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CBS News
3 days ago
- Entertainment
- CBS News
Gilroy Garlic Festival returns for first time since 2019 mass shooting
For 40 years, the Gilroy Garlic Festival was a Bay Area tradition, making one small farming community world famous. But it all came to a halt in 2019 when a gunman opened fire on the crowd. Now, six years later, the event is back up and running. It was one of the most popular and unlikely events anyone could imagine: a celebration of a plant with such a strong smell that it was known as the "stinking rose." "Prior to 1979, garlic was sort of in the closet, right? And it wasn't until we started having a garlic festival that garlic came out of the closet and became a mainstream, very popular ingredient used for cooking," said Greg Bozzo, a former festival president. Over the years, the Gilroy Garlic Festival didn't just promote a pungent vegetable; it put the city on the map. At its height, 80,000 people attended the three-day event until 2019 when a lone gunman entered the grounds and began shooting people with an assault rifle. He was killed in less than a minute, but three festival goers, including two children, died and 17 others were wounded. The resulting lawsuits and insurance hikes shut the celebration down until this weekend. "This is a staple, right? Everybody from the Bay Area comes to Gilroy for this festival," said visitor Cheryl Weiland. "So, when it shut down, everybody was really sad. Now, it's like the first time back in the original venue, and we just had to come." Actually, it was a brand new venue. The event was taking up one corner of the Gilroy Gardens theme park. The space can only hold about 3,000 people, roughly one-tenth of the old crowd, but the tickets sold out in about six hours. "We're definitely going to try to grow it," said current festival president, Paul Nadeau. "This is a first step forward, so after being in kind of hiatus for the last five years, we're really starting to brush off the dust on our boots and making sure that we grow this responsibly." Organizers said growing the event will probably require another change of location, and they are not ruling out a return to the original venue at Christmas Hill Park. "What happened there six years ago is something that should never happen to anybody," said Bozzo. "So, as we look forward to future festivals, we want to continue celebrating garlic in this community. But as we move forward, we will never forget the past." Bozzo's family had been part of the event since its beginning and was on scene when the shooting occurred. He recently was elected mayor on a promise to restore and preserve the festival. Now, visitors once again feasted on all kinds of garlic-infused foods, from pasta and French fries to unorthodox items like ice cream, kettle corn and even garlic beer. But Bozzo said it was the people themselves who were changing the fortunes of the festival and the city. "You have helped us come back," he said, "and instead of being remembered for something bad that happened to us, we will now be known for how we responded to it. And I thank everybody for that." It's always so much harder to build something than it is to destroy it. The town was shaken by a random act of madness, and it's taking some time to get its feet back under it. But the determination to reclaim their beloved tradition shows that the scent of garlic isn't the only thing that's strong in Gilroy.
Axios
6 days ago
- Axios
Gilroy Garlic Festival returns after multi-year hiatus
The Gilroy Garlic Festival returns this weekend for the first time since tragedy unfolded nearly six years ago when three young people were killed in a mass shooting and 17 were injured. Why it matters: For four decades before it was abruptly shut down, the beloved tradition served as a cornerstone of civic pride and economic driver for the South Bay community. State of play: The festival is now relaunching at South County Grove in Gilroy Gardens at a much smaller scale. This marks the first time the festival won't be held at its longtime home at Christmas Hill Park, a shift driven by the 2019 shooting, soaring insurance costs in its aftermath and the pandemic. Attendance will be capped at 9,000 — less than 10% of its size when the event drew more than 100,000 people at its peak. Catch up quick: Gilroy, dubbed the "Garlic Capital of the World," started the festival in 1979 with garlic-laced food, cooking demos and live music to spotlight its identity as a top garlic producer. The 2019 festival was marred by violence when a gunman cut through a fence and opened fire with an assault-style rifle, wounding 17 and killing three — including 6-year old Stephen Romero and 13-year old Keyla Salazar. The big picture: Organizers hope the revived event can help restore the spirit that once made Gilroy a summer destination. What to expect: The event will include favorites like garlic ice cream, garlic-themed attractions and "Gourmet Alley," where chefs prepare sizzling shrimp scampi, garlic fries and pepper-steak sandwiches, plus wine tastings and a beer garden.
