HOW WE KNOW

Where this
comes from

Real local updates. Here's how we get them. We read the city paperwork so you don't have to. Everything on The Bay Main starts with something public, and every story links to what we used.

City records come first

Planning lists, council and commission agendas and minutes, public works project pages, and permit records. If the city decided something, we say what, when and who voted.

Then the other public bodies that shape your town

School district boards decide closures and campus changes. Counties and other agencies handle land the city doesn't. We name whoever made the decision, because a city, a school board and a neighborhood association are not the same thing.

For businesses, we go to the business

A permit tells us someone applied or was approved. It doesn't tell us whether the doors are open. For that, we look for an announcement from the business itself, then local reporting. Map and review listings can help us find the right location, but we don't treat them as proof.

Local news helps us find things, and we credit it

City websites can be slow to show a change. Local reporters often catch it first, so we watch local outlets like the Vallejo Sun, the Vallejo Times-Herald and others like them. When we rely on their reporting, we link to the original and name who did the work. Where we can, we check it against a public record too.

Reviewed before publication

We check each update against its sources before publication. Research and drafting can be assisted by AI; publication follows the owner's approval and an evidence review. A collected lead does not publish automatically.

What we say, and what we don't

We use words that match the evidence.

Applied or proposed means someone has asked. It doesn't mean it's coming. Approved means a decision was made. It doesn't mean it's being built. Open means we confirmed it. "We haven't found any public filings since [date]" means exactly that. It doesn't mean nothing is happening.

When sources disagree, we tell you. If the city lists 109 homes and the developer says about 100, you'll see both numbers and the dates, not a number we picked.

Dates

Every story shows when the source was published and, separately, when we last checked. Checking a document again doesn't make its facts newer.

Neutral on purpose

We report what happened, who decided it and what comes next. We don't say whether it's good or bad, and we don't guess what the town thinks.

What we don't cover, and what we might miss

We cover changes that affect places and services: development, public works, schools, transportation, and business openings and closings. We don't cover crime, elections, opinion or events. We're also not a complete inventory of your city. Some sources, like a few local papers, can't be searched automatically, so we may miss things. Each city page lists the gaps we know about.

Something wrong or missing?

Corrections: corrections@thebaymain.com. Tell us which story and what's wrong. A link or document helps. Corrections are posted visibly on the story.

Tips: tips@thebaymain.com. Tell us what you saw and where. If you can, include a link, the name of the document, or the date it was announced. A tip is a lead, not a source. We confirm it before anything is published, and we never publish a tip as received.