Stateline Solar Project Given County Okay

(March 12) The county board of supervisors this week held a public hearing at which it certified the environmental impact report for the Desert Stateline solar project, adopting a finding of overriding considerations and approving the issuance of two production groundwater well permits to allow the project to proceed.
The federal government has given go-ahead to Tempe, Ariz.-based First Solar Inc.’s  2.6 square mile Stateline Solar Project, which is to be located just west of the California/Nevada border near Primm, Nevada in the Ivanpah Valley.
First Solar’s Stateline project will utilize mirrors to focus the sun’s rays on a heating tower to run a steam turbine, thereby yielding roughly 223 megawatts, adequate electricity for 82,800 households.
The project needed go-ahead from the county, as the local land use authority, to proceed.
According to  Tom Hudson, the director of the county’s land use services department, he and his department are relying upon a March 18, 2008 memorandum of understanding between the county and the Bureau of Land Management that he said “established guidelines for an effective, efficient and cooperative process for conducting environmental reviews of proposed projects that are located on public lands managed by the BLM and that may or may not include private land under the jurisdiction of the county.”
Hudson said the federal government had already certified the project as being in compliance with the provisions of the National Environmental Policy Act and that the county has now looked at the project in terms of regulations and limitations specified under the California Environmental Quality Act, which he said was similar to but in some particulars different from federal regulations and requirements.
“A comprehensive joint draft environmental impact statement and environmental impact report was completed for the project,” Hudson said.
Hudson said the project is deemed to be consistent with the county general plan in that the “county general plan does not impose conditions on public lands, including the project site, so there are no inconsistencies to discuss.” Hudson further maintained that the project is consistent with state goals and objectives. “The project will help California meet its Renewable Portfolio Standard goal, which imposes interim requirements to procure 20% of retail electric power sales from renewable sources today and 25% by 2016. By 2020, utilities must procure 33% of electrical power retail sales from renewables,” Hudson told the board of supervisors.
Additionally, Hudson stated, the project will have a favorable greenhouse gas offsetting factor.
“The energy produced by the project would displace approximately 294,728 Metric tons of carbon dioxide each year that would otherwise be emitted by fossil fuel-fired power plants,” Hudson said.
With regard to visual impacts of the project, Hudson acknowledged that the proposed project is located within an area “characterized by rough, rocky mountains formed by northerly trending fault blocks [and] views from travel routes within the vicinity of the study area tend to encompass broad, sweeping desert expanses bordered by rugged mountain ranges,” which would be disturbed by the project’s introduction of “with industrial character into the foreground and background views from I-15, the Primm Valley Golf Course, the Mojave National Preserve, and the Stateline Wilderness Area.” Given other facilities in the area, including the adjacent Ivanpah Solar Electric Generating System, Hudson said, “The impact of the proposed facility on the existing visual character of the site and its surrounding landscape would be less than significant.”
Hudson also said that “Construction of the project would have a direct adverse effect on the desert tortoise, resulting in the displacement of approximately 40 adult desert tortoises, and permanently impacting approximately 2,023 acres of desert tortoise habitat. Impacts to desert tortoise individuals and habitat would be reduced through implementation of applicant proposed measures and mitigation measures required for protection of wildlife and other resources.” Those efforts include, Hudson said, reducing potential direct and indirect degradation of desert tortoise habitat, taking efforts to protect the tortoises by relocating them, eliminating noxious weeds in the area that are a hazard to the tortoises, engaging in dust control and taking care with chemical and fuel storage as well as trash disposal.
The project will also have regrettable impacts on the golden eagle, which species has a dozen nesting territories within 10 to 12 miles of the project site. “Seven of the 12 nesting territories were determined to be active during the 2010 golden eagle nest surveys,” Hudson said. “The closest active nest is approximately two miles to the northwest of the project site, near the Umberci Mine. Although no golden eagle nest sites occur within the project study area, the project site is located within foraging distance from the identified nests. Potential impacts to golden eagles would be reduced through mitigation measures required for protection of wild life and other resources. Implementation of the measures would reduce impacts on the golden eagle to less than significant levels.”
Water for the project, Hudson said “would be obtained from two new groundwater production wells; the primary well to be located on the southeastern corner of the facility, and the secondary well located approximately 4,250 feet west of facility. The Applicant has prepared and received approval from the county geologist of a groundwater monitoring and reporting plan, fulfilling the requirements of the San Bernardino County groundwater monitoring program guidelines.”
Hudson prepared a statement of overriding considerations for the project which the board approved. That statement said the project would support the Bureau of Land Management in meeting federal land policy by  serving to “manage public lands for multiple uses that take into account the long-term needs of future generations for renewable and non-renewable resources” and “support the Bureau of Land Management” in achieving “Executive Order 13212 (May 18, 2001) which mandates that agencies, including the Bureau of Land Management,  act expediently and in a manner consistent with applicable laws to increase the production and transmission of energy in a safe and environmentally sound manner [and] Secretarial Order 3285A1 (March 11, 2009 and amended on February 22, 2010) which “establishes the development of renewable energy as a priority of the Department of the Interior.”
The statement of overriding considerations further states that “The project will support investor-owned utilities in meeting the Renewable Portfolio Standard to supply 33% of California’s total electricity through renewable energy generation by 2020 [and] The project will assist the state in reaching the greenhouse gas emission reduction goals in Assembly Bill 32 to 1990 levels by 2020, by generating electricity without the use of fossil fuels or natural gas fired generation.”
The statement of overriding considerations also noted that “The project will establish 300 megawatts of generating capacity for emission-free photovoltaic solar electricity in an area of high solar insolation to maximize the use of available sunlight.”

