(December 5) YUCCA VALLEY—The attempt to recall town council members George Huntington and Robert Lombardo refuses to die, nearly two months after the county registrar of voters made a determination that there were an insufficient number of valid signatures on the petitions for that effort to force a vote on whether to remove the two officials from office.
The Sentinel has learned that lead recall proponent Ron Cohen  has retained legal representation in his effort to overturn the county registrar of voter’s finding that the recall should not proceed.
Ron Cohen led a contingent of some two dozen activists intent on reform at Town Hall whose  zeal hit a critical mass after the council voted in February to increase then-town manager Mark Nuaimi’s salary and benefit package to just under $300,000 per year and extend that contract to 2016. All four of those who voted for Nuaimi’s contract extension came in for criticism, including the mayor, Merle Abel, and councilwoman Dawn Rowe, Lombardo and Huntington. Cohen and his cohorts decided to concentrate their recall efforts against Lombardo and Huntington, who had been reelected to the council without opposition in November 2012, and seek to remove Abel and Rowe when they come up for reelection in 2014.
The recall committee began gathering signatures for the Lomabardo and Huntington recalls in late April. That drive entailed door-to-door canvassing, as well as signature gathering in public areas such as in retail centers and on street corners.
In the case of both Huntington and Lombardo, the recall petitions had to be endorsed with the valid signatures of 2,461 voters residing within the town of Yucca Valley to force the recall vote. Recall proponents insist they carefully screened the signees and, in the case of Huntington, turned in petitions containing 2,712 signatures, and in the case of Lombardo 2,720.
Upon examining the petitions and the signatures, the registrar’s office initially concluded 458 signatures on the Huntington petition were invalid and 448 on the Lombardo petition were invalid. Thus, according to the registrar’s office and Yucca Valley Town Clerk Leslie Copeland, the Huntington petition contained 2,264 valid signatures and the Lombardo petition contained 2,272 valid signatures.
“Each petition needed 2,461 valid signatures to qualify for a recall election,” Copeland said in October. “Because of the insufficient number of valid signatures, the current recall process of Robert Lombardo and George Huntington is considered complete.”
Cohen, however, did not take that lying down and he approached County Registrar of Voters Michael Scarpello to demand that the processing of the petitions be double-checked. Accordingly, Cohen had sojourned from Yucca Valley to the county seat on October 11, October 15, October 16, October 17 and October 18  to carry out a thorough analysis of all of the petition signatures deemed  “unvalidated.”
Cohen told the Sentinel he had demonstrated to the registrar’s satisfaction that many of the signatures that were disqualified were in fact valid.
After the second count, which Cohen personally monitored, the registrar’s office made changes to the original tally, but that difference was insufficient to overturn the finding that the recall effort had failed. Thirty or more of the signatures on each petition  that were initially disqualified have now been certified as valid. Thus, according to the registrar, the petition targeting Huntington for recall actually had 2,294 valid signatures and the petition to recall Lombardo had 2,310 valid signatures. Both new counts are below the  2,461 valid signatures threshold needed  to trigger a recall question for the ballot.
Of the 2,722 signatures verified on the petition against Huntington, 428 were declared invalid by the registrar of voters. The registrar found 410 of the signatures out of 2,720 on the  Lombardo petition invalid.
Michael Scarpello, the San Bernardino County Registrar of Voters, said the second count was “very thorough.”
Cohen has not indicated whether he will force the issue with legal action, though his lawyer has notified town officials that he wants all documentation relating to the recall preserved.

(December 4)  The city of Upland has attempted to redress a situation in which it was alleged its city council  had violated the Brown Act.
The Ralph M. Brown Act is the state of California’s open meeting law that requires that all public business, with a few specific exceptions, must be conducted openly.
On two occasions in the last two months, the council undertook action that appeared to be in violation of the Brown Act’s provisions. The first of these occurred on October 25 when city manager Stephen Dunn provided members of the council with a questionnaire which called for them to rank municipal programs with regard to their necessity and importance to provide Dunn with guidance as to where he should pare back city operations in an attempt to balance the city’s upcoming 2014-15 budget.
In the second instance, the council selected members of its newly formed Fiscal Task Force Committee by having each member of the council simply forward his or her two allotted  nominees to the city manager outside of a public forum, without a previous public discussion or vote to ratify those nominees as actual appointees.
