(March 28) With the number of its international passengers on the upswing, Ontario International Airport saw an increase of slightly over one-half percent for overall traffic totals in February.
The increase of 0.55 percent over February of last year 2014 was positive news for the airport, even though domestic travel from the aerodrome dropped off slightly and its numbers were bettered by rival Los Angeles International Airport, where travel was  up 3.87 percent for the same period.
Both Los Angeles International and Ontario Airport are owned and operated by Los Angeles World Airports, the corporate arm of the city of Los Angeles Department of Airports. In 1967, the city of Ontario entered into a joint operating agreement with the city of Los Angeles for management of the airport. In 1985, Ontario deeded Ontario Airport to Los Angeles. Under Los Angeles’ management and ownership, ridership at Ontario Airport steadily increased, from 200,000 passengers passing through its gates in 1967 to 7.2 million passengers in 2007. But ridership at the airport has dipped to around 4 million per year since then, and Ontario, rethinking its arrangement with the larger city, sued to Los Angeles in 2013 in an effort to regain ownership and control of the airport.
Ontario officials say Los Angeles is purposefully mismanaging Ontario Airport to increase ridership at Los Angeles International Airport. Los Angeles officials say that the numbers drop at Ontario Airport coincided with the contracting economy and a shift in the airline industry, which has increased flights into major population centers such as Los Angeles while decreasing the use of outlying regional hub airports such as Ontario.
Ontario International’s domestic traffic for February was down 0.68 percent, with 280,602 domestic passengers, compared with 282,530 for February of 2014.
At the same time, the airport’s international traffic was up 91.47 percent over February 2014.
“We’re pleased to see a slight increase in February although January through March is typically a slow period,” said Jess Romo, the airport manager in Ontario.  “It’s good news since we’re only two months into the year. International traffic was strong in February. This is a good sign.”
Mexico-based Volaris began service to Guadalajara from Ontario International Airport in April of last year. That accounted for the uptick in the international passenger figures registered in February, when there were 7,337 international passengers at Ontario Airport. Twelvemonths previously there had been 3,832 passengers to or from Mexico.  Both Volaris and AeroMexico offer seven nonstop flights a week to Mexico.
And it appears international passenger numbers at Ontario will soon be increasing. Airport officials last week announced AeroMexico will offer four-times-a-week round-trip flights from Ontario to Mexico City beginning Monday, three days from now, i.e., April 6.

(March 30) San Bernardino County will increase the number of its incorporated municipalities to 25 under the latest proposal relating to unifying the communities around Lake Arrowhead in the San Bernardino Mountains.
In response to incorporation sentiment in the mountain region, the San Bernardino County Local Agency Formation Commission has commissioned Santa Ana-based Rosenow Spevacek Group Inc. to weigh in on the feasibility of unifying the unincorporated communities of Lake Arrowhead, Crestline, Running Springs, Arrowbear, Green Valley Lake, Skyforest, Rim Forest, Twin Peaks, Blue Jay and Cedar Glen into a single 40-square mile city.
There have been previous efforts to incorporate Lake Arrowhead, which is the most economically vital of the area’s towns. None of those reached fruition.
An impetus driving the current effort is the proliferation of sober-living homes and drug-rehabilitation centers in the communities, resulting in tension within the neighborhoods where those facilities are located. Many area residents have expressed the belief that the board of supervisors, none of whose members live in the San Bernardino Mountains, had any sensitivity to the issue. Moreover, they say, the county’s permitting and regulation of the drug rehab facilities is lax. It is the belief of some that a newly created city would be able to take command of land use policy and zoning to either prohibit or significantly limit such businesses and residential facilities in the area.
Rosenow Spevacek’s focus will not pertain to land use policies, but the nuts-and-bolts practicality of the economic viability of the specified communities coalescing into a single unit, and whether the revenue to be generated tax-wise and assessment-wise from within the proposed boundaries would sustain the cost of providing standard municipal services.
The area in question is on the western side of the San Bernardino Mountains, within the county’s Second Supervisorial District. After the 2010 Census, a portion of what had been the Third Supervisorial District, which previously contained the lion’s share of the San Bernardino Mountains, was moved into the Second District. The San Bernardino Mountains currently boast a single incorporated city, Big Bear, which lies on the eastern side of the mountains in the Third District. Big Bear, with a population of 5,124 is the county’s second smallest city.
If Lake Arrowhead, Crestline, Running Springs, Arrowbear, Green Valley Lake, Skyforest, Rim Forest, Twin Peaks, Blue Jay and Cedar Glen were to be consolidated into a single city, the population in that municipality would total at least 30,327, making it larger than Needles, Big Bear, Grand Terrace, Yucca Valley, Loma Linda, Barstow and Twentynine Palms, such that it would be the seventeenth largest and eighth smallest of what would then be the county’s 25 cities.

