By Mark Gutglueck
The ultimate impact the alcohol-related hit-and-run incident involving Ontario City Councilman Jim Bowman on Monday, July 8 will have on his political career, now in its 28th year, is unclear, and will likely be dependent upon the thoroughness of detail to be included in the police report of the matter, which has yet to be completed.
That report is to be compiled, the Sentinel has learned, by Traffic Officer Jeff Holcombe before undergoing extensive review by three command levels of the department, including Chief Mike Lorenz, before being provided to the San Bernardino County District Attorney’s Office, which is to make a conclusion as to whether to charge Bowman in the incident. That report in the form Holcombe provides is likely to be edited before it goes to the prosecutor’s office. Nor will the matter be considered in a vacuum prior to a recommendation being made by Supervising Deputy District Attorney Joe Gaetano as to whether Bowman’s action with regard to separate issues rose to the status of a criminal offense. It is anticipated that an attorney representing Bowman will be given the opportunity to provide the prosecutor’s office with both medical and factual detail along with video footage and other digital data Bowman and his supporters maintain indicate that what occurred late Monday afternoon was a medically-related episode that resulted in Bowman temporarily conking out behind the wheel of his pick-up truck rather than the councilman driving under the influence of alcohol.
The digital data, including that to be gleaned from his cell phone and his vehicle’s event data recorder, i.e., the pickup’s so-called “black box,” will establish that Bowman did not purposefully leave the scene of the accident, as was indicated in the citation he received after the incident and which formed the basis of media reports to the effect that he had engaged in a hit-and-run, his advocates are preparing to propound. Continue reading →

San Bernardino County residents this week were given a close perspective of the political dysfunction that has resulted as a consequence of the sharp partisan divide between their Republican-dominated county governmental structure and the vice-lock Democrats have over California’s state government.
At issue, and consequently given short shrift, is the difficulty many California homeowners and businesses, as typified by ones in the desert and mountain areas of San Bernardino County, in obtaining and/or retaining insurance coverage on their homes or business operations, most particularly fire insurance.
Over the last decade wildfires in California have increased dramatically. The number of fires scorching 10,000 acres or more began to rise substantially beginning in 2005. Of the 20 largest wildfires in the Golden State between 1950 and 2023, 18 occurred since 2000. Ten of those eighteen took place in the two-year period of 2020-21.
Consequently, the cost of homeowners or business insurance including fire coverage began a steady increase years ago and then escalated more rapidly still beginning in 2020. Continue reading →

A subset of San Bernardino County transit officials this week expressed a combination of enthusiasm and dismay at a development that has forced their renewed recognition that the governmental collective devoted to regional transportation issues has as a body consistently squandered an eminently promising prospect of alleviating Southern California’s most vexing commuting challenge.
On Monday, July 8, the California State Transportation Agency earmarked just under $500 million to be used to extend the Gold Line, what is already the world’s longest light-rail passenger extending from its Pacific Ocean terminus in Long Beach nearly to the eastern end of Los Angeles County, into San Bernardino County. There was also indication given that another installment of $298 million from the state will be provided to the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority to fund the final phase of the final 3.2-mile extension of the rail line from Pomona to Claremont and across the county line into Montclair being undertaken by that entity’s sub agency, the Foothill Gold Line Construction Authority.
While virtually all of Los Angeles County’s and a good share of San Bernardino County’s transportation officials hailed the provision of the funds, the most ardent supporters of the Gold Line in San Bernardino County bemoaned the lack of resolve among the larger collection of transportation officials in their jurisdiction which has manifested over the last five years, preventing what they said was an infusion of state and federal dollars that would have ensured the Gold Line would be extended all the way to Ontario Airport by mid-2028. Because of that lack of resolve, they say, the light rail extension will not make it to the aerodrome until the early-to-mid 2030s, if at all. Continue reading →

There is a new area closure order in effect on the San Bernardino National Forest and the Angeles National Forest. Several roads, campgrounds, picnic areas, trailheads, and dispersed recreation areas are closed to the public to provide for firefighter, community and public safety. Recreation activities are prohibited within the closure area. More information about the closure order is available on the national forest websites at https://www.fs.usda.gov/alerts/sbnf/alerts-notices and https://www.fs.usda.gov/alerts/angeles/alerts-notices.
Due to the favorable weather today, fire crews were able to put in more handline and continued to mop up the edge of the fire. The cooler temperatures and higher humidity helped the firefighters going direct on the fire perimeter and kept the fire south of the 3N06 and 3N06D spur roads.
Tomorrow thunderstorms are expected into the evening with wind gusts up to 20-30 MPH. This weather will present challenges on the fire and test containment lines that are already in place. Given the expected weather conditions the firefighters will stay vigilant through the weekend, monitoring and patrolling the fire line for any spots or new starts.
Air Quality:
Visit AirNow.gov for information and actions you can take to protect yourself and loved ones.
Road Closures:
Lytle Creek Road is open to residents only north of Glen Helen Parkway.
Evacuations:
Mt. Baldy Resort.
Note: In an effort to quickly communicate information on impending dangers, the San Bernardino County Sheriff Department and San Bernardino County Fire Department send high-speed mass notifications via telephone and text messages. This system is known as the Telephone Emergency Notification System (TENS). To learn more about this service, visit the website for more information: https://sbcfire.org/alertwarning/.
Closures:
Closure order in effect on the San Bernardino National Forest and the Angeles National Forest. Several roads, campgrounds, picnic areas, trailheads, and dispersed recreation areas are closed to the public to provide for firefighter, community and public safety. Recreation activities are prohibited within the closure area. More information about the closure order is available on the national forest websites at https://www.fs.usda.gov/alerts/sbnf/alerts-notices and https://www.fs.usda.gov/alerts/angeles/alerts-notices.
Fire Restrictions:
The San Bernardino National Forest has implemented increased fire restrictions. Campfires are restricted to those developed areas listed in the Forest Order.

The FBI and the Department of Homeland Security have stepped up their scrutiny of colleges and universities in San Bernardino County and elsewhere to ward off efforts by Communist Chinese agents to not only purloin advanced chemical engineering data and other sensitive information but to obtain restricted chemicals as well.
University and college science departments have, generally, unfettered access to chemicals that in most other contexts are considered restricted materials.
In other contexts at universities and colleges elsewhere in the United States, most famously at the University of Florida, Chinese nationals who have matriculated as students or obtained positions as researchers have purchase more than 10,000 samples of organic chemicals, inorganic chemicals, biochemicals, drugs, toxins and reagents by ordering them on behalf of various campus laboratories and then diverting them to secondary locations, from which they were illicitly shipped to China.
These activities occurred frequently over a recently-ended seven year period. Continue reading →