Countywide Legal Defense Contract Awarded To Politically Well-Connected Firm

(March 11) The board of supervisors this week awarded a lucrative county contract for the provision of what is known as conflict representation for indigent defendants in the county’s courts to a firm that was underbid by its competitors on two portions of the contract.
Conflict representation for a defendant without the financial means to hire an attorney to represent him/her comes about when the crime he/she is charged with involves [an]other defendant[s] of likewise modest financial means who is represented by the public defender’s office, which is dedicated to providing a defense to the county’s accused who are without the wherewithal to retain an attorney on their own. In those cases where one or more of the defendants is contending or may contend that he/she is being accused of a crime actually committed by his/her codefendant[s], a separate attorney is needed to prevent one defendant from being exploited by the defense but on by the other defendant.
Whereas previously three separate law firms provided the conflict representation, the county, by its action this week, is allowing a law firm headed by Earl Carter to handle all of the county’s conflict representation.
Through December 31, 2013, four law firms had contracts to serve as conflict attorneys representing defendants in San Bernardino County.  The Law Firm of David Goldstein had a $9.35 million contract to provide conflict attorney representation in the West Valley region of San Bernardino County. The law firm of Carter Spring, Shank & O’Connor,  headed by Earl Carter and Jim Spring, had an $18.75 million contract to represent defendants in the East Valley as well as a $12 million contract to represent defendants in the county’s North Desert Region. Attorney John Burdick had a $1.875 million contract to do conflict representation in the East Desert region.
On September 26, 2013, County Chief Executive Officer Greg Devereux approved the solicitation of bids for court-appointed adult indigent defense representation service providers. A proposal evaluation committee consisting of representatives of the county and the Superior Court was formed to review the submitted proposals. When that committee did not arrive on a decision on which firms to extend the conflict representation contracts to by December, the board of supervisors extended the contracts with Carter Spring Shank & O’Connor, the Goldstein Law Firm and attorney John Burdick through March 2014 for $2,450,000, $1,070,000 and $200,000, respectively.
In response to the September 26 bid solicitation, six law firms submitted bid proposals for the work, including Earl Carter’s firm under the name Inland Defenders; Burdick under the name Contract Defenders; Greenline Partners, headed by attorneys Daniel Greenberg and Raj Maline; Robert Ponce; the law firm of Brown, White and Newhouse; and the law firm of  Skipper, Singer & Associates.
The county board of supervisors this week, in the words of County Chief Executive Officer Greg Devereux, approved an agreement with Inland Defenders “to provide adult indigent defense services in an amount not to exceed $8,000,000 annually and $20,000,000 total over the 30-month term of April 1, 2014 through September 30, 2016 with two additional one-year options if in the best interest of the county.”
That contract applies to all four of the county’s regions.
Devereux made his recommendation and the board its vote in favor of Inland Defenders despite the consideration that with regard to the contract for representation of the East Valley region, Inland Defenders was substantially underbid by Greenline Partners and with regard to the contract for representation of the North Desert it was underbid by both Greenline Partners and Robert Ponce.
Inland Defenders bid $3,085,680 on the East Valley portion of the project. Greenline bid $2,142,480 on the East Valley portion of the project.
Inland Defenders bid $1,847,880 on the North Desert portion of the contract. Greenline bid $1,347,840 on the North Desert portion of the contract. Ponce bid $1,500,300 on the North Desert portion of the contract.
Devereux’s recommendation was based in large measure by a review done by a team of evaluators consisting of  Superior Court judges Annemarie Pace and John Vander Feer as well as chief assistant county counsel Michelle Blakemore and deputy county counsel Phoebe Chu.
The evaluation committee of Pace, Vander Feer, Blakemore and Chu ranked the competitors using a process by which each firm was eligible to receive up to a maximum of 100 points each measuring the level of service they offered, for a total maximum score of 400 based upon the rankings of all four evaluators.
Inland Defenders scored a rank of 353. Contract Defenders scored 315. Greenline Partners was ranked at 309. The Ponce law firm achieved a 306 ranking. Skipper, Singer and Associates as well as Brown, White & Newhouse scored an identical 240.
In his report to the board of supervisors on the contract agreement this week, Devereux indicated that the bottom-line cost of the service was not a controlling factor in the bid completion. He equivocated somewhat with respect to whether Inland Defenders had qualified as the lowest bidder overall or in relation to portions of the contract.
“Upon receiving the scores, the finance and budget office noted that the cost portion of the
scores were difficult to compare since one proposal was countywide only and the others were countywide and/or for specific regions,” Devereux wrote. “To make an equitable cost score comparison, the finance and budget office ran two scenarios using a formula from the county purchasing department to objectively score the cost portion of each proposal. The first scenario separated each proposal into stand alone regional proposals and scored the cost in each region separately. The second scenario merged the second best scoring proposal in each of the individual regions to form a countywide proposal for comparison to the two countywide proposals. In each scenario, Inland Defenders’ proposal remained the highest scored, both countywide and in the individual regions.”
Participants in the competition as well as others protested that favoritism was shown to Inland Defenders when it was permitted on January 2, 2014 to submit via fax a revised fee schedule, one day before the intent to award was declared. That opportunity to resubmit a key part of its bid was not extended to any of the other competitors.
In his report to the board of supervisors on the contract agreement this week, Devereux gave what appeared to be a justification for allowing Inland Defenders to submit a follow-up bid.  “After confirming Inland Defenders’ proposal as the highest scoring, inclusive of cost, and reviewing the cost proposals from each respondent, the finance and budget office determined that it was in the county’s best interest to negotiate pricing with Inland Defenders as permitted under the request for proposals rather than move forward immediately with a notice of intent to award. Inland Defenders offered a revised cost proposal of $6,724,560, an annual reduction of $437,220.”
Inland Defenders originally offered to handle all four regional contracts annually for $7,161,780. The only other firm that bid on all four regional contracts was Brown, White & Newhouse, which bid  $7,828,020 on the overall contract.
Unaddressed in Devereux’s report are perceptions that were aired during the last two months that Carter and the other attorneys associated with Inland Defenders had bought an advantage in the contract sweepstakes by making hefty campaign contributions to San Bernardino County officials.
Documents on file with the San Bernardino County Registrar of Voters’ office and the California Secretary of State’s office show that Earl Carter, together with his recently deceased law partner Jim Spring, and his law firm, Carter, Spring, Shank & O’Connor, donated a total of $120,500 to district attorney Mike Ramos from 2004 until 2012. Additionally, together with his law firm and law partners, Carter has made $88,500 in political donations to all five current county supervisors, including $38,000 to Gary Ovitt, $32,050 to Josie Gonzales, $12,750 to Janice Rutherford, and $1,500 each to both Robert Lovingood and James Ramos.
District attorney Ramos, whose deputy prosecutors are the professional and courtroom adversaries of defense attorneys including those employed by Inland Defenders, intensified this controversy when he wrote a letter of recommendation for Inland Defenders that was submitted to the evaluation committee.
Devereux in his report indicated he and county staff were aware of the controversy over the county’s intention to award the contract to Inland Defenders and that they had discounted the protests that controversy had engendered.
“Subsequent to issuing the notice of  intent to award the contract, the purchasing department  received a number of requests for copies of documents from proposers who were not selected,” Devereux wrote. “To accommodate these requests and allow time for the proposers to prepare an appeal if desired, purchasing extended the appeal period. During the extended appeal period, purchasing received two written appeals from Greenline Partners and Robert Ponce. The appeal requests were reviewed by the purchasing agent and denied, resulting in the recommendation to award all four regions to Inland Defenders, the highest scoring proposer.”

