The Yuhaaviatam of San Manuel Nation’s billboard off the 10 Freeway near the San Bernardino County/Riverside County divide between Yucaipa and Calimesa was vandalized in the hours after sunset on Thanksgiving Eve.
The precise intention of those who defaced the billboard was unclear. The billboard owned by the Yuchaaviatam, originally displayed an advertisement which promoted the Yuhaaviatam with the depiction of three female tribe members, the tribe’s logo, the name of the website ANameHasPower.com and the word Yuhaaviatam in all capital letters across the approximately 26 feet of the 30 foot width of the 10-foot-by-30-foot billboard. Following the vandalism, the ad was partially obscured by a ten-foot by 5.26-foot wide American flag which was fastened near the top of the sign and which draped down to parapet at the bottom of the billboard. To the left of the flag what, appeared to be precisely drawn or stenciled yellow capital letters nearly two-feet tall stated, “America is not on stolen land Your Ancestors were conquered.” Beneath that in smaller yellow capital letters – roughly ten inches to one foot in height – which appeared to be drafted with less precision and without the aid of a stencil was the phrase “Happy Thanksgiving.”
The portion of the original advertisement left visible consisted of the tribe member furthest to the right, most of the final syllable, tam, in Yuhaaviatam, and the tribe’s logo. Continue reading →

The Rialto Unified School District Board of Trustees has conferred a $356,000 annual contract on Bassett Unified School District Superintendent Alejandro Alvarez in a successful effort to lure him 40 miles eastward and hopefully end a seemingly endless progression of scandals plaguing the Rialto public school system.
The move means Alvarez will net a $114,225.03 raise, making him the 35th highest paid of California’s 1,139 school district superintendents.
Alvarez has been in the role of Bassett Unified’s superintendent since 2020. Prior to that, he was the deputy superintendent with the Compton Unified School District. He previously was an associate superintendent in the Fontana Unified School District, where he began his career in education as a teacher.
He is to officially succeed Judy White, who was brought in as Rialto Unified’s interim superintendent earlier this year after the previous interim, Edward DeSouza was himself implicated by extension and passive neglect in the miasma of corruption and either/or political entanglement or political disfavor that had engulfed previous superintendents in Rialto going back a decade.
White had stabilized, at least partially, a situation in which the district’s administrators found themselves involved in or resisting literal extracurricular activities by which they enriched themselves using money, funding or programs intended to benefit the children, as often as not academically underachieving ones, of the district’s substantial numbers of impoverished families. Those superintendents, variously, were either connected with those doing the exploiting, on the wrong side of a school board member or members with family members involved in the wrongdoing or seeking to extend their tenure by letting those school boar members slide after the situations in some fashion showed themselves for what they were. Continue reading →

Three-and-a-half years after Redlands city officials in their zeal to see the former Redlands Mall redeveloped surrendered a key element of their municipal authority to Village Partners without a fight, the Newport Beach-based company has sold the 11.5 acre property to Jack and Laura Dangermond.
The entitlement to build what was called State Street Village granted to Village Partners Ventures runs until September 2027, the date to which the Dangermonds presumably have to break ground on a project to be located on what is widely perceived to be one of the most visible pieces of ground in the now 137-year old city. For many, the sale of the land poses the question of whether the Dangermonds, whose undeniable talents lie in a direction generally untied to property development, can accomplish in 22 months what Village Partners Principal J. Donald Henry and his team of direction of construction management Roger Stevenson, director of development Kaitlin Morris and construction manager Clarke Campion could not carry out in 42 months or what Village Partners’ predecessor, Brixton Capital, was unable to accomplish over a period of eight years.
That central question is surrounded by a series of others, extending to how thoroughly the Dangermonds, who while rooted in the tradition of Redlands’ past and embodying the cutting-edge technology of the first three decades of the Third Millennium, are willing to deviate from the lost past grandeur of Redlands’ Downtown toward a denser urban environment some but not all futurists envision. Continue reading →

