San Bernardino County District Attorney Mike Ramos has been selected by the National District Attorneys Association to serve as chairman of a nationwide committee dedicated to working with district attorneys, public safety leaders and victims’ rights advocates to draft and support a United States Constitutional amendment for victims’ rights.
“I am honored to represent San Bernardino County on this important issue and to be entrusted by my colleagues from across the nation,” Ramos said. “My entire career as district attorney has been based on holding criminals accountable and fighting for victims and their families. Right now, as our nation grapples with prison reform and the rights of prisoners, I keep asking myself, ‘What about the victims? What about their families having to deal with a lifetime of pain?’ We need to hear their voices, and those voices need to be protected in all of this discussion.”
Constitutional scholars and political scientists say there is little near-term prospect for such an amendment to be put into place at the federal level and that there are both legal and Constitutional problems with the concept altogether. Moreover, some pro-law enforcement groups believe that even if such an amendment were to pass Constitutional muster, its application, depending on its final form, might prove more problematic than helpful for prosecutors.
Victims’ rights amendments have been included as provisions in some states’ constitutions, and the concept has been proposed for other states, and such an amendment has been proposed for inclusion in the United States Constitution. So-called victims’ rights provisions vary from state to state, with certain similarities. The precise format for the proposed federal amendment has not yet been presented publicly.
One roadblock to a national victims’ rights amendment consists of the need, as is the case of any Constitutional amendment, for the language of the amendment to garner first approval by both the House of Representatives and the Senate and to thereafter gain ratification of 38 of the United States’ 50 state legislatures. Another obstruction is that elements of such an amendment may come in conflict with other Constitutional amendments, such as the Fifth Amendment, Sixth Amendment and the Fourteenth Amendment. Additionally, typical states’ victims’ rights amendments entail requirements that prosecutors stay in touch with the victims and their families throughout a prosecution, and follow up with similar contact post-conviction to advise them of developments relating to the case, such as parole hearings, applications for pardons or other forms of executive clemency or relief, or anything impacting the individual convicted. Some prosecutors consider these requirements to be an undue burden upon them and ones that may compromise, or detract from their ability to carry out, their basic prosecutorial function.
To overcome these roadblocks, Ramos indicated he will be working with other members of the law and justice community and former Oklahoma state senator Brooks Douglass. Douglass is a champion of victims’ rights at least partially as an outgrown of his own experience. In 1979, his parents were murdered in a brutal home invasion. Douglass and his sister were also shot and left to die, but they both survived.
Douglass maintains the U.S. Constitution should be amended with protections for victims’ rights.
“In the Bill of Rights to the U.S. Constitution there are 23 enumerated rights for the accused,” Douglass said. “The problem is there are no rights specified for victims.”
The effort to enhance the legal status of victims and tweak the law to layer in what some consider to be “protections” to those who are not themselves the target of a criminal prosecution is fraught with complication, and carries with it the potential of eroding existing Constitutional protections and other rights enjoyed by citizens.
In San Bernardino County, previous efforts at “victim support” and “victim/witness support” have gone astray and led to miscarriages of justice, as both paid and volunteer members of the district attorney’s division intended to augment the office’s prosecutorial function by offering encouragement, protection and both physical and psychological support to victims and witnesses called upon to testify in criminal proceedings have on occasion engaged in action that was tantamount to suborning perjury against the accused.
One such matter was the case of Robert Gruce, who was charged with rape and was subsequently persuaded to enter a guilty plea wholly on the strength of the rape victim’s testimony against him. Immediately thereafter, the victim who was the only witness against Gruce recanted that testimony, declaring that Gruce was not her assailant and that she had been pressured by witness support personnel to testify against him. She said that she was instructed to identify Gruce as the man who raped her and to avoid looking at him while she was on the witness stand.
On April 16, 2015, an amendment to the Constitution of the United States protecting the rights of crime victims, known as House Joint Resolution 45, was proposed. The amendment was supported by Douglass and several other lawmakers and victims’ rights advocates. The bill failed to pass in the House.
