$1 • Friday, December 28, 2018 • Vol. 124, No. 52 • morganhilltimes.com • Serving Morgan Hill since 1894
Happy New Year ! Some cannabis deliveries could be legal NEW LAW WILL ALLOW CANNABIS DELIVERIES TO HOMES Bryce Stoepfel Reporter
➝ Pot Law, 11
Robert Eliason
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 door-to-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
SHOPPING SPREE Morgan Hill Police Capt. Emil Kokesh and Officer Ken Rak were joined by a group of enthusiastic fourth-graders from Jackson Academy of Math & Music at the Dec. 19 Shop With A Cop event at Target.
Kids, cops shop STUDENTS TREATED TO EVENING WITH MHPD, TARGET GIFT CARD Michael Moore Editor
Fifty-two lucky fourthgraders got a chance Dec.
19 to finish some holiday shopping—for themselves and their peers—courtesy of Morgan Hill Police officers. It was the fourth annual Shop With A Cop charity and outreach event, organized by the Morgan Hill Police Officers Association. Before being treated to a $100
shopping spree at Target, the students selected for this year’s program enjoyed a tour of the police station on Vineyard Boulevard, met the city’s K9 police dog, Bosco, and were awed by demonstrations of patrol cars, handcuffs and other tools of the law enforcement trade. After eating dinner
with a dozen-plus MHPD officers, the group rolled up to Target on Cochrane Road in a caravan of Morgan Hill Unified School District buses and police cruisers. Running into the store in order to keep up with the kids, each officer was teamed up with a small group of students to help ensure they stayed
within their budget and purchased everything on their lists. Kia Jones, 9, a fourthgrader at Jackson Academy of Math & Science, said while deciding what to purchase at Target that meeting the city’s K9 officer was the highlight of the evening ➝ Shopping, 15
2018: Taking a look back THE GOOD, THE BAD, THE UGLY OF NEWS IN MORGAN HILL Michael Moore Editor
Trial to Morgan Hill. On May 16, the tour brought nearly 120 of the world’s best cyclists—including some of the sport’s household names like Peter Sagan and Mark Cavendish—and thousands of visitors to downtown Morgan Hill and western foothills of the Santa Cruz mountains. The 21.6-mile loop— which requires competitors to continuously stomp the pedals if they want to get ahead—started and finished in the city’s downtown, and the course route was closed to vehicle traffic. The time trial also featured a cycling festival ➝ Review, 2
File photo
As 2018 approaches its end, it seems much of the year’s excitement in the local news has been concentrated in the last few weeks: new elected officials, the county’s purchase of St. Louise Regional Hospital, a nationwide romaine lettuce scare, another chapter closed in the ongoing effort to build a Catholic high school in southeast
Morgan Hill, a mid-November smoky hellscape from Northern California fires, and so forth. This week and next, the Times takes a look back through 2018 and reflects on some of the most memorable, inspiring, harrowing, uplifting and unusual moments in Morgan Hill and South County over the last 12 months. As usual, City Hall was busy throughout 2018— mostly with ongoing development requests, approvals, delays and more. But perhaps the city’s biggest accomplishment this year was attracting the Amgen Tour of California Stage 4 Time
WORLD CLASS EVENT Thousands of spectators lined the opening stretch of the Amgen Tour of California’s May 16 time trial on Monterey Road, cheering each competitor as they rounded the first turn onto West Dunne Avenue to start the 21.6-mile loop. The event broadcast images of Morgan Hill all over the world and brought thousands of visitors to town.