Dr. Cebrun, Embattled Rialto Schools Superintendent, Quits

(March 10)  Rialto Unified School District Superintendent Harold Cebrun, who was caught up in the Judith Oakes scandal just as the current school year was beginning, elected to retire earlier this month, effective March 31.
Former district accountant Judith Oakes, who stands accused of stealing $1.8 million in lunch money proceeds from the district’s Nutrition Services Department over the past eight years, was alleged to have had a personal relationship with the superintendent.
Cebrun denied their was anything improper or untoward his relationship with Oakes, but the extent of her thefts left Cebrun under a cloud.  At least four separate investigations of the thefts have been carried out by the Rialto Police Department, the district attorney’s office, a private investigator hired by the school district and the state superintendent of schools. According to the Rialto Police Department, Cebrun was not involved in and had no foreknowledge of Oakes’ embezzlement.
In the immediate aftermath of Oakes’ arrest on August 7, a pall fell over the 26,485-student district. On September 12, 2013, as the investigation into the matter was proceeding, Cebrun and deputy superintendent James Wallace were placed on paid administrative leave. They were never returned to active status.
The investigations of Oakes’ activity showed that her thefts from the district had predated by many years Cebrun’s arrival at the Rialto district in March 2009. Previously, Cebrun was superintendent in the Compton and Lynwood school districts.
Oakes was charged by the San Bernardino County District Attorney’s Office on October 8 with eight counts of embezzlement by a public or private officer and eight counts of a public officer crime.
An audit confirmed that Oakes, who was an accountant for the district overseeing the school lunch program for nearly 14 years, stole more than $1.8 million since 2005.
According to investigator Jeff Stewart , who was hired by the district to look into the thefts, it is likely that Oakes stole more than $3.1 million since 1999. On top of the $1.8 million in cash Oakes is documented as having taken in the last eight years she was with the district, another $1.3 million is unaccounted for in the years between 1999, the year Oakes is believed to have begun her depredations, and 2005. The examination of the disappearance of district money prior to 2005 was less rigorous because those crimes fall outside the statute of limitations.
Oakes was married to Jack Oakes, an educator who eventually rose to the position of school principal in the San Bernardino City Unified School District. In the mid-1990s, Judith Oakes was working as an accountant at the Bank of Redlands, which is now known as Community Bank.
In 1997, she went to work in the Rialto Unified School District as an accountant. Eventually, she was given virtually unfettered oversight of the cash receipts from the district’s school lunch program. Not only did she oversee the crew that had physical custody of the money, she was given ultimate accounting authority over the funds.
Beginning in 1999, Oakes is believed to have begun pilfering roughly $4,000 a week from the batches of bills collected and processed by the district’s money-counting machines prior to bank deposit, according to Stewart. Having begun the thefts, it seems Oakes was obliged to continue stealing approximately the same amount of money every week – an average of between $4,100 and $4,300 weekly – so that the pattern of thefts would remain undetected.
According to Stewart, sometime after she was put in charge of the staff counting and bundling the lunch money and then depositing it into a school district account, Oakes was entrusted with security arrangements in the office where the money was counted, as well as the loss control procedure devised for the money-counting function. That increase in trust and duty came after, Stewart said, she had begun her thefts. “The [district nutrition] department has a money-counting machine that counts bills, and informs workers when there’s enough to ‘strap’ into batches,” Stewart said. “Ms. Oakes was involved with the installation of the camera system and was aware of what areas in the room were visible to it,” according to Stewart.
Oakes engaged in two levels of sleight-of-hand in first secreting the money she took out of the money counting room and then obfuscating the books that tallied the lunch receipts district-wide.
In the first instance, according to Stewart, “Oakes reportedly would bind the bills up at the back counter of the room, rather than on the table next to the computer, where she couldn’t be seen on camera. Ms. Oakes would then quite frequently take a strap or two of twenty-dollar bills or other denominations and stuff them down her top after checking to make sure the person at the computer was not looking.”
Oakes, who had an overview all of the money flowing in from all of the district’s schools, would then provide falsified deposit slips after the money was bundled and ready for deposit. Oakes overcame the scrutiny of the district staff member responsible for reconciling the bank statements with the district’s deposits by falsifying a spreadsheet which she substituted for ledgers containing entries related to the checks and cash collected from each school.
On occasion, it appears, some staff members noted inconsistencies and irregularities with regard to the total amount of money counted and the amount deposited, but Oakes was able to use her position and authority to override any questions and staff members did not, at least until relatively late, make an effort to report those irregularities out of fear of getting on Oakes’ bad side.
The roughly $210,000 Oakes was stealing from the district yearly augmented an already very comfortable $190,000 yearly household income she and her husband pulled down. Jack Oakes, who had ascended to the position of principal at Ramona-Alessandro Elementary School in the San Bernardino City Unified School District, made $119,771 during the 2009-2010 school year. Judith was making over $70,000 at that time.
In April 2010, Jack Oakes was severely injured in an off-roading accident in the desert and died of a trauma-induced heart attack.
After her husband’s death, Judith Oakes continued the thefts from the district she had previously been engaged in for over a decade. By the end of 2011, it has been alleged, she had begun a relationship with Harold Cebrun.
In May 2013, discrepancies with regard to the receipt and depositing of district lunch money was suspected. Video cameras showing perspectives from different angles than those Oakes had previously established were installed in the money counting room unbeknownst to Oakes and Cebrun. She was caught on video stuffing money into her brazier on at least two occasions.
When she was arrested on August 7, Oakes had two packets of $2,000 in $20 bills in her possession. More packets were found at her San Bernardino home later when it was searched pursuant to a warrant. Oakes made incriminating statements to police officers, characterized as a confession. She immediately posted $50,000 bond and was released.  She resigned her post on August 8.
Cebrun repeatedly denied any knowledge of Oakes’ illicit activities. The district has kept elements of the district’s investigation carried out by Stewart very close to the vest. It was unclear whether the district had sufficient grounds upon which to terminate the superintendent. The district kept him in limbo for more than six months, continuing to pay him but taking no official action to severe him. One member of the board, Joseph Ayala, advocated for returning Cebrun to the helm of the district. He was outvoted by his colleagues.
The case for keeping Cebrun employed was dealt two separate blows in January, when two reviews of the Rialto Unified School District by the state of California’s Fiscal Crisis and Management Assistance Team were delivered to the district.
The district administration had failed to utilize industry standard purchasing and accounting procedures and had engaged in making contractual or purchasing commitments on behalf of the district without prior authorization from the school board, according to a management assistance team review of the district’s contractual and purchasing practices dated January 6.  Another report pertaining to the district’s special education programs referenced shortcomings in the oversight of expenditures that resulted in the squandering of over $1 million and a “systematic lack of focus on instruction” for special needs students and a “lack of guidance from the highest level of leadership.”
Firing Cebrun outright at the present time would have been costly. A clause in his contract requires that he be paid 18 month’s salary if he is terminated. Thus, the school board’s acceptance of his retirement at his own volition on March 7 appears to have saved the district $360,000.
“The board respects Dr. Cebrun’s long history of service to public education, thanks him for his service to the district and wishes him well in the future,” the district stated in a prepared release that came after a two-hour closed executive session outside the view of the public on March 7. The vote to accept his resignation was made on a 4-1 vote, with board member Edgar Montes dissenting.
Unresolved at this point is the status of Wallace, who is still being paid his $170,501 annual salary.

Mobile Home Residents Chino Once Sought To Protect Have Now Filed Suit Against The City

(March 11)  Four years after the city of Chino threw its weight behind a group of mobile home park residents in their ongoing difficulties with their landlord, those residents have turned on the city and have filed a lawsuit against the municipality.
In 2009, the owner of the Lamplighter Mobile Home Park, Tom Morgan and his company, Chino MHC LP, sought to subdivide the park and develop property within that would be vacated by its residents or sell the coach spaces to any residents willing to purchase them.
The planning commission approved the subdivision of the park at 4400 Philadelphia St., essentially allowing the rental units to be turned into ownership lots.
On April 20, 2010, the city council overturned the planning commission.
The city council took the action largely out of sympathy for the mobile home park’s 260 residents, many of whom are elderly and living on fixed incomes. The city has long had a rent control ordinance which sets rents at the Lamplighter at two-thirds of the consumer price index. Rental rates for Lamplighter residents ranged from $300 to $600.
City staff and the city attorney, Jimmy Gutierrez, advised the city that Morgan and Chino MHC LP were acting within the law by moving to subdivide the property even if by doing so an indirect result was that the mobile home park was getting around the limitations of the ordinance.
At least two of the council members said they were persuaded to overturn the planning commission because they believed the residents at the park would be unable to qualify for loans to purchase their lots and would essentially be thrown out on the streets.
Councilwoman Eunice Ulloa, while acknowledging that Chino MHC LP was legally entitled to undertake the subdivision, argued that the conversion should be denied on “humanitarian” grounds.
In July 2010, Morgan and Chino MHC LP, represented by attorney Richard Clouse, filed suit against the city of Chino in San Bernardino County Superior Court in Rancho Cucamonga, seeking $34 million in damages and assurance that the units could be transformed into ownership lots.
The city made a spirited defense of its action in court, expending close to $500,000 in legal fees.  Ultimately, however, the city took a drubbing.
The judge hearing the matter, Superior Court Judge Joseph Brisco, in  January 2011 ruled that the city could not prohibit the conversion of the park and issued a court order for the  city council to reverse its decision.
The city appealed but lost in October 2012, when the Fourth District Court of appeal ruled that the city could not stop conversion of the mobile home park to tenant ownership unless it could show the owner was taking the step to avoid rent control.
Clouse succeeded in demonstrating that the conversion was a legitimate undertaking to maximize the value of Chino MHC LP’s investment.
The state supreme court refused the city of Chino’s further appeal.
Out of options, the city council on October 15, 2013, with Mayor Dennis Yates absent and councilman Glenn Duncan abstaining, voted 3-0 to allow Chino MHC to sell the lots in the park.
On November 5, 2013, the council gave final approval of the conversion plan.
As a consequence of that vote, the park residents’ association has retained Irvine-based attorney Robert Solomon and on February  3 filed a civil action in Rancho Cucamonga Superior Court, naming the city of Chino as respondent and Chino MHC LP as real party in interest.
The suit filed Feb. 3 in Rancho Cucamonga Superior Court asks the court to overturn the Chino city council’s Nov. 5, 2013, approval of the park owner’s plan to convert his rent-controlled property to tenant ownership.
The suit maintains the council abused its “discretion” by approving the plan in the face of information indicating that a survey of residents conducted by Chino MHC contained inaccurate and misleading information and that the approval violates the city’s general plan and the state Fair Employment and Housing Act. Moreover, according to the suit, the conversion will put the city of Chino out of compliance with state-mandated  low-income housing availability requirements.