(April 2) Redlands High School Wrestling Coach Mario Estrada, who oversaw the Terrier grappling team for four years, has been removed from that position.
At least two parents were critical of his overly aggressive approach, which included free wrestling matchups during practice, in which he himself sometimes participated.
During one of those sessions on February 10, he slammed Ernesto Guzman, a senior on the team who wrestled in the 145 pound class, to the mat. Guzman, it was later learned, sustained a concussion.
A complaint regarding Estrada was made to High Athletic Director Ken Morse on  February 16.  Subsequently, the Redlands Police Department was contacted.
The high school conducted an inquiry into the matter and the police department carried out an investigation.
Members of the team and the assistant coaches were questioned, and on balance they said that Estrada, though spirited and intense in his approach, did not go beyond the pall in what is recognized as a rough contact sport.
The police department concluded that there was no criminal culpability on Estrada’s part.
The high school administration learned that on occasion Estrada had used profanity around his charges and had not been diligent in insisting the wrestlers wear headgear, which was deemed a lapse in safety protocol.
In what assistant principal Chris A. Ruhm said was an appropriate response, Estrada was relieved from his post.
That change was reflected on the high school’s website, on which the roster of athletic coaches shows a blank slot for the school’s wrestling coach.

(March 31) Ontario’s Yangtze Restaurant, a landmark business on Euclid Avenue since 1961, has closed.
It was operated by the Gin family, whose matriarch Edna was still participating in food preparation at the age of 91 on the day of its closing, March 30.. Gin and her husband Ray opened the restaurant on April 22, 1961.
A quintessential Chinese restaurant with excellent pork and shrimp chop suey, it was appreciated by three generations of residents of the Inland Empire. It was located on the ground floor of the three-story Continental Hotel building at 126 N. Euclid Avenue, next to what had been a United Artists theatre in the 1960s.
Though it never lost its popularity with Chinese food aficionados, the restaurant never regained the position it once held as the premier such establishment in the Inland Empire after the Montclair Plaza opened in 1968, drawing away business from downtown Ontario.  Things worsened with the advent of the Ontario Mills, The Shoppes in Chino Hills and Victoria Gardens in Rancho Cucamonga.
The closing is the second disappointment for ethnic cuisine lovers in Ontario in two years. Ramon’s Cactus Patch, which was located at 647 West California Street, shuttered in April 2013.
Just as at the Yangtze, in the case of the Cactus Patch, its founder, Ramon Sanchez, who was then 99, was present at the closure.

(March 29) Maestro Jon Robertson will lead the Redlands Symphony in a concert featuring the works of Beethoven and Mozart on Saturday, April 11, in the Memorial Chapel on the campus of the University of Redlands. Noted pianist Roberta Rust will perform Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 23 in A major as part of the program. The concert begins at 8 p.m., with doors open at 7 p.m. Maestro Robertson will discuss the program in a pre-concert talk that beings at 7:15 p.m. Single tickets for the concert start at $15. The complete program for the concert includes the Coriolan Overture by Ludwig van Beethoven, Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 23 in A major, K. 488, performed by Rust, and Beethoven’s Symphony No. 3 Eroica in E-flat major, op. 55. “This will be an evening of majestic music from two of the world’s greatest and most popular composers,” said Maestro Robertson. “And I’m especially excited to have Roberta Rust here to perform for our Redlands audience. She is an extremely talented performer who I know will bring her own special interpretation to the piece by Mozart.” Roberta Rust has concertized to critical acclaim around the globe since her debut as soloist with the Houston Symphony at age sixteen and as recitalist at Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall. The New York Times hailed her as “a powerhouse of a pianist – one who combines an almost frightening fervor and intensity with impeccable technique and spartan control.” Her many remarkable recordings feature music of Debussy, Haydn, Villa-Lobos, Prokofiev, and contemporary American composers. Solo recitals include performances at Sala Cecilia Meireles (Rio de Janeiro), Merkin Concert Hall (NY), Corcoran Gallery (Washington, DC), and KNUA Hall (Seoul). Rust has played with the Lark, Ying, and Amernet String Quartets, and her festival appearances include OPUSFEST (Philippines), Palm Beach Chamber Music Festival, Festival Miami, Beethoven Festival (Oyster Bay), and La Gesse (France). She has performed as soloist with numerous orchestras including the New Philharmonic, Philippine Philharmonic, Boca Raton Symphonia, the New World Symphony, and orchestras in Latin America. Born in Texas of American Indian ancestry, Rust studied at the Peabody Conservatory, graduated “summa cum laude” from the University of Texas at Austin, and received performer’s certificates in piano and German Lieder from the Mozarteum in Salzburg, Austria. She earned her master’s degree at the Manhattan School of Music and her doctorate at the University of Miami. Her teachers included Ivan Davis, Artur Balsam, John Perry, and Phillip Evans, and master class studies were with Gary Graffman, Leon Fleisher, and Carlo Zecchi. She served as Artistic Ambassador for the U.S., was awarded a major NEA grant, and also received recognition and prizes from the OAS, National Society of Arts & Letters, and International Concours de Fortepiano (Paris). In addition, she is a music critic for Clavier Companion Magazine.
The sponsor for the April concert is Majestic Realty. Single tickets for the concert are available at the door and online at www.redlandssymphony.com. Tickets can also be purchased by calling the box office at 909-748-8018.