San Francisco Chronicle
21-07-2025
- Politics
- San Francisco Chronicle
After tragedy, a beloved Bay Area festival shut down. Now it's back — but it'll be different
Greg Bozzo stood amid the towering redwoods and lush green hills of Gilroy's Christmas Hill Park, blinking back tears as he wondered aloud: When it mattered most, did he do enough? Nearly six years ago, Bozzo — a tall, gray-haired man with relentless energy — was at this same park, getting ready to break down the 41st annual Gilroy Garlic Festival, when he heard a pop-pop-pop-pop-pop. He glanced up. Droves of people were fleeing what he later learned was a gunman, dressed like a soldier with an assault rifle, near the inflatable slide. What Bozzo witnessed over the next 45 seconds — pure chaos as he rushed toward the slide to help; festival-goers frantically tending to the wounded; people crying out for their loved ones — has stuck with him. 'I refuse to recognize that I'm an emotional person,' Bozzo said while discussing that shooting, which killed three people, including two children.'But this? This one gets me.' Last year, despite having no political experience, Bozzo ran for Gilroy mayor. At the crux of his campaign: a promise to help himself and others heal from the horrific events of July 28, 2019, by reviving the city's iconic festival. For the four decades before its abrupt and tragic closure, it had been an essential source of local pride. Now, about seven months after Bozzo was narrowly elected, he is among a small group of community leaders responsible for the festival's comeback. And the big question for most Gilroyans isn't whether resuscitating the event was worth it. Rather, it's whether a scaled-down version can provide the Silicon Valley suburb's roughly 60,000 residents the closure they need. What's clear is it will feel different. When the three-day festival arrives July 25 at Gilroy Gardens' South County Grove, it will be somewhere other than Christmas Hill Park for the first time since its founding in 1979. It will also be a fraction of the size. Long known for drawing crowds of more than 100,000 people, this iteration is limited to 9,000 guests. Tickets sold out within six hours. 'I think we're ready for this festival so we can show that we can turn the page and move on,' said City Council Member Tom Cline, who served as Gilroy Garlic Festival Association president from 2019 to 2021. 'Boston got to have the Boston Marathon the year after the bombing, and we just weren't able to do that.' Just as that marathon is more than a race, the Gilroy Garlic Festival became more than a place to eat and listen to music. People planned their summer schedules around it. By transforming Gilroy's garlicky stench from a punchline to a point of honor, and raising millions of dollars for charities, the event came to embody the principles residents say they value most: hard work, hospitality, community. With those festivities now shrouded by tragedy, organizers hope to usher in a new era while reminding visitors of their decades-long heyday. Among the many familiar attractions set to return are free samples of garlic ice cream, garlic-themed arts and crafts, and 'Gourmet Alley,' where pyro chefs fire up gigantic skillets loaded with such garlic-infused dishes as shrimp scampi and pepper-steak sandwiches. The ultimate goal: grow this reimagined event in coming years to the point where Gilroy feels like itself again. 'Gilroy is the garlic festival,' said Gilroy native Patrick Carr, who teaches at a middle school in nearby Watsonville. 'And, it wasn't just what put us on the map. It was supposed to be our safe space.' During his recent visit to Christmas Hill Park, Bozzo leaned against his white pickup in the parking lot as he gazed at the patch of grass where the inflatable slide used to sit. In the more than 2,000 days since he found himself about 100 yards from an active shooter, Bozzo, 58, has confided in people he trusted about the complex emotions triggered by the incident. Those conversations helped him acknowledge his nagging what-ifs for what they are: signs that he hasn't fully moved forward from the tragedy. 'Rationally, I know there was nothing I could do,' Bozzo said. 