Unattended Death and Biohazard Cleanup in Pinole, CA

Pinole, in Contra Costa County on the shore of San Pablo Bay, takes its name from 'pinole,' a word of Nahuatl origin for flour ground from maize and chia seeds — legend holds that Captain Pedro Fages's Spanish expedition was fed pinole by a local village and named the area for it.

In 1823 Ygnacio Martinez received the Rancho El Pinole land grant and built a hacienda on the site of what is now Pinole Valley Park.

In the 1850s Portuguese immigrant Bernardo Fernandez opened a trading post on the bay and built the Fernandez Mansion, which still stands at the end of Tennent Avenue.

Pinole's settlement took off with the arrival of the Southern Pacific Railroad in 1878, the same year its first post office opened, and growth was further spurred by the California Powder Works in neighboring Hercules.

The City of Pinole was incorporated on June 25, 1903.

When Interstate 80 reached Pinole in 1958, the old bayfront town was transformed into a suburban bedroom community for the wider Bay Area.

Pinole had a population of 19,022 at the 2020 Census, up from 18,390 in 2010.

Pinole has about 6,588 households (2020-2024 figures), and an unusually high 79.4% of its homes are owner-occupied.

The city covers about 11.76 square miles stretching from the San Pablo Bay shoreline inland along Pinole Creek.

Pinole's students attend Pinole Valley High School, the city's public high school on Pinole Valley Road, which serves roughly 1,100 students.