By Count Friedrich von Olsen
Normally, I rely upon three methods of stirring up information for this column. I might have my chauffer, Anthony, trot out the Bentley for a sojourn down the mountain so I can burn some shoe leather padding about – at my age I can no longer dash – in the halls of justice or administration or have a face-to-face meeting with a solicitor or official in the know of the various goings-on in this gigantic county. Or I will task my butler, Hudson, to troll the worldwide web for this tidbit or that, so I can then use that as the thread with which I might embroider my narrative. Or I might simply take up my place at my desk and then serve in the capacity of a mad dervish phone jockey and shake something or other loose from whoever it is who will stay on the phone with me long enough to make some headway…
This last weekend, however, I needed to do none of that. Rather, I merely had to wander off the grounds surrounding the chalet and step with my spindly legs the half mile or so to Arrowhead Resort, where the San Bernardino County’s Annual City County Conference was held…
For a time, what I encountered were presentations on mundane topics of no conceivable interest to anyone and I feared my hike had been for naught. I was on the verge of slipping into Bin 189 to order up a Bloody Mary to fortify myself  with the endurance to retrace my steps back to the chalet.  But then I heard something that caused my ears to prick up and provide me with the fodder to fill this column with something lively…
Being openly discussed was the latest connivance the bureaucrats in Sacramento have come up with to fleece the taxpaying residents of the Golden State. I give you, good reader, warning that this is going to outrage you, but please, do not cast away or tear up the Sentinel in disgust, but keep reading, as I am merely the messenger here, attempting to give you the low down on what elements of your own government are plotting and not in any way endorsing this larcenous scheme…
It seems that state officials do not believe the gas tax we Californians are paying is enough. Never mind that we are already hit with the highest such tax in all of the USA’s fifty states. More money is needed to construct roads and highways, build and repair bridges and plug some 3,750,000 potholes. How do they plan to do this? They want to charge you for every mile you drive. The figure I heard quoted was one-and-a-half cents per mile…
None of this is set in stone, of course, but apparently the idea is to try this out as some kind of a “pilot program,” presumably in some isolated area or maybe some backwater county, and see if it works. Once it is demonstrated on a smaller scale, it is to be put into effect statewide, state officials hope, by 2019…
There are two things at play here. The way this is going to be promoted is that this program will generate revenue for our ailing transportation system and will simply be a modest use fee to offset the wear and tear we all are responsible for as a result of our reliance on the internal combustion engine. The second goal behind this, one which will not get much emphasis I am willing to bet, is that it is aimed offsetting the anticipated losses the state will suffer as motor vehicles become more and more fuel efficient, burning less gasoline and diesel fuel, upon which the already excessive taxes are levied. In other words, no good deed goes unpunished. If I sell my Bentley and buy a Tesla, reducing my carbon footprint, the government will still get its pound of flesh…
I think this latest idea coming out of Sacramento is a bad one. I trust most of my readers have been following things over the last few years and are aware that our state capitol is dominated by Democrats. They hold the upper hand in the upper floor of the California Legislature – the State Senate – and in the lower floor of the legislature – the California Assembly. Our governor is also, alas, a Democrat. I am reminded of what General George Patton, truly one of the greatest Americans in history, said. “Politicians are the lowest form of life,” said the general. “And Democrats are the lowest form of politician.” I find it hard to disagree with that sentiment…
The problem these officious bureaucrats are going to have in enforcing this harebrained law is that they are going to have to track our vehicle use. And how are they going to do that? I suppose there will be more than one way. Perhaps each car will be outfitted with a device allowing the Department of Motor Vehicles to monitor each vehicle’s odometer. That would be one way. Or each car will be outfitted with global positioning devices, allowing our citizenry’s whereabouts to be constantly tracked and monitored…
It seems, though, this last option might not prove workable. It seems the U.S. Supreme Court might not allow the DMV to do that. This week, on Monday, the highest court of the land ruled, in the matter of Torrey Dale Grady v. North Carolina that the government’s wholesale use of global positioning devices or other space-age technologies to monitor its citizens, runs afoul of the Fourth Amendment, which protects Americans against unreasonable searches and seizures.
North Carolina officials had subjected Mr. Grady, a twice convicted sex offender, to a protocol in which he had to wear a global positions device at all times to the state could track his constant whereabouts. He challenged that as an unreasonable search under the Fourth Amendment, but North Carolina’s courts, including that state’s highest court, ruled that the tracker was no search at all and not unreasonable. But the Supreme Court rebuked North Carolina, summarizing that state’s position that “the state’s system of nonconsensual satellite-based monitoring does not entail a search within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment.”  According to the U.S. Supreme Court, “That theory is inconsistent with this court’s precedents.” So, let me see if I have this straight…
According to the U.S. Supreme Court, even a convicted criminal cannot be subjected to having to wear or carry a global position signaling beacon or other form of monitoring device, knowingly or unknowingly, willingly or unwillingly, without there first being a warrant obtained to indicate there is probable cause for saddling that individual with such a device, i.e., grounds to believe he is about to commit an offense. How then does the state of California intend to affix on each of our cars a global position device or other type of electronic tracking device when there is no reasonable suspicion each and every one of us is engaged in some type of criminal activity that needs to be monitored and no court has issued warrants based on such findings? I would not sell the bureaucrats in Sacramento short, however, and perhaps, by 2019, they will come up with some way to finagle this…