'But when you go through something traumatic like this, you can't help but question yourself.' As the 2019 festival was winding down on a warm Sunday evening, 19-year-old Santino Legan crept along Uvas Creek, then used bolt cutters to sneak through a fence. After raising an AK-47-style rifle he'd recently purchased in Nevada, he began shooting at festival-goers gathered near the inflatable slide. On top of the three people he killed, Legan wounded 17. Many others, like Bozzo, were left with less visible injuries. Though Legan is believed to have had possible links to the white supremacist movement, authorities couldn't identify a specific motive for the shooting. Perhaps the closest they'll come to knowing what compelled Legan was his four-word response to someone who'd asked him amid the mayhem why he was doing this: 'Because I'm really angry.' The rampage ended less than a minute after it started when, while under fire from police, Legan took his own life. Witnesses recall feeling like the violence had lasted forever. Christian Swain, lead vocalist of the local cover band TinMan, was midway through Grand Funk Railroad's 'We're an American Band' when the shooting began close-by. He tossed his microphone, raced off a 5-foot stage with his bandmates, dropped to his hands and knees, closed his eyes and asked himself: How could this be happening? Gene Sakahara, a retired educator who'd attended the festival since its inception, remembered having a similar thought. After he grabbed two of his young grandsons, Sakahara guided them behind a large barbecue grill and, while clutching a chef's knife, watched for the shooter. Nearby, at the slide, Bozzo heard a woman screaming for her daughter, in Spanish. Almost immediately, he realized that her daughter, 13-year-old Keyla Salazar, had been killed. Before the woman could see her child, Bozzo directed her toward other family members. Salazar, a San Jose resident, had been an aspiring animator. Legan's two other victims were Stephen Romero, a 6-year-old San Jose boy who loved Batman and Legos, and 25-year-old recent college grad Trevor Irby. The Chronicle's attempts to contact the families of Salazar, Romero and Irby were unsuccessful. Within a week of the Gilroy massacre, mass shootings at a Walmart in El Paso, Texas, and a busy entertainment district in Dayton, Ohio, seized national attention. Since then, nearly 4,000 shootings involving multiple homicides have occurred nationwide. Whenever a mass shooting hits the news cycle, many Gilroy survivors feel thrust back in time. 'The events of that day have never fully left me,' Swain said. 'Just when I think I've moved past it, I hear about a shooting at a mall, a church or even another festival, and I'm reliving it all over again.' To some, the way to cope seemed obvious: try to replace the memories with more positive ones. Yet, even as two copycat garlic festivals sprouted in the Central Valley, Gilroy's failed to relaunch. In the wake of the shooting, the event's insurance liability spiked from $1 million to $10 million — a prohibitive sum for its grassroots operators. A lawsuit filed by five of the wounded alleged that poor planning by the city, the festival association and the festival's security firm had made the shooting possible. Then the pandemic arrived. By April 2022, festival organizers were announcing that the event could be canceled for the 'foreseeable future.' Through it all, the festival association tried to keep the spirit of the event alive — and maintain the brand. There have been farm-to-table dinners, golf tournaments, concerts, even a drive-through popup at a Presbyterian church meant to mimic 'Gourmet Alley.' 'The thought of giving up was just too tough for us to stomach,' said Cindy Fellows, the festival association's president last year. In November 2023, a judge dismissed the shooting victims' lawsuit. Soon, the city dropped the festival's insurance liability to $4 million. The following April, Bozzo, a landscape contractor well-known for his community involvement, announced his campaign for mayor. Like many of his neighbors, he felt the city hadn't done enough to resurrect the festival. And, as a former festival association president who'd worked the event his entire adult life, Bozzo figured he was as equipped as anyone to troubleshoot any challenges. Within days of his swearing-in, Bozzo appointed himself to a seat on the Gilroy Gardens Board of Directors, which allowed him to act as a sort of mediator between festival organizers and the city-owned venue. 'As soon as Greg became mayor, I noticed that the overall attitude shifted throughout town about the festival,' said Paul Nadeau, the festival association's current president. 'Before, there were a lot of preconceived notions that the city didn't want it, so it just wasn't going to happen. Greg campaigning on bringing the festival back was really big in making people believe, 'Hey, maybe this really canhappen.'' Bozzo's campaign theme also forced residents to face an uncomfortable question: What is Gilroy without the garlic festival? Nestled at the intersection of two concrete paths, on what locals call Christmas Hill Park's 'ranch side,' three boulders symbolizing those killed flank a huge palm tree. Surrounding this small garden, a wooden fence has 17 markers — one for each person injured. Though Bozzo helped the city construct that memorial, he seldom visits it. Occasionally, while talking about what many Gilroyans still consider the worst day in town history, he remembers just how raw those feelings remain. 