Multiple entities in the region that includes the nortwesternmost tip of San Bernardino County are awaiting Orange County Superior Court Judge William Claster’s determinations with regard to a complex set of contentions among numerous governmental and business entities pertaining to water rights and usage in the West Mojave Desert.
At stake is how the overdrafting of the water table in the Indian Wells Valley, which lies at the confluence of San Bernardino, Kern and Inyo counties.
Under scrutiny is the Indian Wells Valley Groundwater Authority’s Ground Water Sustainability Plan, the strategy designed by the controlling majority of that regional joint powers authority to share the valley’s precious water resources, which some interested parties hail as necessary and other entities consider unfair and unworkable.
Complicating the matter is that the Indian Wells Valley Water District, which is the dissenting member of the groundwater authority, in September reinstituted a legal challenge to the sustainability plan in the form of a reverse validation action.
The issues at play extend back more than a decade.
In 2014, in the face of a persistent drought, then-Governor Jerry Brown declared a state of emergency with regard to California’s water situation and then signed into law the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act, which classified 21 groundwater basins in the state, including the one in Indian Wells Valley, as being in a state of critical overdraft. Continue reading →

The off-duty San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department narcotics detective who on October 27 intervened to end the high-speed flight of the suspect who had an hour previously gunned down one of his colleagues has been identified.
Shortly after noon on October 22, Angelo Saldivar, who was at that time living at 6323 Ashton Court in San Bernardino, traveled by motorcycle to 12346 Hollyhock Drive in Rancho Cucamonga in Rancho Cucamonga, a condominium complex where he had previously resided with his former wife, Veronica Garcia Saldivar, also known as Veronica Garcia Zaragosa, and the couple’s daughter in Unit 2. On November 13, 2024, Veronica Garcia Saldivar Zaragosa had initiated divorce proceedings against Saldivar, which were concluded on July 30, 2025, when a divorce decree was granted, with the notice of the entry of judgment filed on August 20, 2025.
On October 27, Saldivar had come to Rancho Cucamonga on a misbegotten mission to forge a reconciliation with his ex-wife, an effort which, likely moribund from the outset, escalated into an anger-filled verbal altercation. Saldivar’s shouts and Garcia Saldivar Zaragosa’s screams resulted in neighbors making 9-1-1 calls to report the disturbance, one of which reported that the male involved in the family altercation, now known to have been Saldivar, was seeking to force Gacrcia Saldivar Zaragosa into her car at gunpoint.
Both Angelo and Saldivar are known to have owned numerous firearms. At some point after the former couple had begun their argument but before responding law enforcement officers arrived, at least two and perhaps as many as four gunshots rang out. Continue reading →

In memory of Mary Watson-Ortiz, the musicians of the Ontario Chaffey Community Show Band are proud to present Home for the Holidays on Monday, December 15, 2025 at 7:30 p.m.
The concert will be held in Merton E. Hill Auditorium located on the campus of Chaffey High School at the corner of Fifth Street and N. Euclid Avenue.
The Woodwind Celebration Ensemble will present a pre-concert recital in the auditorium lobby at 7:00 p.m. Complimentary coffee and cookies will be served in the lobby prior to the concert.
The performance is free to the public.
The December concert features a repertoire of traditional and contemporary holiday music highlighted by talented soloists, including return engagements by guest artists Bobby Collins and Skip Cain. Show Band vocalists Joscelyn Washington and Natasha Le will be supported by the musicians of the Show Band.
The concert will include renditions of many holiday favorites, including Leroy Anderson’s Sleigh Ride, a Hanukkah Celebration, and a Christmas Medley sing-along.
Show Band vocalist Jocelyn Washington will be featured on Oh Holy Night along with the famous song written by Mark Lowry of the Gaither Band, Mary Did You Know?
Natasha Le will perform Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas.
The Show Band is honored to feature Bobby Collins and Skip Cain in this year’s holiday concert.
Bobby Collins will sing The Christmas Song, Grown-Up Christmas List and We Need a Little Christmas.
Skip Cain will perform White Christmas by Irving Berlin from the 1942 musical Holiday Inn.
The Show Band will be featured on these and other selections, including a jazzy winter composition entitled Let it Snow! Let it Snow! Let it Snow! and March of the Toys from Disney’s Babes in Toyland. Continue reading →