Candidate Match-Ups Materialize For County’s June Primary Election

(March 13)  Elections for all seven of the county offices up for a vote this year will be contested.
In San Bernardino County, elections run on a four-year cycle, with the heaviest elective season falling in the year where the California gubernatorial elections are held. Thus, this year, the district attorney, sheriff, treasurer-tax collector, assessor and superintendent of county schools and the supervisors in the county’s Second and Fourth districts are up for election. In the years corresponding to the presidential election, supervisors in the first, third and fifth district must stand for election.
Mike Ramos, the district attorney first elected in 2002 who had no opposition in 2006 and turned back challenges by Frank Guzman and Robert Conaway in 2010, is being opposed this year by Grover Merritt, a deputy district attorney who formerly headed the district attorney’s office’s appellate unit.
Sheriff John McMahon, who was appointed to that position by the board of supervisors in 2012 following the resignation of then-sheriff Rod Hoops, will face two challengers in June, former San Bernardino County sheriff’s department lieutenant Clifton Harris and current Los Angeles sheriff’s department deputy Paul Schrader.
Incumbent Treasurer-Tax Collector Larry Walker is being opposed by certified public accountant Ensen Mason, who previously ran against Walker. In San Bernardino County, the treasurer-tax collector’s function has been combined with that of the auditor-controller. Walker was first elected as auditor controller recorder in 1998 after serving 12 years as Fourth District supervisor. He has been the treasurer tax collector for more than three years, following the consolidation of the treasurer and auditor roles.
Incumbent assessor-recorder Dennis Draeger is not seeking reelection. His chief deputy, Dan Harp is seeking election and is being opposed by former state assemblyman and state senator Robert Dutton.
County superintendent of schools Gary Thomas is not running for reelection. Ted Alejandre, who was recently promoted to the position of assistant county schools superintendent by Thomas to assist him in his electoral bid, is running,  as is Rita Ramirez and Frank Garza.
In the Second District, incumbent Janice Rutherford is being challenged by  Randolph Beasly, a retired sheriff’s department scientific analysis division employee.
In the Fourth District, incumbent supervisor Gary Ovitt has opted not to run. Instead, Congresswoman Gloria Negrete-McLeod and California Assemblyman Curt Hagman are vying against one another and two others, Chino Valley Unified school board member James Na and Ontario Councilman Paul Vincent Avila.
Other political match-ups in San Bernardino County include:
Incumbent 8th Congressional District Representative Paul Cook, R-Apple Valley, faces three challengers in the personages of Robert Conaway,  Paul Hannosh, Odessia Lee.
Lesli Gooch, Eloise Gomez Reyes, Danny Tillman, Pete Aguilar, Joe Baca, and Paul Chabot,  are seeking to replace Representative Gary Miller, R-Rancho Cucamonga, who announced in February that he would not seek re-election in the 31st Congressional District.
Christina Marie Gagnier, Scott Heydenfeldt and Norma Torres are running in the race to succeed Negrete-McLeod as 35th Congressional District representative.
Connie Leyva, Matthew Munson, Shannon O’Brien, Sylvia Robles and Alfonso Sanchez are vying to replace Norma Torres, who is running for Congress, as state senator in the California 20th State Senate District.
Michelle Ambrozic, Art Bishop, Bob Buhrle, John Dennis Coffey, Robert Larivee, Jerry Laws, Scott Markovich, Jay Obernolte, Rick Roelle and Brett Savage are seeking election in the 33rd Assembly District, where incumbent Tim Donnelly is not running for reelection and is instead running for governor.
Art Bustamante, Kathleen Marie Henry, Melissa O’Donnell and Marc Steinorth  are running in the 40th Assembly District, where Mike Morrell is currently the incumbent. Morrell is a candidate to replace Bill Emmerson in the California State Senate in a special election later this month.
Karalee Hargrove and Chad Mayes are running for state Assembly in the 42nd District.
Gil Navarro is challenging incumbent Cheryl Brown in the 47th Assembly District.
Dorothy Pineda is vying against incumbent Freddie Rodriguez in the 52nd Assembly District.
In the Loma Linda Municipal Election slated for June, incumbent councilmen Phillip Dupper and Ron Dailey are the only candidates on the ballot.

SB Police Union Objects To Mayor & Council’s Charter Committee Proposal

(March 13)  The San Bernardino Police Officers Association is maintaining a move by newly installed San Bernardino Mayor Carey Davis and his supporters on the city council to create a committee to review the city charter is illegal.
San Bernardino is a charter city as opposed to a general law city. Its charter and amendments thereto, per state law, are approved by the city’s voters. Provisions put into the charter by means of a citywide vote over a decade ago require that the city’s public safety employees – firefighters and police officers – be paid on a scale equal to the average pay of police officers and firefighters in ten similarly sized  California cities.
San Bernardino has been beset with financial difficulties that culminated in the city’s filing for Chapter 9 bankruptcy in 2012. Former mayor Patrick Morris has maintained that a major factor in the city’s fiscal deterioration is excessive salaries and benefits provided to city employees and retirees. Davis, an accountant by profession and a political ally to Morris, is of like mind.
As one of his first acts in office, Davis called for the creation of a municipal commission to consider charter changes, suggesting that the requirement that police and fire officers be provided with raises based on salaries given to their counterparts in cities free of the financial challenges San Bernardino faces should be done away with. That move failed when it was pointed out that a municipal commission cannot be formed without prior voter approval. The city council has now adjusted the proposal to seek the creation of a citizens committee to review the city charter.
San Bernardino Police Officers Association Attorney Rockne A. Lucia Jr., however, has taken issue with the proposal to charter the committee. Lucia maintains state law does not permit the appointment of committee members who are to act in the capacity of a commission. Those members must be elected by a vote and must reside within the city, according to Lucia.
Lucia hinted that by creating the panel to consider and recommend charter amendments, Davis and the council were seeking to provide the city’s voters, who must ultimately ratify the changes, with the impression that any endorsement of the changes by the committee were independently derived by a body that is at arm’s length from the city council.
Rather, Lucia suggested, the council should simply act on its own to place whatever charter amendments it deems fit before the city’s voters without cloaking them in the patina of an independently arrived at proposal.
Lucia said “the Council may simply propose amendments to the city charter directly, and ask city residents for an up or down vote on its proposals.” This, Lucia said “would streamline the process, and provide more direct political accountability or praise for any amendment’s fate.”
It is anticipated that on Monday, despite the police union’s protest, the city council will consider the creation of a charter review committee to be composed of one city business owner and one resident appointed by Davis and one resident appointed by each council member, along with a hired “charter specialist” steeped in municipal law.