Ruth Musser-Lopez, who is a columnist for the Sentinel, delivered two  cease and desist letters, one dated October 30 and one dated November 12, to the city after those actions. In response, city attorney Kimberly Hall Barlow drafted two letters, each dated November 26, in which she gave Musser-Lopez assurances the council would refrain from such action in the future. The city council also scheduled a hearing at its November 25 meeting at which it officially made the committee appointments in public.  With regard to Dunn’s request that the council members fill out questionnaires, Barlow wrote, “We believe that the conduct was not a violation of the Brown Act. The Brown Act does not require all city council actions to be taken within the context of an open meeting. It only requires that, with few carefully defined exceptions, all ‘meetings’ of a city council must be open to the public. Therefore, the written submission of documents by council members to the city manger outside of a regular meeting would only violate the Brown Act if the act of submitting those documents itself constituted a meeting.”
Barlow’s letter continued, “Government code Section 54952.2 makes clear that for a ‘meeting’ to occur, there must be some discussion, deliberation, or communication among the council on a topic within the subject matter of its jurisdiction that results in the development of a collective concurrence. By individually submitting information to the city manager, no interaction among council members occurred, no deliberation took place and no consensus was reached.”
Despite that defense of the council’s action,  Barlow’s letter also stated, “In order to avoid unnecessary litigation and without admitting any violation of the Ralph M. Brown Act, the Upland City Council hereby unconditionally commits that it will cease, desist from and not repeat the challenged past action as described above. Rest assured that the city council takes the obligations of the Brown Act very seriously, and it is for this reason that the commitment contained in this letter is made. Even though we do not believe a violation occurred, the city  council wants to ensure that the public maintains confidence in the process through which these difficult issues will be discussed and decided.
With regard to the council’s selection of the committee members outside the forum of a public meeting, Barlow wrote Musser-Lopez another letter, also dated November 26, in which she repeated her representation that “The Brown Act does not require all city council actions to be taken within the context of an open meeting.”  Barlow propounded, “Therefore, the written submission of ad hoc budget committee appointees by council members to the city manager outside of a regular meeting would only violate the Brown Act if the act of submitting appointee names itself constituted a ‘meeting.’ By individually submitting  names of their individual appointees to the city manager, no interaction among council members occurred, no deliberations took place and no consensus was reached. To the contrary, the complete discussion and deliberation regarding the committee occurred in a duly noticed and open public meeting. In that process, it was made clear that each council member would have 2 appointees to the ad hoc committee. Any member of the public wishing to address the formation of the committee, its membership, process for appointment, etc., could have done so at the meeting of October 28th. Therefore, the appointments did not qualify as a ‘meeting’ under the Brown Act and was not required to be made during an open meeting. If post-appointment ratification of those on the committee had been required, it would have to have been done at a public meeting; however, no ratification was required by Upland ordinance or by the process expressly agreed upon at the public meeting. Thus, the committee is not illegal as you contend in your letter dated November 11, 2013 (sic). As no action was taken outside of a noticed and public meeting there is nothing to cure. Nonetheless, the full council acted to ratify the appointments at their meeting of November 25, 2013.”
Musser-Lopez, who formerly resided and was registered to vote in Upland, now divides her time between her residence in Needles and Upland, where she is a caretaker for an elderly family member. She was formerly a councilwoman in Needles.
“I had to pay money to obtain documents that included information that should have been readily accessible online in the minutes or as a part of an agendized discussion,” she said of her recent experience in Upland. “Instead, I had to go out of my way, make a special trip and expend my own personal funds to obtain information that a majority of the council had acted on. When I was on the city council in Needles, I was given instruction on the Brown Act.  There is a reason why this kind of written communication involving a majority of the council is illegal.   They are discussing and deliberating outside of the public’s view as to how they would likely vote on the budget or fiscal matters. The public can’t see or hear that discussion. In California, we voted to have open meetings, not meetings behind our backs.  When there is a majority involved in the discussion, they are not allowed to use an intermediary to communicate with each other outside the purview of the public,” she said.
