The cycle of vacancy-begetting progression up the political food chain-begetting vacuum-begetting political advancement-begetting further vacuum that has beset the cities of Chino and Chino Hills and the Chino Valley Fire District which was touched off with Glenn Duncan’s resignation from the City Council earlier this year remains in full throe.
In April, Duncan announced he would leave his post on the city council – a position he held for nearly a quarter of a century and to which he had been most recently reelected in November 2016 without opposition – as a consequence of having been diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease. The city council subsequently moved to replace him by appointing Dr. Paul Rodriguez, on a 4 to 1 vote, with Mayor Eunice Ulloa dissenting, after considering and rejecting planning commissioner Harvey Luth, who was supported by Ulloa and councilman Gary George but failed to garner a crucial third vote.
Across the city limits, in Chino Hills, Ed Graham, who had been a member of the maiden city council when the City of Chino Hills formed in 1991 and then remained in office consistently for nearly 26 years and had served as mayor of San Bernardino County’s southwesternmost city six times, likewise announced his retirement in June, almost as if he was taking his cue from Duncan. Graham officially left the council in July. The city council elected to replace him with Brian Johsz, a member of the Chino Valley Fire District’s board of directors. Johsz, who was once a staff member with former San Bernardino County Fourth District Supervisor Gary Ovitt, was himself appointed to the fire district board in 2013 to replace Ray Marquez, who left the fire board after winning a special election to fill a vacancy on the Chino Hills City Council created when councilman Wilburn “Bill” Kruger resigned from that position.
As a result of his elevation to the city council, Johsz resigned as a fire board member. Last week, the four remaining members of the fire board – Sarah Evinger-Ramos, Mike Kreeger, Ed Gray and John DeMonaco – took up the assignment of replacing Johhsz within their ranks. Under consideration were Chino Community Services Commission President Kevin Cisneroz, Chino Planning Commissioner Steve Lewis, Chino Planning Commissioner Harvey Luth, retired Chino City Manager Richard Rowe, Chino Hills Parks and Recreation Commissioner Joe Schaffer and Carbon Canyon Fire Safety Council Member Vance Stearns. Ultimately, the board voted 3-1, with Kreeger dissenting, to appoint Luth.
Luth moved to Chino with his parents when he was three-years old in 1959, living on his family’s Euclid Avenue farm until he was in junior high. His family moved into a single family residential home in Chino in 1969. He attended Ontario Christian High School, graduating in 1974. He attended and graduated from Cal Poly Pomona, where he studied horticulture. He is the proprietor of L and L Nursery Supply in Chino.
Luth is a Kiwanis member, and was a board member with the Chino Community Services Commission, 3-Way Thrift Store, the YMCA board, and the Chino Community Theatre. He was sworn in on Wednesday and will need to stand for reelection in November 2018 to remain in office beyond the expiration of his current term in December 2018.
To take up his position on the fire board, Luth resigned from the Chino Planning Commission. It is anticipated the Chino City Council will fill that vacancy sometime within the next two months.