“We intend to look at the existing language in current drafts and make any necessary changes before reintroducing a new proposed amendment,” Ramos said. “Once that happens, I look forward to working with our United States Senators and Representatives to protect and ensure the rights of victims,” said Ramos.
-Mark Gutglueck

A group of Ontario-based activists intend to marshal considerable political muscle in the 2018 election throughout the Inland Empire by making sure significant numbers of African-American voters go to the polls.
Aaron Bratton, one of the volunteer leaders of the Ontario chapter of the Color of Change organization, told a crowd gathered in Ontario Monday night that the African American community has been given short shrift because the last two generations have not followed up on the positive gains achieved through hard work and activism elements of the community engaged in during the 1960s and 1970s.
Bratton is the son of Walter Bratton, the first black firefighter employed by the Ontario Fire Department. Aaron Bratton said a major push for fair play in Ontario originated with his grandparents, Elvenia and James Lawrence Bratton, who moved to Ontario from South Carolina in 1956 with their still growing family. Eight years later, the Civil Rights Act of 1964 was passed by Congress and signed into law by President Lyndon Johnson. Eleven years later, the Ontario Fire Department remained as a bastion of white men, and Elvenia and James Lawrence, or J.L. as he was known, confronted Ontario officials.
“They went to the city and asked ‘Why is your fire department all white?’” Aaron Bratton said. “The result was they hired my father. That was in 1975. He retired in 2006, after 31 years on the department. That was a breakthrough. He was the first black firefighter in Ontario. In 1986, the department hired Floyd Clark, another African-American, who eventually promoted to fire chief. He was fired as chief two years ago. To this day, the department has only had two African American firemen. I feel like things have gone backwards.”
Aaron Bratton continued, “My grandmother came here with my grandfather back in 1956 to escape Jim Crow, because California seemed like a better place than the South. It is a better place, but there is still racism. It is more subtle and behind the scenes. The negative attitudes toward black folks still persist. My grandmother went right up to the civil authorities and embarrassed them, really, that their fire department was lily white. That brought about change and the change continued, at least somewhat, because in 1986 they hired another black man who would go on to become the fire chief. But since 1986, what happened to the legacy of my grandmother and grandfather? That legacy is deteriorating. We’ve gone back to zero [black] firemen. The situation has regressed. It seems like we got comfortable and we fell asleep.”
Aaron Bratton graduated from Ontario High School and went to Cal State University San Bernardino where he obtained a degree in political science. He then went to Pepperdine University Law School, graduating last year. During his last semester in law school his aunt, Barbara Bratton, became entangled in a criminal case in which she was charged with real estate fraud after she contested the efforts by a predatory loan operator who initiated foreclosure proceedings against her and had the property fraudulently and erroneously deeded to a couple who at first laid claim to the home in question and then denied participating in the scheme.
“I was there in the courtroom every day and I witnessed firsthand how flawed the system is and the injustice of that trial,” Aaron Bratton said. “The action of overzealous prosecutors maliciously offering misrepresentations as facts and the harsh sentencing had a really big impact on me.”
Bratton said his law studies drove home to him the point that the law has not been fairly applied and that “over and over again in civil law, criminal law, corporate law, trademark law, black people have been screwed over time after time. Again and again cases would come up that involved a black man raping a white woman. I would be the only black guy in the whole classroom. Those were important cases in criminal law, with black men being scapegoated. That fired me up. I didn’t have patience for it anymore. My cowardice left me and I had to speak out. It didn’t matter that the professor went to Harvard Law School. I would tell them they had it wrong. So much of what is in the law is based on these fallacies, these stereotypes. We see black people being railroaded.”
But social justice is not just going to simply materialize or evolve organically, Bratton said. The black community is responsible, he said, for allowing the injustice to perpetuate itself. “There is too much apathy,” he said “Black folks have to learn. They have to educate themselves on how to navigate the legal system.”
