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By Luciana Chavez John Espinosa’s Merced College story is ongoing. It started nearly a decade ago when he left Atwater High a year and a half early to attend Merced College. The current chapter began three years ago with a job as a lab technician on the college’s Los Banos Campus. Espinosa could again use Merced College as a springboard…

By Lee Pevsner How would you spend $27 million? Personally, I would buy a Bentley convertible, but I do not think that would meet the funding guidelines.…

By Marc Medefind As soon as I was eligible, I got my COVID-19 vaccination. After an anxious year of waiting, I felt like a kid on Christmas Day when I got my…

By Luciana Chavez City of Merced Fire Chief Derek Parker was just a volunteer administering shots to Merced County residents when he met Merced College President Chris Vitelli at the school’s COVID-19 vaccination clinic back in February. It was a quick exchange, Vitelli shaking Parker’s hand and saying, “Hey, if you ever want to partner up on…

By Lynda Brommage If you have been to a few annual community events — such as the Hilmar Dairy Festival or the Christmas Musical at the…

By Lynda Brommage Who do you call and where do you take a wild animal that has been injured, traumatized or orphaned? It could be a coyote…

By Tracy Klehn Special to the Times Uncle Pete had been feeling blue for the last year or so. Up until the age of 91, you could find him out cutting his own lawn, playing golf, meeting regularly with his buddies for coffee and driving with his wife of 58 years from their home in Merced to visit family in Southern California and Arizona.…

By Mike Biddison August is National Coffee Month, and coffee purveyors all over the country will be touting the joys and benefits of the brew that…

By Lynda Brommage There’s an equine paradise in a nearby town with more than 30 retired horses that are free to roam between five pastures,…

Since COVID-19 hit Merced, there hasn’t been much progress to talk about. Homelessness has only gotten worse, unemployment is as high as always, and, of course, crime is going up. The zealous pundits out there may want to blame the liberals in Sacramento, Gavin Newsom, Donald Trump or systemic racism. However, I would pose that I have…