'We can't let some crazy guy determine our community's fate,' Bozzo said. 'It's time to have our festival back. It's time for us all to heal.' Community leaders founded the Gilroy Garlic Festival in 1979, after the president of a local college became incensed about a tiny French town proclaiming itself the real 'Garlic Capital of the World.' Within a few years, that celebration of all things garlic was packing the 51-acre Christmas Hill Park the last weekend of each July, receiving write-ups in national magazines and changing people's perceptions about its eponymous allium. Despite being a widely used cooking ingredient, garlic had long been stigmatized as stinky, working-class and old-world. Notorious for the pungent odor that wafted from the garlic processing plants on the east side of town, Gilroy had a similarly unsavory reputation. But the more the garlic festival ballooned in popularity, the more people appreciated the plant for its versatility and flavor. Some culinary experts touted the eclectic dishes from 'Gourmet Alley' as the ultimate showcase of garlic's unifying power. And it wasn't just cuisines that garlic was bringing together. By the time Gilroy-based Christopher Ranch solidified itself in the 1990s as the nation's premier grower of garlic, the festival was going global. Gilroyans love recounting stories about encountering someone in a far-away land who, upon meeting them, shot back some variation of the same response: Gilroy? The garlic capital! For a place some consider Santa Clara County's last bastion of agriculture, the garlic festival represented far more than a quirky niche. It was a reason for residents to puff their chests. Gilroy's official logo features a lowercase 'g' with a garlic bulb depicted as the curly tail. On the side of a prominent building downtown, a giant mural asserts the community's 'garlic capital' status. 'Back when I was a kid growing up in Gilroy, coming from a town that smelled like garlic was embarrassing,' said Sakahara, a lifelong Gilroyan who teams up with Greg Bozzo's father, Sam Bozzo, at every garlic festival to form 'SakaBozzo,' the crowd-favorite cooking demonstration duo. 'Now, thanks to the garlic festival, it's chic to reek.' The festival also brought much-needed tourism to a community often on the brink of a fiscal crisis. For at least three days every year, city leaders could bank on full hotels, gas-station lines and swarmed diners. Though Gilroy is creating a new executive-level position tasked with attracting new businesses and boosting sales-tax revenue, it has no easy way to replicate the cash infusion the festival once offered. Then there's all the money nonprofits and schools have lost without the festival. Throughout its 41-year run at Christmas Hill Park, the garlic festival was Gilroy's biggest fundraiser, generating a total of more than $12 million for local charities. In the process, it pioneered a creative business model. At the end of each festival, event leaders divided festival proceeds among the organizations that supplied several thousand volunteers, doling out checks that covered hourly wages for every worker. For some groups, those four- or five-figure payouts were an indispensable part of their annual operating budgets. 'It has been an ongoing, significant challenge for us to replace the money we got every year from the festival,' said Kelly Ramirez, president of the Gilroy Rotary Club. 'For the first time this summer, we sold fireworks. Of course, that's not as profitable as the garlic festival was.' All these years later, Ramirez can feel her heart drumming in her chest when she discusses the shooting. She had been in a nearby retail booth when Legan opened fire. Another volunteer in her booth was wounded. Like Ramirez, Swain thinks a lot these days about how lucky he is to be alive. Had the shooter just turned a bit to his right, Swain said, he would have seen the stage where the members of TinMan were 'sitting ducks.' Now Swain is preparing to finish what he started. He had only gotten to the second chorus of 'We're an American Band' before TinMan fled offstage. Though the crowd will be smaller, and the venue will be different, Swain and his band are set to perform July 26, at the end of the new-look event's second day. Since its last garlic festival, TinMan has ended dozens of shows with 'We're an American Band.' The next performance figures to be the most memorable. 'I don't care that fewer people will be there this time,' Swain said. 'When my band finally gets to finish that song, all the memories will flood back. It'll feel cathartic. It'll feel right.'