“When Councilman Gino Filippi says he would like to see a discussion on ‘privatizing of city utilities’ and he does so on a piece of paper that can be viewed by his council colleagues but is not available to the public,  to me that means they are discussing selling the water utility.   The public should know that this is the direction that Mr. Filippi is interested in taking the city.  Because this polling or questionnaire was done outside of view of the public, the only reason I know that Mr. Filippi is oriented this way is because I took the time and my own money to file a Public Records Act request to obtain those filled-out questionnaires.  But the rest of the world has not seen the questionnaires.  These answers should have been made public as a part of the council packet that is prepared and published online by the city manager.  We should not be made to file a Public Records Act request.   This goes way too far in keeping information from us, information that we need to have to get an equal start on trying to fight to protect our pocketbooks and our property.”

(December 4) Some 2,220 miles across the country, a decision made in a major municipal bankruptcy case this week could have a controlling impact on how the city of San Bernardino fares in its effort to restructure its debt and reduce the generous pension benefits it committed to providing city employees as a strategy in working itself out of its bankruptcy. Generous pension provisions to its retired employees are now considered a major factor in San Bernardino’s bankruptcy.
In August 2012, after years of financial challenges, the city of San Bernardino filed for Chapter 9 bankruptcy protection. As a consequence, San Bernardino found itself at the forefront of a profound financial and public policy issue. Emerging as a significant question in that matter is whether public pension obligations are to be held as sacrosanct, no matter how generous or reasonable individual pensions are, or whether troubled municipalities can skip out on their commitments to continuously fund the retirement accounts of their current and past employees.
Public employees, their pension fund associations and their advocates maintain that under the law, municipalities and other governmental entities must honor their payment schedules for contributions toward pension funding, no matter the governmental entity’s state of solvency or if it is seeking bankruptcy reorganization.
The relatively few California cities that have found themselves in the position of having to declare bankruptcy have shied away from testing whether, in fact, employee pension funds enjoy a specialized status vis-à-vis claiming to be first in the line of creditors to be paid by a governmental entity that is struggling financially.
In California, San Bernardino is one of three cities with populations of over 100,000 which have sought bankruptcy protection. The other two, Vallejo and Stockton, have elected to continue to stay current on their pension fund obligations. San Bernardino, however, has taken the position that pension payments should not be  excluded from the list of debts it wants to reduce, and that the California Public Employee Retirement System, known as CalPERS, should accept for the time being a pendency plan that reduces the payments it will receive from the city in the same ratios that the city is reducing its payments to its other creditors, including its bondholders and suppliers of goods and services,  until such time as the city is able to regain its financial footing. San Bernardino, which currently has a $25 million annual obligation to the retirement system, withheld more than $14 million  in pension fund payments from July 2012 until July of this year. The city wants to continue to make partial payments until such time as it gets back on its feet financially. Even more alarming to CalPERS is the perception that the city is looking down the road at a longer-term solution that would include renegotiating the amount of its commitment to the retirement system, one that would indeed set a precedent in California of reducing the pensions of retired or soon-to-retire city employees.
CalPERS opposed San Bernardino’s bankruptcy petition, asserting that the pension fund system has a special status.
Moreover, CalPERS has, disputed since shortly after the municipality’s filing of its August 2, 2012 bankruptcy petition, San Bernardino’s contention that it is in dire fiscal straits. The pension system maintains that San Bernardino has hundreds of millions of dollars worth of assets that can be tapped into or liquidated to satisfy its many creditors. CalPERS asserts San Bernardino is simply skipping out on its financial responsibility and is not eligible for bankruptcy.
U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Meredith Jury, who is overseeing the city of San Bernardino’s Chapter 9 bankruptcy filing, has consistently ruled that San Bernardino is as insolvent as it claims. In August, she ruled that the city’s bankruptcy should be granted pursuant to a pendency plan by which the city continues to pay its employees and other expenses critical to its day-to-day operations but services its other debts on the basis of the limited financial means available to it.
CalPERS wants out of Jury’s courtroom and is pressing for leave to appeal the matter to another judge, a request Jury has already denied.
This week, CalPERS has been forced to contemplate the consideration that other bankruptcy judges may prove every bit as, if not even more, accommodating of the city’s requests to back away from its pension commitments to current and former employees.
