The San Benito County Civil Grand Jury is looking for 19 new members to be impaneled in July.
The group serves as the watchdog for the public as it relates to government organizations and how they’re run.
Two representatives were at the San Benito County Business Expo & Job Fair on Thursday recruiting for the roles.
“There is a small stipend,” current Foreman John Campos. “For the most part, it’s volunteer. It’s being really the eyes and ears of the community.”
The grand jury also takes in citizen complaints.
“Anything from building permits to occasionally a letter from a death-row inmate,” he said.
In the last report issued by the local grand jury, for 2016-17 in the fall of last year, some of the issues brought to light included the Hollister Animal Shelter, the San Benito County Jail and the juvenile hall.
The current grand jury will sit through June 30, and the superior court hopes to get the next one impaneled so it can start working in early July, said Maria Alfaro with the local courts.
“It’s becoming difficult to get people to volunteer,” Alfaro said. “The past few years, we’ve had to summon people to come to the courthouse” where the judge asks them questions to see if they want to volunteer.
Campos called the experience “very rewarding.”
“You get to do things, you never really knew what a grand jury could do,” he said, mentioning the power to investigate and supboena at times.
Campos said it’s not necessarily to be critical of government agencies, “but how to make the community better.”