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Travel + Leisure
13-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Travel + Leisure
The Largest Garlic Festival in the World Is Back—and Yes, There's Still Garlic Ice Cream
After a three-year hiatus, the Gilroy Garlic Festival will take place this year from July 25 to 27. Visitors can expect cooking classes, live music, lots of garlicky cuisine—including the event's iconic garlic ice cream—and more. California's highways cross through some of the world's most incredible scenery—and in some cases, they'll even take you on an odoriferous journey. Just east of Monterey Bay, Highway 101 runs through the small town of Gilroy, California, home to a little over 58,000 people. However, you'll most likely smell Gilroy before you see it—the pungent smell of garlic is sure to hit you, even if the windows are rolled up. Known as 'The Garlic Capital of the World,' Gilroy produces more than 100 million pounds of garlic annually, and for years, the town celebrated its famous aromatic crop with an annual soiree, the Gilroy Garlic Festival. After a tragic shooting in 2019, the festival went dark during the pandemic, and then closed indefinitely in 2022 due to financial constraints and insurance requirements requested by the city. However, it's officially back in action this year, and will take place from July 25 to 27 at South County Grove, located next to the Gilroy Gardens Family Theme Park, a horticulture-themed amusement park. Historically, the festival was held at Gilroy's Christmas Hill Park and welcomed tens of thousands of guests across a single weekend. This year, it will be far more intimate, with just 3,000 entrants per day. Nonetheless, the lineup is promising. There will be interactive cooking demonstrations and live entertainment. 'Gourmet Alley' will have stalls selling garlic-flavored dishes of all sorts, from pesto pasta, calamari, and scampi to pepper steak sandwiches, loaded tri-tip fries, and the festival's legendary garlic ice cream. "Some people like [the ice cream], some people don't,' said Cindy Fellows, a past president and a current board member of the Gilroy Garlic Festival Association. 'But it will be present—and it sure is an interesting thing to taste." From left: Fresh off the grill a pepper steak sandwich; a volunteer vendor heating up the grill. Gilroy Garlic Festival Association The Gilroy Garlic Festival has long been a fundraising behemoth for the Santa Clara Valley city—the festival is 99 percent volunteer-based, and proceeds go to local schools to fund things like camps and sports equipment, and other community needs. 'So many nonprofits really benefit from the Garlic Festival,' Fellows said. 'And over the last six years, they have suffered from its absence. We're thrilled to be back and to support them again.' Fellows, who is a Gilroy native, says the event has pumped $12 million back into the community since its inception. Gilroy, which is usually a sleepy town, comes alive during the festival, as locals are joined by travelers from across California and the country. Regional farmers, such as Christopher Ranch (the nation's largest grower of fresh garlic) are vital to the festival, too. 'Local farmers help us with peppers, onions, and different things," Fellows said. "It's a time to come together as a great community, and everybody jumps right in.'
Eater
02-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Eater
At Long Last, the Gilroy Garlic Festival Has Returned
It was back in 2022 that the organizers of the Gilroy Garlic Festival let the greater garlic community know there'd be no more grand festivities, 'indefinitely.' Thankfully, the drought is over: from July 25 to 27, there'll be a smaller, more intimate garlic festival in Gilroy. Tickets are already waitlisted since, per the Mercury News , they sold out within hours. There'll be all the food, music, and activities of former fests, just on a smaller scale. The 3,000-person event will take place on the five-acre South County Grove next to the Gilroy Gardens theme park. In 2019, a gunman wounded 17 people and killed three attendees, and the festival went on hiatus in 2020 due to COVID-19. The festival then transitioned to a drive-thru version in 2021 and other smaller events, according to the Mercury News . The festival was founded in 1978 and became a keystone of the area's annual goings-on. Marina burger joint cited for rodent droppings Athleisure-clad diners on Chestnut Street may pause before eating at Super Duper Burgers next time. A routine city inspection found rodent droppings throughout the restaurant and bread containers stored on the floor. Though the original order instructed the restaurant's outpost to close, the San Francisco Chronicle reports the restaurant received a conditional pass; the original order's closure instruction was apparently an error. An Anchor Brewing update looks nonexistent Fans of Anchor Brewing have been waiting to see what new billionaire owner Hamdi Ulukaya would do with the steam beer-producing hometown hero. The San Francisco Standard took it upon themselves to figure it out. Unfortunately, there's been little activity since May 2024: there was a February Alcoholic Beverage Control permit secured, an April sighting of Ulukaya at Mexican restaurant Papito, and that's about it. Ciccio reopens after a fire It seems it's comeback season for two local restaurants that were hit by fires this spring. Niku Steakhouse made its comeback on Friday, May 30, after a fire in March. Now, Ciccio in Yountville — which suffered a minor fire at the end of April — is back in action as of Saturday, May 31. Mellow coffee lounge opens in Berkeley University Avenue's Wine So Cru is about to open a 'collaborative coffee lounge,' per an Instagram announcement. Styled as 42ndPour, the business will open Saturday, June 7, from 7 to 11 a.m., pouring the immaculate Hydrangea Coffee Roaster. There'll be East Bay-baked pastries and tea, too. Sign up for our newsletter.