By Mark Gutglueck
Born on January 4, 1860 in Greenville, Texas, Sidney Voris Horton was the son of Peter I. and Mary (Melton) Horton. Peter Horton had a 1,000-acre plantation on which 27 slaves cultivated wheat and corn. In 1868, Mr. Horton sold his ranch in Texas and brought his family and one slave to Redlands. Here he purchased 40 acres at California Street and Colton Avenue, where the Mission School now stands. This property was sold at a handsome profit in 1872, He then acquired acreage near the mouth of the San Timoteo Canyon under a patent signed by President Ulysses Simpson Grant, three years before the Southern Pacific Railroad came through the area.
Sidney was ten years old when he started attending classes in the Little Mission School along with other pioneer children. Six years later he went to work on his father’s new ranch near the former Vache Winery in Bryn Mawr, then “Nahant” and later “Redlands Junction.”
At the age of 18, he joined the Southern Pacific crew at San Gorgonio, now called Beaumont, and worked with the railroad for seven years.
On July 1, 1885, Sidney V. Horton and Beulah E. Hamner of Redlands, the daughter of Samuel N. and Julia Ann (Covington) Hamner, who was born in 1866, were married. Together they went to the new Horton Ranch where, with his father’s help, Sidney planted oranges, peaches and other fruits on part of the 80-acre farm. There the newlyweds built their home.
Sidney and Beulah had seven children: Alice Horton Schufeldt (1889 – 1986),  Mildred Horton Brassington (1891 – 1949),  Sidney Voris Horton (1893 – 1931),  Gladyce Horton Rogers (1895 – 1977),  Eugene Roland Horton (1901 – 1965),  Floyd A Horton (1903 – 1964) and Bertha Horton, whose date of birth and death are unavailable.
Sidney Horton was a successful citrus grower throughout the 1990s and after the turn of the 20th Century. In 1908, he was elected as San Bernardino County’s Fifth District supervisor and served from January 4, 1909, his 49th birthday, until January 8, 1917. He was reelected in 1912 and was chairman of the board from January 4, 1915, his 55th birthday, until he left office.
Sidney Horton’s brother, Benjamin S. Horton, was the manager of the Tonopah and Tidewater Railroad, residing at Death Valley Junction.
After leaving the board of supervisors, Sidney devoted himself again to be a full time private rancher. In 1925, Sidney Horton, Sr. relocated his center of interest to a smaller ranch higher in the canyon where he planted five acres of citrus, leaving the management of the larger ranch to his son, Hugh.
In 1931, his family suffered a significant loss when his son, Sidney V. Horton, Jr., was killed as the result of the explosion of a gasoline-filled smudge pot used to fight frost in orange groves.
Sidney Horton died at a rest home in Redlands on Christmas Day 1941, 18 days after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. He was 81 years old. He was survived by his wife, Beulah, two of his sons, Hugh and Eugene; and four daughters, Mrs. Mildred Brassington of Long Beach, Mrs. Alice Schufeldt, Mrs. Gladyce Rogers and Bertha E. Horton, all of Los Angeles.