Simultaneously, he said, African-American voters have to participate in the electoral process, and turn out in percentages greater than that of the general population.
“What we’ve done is taken our foot off the gas,” he said. “Forty years after my father was the first fireman in Ontario there are zero black firefighters with the department. If you ask why, you will be given all sorts of nondiscriminatory reasons and explanations. That is all a charade. It is a rigged system. We have poor voter turnout. That is not a coincidence. We have to be involved to hold our leaders accountable. I don’t have time or patience for cowardice. I’m not asking for people to lead the way. I just want people to help me get the job done.”
Bratton suggested that the most logical pathway to change was for the African-American community to assert itself politically and then capitalize on whatever influence it is able to bring to bear in that way to effectuate reforms legally and within the justice system and the courts.
Themes sounded during the meeting pertained to the court system being an unfair and uneven playing field.
Lionel Walker said, “We have to break down these walls that don’t allow us to be fairly tried [in courts of law].”
An issue raised repeatedly was the seeming impunity with which law enforcement officers utilize deadly force in dealing with African-American men.
One woman referenced the shooting of Stephon Clark in Oakland last month.
“If someone shot my son 20 times, I don’t know what I would do,” she said. “What are we going to do about it? It is time for us to take care of us.”
La’Nae Norwood, a consultant to Color of Change, characterized the use of deadly force against black men by police and the disparity of incarceration of African Americans vis-à-vis the white population as “the new lynchings.” Norwood said that lynchings in America had essentially ended in the 1960s but that at present, black men are being incarcerated, statistically in terms of their percentage of the population, at three times the rate they were in 1968.
In 2014, Norwood said, African-Americans, who constitute less than 11 percent of the population in the United States, constituted 2.3 million, or 34 percent, of the total 6.8 million who were in prison or jail. Moreover, she said, African-Americans are incarcerated at more than five times the rate of whites, and the imprisonment rate for African-American women is twice that of white women. She said that nationwide, African-American children represent 32 percent of children who are arrested.
Norwood said the aim of Color of Change is to “engage the black community in political affairs and make its members aware of the existing political climate.”
Those seeking to involve themselves in the Color of Change effort can contact Norwood at lanae@idealculture.org.
Monday night’s forum took place at the Stephanie Wiltz Events Forum on Laurel Avenue in Ontario.
–Mark Gutglueck

By Mark Gutglueck
The deal between the City of Adelanto and American Scientific Consultants, LLC to settle the lawsuit that company brought in December over the city’s November withdrawal of its offer to sell that firm the public works yard and enable American Scientific to pursue production of cannabis-based products at that location appears to have fallen through.
As a consequence, the $5 million lawsuit remains active.
A little more than two weeks ago, at its March 28 meeting, the Adelanto City Council, which since January has been reduced to four-fifths strength because of the removal of former councilman Jermaine Wright, voted 3-to-1 to sell the public works yard, which consists of two buildings and one gross acre of accompanying property, to American Scientific for $1 million.
That vote came during the council’s discussion of a lawsuit filed against the city by American Scientific in a closed session prior to the start of the meeting’s public session. At the beginning of the public portion of the March 28 meeting, city attorney Ruben Duran reported that “The council voted on a motion by the mayor [Rich] Kerr with a second by mayor pro tem [John] Woodard to approve the settlement agreement with American Scientific Consultants 3-to-1, with councilman [Ed] Camargo voting no.”
Under the terms of that agreement, the city agreed to sell the property for $1 million, subject to a $1 per year leaseback arrangement by which the city was to be allowed to continue to make use of the six-year existent emergency operations center located in one of the buildings on the property over the next four years. The agreement called for American Scientific to hereinafter abandon any litigative claims against Adelanto arising out of the city having sought to terminate the deal last November. Additionally, American Scientific agreed to end its appeal of the city’s action in revoking permits it had once granted to the company for a cannabis-related operation on Koala Road the city shuttered after the city’s code enforcement division learned that American Scientific had jumped the gun on initiating operations there prior to having documents for its occupation of that location certified.