U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Steven Rhodes is hearing the city of Detroit’s bankruptcy case. Detroit, the largest U.S. city to ever declare bankruptcy, is beset with an estimated debt – $18 billion – that makes San Bernardino, with its $180 million in ongoing unfunded liabilities and $49 million annual operating deficit, by comparison seem as if it is almost flush with cash.  On December 3, Rhodes ruled that Detroit is not only eligible for bankruptcy but can also cut pension benefits as part of its strategy to map its way out of the financial abyss it has found itself in. Pensions, just like any other contracts, can be altered, given the exigency of bankruptcy, Rhodes ruled.
Rhodes’ ruling provides a precedent that outfits San Bernardino with more leverage in its match with CalPERS, providing the city with the potential option of abrogating a contract that CalPERS and the city’s municipal employee’s unions considered sacrosanct, unbreakable, and absolutely ironclad.
CalPERS’ position appears to be eroding by the minute. The pension system has maintained that it has special status among the city’s creditors and that it should go to the front of the line when the city begins to pay those to whom it is in arrears. Jury did not accept that, ruling that CalPERS has no greater or lesser standing than the scores of other entities the city owes money to.
In the cases of two other cities in California that have sought bankruptcy protection, Stockton and Vallejo, those cities have chosen to stay current on their obligations to CalPERS. However, in the Stockton case, the federal bankruptcy judge hearing the matter, Christopher Klein, granted Stockton’s request to set aside the city’s health benefit debts. And while he ratified the plan to make good on the city’s obligation to CalPERS, Klein indicated that had the city requested the authority to modify its pensions, he would have gone along with the request.
With Rhodes’ ruling in the Detroit matter, financially troubled cities may now be emboldened to do battle with the managers of their employees’ pension funds.
And while CalPERS maintains that municipal retirees are due all retirement moneys they qualify to receive under current formulas since those pensions represent  “promises made in exchange for the financial and physical investments that public employees and retirees make in our communities,” others see the matter somewhat differently. Many retirees are availing themselves of pensions utilizing a formula based not upon a percentage of their maximum salaries as municipal employees but a percentage of their salaries plus vacation pay, overtime pay, vehicle allowances, educational allowances, travel allowances, computer and cell phone allowances, clothing allowances and other stipends.  In recent years, there have been several highly publicized cases of pension spiking, including examples of high ranking public employees who, while employed earned salaries in the $200,000 per year range but by adding on various addenda to their salaries and other forms of compensation for their retirement calculations, are now receiving yearly pensions approaching $300,000.
Unexplored in the bankruptcy proceedings so far is an examination of the tactics used by employees and their unions to extract from elected city officials generous salary and benefit packages, including concerted efforts to elect or reelect politicians willing to provide them with those budget-busting salaries and benefits and chase from office those elected officials unwilling to break the city treasury to accommodate the unions.
Upon the demonstration that such tactics were used by unions to strong-arm elected leaders into providing their members with generous retirement benefits, a judge who is requested to grant pension modifications might seriously entertain such a remedy under the principle of the “balancing of hardships” whereby a city in a state of financial duress beset upon by a multitude of creditors, all of which could not be fully satisfied by that city’s available financial means, would appear to have grounds to seek to reduce pensions deemed to be excessive.

(December 3) SAN BERNARDINO—For the second time since the city of San Bernardino declared bankruptcy in August 2012, the city council has given its police officers raises.
The pay increases, which are scheduled to go into effect next August, like last year will entail an additional million dollar drain on the city’s already decimated budget compared to the previous year.
The automatic raises are a consequence of a provision in the city’s charter known as Section 186, which requires that the salaries of police and firefighters in San Bernardino be based upon the  average remuneration of their public safety counterparts in ten selected California cities with populations comparable to San Bernardino.
The city council is constrained under the terms of the city charter to provide the raises. The San Bernardino Municipal Charter, which can be altered only through a vote of the city’s residents, dictates, under its Section 186, that police and fire department pay is to be determined by averaging the pay provided to similar positions in ten California cities with  populations between 100,000 and 250,000. Those ten cities are selected by a process in which all California cities in that population range are considered and the union eliminates from the list the lowest paying municipalities and a city management representative eliminates the highest paying cities until the ten from which the average is taken are determined.
The council voted to comply with the Charter Section 186, nearly eight months before the raises are to go into effect, in part to provide the city’s finance department adequate time to work the numbers into the upcoming 2014-2015 budget.
