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THE LIFESTYLE MAGAZINE OF SAN BENITO COUNTY

A supplement to the Hollister Free Lance

JANUARY 4, 2019

The Season for Self Care

Ready for renewal the New Year

SAN BENITO MAGAZINE INSIDE THIS ISSUE

Local practitioners offer insights on rejuvenation in the new year ON SENIORS P12 | CELLAR DOORS P14

PROTESTS AT ICE OFFICE P4 | 2018 PHOTOS P6 | HOSPITAL REPORT CARD P12

HOLLISTER • SAN BENITO COUNTY

A New SV Media publication

Friday, January 4, 2019

sanbenito.com • Vol. 146, No. 1 • $1

Some cannabis deliveries could be legal NEW LAW WILL ALLOW SOME CANNABIS DELIVERIES TO HOMES Bryce Stoepfel Reporter

FLYING HIGH This artist’s conception of Google’s passenger drone airplane is now flying test flights over Hollister.

Mysteries of 2018 SAN BENITO IN 2018 HAD A DRONE TAXI, CANNABIS LAB Bryce Stoepfel Reporter

It's a bird; it's a plane, it's...what is that? If you've happened to be near the Hollister Municipal Airport and have seen a strange plane/flying car/ something else, you may be one of the few to lay eyes on Kitty Hawk's ultra-secret self-piloting flying taxi, Cora. “After almost eight

years of exploring new frontiers, we had built the aircraft we had been dreaming of: Cora,” Kitty Hawk said in a press release, “an electric, autonomous fully fledged air taxi that takes off like a helicopter and flies like a plane. The first step to a world where the freedom of flight belongs to everyone.” Kitty Hawk, founded by Google co-founder Larry Page, got off the ground in 2014 with the help of a $100 million loan from Page's deep pockets. From testing

grounds in New Zealand, all the way to Hollister. Cora can seat two people, travel up to 110 mph and reach altitudes of 500 to 3,000 feet. According to documents released by Kitty Hawk, Cora can fly as far as 62 miles. “After almost eight years of engineering, reengineering, and re-reengineering, we had done it,” read a statement from the company’s website. “We had designed an air taxi...that could take off like a helicopter and SNEAK PEAK The top secret Cora drone taxi ➝ Mysteries, 6

Bryce Stoepfel

➝ Cannabis, 11

Submitted graphic

Personal use of cannabis is legal in California, but it’s still difficult to obtain in many cities and counties. Soon that may change. On Dec. 11, the California Bureau of Cannabis Affairs introduced new rules and regulations, including access to unrestricted cannabis, despite city or county laws that currently ban it. The final decision is not up to the state's Office of Administrative Law, who is expected to hand down a ruling within 30 days. Proposition 64, approved by the state’s voters in 2016, left it up to local governments to regulate production, sale and distribution of cannabis. Faced with bans and restrictions in many localities, some entrepreneurs have started lucrative cannabis delivery services, offering doorto-door delivery products from legal business in one locale to place where cultivation, sale—and deliveries—are banned by local governments. Cannabis industry advocates have complained about the restrictions on cannabis delivery, citing the lack of availability of legal cannabis for many Californians. A new state law set to

was captured in this rare photo on the tarmac at the Hollister Airport, where it is being built and tested.

County crop reports are mixed VALUE OF LIVESTOCK, PASTURE UP, VEGETABLES DOWN Barry Holtzclaw Managing Editor

San Benito County continues to be one of the top five producing counties in California of specialty vegetable crops, spinach, lettuces and salad mix products. The 2017 Crop and

Livestock Report, prepared annually by county Agriculture Commissioner Karen Overstreet, offered a very mixed set of production results, with overall production down 4 percent. The county is required by law to produce this report. “The economic impact of production agriculture to our local economy is much greater than the gross production value detailed in this report,” said Karen

Overstreet, county agriculture commissioner. “It is a fundamental, and an often unidentified fact that agriculture provides additional value well beyond the $351 million dollars in gross product sales to San Benito County’s economy.” “Labor, logistics and traffic are beginning to hinder the industry,” she said in the report. “We will learn more about these effects over the next few years to come.” San Benito Countu’s

agricultural industry produces a variety of commodities, including numerous specialty vegetable crops, fruits, nuts, choice beef and quality wine grapes. In 2017, the overall value of the county’s agricultural decreased by 4 percent from 2016, down $13.8 million, from $365.1 million to $351.3 million, with the biggest decrease in vegetable and row crops, down more then $20 million.

The value of one other relatively small category for San Benito County, livestock and poultry, was down more than 60 percent, to $994,000. The value of other agricultural production categories—field crops, fruits and nuts and cattle, increased in 2017. The year saw average yields in most commodities, Overstreet reported. Spinach moved to number ➝ Report, 2


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