You Spoke … We Listened!

BenitoLink was born out of a two-year visioning process which involved nearly a thousand residents of San Benito County.

Members of the community cited the lack of local news and information as a major concern and, as a result, Vision San Benito has created BenitoLink, an on-line web portal created by San Benito residents for San Benito residents. BenitoLink is designed to include local news, events, sports, opinions and community discussion forums.

Residents and visitors will be able to find out what is happening throughout our county and to find services, opportunities and information important to us. As it grows, BenitoLink has the flexibility to be whatever the community wants it to be, so your input is essential to it’s success.    

San Benito is a beautiful and historically rich county. BenitoLink will share stories about those who walked and rode across our hills and planted our fields long before we arrived. It has been shown that communities benefit from respectful discussion of important choices and, to that end, BenitoLink will also facilitate discussions about the opportunities and challenges facing us today.

By becoming more informed we’ll be better able to steer San Benito on a healthy and prosperous course into the future.

Our goal is to keep BenitoLink free for everyone to enjoy. Realistically however, there are operating expenses and we will need to generate sufficient revenue to break even. We will be seeking voluntary donations, membership subscriptions, sponsorships and advertising. A small board of local residents will run BenitoLink as a non-profit business.

BenitoLink’s founding partners include Vision San Benito County, the Community Foundation for San Benito County, and CMAP, the Community Media Access Partnership. Startup funding has come from grants by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation and the Community Foundation for San Benito County, in addition to several generous private donors who believe in the value of a well-informed community.

We recognize that there is both a digital and a cultural/language divide in our community and we must work on addressing that situation so that more of our community can participate. Your ideas and thoughts about this and other challenges are highly valued and we hope that you will contribute them through BenitoLink’s online forums.

On BenitoLink those in need of services can connect with the resources that can improve their lives. Links to health services, employment, education, and community events will give access in new ways.

We will be able to write about what our youth are interested in and share what it is like to grow up in San Benito County.

BenitoLink will be gathering content from a growing cast of volunteer citizen journalists. BenitoLink invites you to become a reporter, columnist, photographer, videographer, or forum moderator. If you or your organization have content that you would like to contribute on a regular basis, or irregular basis, let's make that happen! Contact us!

We hope that BenitoLink will help to enable and facilitate participation of all of our residents in decisions that improve the quality of life in our community. The success of BenitoLink depends on making it an effective resource for us all. We sincerely hope that you will find value in BenitoLink and support our ongoing mission of “Connecting Us.”

BenitoLink, the more we all put into it, the more we all get out of it!

Please leave us your comments!

Please read our Terms of Service for more details on how to participate.

Advisory Committee

Julie Morris, Bob Reid, Mark Paxton, Paul Levy, Kathy Bisbee, Leslie David, Lois Locci