Supervisors Turn Down Oak Hills Solar Project

(March 12)  The San Bernardino County Board of Supervisors this week upheld the county planning commission’s September denial of Sycamore Physicians Partners’ application for a permit to construct a solar energy project in Oak Hills.
Sycamore Physicians Partners’ application had been filed with the county prior to the county’s imposition of a moratorium on the consideration and approval of solar projects that went into effect in May of 2013 but has now elapsed.
Sycamore had asked the county land use services division to certify a 2.7-megawatt photovoltaic solar facility on 20 acres in the unincorporated county area south and west of Hesperia in a rural living land use district on the northeast corner of Fuente Avenue and El Centro Road.
County staff, however, acceding to widespread objections by homeowners in rural desert communities throughout the county who maintain that solar fields are a too-intensive use that is incompatible with nearby residential neighborhoods, recommended that Sycamore’s application for the conditional use permit be denied. According to the county land used division’s staff report from last year, the project would have a “significant impact on the environment, specifically with regard to scenic resources.” According to county planning director Terri Rahhal, at public hearing for the project held on August 8, 2013 , there was considerable public opposition to the project and  some participating “expressed concerns about land use compatibility, given the location of the project site in an area surrounded by rural residential uses.”
Rahhal said the planning commission made a tentative finding at that time that the proposed project “would not be compatible with the rural character of the Oak Hills community and would therefore not be consistent with the Oak Hills Community Plan. On September 27, 2013, Sycamore Physicians Partners, LLC, filed a timely appeal of the planning commission’s action to deny the project. The applicant’s appeal contended that the planning commission’s findings for denial were inaccurate and that the project is consistent with the goals and policies of the county general plan and the Oak Hills Community Plan. The applicant contended that the project will provide a much-needed renewable source of energy and that the design of the project will not impact existing view sheds or significantly impact the environment and will be compatible with the existing rural character of the neighborhood.”
As first proposed, the project would have entailed an unmanned solar array operation including 54 arrays containing non-reflective modules mounted on a fixed tilt system.
The proposed modules would have been oriented to the south and angled to a degree to maximize solar resource efficiency. The modules were to be connected to inverters, which convert direct current into electrical alternating current. The electricity was then to be stepped up and collected in conduits that terminate at the point of interconnection to the local electricity grid via an existing Southern California Edison (SCE) power line along Fuente Avenue.
Each solar module was to have been fastened to the ground surface via hydraulically driven, two-inch diameter, galvanized pipe. Sycamore Physicians Partners maintain this method of fixing the arrays would result in minimal topsoil disturbance and would allow retention of much of the on-site vegetation, which would moderate ground-level wind speeds and, consequently, minimize erosion. The maximum height of the panels had been set to range from 8-10 feet depending upon existing site topography.
Project approval would have required a conditional use permit. A conditional use permit is a discretionary application that requires a finding of consistency with the general plan and any applicable community plan, among other findings for approval. The proposed project would have provided, according to Rahal, a renewable source of energy for the surrounding community, consistent with several conservation policies of the general plan. Rahal also maintained that the proposal “conforms to applicable design standards of the development code. However, based upon the testimony and information provided at the August 8, 2013, and September 19, 2013, planning commission hearings, the commission found that the project is incompatible with the existing rural community and that sufficient evidence has not been provided to justify a finding of no significant impact on the existing aesthetics and views of the area.”
On December 27, 2013, Sycamore Physicians Partners submitted a proposal to scale down the project from 2.7 megawatts to 1.5 megawatts, reducing the number of solar arrays from 54 to 15, while the boundaries of the project site were to remain the same. The applicant requested that the board of supervisors consider approval of the revised site plan, which was not presented to the planning commission.
“Staff continues to recommend upholding the planning commission action on the project because the site plan revisions do not alter the basic land use compatibility and aesthetic issues cited in the findings for denial,” Rahal said.