The lawsuit was filed in December based upon what American Scientific’s Irvine-based attorney, Rick Augustini, termed the city’s breach of a real estate purchase contract. According to Augustini, in mid-2016 American Scientific Consultants became interested in entering into the medical cannabis business in Adelanto and “spent hundreds of hours and thousands of dollars securing medical cannabis permits and licenses” from the city, while simultaneously seeking property in the city where it could operate. Augustini’s suit on behalf of American Scientific claims that in March 2017 the city resolved to sell its public works yard, located at 17451 Raccoon Avenue, to generate revenue for infrastructure and to resolve a budgetary shortfall. On March 30, 2017, Augustini claims American Scientific offered to purchase the property and that C.B. Nanda on behalf of American Scientific and acting city manager Mike Milhiser on behalf of the city spent roughly three months negotiating the terms of a prospective sale “in an arms-length transaction.” Augustini maintains that on June 28, 2017, city officials told American Scientific it would sell the property for $1 million and that on July 13, 2017 the city accepted a written $1 million offer to purchase the property American Scientific had submitted on July 3, 2017. Augustini says a document setting out the agreement was signed by Nanda and Milhiser.
Curiously, in the suit, Augustini maintains that at that time the city had made no commitment to rezone the property to allow commercial cannabis-related activity there. Nevertheless, according to Augustini, on the strength of its agreement with the city to buy the property, American Scientific assigned its rights to AMN, LLC, a company affiliated with American Scientific Consultants, and entered into an agreement with Canniatric, LLC, a company which makes tinctures of cannabis, to have it operate out of the Raccoon Avenue property. Escrow papers prepared by Milhiser were signed by both the city and American Scientific, according to Augustini, and escrow on the sale opened. Over the next few months both parties thereafter undertook their respective due diligence with regard to the sale.
In August, the city council elevated community development director Gabriel Elliott to the post of city manager.
Kerr, Wright and Woodard, who were then the council’s controlling majority coalition, gave direction to Elliot to orchestrate the expansion of the city’s marijuana cultivation zone from 663.35 acres to 2,214.5 acres, which included the 17000 block of Raccoon Avenue, freeing American Scientific to proceed with its intended commercial cannabis activity. Elliott, who was not in favor of the zoning expansion just as he felt it ill-advised for the city to proceed with the sale of the public works yard, nevertheless acquiesced to the council majority’s instructions and facilitated the zoning change, arranging for the council to cast a confirming vote ratifying the zone change on September 8, 2017.
The council’s action changing the city’s zoning map increased significantly the value of the properties moved into the cultivation zone. Somewhat improbably, Augustini maintains that “American Scientific Consultants, LLC and C.B. Nanda had no involvement in or foreknowledge of defendant’s decision to expand the cultivation zone to include the subject property.”
On November 7, 2017, the FBI arrested Wright in accordance with an arrest warrant prepared by the U.S. Attorney’s Office alleging he had been using his position as a city councilman to facilitate city action in favor of would-be marijuana entrepreneurs seeking to set up businesses in Adelanto in exchange for bribes.
The day after Wright’s arrest, on November 8, the city council went into closed session during which Elliott had scheduled its members to come to a determination with regard to finalization of the sale of the public works yard. Without Wright present, the crucial third vote to support closing the sale of the public works yard to American Scientific was not provided, as councilman Ed Camargo, who had always been opposed to the marijuanization of Adelanto, along with councilman Charley Glasper opposed selling the property.
Just over six weeks later, on December 21, Augustini sued the City of Adelanto on behalf of American Scientific, alleging the city had breached an agreement to sell the city’s public works yard. In that legal action, Augustini is seeking for his client a judgment “for damages according to proof at trial but in no event less than $5,000,000 plus prejudgment interest at the legal rate.”