Accordingly, 163 police officers will see a 2.91 percent or $210.69 per month increase and will now be paid between $5,235.98 per month and $7,463.19 per month, depending on seniority. Forty-four detectives and corporals will receive a 3.41 percent or $279.20 per month increase and will now be paid between $6,411.02 per month and $8,477.40 per month, depending on seniority. The department’s 39 sergeants will receive a 2.79 percent or $261.61 per month increase and will now be paid between $7,618.33 per month and $9,634.21 per month.  The pay increases for police officers, detectives, corporals and sergeants will cost the city $56,830.06 per month.
In the case of the police officers, corporals, detectives and sergeants, the salaries were based upon the average paid to comparable positions in the police departments in the cities of Fairfield, Fullerton, Garden Grove, Irvine, Lancaster, Norwalk, Oceanside, Palmdale, Pomona,  and Santa Clarita.
The salary paid to law enforcement trainees will be upped to $4,188.78 per month ($24.17 per hour), which is 80 percent of the lowest grade of pay for a police officer.
Adding annual fringe benefits and other salary-driven costs which rise with salary increases such as the state public employee retirement system contributions, unemployment and Medicare, the total increased general fund cost for salaries and benefits for the police officers, corporals, detectives and sergeants for fiscal year 2012/13 is $823,357.89; overtime costs are estimated to be $216,269, for a projected fiscal year 2013/14 increase of $1,039,626.69.
In making adjustments to the salaries of the department’s management personnel, the department’s nine lieutenants, assistant chief and chief will all see cuts in pay,. Only the department’s three captains will see raises. The lieutenants will take a .40 percent cut in pay or lose $48.12 per month. The captains will get a 1.85 percent increase, amounting to $250.54 per month. The assistant chief will sustain a 1.75 percent pay cut and lose $273.94 per month and the chief of police will be downscaled 2.94 percent or $519.80 per month. The comparable pay survey for the management team was made from the cities of Costa Mesa, Fairfield, Fullerton, Hayward, Huntington Beach, Murrietta, Pomona, Roseville, Ventura  and Santa Rosa.
The overall Charter 186 financial impact for the police management group will result in a decrease of $7511.61 to the general fund.
Mayor Patrick Morris, a former Superior Court judge who in his role on the council does not have the power to vote except to break a tie or to form a quorum, is the city’s most outspoken opponent of Charter Section 186.  Calling salaries for the city’s safety employees “our most expensive single item,” Morris said it is contrary to common sense to be increasing the pay of already well remunerated municipal employees, “particularly in times of bankruptcy and insolvency.”
Some citizens opposed to Charter Section 186 have remarked  that the cities chosen for the salary survey are better fixed financially than San Bernardino. Defenders of the charter section maintain that San Bernardino’s elevated level of crime entitles police officers who work there substantial remuneration.

By Wendy Clements
SAN BERNARDINO–To help local businesses utilize enterprise zone tax credits before they expire at the end of the year, the San Bernardino Valley Enterprise Zone (SBVEZ) has organized one last complimentary workshop on Thursday, December 12. The event will be held from 8 a.m. to 10 a.m. at the city of Colton Council Chambers, 650 North La Cadena Drive, Colton.
This workshop will provide local businesses vital information on how to use the enterprise zone tax credits to save money on their future state taxes, and details about key deadlines involving the ending of the program. With only a few weeks left to secure the credits, the SBVEZ is encouraging all San Bernardino and Colton businesses carrying out any hiring or capital investment activities to find out if they qualify before time runs out. Any qualified new hires or taxes paid on certain equipment purchases made between October 2006 and December 31, 2013 may be eligible for SBVEZ credits.
The workshop will also provide a brief overview of  Governor Jerry  Brown’s new Economic Development Initiative Program that will start on January 1, 2014 and offer tax credits to companies statewide.
To register for the workshop, contact zone manager Wendy Clements at 909.382.4538, or info@sbvez.com.
The San Bernardino Valley Enterprise Zone is one of 40 existing enterprise zones established by the California Department of Housing and Community Development to encourage investment, growth, development and job creation in economically distressed areas of the state. The enterprise zone program grants employers tax credits and incentives for pro-growth business investments that improve economic activity within designated zone areas.