Court Realignment Puts Presiding Judge At Odds With County’s Lawyers

(March 7) In September 2012, Judge Marsha Slough succeeded to what might have otherwise been considered the apex of her judicial career when she was elevated from the position of assistant presiding judge to replace Ronald M. Christianson as the presiding judge of the San Bernardino Superior Court.
That crowning achievement, while no doubt an honor and tribute to her and the esteem she is held in by her fellow jurists, came at a most unfortunate juncture.
Even before the economic downturn of 2007, the court system in California was inadequately funded and San Bernardino County’s courts were particularly lacking in both financial and human resources.  When Slough became presiding judge five years later, San Bernardino County had the most substantial shortfall of judges of any of California’s 58 counties, with 91 jurists serving a population of over 2 million residents. That was 65 fewer than the 156 judges the state of California’s Judicial Needs Assessment said San Bernardino County should have. As one of those overworked judges, Slough was more than conscious of the massive caseloads and mounting backlog of cases she and other members of the bench were staggering under.
Immediately upon being chosen to fill the presiding position, Slough was buffeted by further cuts.
Judge Larry Allen, the assistant presiding judge, in late 2012 summed it up this way: “Our court has been operating on a shoestring budget for many years. Now the state is taking away the shoestrings.’’
Slough, Allen and then-court executive officer Stephen Nash huddled and came up with a painful but nonetheless necessary strategy to meet the challenge, which involved $22 million in further state funding cuts for 2012-13 to be followed by another $13 million in funding reductions in 2013-14. In a series of moves, Slough shut down the Chino Courthouse, which served residents in the southwestern portion of the county, the Needles Courthouse, which served the northeastern portion of the county, the Barstow Courthouse, serving the northernmost portions of the county and the Big Bear Courthouse, which served the San Bernardino Mountain Communities.
Those economies saddled county residents with an immense burden. Far flung San Bernardino County, which spans more than 20,000 square miles, is the largest county in the lower 48 states, with a land mass greater than the states of Delaware, New Jersey, Rhode Island and Connecticut combined.
The Joseph Campbell Courthouse in Victorville was the closest courthouse to most people living in the High Desert, and residents in the communities of Trona and Needles were obliged to make round trips of nearly 200 miles to obtain justice.  After a massive protest, the Barstow Courthouse was opened one day each week, with a single judge there hearing cases.
A year-and-a-half into her tenure as presiding judge, Slough is on the verge of yet another response to the financial challenge to the county court system. This response is of such scope that it is being billed as a “realignment.”  The terms of the change are so sweeping and in the phraseology of some so “radical” that the move is one that has garnered virtually no support of attorneys, who are traditionally highly accommodating of the forum within which they must function.
While the general public is virtually unaware of the coming changes, Slough’s tentative announcement of the pending changes last October sent shock waves through the legal community. Echoing outrage grew into a deafening crescendo last month when Slough through her office gave official notice that the realignment would indeed go into effect in May.
The makeover will include transferring all civil cases countywide to the new San Bernardino Justice Center, an eleven story edifice with 40 courtrooms now in the final stages of completion. In addition, San Bernardino district criminal cases, now being heard in the San Bernardino Central Courthouse built in 1927, will be tried in the new San Bernardino Justice Center.
West Valley Superior Courthouse in Rancho Cucamonga, which currently is the venue for both civil and criminal cases originating on the west end of the county, will be devoted primarily to criminal cases, including those arising on the county’s west end and other felony and misdemeanor cases from the county’s central district which are currently routed to the Fontana Courthouse.  A small portion of the criminal cases now heard in Fontana will be adjudicated in San Bernardino. At least temporarily, hearings on both civil and domestic violence restraining order matters will be heard at the Rancho Cucamonga Courthouse.
The historic San Bernardino Courthouse will remain as the forum for the family law cases it currently hosts and will soon serve as the venue for the family law cases presently heard in Rancho Cucamonga.
The Fontana Courthouse will become the stage for all small claims, landlord tenant disputes and traffic/non-traffic infractions from the San Bernardino, Fontana and Rancho Cucamonga districts. The lion’s share of criminal cases now being heard in Fontana will transfer to Rancho Cucamonga. A lesser number of the Fontana criminal cases will go to San Bernardino.
The Victorville Courthouse will remain a venue for High Desert family law cases.
David H. Ricks, the president-elect of the Western San Bernardino County Bar Association, spoke to the Sentinel in his capacity as a private attorney and citizen, making clear that he was not representing with his comments the Western San Bernardino County Bar Association, which he said has not officially committed to publicly opposing the realignment as an organization. Ricks said virtually every attorney he has discussed the realignment with is adamantly opposed to it.
“I had a meeting with [then-county court executive officer] Stephen Nash and Judge Slough, who are the architects of this whole thing,” Ricks said. “I asked point blank ‘What is the financial benefit to be realized?’ The presiding judge said in essence that there is none. That is not the purpose of this. It is a convenience maneuver to address the use of judges and court reporters. This is intended to consolidate the court clerk’s office for efficiency purposes.”
Ricks said, “Their position is this is not a matter of cost. It is a matter of convenience to the courts and the ability to move people around as well as the ideal with regard to the movement of prisoners. The Rancho Cucamonga Courthouse and the new San Bernardino Courts are situated atop holding facilities and they are designed for moving detainees in and around the courthouse. They have elevators that can go unmanned between floors and have hallways that are not exposed to the public or the judges.  One justification for doing this is that in Fontana where there are currently a lot of criminal matters handled, the prisoners have to be walked with bailiffs and sheriff’s deputies as escorts. There is no secure hallway there to move prisoners. This is not going to result in any appreciable cost savings, nor did they do a study to see if cost saving would be obtained.”
Ricks continued, “On the weekend in October before I learned about this, there was a meeting between Judge Slough and the western San Bernardino County judges. I talked with several of the other judges just as what was going to happen was announced. It was a surprise to them. There had been no information about it or discussion prior to that morning. There was no consultation with any bar organization or any local government agency. The cities did not know about this until it was announced and officially decided that it was going to be done  [Board of supervisors chairwoman] Janice Rutherford did not know until it was announced. Members of the board of supervisors then had asked that the courts not to do this and were basically told it will happen and that is the way it is.”
One of Ricks’ predecessors as Western San Bernardino County Bar Association president, Jim Banks, told the Sentinel, “The only savings that result from realignment are saving administrative headaches allocating clerks, court reporters and other court personnel.  The truth is that for every judge you need a clerk, usually a bailiff and often a court reporter, regardless of whether they are in one building or three.  Civil court reporters are charged to the litigants.  Some clerks and research attorneys may be more conveniently located among all of the judges in one building, but each of them will be on the court payroll whether they are sitting in San Bernardino, Rancho Cucamonga or Victorville. Realignment, therefore, is not a solution to the budget shortfall.  It is little more than an attempt to make the court easier to manage.  The problem is that while it makes court management a little bit easier and possibly a little bit cheaper, it has disastrous consequences for the public, the litigants and attorneys in Rancho Cucamonga and Victorville.”
Banks continued, “The elderly, poor and other disadvantaged persons may not be able to get to court at all.  Even if they can afford the transportation, the trip will be exhausting and they will be in a strange place, exhausted, frightened, weakened and confused.   Fewer people will be able to afford to go to court because it will cost more for litigants due to travel time for witnesses, experts, attorneys and others.”
Banks said the city of San Bernardino is not equipped to handle the influx of both civil litigants and jurors.  “Jurors, from Needles to Chino Hills, will be expected to travel to San Bernardino, find a parking place because they’re not furnished by the court, move their cars from time to time, walk several blocks through the streets of San Bernardino, sit and wait or serve, then hike back to their cars and drive back home.  Presumably their outcry will be swift and loud.  For that reason alone, realignment is a disastrous alternative.”
While Banks said the realignment would hurt county residents, he pointed out that at least one public entity, the city of Rancho Cucamonga, would suffer significantly as a consequence of the concentration of criminal cases in the courthouse there.
Banks said the Rancho Cucamonga Courthouse will become “a magnet for criminals of every stripe imaginable. What is the prognosis for the beautiful Rancho Cucamonga Civic Center and its surrounding neighborhood?  Most experts (Realtors, lawyers) agree that it will be turned into a campground for all sorts of accused criminals including gang members, drug dealers, child molesters, rapists, other violent offenders and their friends and relatives, all collected from Chino to Rialto and concentrated in one courthouse.  Attorney offices will be replaced by bail bondsmen.  The buildings and other improvements will be subjected to excessive vandalism and eventually fall into a state of disrepair.  The civic center will be converted from a beautiful and peaceful environment to an ugly and dangerous neighborhood.”
Sal Briguglio, who has worked as an attorney in San Bernardino County for more than three decades and has had an office in Rancho Cucamonga  for most of that time, told the Sentinel, “I have multiple concerns, the first of which is how people without a vehicle are going to reasonably get to the new courthouse. We checked the bus system. To take a bus from Rancho Cucamonga, you have to take two busses. The first has 27 stops to get you to the middle of Fontana. You then pick up a second bus, which after 31 more stops will take you into San Bernardino. You then have to walk a half mile to get to the courthouse. If you are coming from Chino or Chino Hills, you have to take four busses or you can take a bus to the MetroLink, which will dump you a half mile from the courthouse. If you live in Barstow and don’t have a car, there is no bus service to Victorville. You have to hitchhike.”
Briguglio said the concentration of civil cases in San Bernardino was going to precipitate a logistical nightmare for litigants, their lawyers and witnesses.
“The new court building has no public parking,” Briguglio said. “It was built with only 200 parking spaces. They have not thought out what this means in practical terms. Where are the attorneys. litigants and jurors going to park?  When you get three blocks past the courthouse you are in a high crime residential area. You have to leave your car there and hope it is there when you get back. To get to the courthouse you will then have to walk through a very rough neighborhood. You will not be able to take anything with you to protect yourself such as mace because you are not allowed to bring that into the courthouse. Safety accommodations have been made inside the building but the safety issues outside the courthouse have not been addressed.”
Briguglio said the state and local officials are to be commended for having done something  –  in this case constructing the new courthouse  –  to overcome the shortcomings at the historic courthouse.
“I have been practicing law for 35 years and I can’t remember a time when everyone was not complaining  about the outdated and miserable conditions in what is called the historic courthouse,” he said. “There is no air conditioning, no heating. The only air conditioning is opening windows when it gets too hot. The lighting is poor.  The elevator dates back to the 1930s. The bathrooms are in less than standard condition.  It is not compliant with Americans With Disabilities Act requirements. The whole thing needs to be torn down. I believe that is why the judiciary approached the state to provide the funds to build a new courthouse. That old building is not an appropriate place to be conducting trials. A new courthouse has been on the books for many years and we had been waiting for state funding, which came in.”
Unfortunately, said  Briguglio, the offsite accommodations for the new facility are vastly inadequate.
“If you are going to have 40 new courtrooms, then you need to provide for the needs of the public,” he said. “No private sector developer could build an 11-story office building anywhere in the county of San Bernardino and get a permit to build with only 200 parking spaces.  I do not know what went into the decision-making to set that up. I do know that there are going to be four empty courtrooms in the new building, which could be filled with operations that should  be transferred over from the old courthouse, so they could just knock it down and turn the land where it is now into a parking lot.“
Briguglio said he had not expressed his concerns directly to Slough, indicating he felt doing so as a private attorney would be inappropriate. He said the sentiments of lawyers in that regard would be better provided through the collective forum of the San Bernardino County Bar or Western San Bernardino County Bar associations.
The Western San Bernardino County Bar Association was formed in the late 1950s by a group of lawyers in the Ontario, Chino and Upland area. The association’s primary mission was to convince court officials of the need to provide a court on the west side of the county, an effort which successfully culminated in the construction of a courthouse in Ontario at Mountain Avenue and Sixth Street. That facility was later closed down and replaced by the courthouse in Rancho Cucamonga.
One attorney who asked that his name not be used uttered  a sentiment similar to those of several of his professional colleagues when he told the Sentinel that closing out the civil division in Rancho Cucamonga  would throw the west end of San Bernardino County “back into the dark ages.”
Richard Anderson, who has been practicing law since 1968 and was the mayor of Upland from 1984 to 1992, told the Sentinel, “I have to tell you I am against what they are calling the realignment. I have yet to ascertain the purpose or what the benefit is to the community or the court system. There is absolutely no economic benefit that I can see. Initially, there was some discussion about how in these difficult economic times there was a need to bring about court efficiency and that the courts need to save money. But that is just not so with this. There is no way this will bring about economic benefit. We are still going to have the same judges and the same staffs. In fact we will have additional costs because of the need for so many people to travel. That this will bring about savings is a canard. I also see in this that justice will be denied here because people who live in the more remote areas of the county, because of the realignment, will have to travel greater distances. This will certainly put an undue burden on people who must go to court on family law matters or unlawful detainers to protect their property interests. I can’t see a benefit, either to the administration of justice or to cost efficiency.”
