Community

The Rotary Club of Morgan Hill distributed $22,000 in college scholarships to 21 Morgan Hill high school seniors, according to a June 20 announcement.

Tickets are now available for Harvest for Heroes 2017, a benefit for the U.S.  Veterans Program at One Step Closer Therapeutic Riding, according to a June 27 announcement.

With temperatures climbing to triple digits at the infancy of the summer of 2017, the City of Morgan Hill’s Downtown Splash feature has been a big hit.The water feature allows children (and adults, as there is no age limit) to run through several jets that shoot water high into the air. The facility recycles and sanitizes water as it refreshes the users, according to city staff.The fountain is located in a corner of the Community and Cultural Center’s outdoor plaza, at 17000 Monterey Road. City staff are planning to keep it open the rest of the summer, from 12 to 4 p.m. every day except Friday.The Downtown Splash feature has been inactive in recent years due to an historic drought and the city’s climbing costs to maintain the facility.In 2015, the city upgraded the fountain by removing the splash pad’s underground equipment vault to a new above-ground enclosure, making maintenance and upgrades easier in the future. This upgrade cost about $150,000.The spray feature was built when the rest of the CCC campus was developed in 2002 with former Redevelopment Agency funds.Other recreational swimming facilities in Morgan Hill—at the Aquatics Center and the Centennial Recreational Center—require users to pay monthly or day-use fees.

The National Weather Service has extended a heat advisory for all of Santa Clara County, which includes Morgan Hill, until 9 p.m. June 22, according to an announcement from the county.

For more than four decades, Bob and Maureen Hunt have known exactly where they’ll be for the Fourth of July weekend: here in Morgan Hill.

School district officials used drones and live streaming at Live Oak and Sobrato High School graduation ceremonies last week to capture the memories of the Class of 2017.

Father’s Day weekend is starting off with a sizzle as temperatures are expected to reach the mid 90’s today, climb into the high 90s by Saturday and stick around the rest of next week, according to the National Weather Service.

Jeannette Close has been named the associate publisher at New SV Media and will head up all advertising and circulation at the Morgan Hill Times, the Gilroy Dispatch and the Hollister Free Lance. She is based out of the Gilroy Dispatch office in downtown Gilroy.“The next five years are going to be explosive. There is a lot going on in South Valley and San Benito County and I am excited to join the SV Media family as we are about to expand and grow alongside the communities we call home,” said Close. Close began her career in community journalism in San Diego more than 20 years ago and then travelled north, where she joined Silicon Valley Community Newspapers as advertising manager, later becoming its associate publisher after it was sold. Most recently, Close headed up the advertising operations at the Press Banner in Scotts Valley and the San Lorenzo Valley.  “I love the direct contact you get with the community at local newspapers,” said Close, who used to collect newspapers from around the world when she was a 13-year-old kid in her hometown of Peoria, Illinois. “It’s great when people come into the office to talk about stories we’ve written and to learn how our reporting has made a difference to them.”Close looks forward to getting out in the community to meet with local businesses, leaders and newspaper readers. “We are not a big corporation,” said Close. “We are locally owned and each of the papers—Morgan Hill Times, Gilroy Dispatch, Hollister Free Lance—has an important legacy in the communities they serve. We want to provide good journalism and, for our advertisers, an opportunity to reach and tell their story to new and returning customers. We aim to give local businesses an avenue to promote themselves that is within reach financially and takes advantage of all the business development tools we have to offer.”Drop Jeannette Close a line at [email protected].

When  Central High School’s 60 graduates walked the Downtown Amphitheater Stage to receive their diplomas at the June 7 commencement ceremony, nearly all of them knew what their next steps were after leaving high school.

Photographer Robert Eliason shot plenty of photos of Sobrato High School's June 8 commencement ceremony at the school campus in north Morgan Hill.