The San Bernardino Valley Enterprise Zone is located in the central portion of  the Inland Empire and includes the city of Colton, the city of San Bernardino and unincorporated portions of San Bernardino County.  In addition to the tax incentive it offers, the San Bernardino Valley Enterprise Zone also features a highly developed network of road, rail and air transportation infrastructure, a skilled and educated workforce, affordable commercial and residential real estate, and many other pro-business programs that make the area a highly competitive location for business. Those wanting more information about the San Bernardino Valley Enterprise Zone or wishing to determine if their business is in the zone can visit www.SBVEZ.com.
Wendy Clements is the zone manager for SBVEZ.

(December 1) Water in the wettest city in San Bernardino County is about to become more expensive.
The Needles Public Utilities Agency, a subdivision of the city of Needles, has notified its customers of its intention to up water rates, giving its customers the opportunity to protest the increase.  If a majority of the city’s property owners/water rate payers protest the rate increase in writing, the board for the utilities agency, which consists of the city council, will lose its authority to impose the rate increase.
Oral comments and protests will be heard at the city council’s January 14 council meeting to be held at the council chambers at 1111 Bailey Avenue in Needles. Needles lies along San Bernardino’s County’s East Coast, on the western bank of the Colorado River.
Currently, the city/utilities agency levies a $34.84 basic service charge on customers with five-eighths inch and three-quarters inch meters, which entitles them to up to 1,000 cubic feet of water per month. The proposed rate increase will take that monthly charge to $37.84. Those with one inch and one-and-a-half inch meters now pay $37.09 for 1,000 cubic feet of water per month and will see an increase to $40.09.
Those with a two inch meter water meter are currently paying $41.73. There bills would increase to $44.73.  Those customers utilizing over 1,000 cubic feet of water per month will be charged $1.49 for each 100 cubic feet of water utilized beyond the basic 1,000 cubic feet.
According to the city/utilities agency the rate increase is necessitated by an increase in  infrastructure and maintenance costs. “The water utility of the Needles Public Utilities Authority established an asset replacement reserve fund in early 2012,” the customer notice states.”Unfortunately the rate of accumulation of funds ($3 per month per customer) has proven insufficient to absorb the cost of an infrastructure failure or the current requirement for rehabilitation of a major waterworks component (well, pump, water main, reservoir). At this time the financial wherewithal to bring those components back in service will have to come primarily from operational cash flows. It is imperative that the asset replacement reserve fund rate of accumulation be accelerated immediately to shore up the water utility’s vulnerability to extended downtime due to infrastructure failure.”
At the time it established the asset replacement reserve fund, the Needles Board of Public Utilities/city council intended to accrue a reserve fund of $350,000. Officials now are seeking to add the additional $3 per month per customer charge to produce a minimum reserve fund of $750,000 to fund the water department’s four-year plan to rehabilitate four water  storage tanks. There is a proviso that the fund shall continue to accumulate until such time as the Needles Board of Public Utilities/city council decides to suspend or reduce the accumulation of funds.

(December 5) Volunteers are needed to help count bald eagles for the 35th season in the annual winter bald eagle counts in and near the San Bernardino and San Jacinto Mountains on Saturday December 21st, January 11th, February 8th, and March 8th.
Concurrent Bald Eagle counts are held at Big Bear Lake, Lake Arrowhead, Lake Silverwood, Lake Perris, and Lake Hemet. Volunteers are stationed at vantage points around the lakes, where they watch for bald eagles during a 1-hour period on the count mornings. Volunteers record their observations on maps and data sheets.  This is a wonderful opportunity to catch a glimpse of our breath-taking national symbol.  Brief orientations are conducted prior to the count so volunteers know where to go and what to do.
“Through this method, the agencies and land managers have learned a lot about which areas are important to eagles and how the populations are doing.  But we can’t do it without a lot of volunteers – we need their eyes to help us look,” said Forest Service biologist Robin Eliason.
The bald eagle counts for this winter are scheduled for the Saturday mornings:  December 21st, January 11th, February 8th, and March 8th.  No experience is needed. Volunteers need not sign up ahead of time and can  just show up at the designated time and location, warmly dressed and with  binoculars and a watch.
· Big Bear Lake area volunteers will meet at 8:00 a.m. at the Forest Service’s Big Bear Discovery Center on North Shore Drive for orientation. Contact Drew Farr (dpfarr@fs.fed.us or 909-382-2816) for more information.  Call 909-382-2832 for cancellation due to winter weather conditions – an outgoing message will be left by 6:30 am on the morning of the count if it has to be cancelled.    There will be a free slideshow about bald eagles at 11:00.
