. With Yolo County Housing limited on funds for improvements in the first place, finding partners was a priority to bring the new play structure into reality. Winters JUSD Trustee Everado Zaragoza, who grew up in the El Rio Villas community, contacted Supervisor Lucas Freichs and alerted him to what was happening in the area. “After touring the site, I knew that we had to prioritize fund-

McNaughton Media

Crystal Apilado/Winters Express

Winters Joint Unified School District Trustee Everado Zaragoza, who grew up in the El Rio Villas housing, spoke to the importance of having a playground for the children who live in the community. ing a new playground and that it would be of major benefit to the mental, emotional and physical wellbeing of future generations of kids who live there,” said Frerichs. Freichs and Evans worked to identify potential funding for the

We at he r Date

Rain

High

Low

July 10

.00

100˚

60˚

July 11

.00

105˚

63˚

July 12

.00

110˚

69˚

July 13

.00

111˚

67˚

Eventos hispanos ....... A-3

July 14

.00

103˚

66˚

July 15

.00

98˚

63˚

Opinion ......................... B-3

July 16

.00

100˚

59˚

Real Estate ................... B-2

Rain for week: 0.00 in. Season’s total: 0.00 in. Last sn. to date: 0.00 in.

Classifieds ................... B-4 Community .................. A-2

Sports ........................... B-6

Winters rainfall season began 7/1/24. Weather readings are taken at 9 a.m. daily by local weatherman Joe Bristow.

playground. The two met with Clay Merril, the government-relations representative for PG&E in Yolo County. “A couple of months ago, I came out here with

See RIBBON, Page 5

See MEETING, Page 5

Suspect arraigned in high school sexual assault case By Lauren Keene

Index Features ........................ B-1

On July 11, the Winters Fire Department hosted a community meeting to discuss and take questions concerning Proposition 218. Prop 218 is a measure designed by the Winters Fire Department to raise money through an additional property tax that will help them build out a healthier department. Specifically, the department is hoping to secure at least two new fulltime staff and newer equipment. Prop

218 will be voted on through mail-in ballots by city of Winters property owners before Aug. 6. Held inside of the fire department’s meeting room, the audience consisted of five Winters residents, several fire department staff and Mayor Pro Tempore Albert Vallecillo on behalf of the Winters City Council. Fire Chief Jack S. Snyder III, stood at a podium and spoke directly to the community members in

An alleged armed sexual assault on the Winters High School campus resulted in the defendant’s arrest last week after the Yolo County District Attorney’s Office filed multiple felony charges. Winters police announced Esteban Arias Garcia’s arrest on Tuesday, July 9, saying his alleged assault of a 15-year-old girl occurred in the fall of 2023 but went unreported to school staff until this past March. “Due to the time between the incident and the report, the severity of the allegations and the sensitive nature of the incident, Winters PD worked closely with the Yolo County District Attorney’s Office, Yolo County’s Multi-Disciplinary Interview Center

(MDIC), Empower Yolo and Winters Joint Unified School District to thoroughly and meticulously investigate the incident,” police said in a news release. Police submitted the case to the DA’s Office, which last week filed charges including forcible sexual assault, false imprisonment with force and violence, and criminal threats. Each of the counts carries an enhancement alleging Arias Garcia, also a student at the school, was armed with a knife during the attack. Officers arrested Arias Garcia on Tuesday and booked him into the Yolo County Jail. In the news release, Winters police declined to release further details “due to the sensitive nature of the incident

See ASSAULT, Page 5

County transfers website domains to .gov for enhanced security Express staff Yolo County is proactively working to step up the security and trustworthiness of its online presence by transitioning all of the county’s professional email accounts and webpages from the “.org” domain to the “.gov” domain. The Yolo

County Department of Innovation and Technology Services (ITS) team is spearheading the strategic move to underscore the county’s commitment to fortifying its digital infrastructure against evolving cyber threats. Registering as a .gov domain requires rigorous validation

through the U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), ensuring that entities genuinely represent legitimate local, county, or state governments. By adopting the .gov domain, Yolo County not only strengthens its security posture but

See DOMAINS, Page 5

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