On March 28, Kerr and Woodard were able to convince Glasper that settling the suit and getting $1 million for the public works yard now is preferable to rolling the dice in fighting the suit and risking the loss of $5 million. A key element of the settlement was the $1-per-year leaseback arrangement contained within it that would allow the city to continue emergency communication and coordination operations out of one of the two buildings on the public works yard property, in which the emergency operations center was set up in 2011-12. The emergency operations center had been built into the site and outfitted through a $375,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security the city received expressly for that purpose in 2011. Acceptance of that grant required that the city commit to keeping the emergency operations center functioning for at least a decade. Closing the center would entail the city being required to refund the $375,000.
Apparently, however, American Scientific is concerned that allowing the city to monopolize the square footage within that building for emergency operations will limit the scope of the company’s intended operations, and for that reason does not want to accommodate the city presence there after taking possession of the building.
According to one well placed source within Adelanto City Hall, American Scientific is unwilling to pay the previously agreed-to $1 million for the building and is pressing to have the city honor Kerr’s offer to sell it for $700,000. Furthermore, the Sentinel is told, C.B. Nanda is unwilling to rent the space for the emergency operations center for $1 per year and wants to charge an amount in keeping with the price American Scientific is paying to acquire the property and what comparable lease rates in the area are.
So far, the city is unwilling to budge on the $1 million price and is insisting that the $1-per-year leaseback arrangement be put in place and honored for four years. Without those conditions being met by American Scientific, city officials are resolved to waging a defense of the lawsuit.

No Fan Of Rodriquez

I note that appointed Councilman Paul Rodriguez (who recently afforded himself the honorary title of “Doctor”) is seeking formal election to the Chino City Council seat he assumed some eight months ago, a rather remarkable ploy considering his recent reputation.
For those unfamiliar with the premise, Rodriguez is in the fast lane to potentially be the first Chino city councilman brought up on charges not only of violation of the Brown Act, but for the added charge of perjury.
Thus far, in the scant eight months he has been on the dais, Rodriguez has proven to me only four truths:
First, that he is not opposed to making anti-policy, predetermined decisions on matters requiring Council vote that are mandated to be debated in public before any decision is made and encouraging other Council members to join him;
Second, he feels no obligation to comply with a written request for records under the California Public Records Act and is willing to perjure himself as to the existence of the records being requested. (For a complete review of the issue and the hard, factual evidence of his illegal activities as presented by former mayor Larry Walker in the 12/19/17 Council meeting, see the Sentinel’s report of that meeting as published in the 12/30/17 edition, available online);
Third, that he believes it is his obligation in City Council meetings to engage in a self-serving, personal discourse that has no relationship whatsoever to the topic at hand (for that embarrassingly documented City Council moment, refer to the YouTube tape of the 12/19/17 Council meeting);
Fourth, that he feels completely justified in first ignoring and then rudely dismissing the urging of Mayor Eunice Ulloa to either end his oration or limit it to the topic at hand.
While Brown Act violation is not strictly an indictable charge, it calls into serious question not only the offenses committed by Rodriguez, but the judgment of the public officials (former mayor Dennis Yates and current councilmember Earl Elrod) who support Rodriguez’s election and sponsored a recent fundraiser. It might be suggested that Messrs. Yates and Elrod hitch themselves to a less wobbly wagon.

Alana Carson,
Chino

The Chino Hills City Council appears on track to ratify imposing the first of five annual eight percent water rate hikes at its May 8 meeting, the same day it will structure graduated water use penalties into its fee structure, which is intended to effectuate de facto water rationing on Chino Hills residents.
Using an intrusive formula which will require all households to declare the number of people living within each domicile and further subject every residence and accompanying yard in the city to aerial surveillance by which the intensity of vegetation irrigation will be monitored, the city is purposed to ensure that those residents/families which fail to adhere to the city’s water efficiency standards will be subjected to financial penalties. Based on meter readings and the data extrapolated from the monitoring of whether each household restricted water usage to the allotments deemed proper, customers will be billed for their per gallon usage according to a three tier paradigm.