·         Lake Arrowhead/Lake Gregory volunteers will meet at 8:00 a.m. at the Skyforest Ranger Station for orientation. Contact Drew Farr (dpfarr or 909-382-2816) for more information.  Call 909-382-2832 for cancellation due to winter weather conditions – an outgoing message will be left by 6:30 am on the morning of the count if it has to be cancelled.
·Silverwood Lake State Recreation Area volunteers will meet at the visitor center at 8:00 a.m. for orientation.  Contact Kathy Williams or Mark Wright for more information about volunteering or taking an eagle tour (760-389-2303 between 8:00 and 4:00; or email: khwilliams@parks.ca.gov).

(December 2) Ontario cops nabbed Santa Claus and nine of the most bold of over 100 protesters who came to the site of Ontario’s recently opened Walmart Superstore on Black Friday to register their discontent with the presence of the retail giant in Ontario and its corporate policies. Those policies include, detractors maintain, paying its workers low wages and providing them with inadequate benefits while offering a   merchandise line that originates largely with manufacturers in Communist China.
The Walmart Superstore built on the site of the long-gone White Front department store at 5th and Mountain Avenues in Ontario was previously the object of protracted legal wrangling that delayed its construction and opening by several years.
Attorney Cory Briggs, representing the Ontario Mountain Village Association, filed a lawsuit against the city of Ontario relating to its 2007 approval of the WalMart Superstore, citing seven violations of the California Environmental Quality Act. Judge Donald Alvarez upheld the Ontario Mountain Village Association on a single issue of those seven raised by Briggs, the safe circulation of delivery trucks coming into the shopping center. Early this year, after the expenditure of $1.5 million by WalMart and $673,000 by the city on legal fees in responding to the lawsuit, Briggs and the Ontario Mountain Village Association dropped their appeal of the dismissed six issues after the city made changes deemed sufficient to redress the truck circulation problem.
The four-and-a-half year legal battle over, work on the project proceeded and on October 30, the supercenter held its grand opening.
WalMart, which was founded by Sam Walton in 1962, grew to become a leading commercial retailer in the United States in the 1970s and early 1980s, in large measure by promoting itself as offering an exclusively American-made product line. In 1988, Wal-Mart was the most profitable retailer in the US and in October 1989 became the largest in terms of revenue. It abandoned the marketing strategy of offering an entirely domestic-made product line in 1992, however, and has since become the leading retailer of Chinese-made merchandise in the U.S., which has invited much bitter criticism and boycotts. Nevertheless, the company remains at the forefront of the retail industry. It has also invited the enmity of organized labor, which has targeted the company for its successful strategy in preventing its workers from unionizing, maintaining wage and benefit rates significantly below the industry standard and engaging in what union officials maintain are “predatory” efforts to drive its competitors employing unionized labor out of business.
The complex of discontent aimed at Walmart coalesced in Ontario on November 29, as a well-organized cadre of Walmart protestors descended on the new store on what has become a culturally iconic event, the massive turnout of customers at retail establishments on what is hailed as the biggest retail sales day of the year, the Friday following Thanksgiving.
Among the leaders of the band of protestors that had come to Ontario on this occasion was Santa Claus, who otherwise goes by his civilian name of Karl Hilgert. Determined to strike a blow against the heartless capitalistic ethos that had given rise to the superstore paying its staff barely more than a subsistence-level minimum wage, the crowd carried signs and placards, occasionally chanting slogans intended to persuade Black Friday shoppers to spend their money elsewhere. Hilgert, in his guise as Claus, the symbol of the commercialism of the just awakening Holiday Season, provided an air of ironic sophistication to the protest. When it became apparent that scores of protestors were lining the streets, police made their presence known.
In what was either a desperate effort to discourage shoppers or a planned ploy to add emphasis to the statement of protest, ten of the protestors, including Hilgert/Claus, ventured out into the middle of the Mountain Avenue Intersection and sat down as a form of human blockade. Shortly thereafter, the police marshaled their numbers and moved out into the intersection themselves, ordering Hilgert/Claus and his cohorts to disperse. When they did not, the officers read the dissidents their rights, handcuffed them and hauled them off.
Throughout it all, Hilgert/Claus remained entirely in character, offering his persecutors candy canes.