Beyond the Grave: Spoken Word Performances
With a gravesite for a stage, three local creatives share their poetry in front of a live audience for the first time in over a year. Audience members’ soft snaps and hums float beneath the towering trees of Evergreen Cemetery in response to the poems….
Derby Skate Contest Raises Funds for Mental Health Awareness
The rapid spinning of wheels wasn’t the only thing rumbling the concrete of Derby Skate Park last Saturday. The noise of live heavy metal bands and the crackling of skateboards flooded the park on May 1. About 300 friends, neighbors, and family members watched local…
Skateworks: Family-Owned Since 1988
A wall of shiny, new skateboard decks sits behind the cash register at Skateworks Los Altos. One deck has “Blood Wizard” emblazoned in gothic font across a royal blue background. Packaged Spitfire wheels and Independent skateboard trucks are displayed beneath the glass checkout counter. On…
MAH Celebrates Qingming at Evergreen Cemetery
Shovel in hand, an Evergreen restoration team member wipes away a bead of sweat that emerges on his forehead. He and another committee member are replanting a headstone that had slowly fallen over due to rainfall. Volunteers are scattered across the cemetery, pulling weeds and…
Barrios Unidos Hosts Santa Cruz Community to Celebrate Black History Month
This article features a short video from City on a Hill Press’s video team, CHP Now. A DJ blasts “Everybody Loves the Sunshine” by Roy Ayers. The walls of Barrios Unidos’ new community center are covered with acrylic paintings of historical Black figures. Over their…
‘Sweat’: African American Theater Arts Troupe Highlights Hardships of Working Class
Through clear plastic masks and staying at a distance, the African American Theatre Arts Troupe (AATAT) carried on its 30 year legacy of uplifting Black actors and stories. In “Sweat,” a play by two-time Pulitzer Prize winner Lynn Nottage, a group of steelworkers’ lack of…
Court Sides with UC, Students Denied Refunds
The UC Board of Regents won two class-action lawsuits filed by students during spring 2020 on Nov. 12. The plaintiffs sued the board for not reimbursing students for benefits and services that their fees pay into, but are no longer accessible due to COVID-19. The…
Local Skaters Host Halloween Contest
An array of colors flashed before spectators’ eyes as skaters wearing NASCAR racer, space alien and cowboy costumes dashed down the steep bank at Ken Wormhoudt Skate Park, also known as Mike Fox, on Saturday afternoon. People dressed as referees blew whistles when another ripper…
Santa Cruz Police Department Receives $85,000 Grant
For a third year in a row, the Santa Cruz City Council approved a Santa Cruz Police Department (SCPD) grant on Oct. 13 to fund traffic enforcement efforts. The $85,000 grant — $10,000 more than last year — will be in effect until Sept. 2021….
Census Bureau Deadline Oct. 5 Despite Federal Order
Despite a court order from federal judge Lucy Koh extending the deadline to fill out the U.S. Census to Oct. 31, the U.S. Census Bureau tweeted Secretary of Commerce Wilbur Ross’s announcment of a new deadline of Oct. 5. — just four days away. The…