Anderson said he is joined by many other attorneys in his perception.
“That is the way I feel,” he said. “I deal with many other attorneys in the civil arena and I can tell you that others agree with me. Sundry other attorneys have expressed the same thing and they are wondering ‘Why are they doing this?’”
Dennis Stout, who was both the mayor of Rancho Cucamonga for eight years in the 1980s and San Bernardino County District Attorney for eight years in the 1990s and early 2000s, said the realignment is “a non-starter in terms of the better administration of justice or cost efficiency. All governmental entities are supposed to serve the people. What they have done with this, I am afraid, is totally ignore the needs of the public.  This may make sense to people oriented around their own self needs, but it just bypasses the principle of why we have a justice system that is accessible to everyone.  In order for the justice system  –  both the criminal justice system and the civil courts – to operate and operate fairly,  it has to be done in a public way. That is why things are open to the public. It encourages people to participate. What this is going to do is put a hardship on everyone who either needs to participate or wants to participate. There may be some marginal savings to the courts in this, although I don’t know that for a certainty. But this is going to transfer the costs to members of the public and to other government agencies, for example police departments who will have to send their officers way out of their jurisdictions. This is going to impose costs on the sheriff’s departments, the district attorney’s office, the public defender and at least some of our county’s cities. This isn’t going to represent any savings in the long haul.”
While some attorneys were willing to speak on the record, many were not. Some said it would be impolitic, unwise or poor form to be critical of the bench and the presiding judge in particular. Significantly, no attorneys speaking publicly or privately to the Sentinel supported the concept of realignment. The Sentinel was unable to locate a single currently serving judge willing to publicly comment on the pending move. All but one of those judges, current and former, who did consent to speak with the Sentinel regarding the realignment did so only under a strict understanding of anonymity. All of those were uniformly opposed to the realignment. The Sentinel’s survey of the bench was by no means exhaustive or scientific, but indicated widespread skepticism about the workability of the arrangement Judge Slough will be imposing in May. One confided that realignment would in short order prove to be “disastrous” and that Slough had been autocratic in devising the realignment strategy, and had not consulted with the bench in drawing it up. The Sentinel did learn, indirectly through Western San Bernardino County  Bar Association President-elect David Ricks, that there was a judge who is supporting Slough’s realignment. Ricks did not identify who that judge is.
“I can tell you without indicating who, because I have agreed not to share their identities, I have found one judge in favor of it,” Ricks told the Sentinel. “That’s it. The other ones I have had conversations with have not been in favor of the change. That is also true of bailiffs and the court clerks. Of the ones in Rancho Cucamonga, none are thrilled about the idea of going from Rancho Cucamonga to San Bernardino and making that daily commute to work.”
The Sentinel located one former judge willing to weigh in on the realignment issue.
Gus Skropos was a Superior Court judge from 2000 until 2005. Prior to that he was mayor of Ontario from 1994 to 1998, as well as city councilman in that city for six years, and served  as an appointed member of the county board of supervisors. He worked as a deputy prosecutor with the San Bernardino County District Attorney’s Office for 12 years.
Skropos said he considered the realignment ill-advised and an approach that reflected the degree to which the judiciary has lost touch with the citizenry it is supposed to serve.
“If this were the first effort to consolidate our courts I think we lawyers and the public at large would be more tolerant and understanding,” Skropos said. “I remember the days when we had municipal courts before they were consolidated with the Superior Court. Municipal court judges were elected and had to live in the local community and as such were inclined to meet the local constituents’ needs. Since the consolidation of the municipal courts, which no longer exist, with the Superior Court, we now have judges who no longer have to live within the county or the communities in which they serve and I see that as a defining moment in why we are now headed in this direction. Judges can, and many do, live elsewhere in the state and I don’t think judges are as well connected to their local constituency as they were two decades ago. This is not a huge problem, but I think there is a disconnect there. I know our judges work hard and are dedicated and sincere, but this particular decision is headed in the wrong direction, in my mind.”
Skropos decried the move as one that will render justice hard to achieve for the common citizen.
“I can recall when we had courtrooms in Twin Peaks, Chino, Redlands, Needles and 29 Palms,” Skropos said. “All of that has evaporated and it does a disservice to local residents. I think people understand that those courthouses were shuttered because we were experiencing tough times and our facilities needed to be streamlined and made more economical. But whereas with the first round of cuts and closures, court services continued to be relatively accessible to the public and the legal community, that is no longer the case. Access to the courts and the dispensing of justice exists to serve the constituents, not the other way around.  The public does not exist for the convenience of the courts. I understand these are difficult economic times. There has never really been a time when money was flowing. There are going to continue to be hard budgetary times. Civil courts, family law courts, small claims courts are very important to the community. Some people tend to think that the courts are just there for criminal matters. That is not the case. If this goes into effect, and I believe it will, people in very populated areas of our county, not just at the extreme ends but people living in the desert and the mountain communities are going to need to drive in excess of 100 miles in many cases on family law matters, custody matters, property cases to access the courts. We have already shuttered five of our courthouses in the last decade. If this were just going to be an inconvenience for attorneys, there would probably not be a lot of sympathy for them with the public. But this will be a major strain on many of our residents who will have business before the court. I don’t envy the decision-makers who have to make these tough calls on the allocation of our public dollars, but I believe there needs to be a reanalysis of this decision. If there were substantial savings to be had, I think people would be a little more inclined to go along with this. But from what I understand, this is just a one or two percent savings at the most. In the larger scheme of things, I think there are better places to look to achieve that economy.”
In response to a request for an interview, Slough told the Sentinel via email, “[O]ur county court system has historically been underfunded, and the cuts unfortunately hit us harder than it has in some of the better funded county courts.  Our cuts went straight to the bone, as we did not have fat to trim! The closure of Needles, Big Bear and the almost complete closure of  Barstow Court have clearly added stress to an already stressed court system.
“The decisions I and others of this court have been faced with have truly weighed heavily, not only on me, but on our court and court family as a whole,” Slough continued. “Of course, these decisions have come at a steep price to our county citizens, and have not been made lightly. I do understand that the realignment plan which has prompted your contact is met with opposition, as have all of these very tough decisions.”
Judge Slough has extended the Sentinel   an invitation to meet with her and the county court system’s recently-hired executive officer, Christina Volkers. This will, Judge Slough said, allow her and Volkers  to “discuss these issues and the backdrop of the past years with you. This will give us the opportunity to discuss the questions that you included in your email and also to brief you on our budget and operational difficulties which have led to the most difficult times this court has probably ever endured.” The Sentinel’s interview with Judge Slough and Volkers is scheduled for March 19.
In the meantime, concern is mounting that the course Slough has set for the court system will be one that will be extremely difficult to reverse, even after what critics call its multiple drawbacks manifest.
“This is going to be set in stone,” Ricks said. “There are no contingency plans to bring civil back to Rancho Cucamonga. No plans. If the budget changes it is more likely they would reopen the Barstow Courthouse before they do anything else. Under this court administration, it does not look like the resumption of civil cases in Rancho Cucamonga is going to happen.  The difficulty in trying to reverse what will happen in May is there won’t be money in future budgets to move back or revert back. It will eat up $1 million from the budget to make this change.  No one thinks using the money that way is advisable other than the presiding judge. No one is able to stop it. The county will have to find more quarters for the DA. The county will have to rent office space for the DA in Rancho Cucamonga. The public defender has the same problem.  This will have a dramatic effect on businesses around the courthouse, which support attorneys and civil clients from out of the area. They will not be there anymore.”
Ricks said that several civil and family law attorneys contemplated legal action to block the realignment, but that option was ultimately rejected.
“In 2012, Los Angeles County made modifications to its court system,” Ricks said. “Personal injury cases were consolidated downtown. They basically closed tons of courts. All civil courts in Pomona except two to handle business cases were shut down.  A lawsuit was filed by lawyers, but it did not get anywhere.  I talked to the firm that handled the lawsuit. They told me the lawsuit was essentially thrown out. We did not see filing a lawsuit or an injunction as worthwhile.  If it was tried and defeated in another county, we could expect the same results here.”
It has widely circulated that there is a hidden impetus for the court realignment, one involving a former presiding judge. That impetus has nothing at all to do with court efficiency or economies of operation, according to that line of thinking. Rather, the goal is one of urban renewal, specifically the rejuvenation of the county seat, the city of San Bernardino.
Just this week, Patrick Morris retired as the mayor of San Bernardino. Prior to his mayoralty, Morris was a Superior Court judge,  and acceded to the position of presiding judge.  Morris’s eight year tenure as San Bernardino mayor was marred by the city’s 2012 filing for Chapter 9 bankruptcy protection.
The advent of the new courthouse in San Bernardino is seen as one of the first major developments in the city’s effort toward financial recovery. By filling it with a majority of courtrooms devoted to civil rather than criminal cases, the courthouse can be utilized as a strategic means of drawing a well-heeled clientele to downtown San Bernardino on a daily basis.
“I can’t prove it, but my sense of it tells me that Patrick Morris is a prime mover in this realignment,” one attorney said. “He was highly respected as a jurist. He was a mentor to many of the judges who are still on the bench. The city where he has just finished up two terms as mayor has gone through this horrific financial debacle. This changeover that will be putting all of the county’s civil courtrooms in downtown San Bernardino is a Godsend for that community. Maybe this is just a coincidence. Others can draw their own conclusions, but I see the influence of Patrick Morris behind this.”
While stopping short of attributing the shape of Slough’s realignment to Morris’s influence, Richard Anderson expressed the belief that an effort to improve the situation in San Bernardino was a factor in the new court operations policy.
“The only conceivable benefit to this is the urban renewal it represents for San Bernardino,” Anderson said. “What this is doing is throwing a bone to the city of San Bernardino in the form of trying to bring in some additional business. I think that is what they are trying to do here but it doesn’t make sense. I know from experience that the parking situation around the existing much smaller courthouse is atrocious.”
It is a battle of wills at this point, Ricks said, and given her position of power and authority, Slough appears to be destined to win, no matter what the consequences.
“When I met with her in November,” Ricks related, “in an attempt to encourage her not to do this, I said, ‘Look, we attorneys are businessmen and businesswomen and we have ideas about how to streamline things and save money. What  if we can come together to come up with ideas to reduce costs to preserve our courts where they are, so the West Valley area could be served locally rather than have civil courts transferred to San Bernardino? I as an attorney have lots of ideas.’ At that point I was told it was not about budgetary issues and it was not going to make any difference. This was being done for the convenience of the court and the ability to manage their manpower more than anything else. The idea of savings was shot down.  According to Judge Slough, it is far more convenient for them to have the ability to cover for judges who may be sick or out for some other reason when you have them in the same location. For administrative purposes it is much more efficient when you have court reporters in the same location. You can pool court reporters to cover more courtrooms. Under the realignment, they are not firing anybody, they are not terminating anyone. From a cost standpoint, this is not making any difference. The state has created a real problem for the courts. Because of the state’s dictates the courts have only a one or two percent reserve available at any time, which means they have just enough money at any time to keep operating for two weeks or at most a month. The courts cannot operate at a deficit so they have to become much more efficient to avoid the potential losses. We understand that and are more than happy to work with the courts to reduce costs and increase efficiency and avoid unnecessary costs. The private sector is much more efficient and we could go through the courthouse and see where efficiencies could make big differences.”
But Judge Slough has proven impervious to the entreaties to reconsider the realignment,  Ricks said, and no one has the leverage to prevent it from occurring.
“Basically, the public does not at this point care and has not reacted,” Ricks said. Janice Rutherford met with Judge Slough and district attorney [Mike] Ramos met with her as well as someone from sheriff’s office, all of whom encouraged her not to do this. During a walk-through of the new building, someone asked her not to do what she has said will come in May. They were told it is going to happen.  Many people express anger about it in private and in confidence, but no one wants to oppose the presiding judge.”
Once the move is made, both Ricks and Briguglio said, the public will awaken.
“For us attorneys, it will be ‘Oh, well, we get paid anyway.’” Ricks said. “It will be something way different for someone who has to travel all that distance, a 200 or 300 mile round trip. It will dawn on people then.”
Said Briguglio, “Everyone is going to have to adapt and the general public will have to deal with it as the rest of us are. My hope is as these problems arise there will be some flexibility and willingness to make adjustments for what is unexpected.”