Atriplex hymenelytra is an evergreen shrub  that tolerates alkaline soil, salt and sand. The leaves accumulate salts which helps extract water from the soil when other plants cannot Salt is shed by dropping the leaves. It can live in up to 30 parts per billion of Boron in solution, compared to most plants which can tolerate only about 1-5 parts per billion. As with other desert climate members of the Atriplex genus, it uses water conserving C4 photosynthetis, and it removes salts by having bladders in the leaves that keep the salt from the plant cells.
The leaves of the species have a number of characteristics that contribute to its ability to adapt  in a hot, dry environment. Its steeply angled leaves reduce midday solar interception, while conversely allowing relatively high interception when solar angles are low and vapor pressure deficits are at a minimum. The leaves substantially reduce their absorption  of incident radiation during the hot periods of the year by changing their moisture and dissolved salt contents. Because the  light intensity required for saturation of photosynthesis is low at such times is low, the reduced  radiation absorption by the leaves results in a greater water-use efficiency at that time of year.
Atriplex hymenelytra is the most drought tolerant saltbush in North America, tolerating the  hottest and driest sites in Death Valley, which lies just north of San Bernardino County, The plant remains active most of the year, but flowers in the main from January through April.
Desert holly grows in locations such as desert dry wash and creosote bush scrub in the Mojave Desert and can be found at elevations ranging from 250 to 3,900 feet.
Its small reddish fruits give it a passing resemblance to the unrelated European holly. Because of its attractiveness, this shrub’s leaves are often used in decorations for the home.
The silvery color is from salts that collect on surface hairs, although there are other reasons for this coloration. The reflective coloration helps reflect the light and therefore reduce the amount of water lost.]
Plants are male or female in their natural dry, desert habitat, but when artificially transplanted to cooler and wetter climates, male and female flowers may occur on the same plant. Female flowers are green.
The plant is a source of food and shelter for many desert animals. Barn Owls and Northern Harriers use its branches to perch on. Pronghorn, deer, and many desert rodents eat the leaves.
With dry soil, it can survive temperatures as low as ten degrees below zero Fahrenheit, but will die if the ground is wet and freezes.

(March 24) Chino voters last week gave  MBK Homes a special dispensation to construct a 113-unit residential project on 12.75 acres of property zoned as general commercial at the northwest corner of Central Avenue and Francis Avenue.
MBK Homes has covered the $174,000 cost of the special election, which included mail-in ballots as well as ones cast at precinct polling places throughout the 77,983 population city.
Measure V called for amending the land use designation of 12.75 acres of vacant land from general commercial to residential-RD12 zoning.
According to the registrar of voters, with 2,700 or 8.45 percent of the city’s 31,944 voters participating, Measure V passed muster, with  1,538 votes or 57.07 percent in favor and 1,157 votes or 42.93 percent in opposition. Five ballots received showed no preference.
Of 2,700 voters participating, 245 went to the polls on Tuesday March 24, and 2,455 voted by mail.
Measure M, which was put into effect by the Chino City Council in 1988, mandates that a special election must be held whenever non-residential property is rezoned to accommodate its transformation to residential use and thereby increasing Chino’s population density.

By Grace Bernal
Spring is unfolding and there are more bare legs and arms as the season progresses. Of course, one day is cooler than the others, and then the drama transforms itself, as the one following that may heat up. The grass turfs have been unrolled and the earth is bursting out into springy colorful lawns. The fashion is also changing into spring pallet colors but the silver color is hanging on until its completion. The silver looks splashed into patterns like circles and and also a hint of black and white stripes are popping out, too. Everywhere you go the signs of spring are there and all the cooler outfits are coming together quite neatly. Keep on springing and experimenting with the new weather and the longer days. Enjoy the colors as they begin to unfold.

“Style is a way to say who you are without having to speak”      ― Rachel Zoe