Chino Hills Allows High Density Units At Butterfield

(March 4) Over the strenuous opposition of nearby residents, the Chino Hills City Council last month opted to allow Overton Moore Properties to proceed with its high density apartment project on the east side of Butterfield Ranch Road.
The project will entail 331 apartment units on 16.5 acres. The project site is bordered on the north by the Heights Apartments complex, low density single residential homes to the south, medium density single residential homes to the west, and the 71 Freeway and Pinehurst Park, which Overton Moore is to develop as part of the project, to the east.
The property was formerly zoned service commercial and the project approval entailed a general plan amendment and a change of zoning to very high density residential. Overton Moore is involved primarily in the development of real estate for commercial purposes and acquired the property primarily because of its previous zoning. The conversion of the property to high intensity residential use is potentially as profitable for Overton Moore as developing it commercially.
According to city manager Konradt Bartlam, at the January 7 planning commission hearing for the project,   seventeen members of the community commented on the project, one speaking in favor of it and sixteen expressing concerns or in opposition.   Bartlam conceded that community concerns included  the project representing an overconcentration of multifamily residential development within the southern portion of the city, that the project was too dense and did not comply with the Chino Hills Development Code, that there is already significant traffic on adjacent roadways,  that the project would add students to the nearby already overcrowded schools, that there was inadequate onsite parking that would lead to overflow parking into the park site and into adjacent neighborhoods, that noise impacts would be onerous, that the project would result in decreased property values, and the development of the property would have effects on privacy.
But  Bartlam said “The California Department of Housing and Community Development allows cities to satisfy their Regional Housing Needs Assessment requirements by rezoning properties to a very high density, which in metropolitan areas such as southwestern San Bernardino County is a density of at least 30 dwelling units per acre.”
As approved, the development will consist of 18 buildings of 1 – 3 bedroom units. A new public street is proposed off of Butterfield Ranch Road, which will serve as the main access for the apartment development and the public park.
Gross density of the project is 20 units per acre, and net density exclusive of the 1.03 acre street and the 1.10 acre drainage channel is 23 units per acre.
The city council unanimously approved the project, pursuant to Bartlam’s recommendation, in so doing making what is called a negative declaration, that is, asserting that no unmitigated impacts to the community will come about as a consequence of the project.
One project opponent bitterly complained that the council’s action “proves that the needs of special interests trump the voice of the citizens in Chino Hills.”
The city council gave only “lip service” to its general plan and development standards, he said.
Overton Moore Chief Executive Officer  Timur Tecimer said the council’s vote drew to a close two years of needless delays over the project.