A first tier will apply only to water usage within the house used for drinking, cooking, bathing, showering and toilet function. Water usage on that tier is prorated to the number of occupants in the home, with each person allowed to use 55 gallons per day.
The second tier pertains to outdoor usage, calibrated to the landscaped area of each individual house with a weather condition factor applied. It is in this arena that the aerial photographic data will be utilized. The formula being used has built-in favoritism toward the wealthier set, who can afford to live in homes with larger yards and more verdant landscaping. Those with more landscaping are allotted more water use at the lower rate, with a calculation that a typical lot will have one third of its area covered in vegetation. Homeowners will be able to utilize water sufficient to irrigate one third of their property. Water allotments for irrigation will flex higher during the months of July to September.
Those who go over that threshold will be categorized into a third tier, in which they will be charged a higher rate for their water use.
It has not been disclosed how the city intends to differentiate between water use inside homes as opposed to outside of the homes, although it has been suggested the city possesses some order of mechanism for doing just that..
City residents can lodge a protest against the rate hikes but the city will not be bound by those protests unless a majority of the property owners register resistance to the increases. The city does not anticipate that protest will meet the requisite threshold of 50 percent plus one of water customers lodging protests, and it is proceeding toward instituting the rate increases as of July 1.

Reversing what appeared to be momentum to reduce by half the scope of California’s newest and most controversial north-to-south water diversion plan, the governing board of the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California on Tuesday voted to take up the lion’s share of the cost of bringing the so-called California WaterFix to fruition.
Brought along with the April 10 vote are eight cities and communities in San Bernardino County which are members of the Metropolitan Water District alliance.
WaterFix is the proposed $17-billion project to re-engineer the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta and construct two massive tunnels through the massive estuary to facilitate the movement of water from the northern part of the Golden State to the south, where five-sevenths of California’s population lives. The tunnels were originally conceived as a joint project between cities and farms served by California’s federal and state north-south waterworks. The two primary participants consisted of the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California, a consortium of 26 Southern California communities/cities/water districts and the gargantuan agricultural Westlands Water District in Fresno and Kings counties.
WaterFix is a successor project to the Peripheral Canal concept, a succession of proposals dating from the 1940s to divert Sacramento River water around the edge of the San Joaquin-Sacramento River Delta, thus creating a canal that would transport fresh water from the Sacramento River and bypass the delta instead of going through it, for uses farther south. The peripheral canal was intended to resolve water quality issues brought on by the inrush of saltwater which occurred as the result of the previous importation of water from the southern end of the Delta into the San Joaquin Valley. This saltwater flow came about as a result of the high-power pumps obliterating the rather insubstantial boundary between freshwater and saltwater. In 1982, voters defeated a ballot initiative to build the then-current Peripheral Canal. The Peripheral Canal concept did not die, however, and over the years Senator Dianne Feinstein and former California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and then Governor Jerry Brown emerged as major supporters of more recent incarnations of the plan.
What originally was proposed to be two 25 mile tunnels from the Sacramento River at the northern end of the delta through the Delta to existing federal and state pumping stations near the southern extreme of the delta, through economic necessity, appeared to be on the brink of being reduced to a single tunnel last year. In September 2017, the Westlands Water District, a jurisdiction that covers more than 1,000 square miles of prime farmland in western Fresno and Kings Counties and as such is the largest agricultural water district in the United States, voted against joining the project, saying it simply did not have sufficient funding to participate. In October, the Metropolitan Water District board voted to make a $4.3 million buy-in to WaterFix. But given the $17-billion price tag to the two tunnel proposal, with funding sources drying up, it appeared as if the project would need to be scaled back. In February, the California Department of Water Resources gave indication that it was purposed to take the project on in stages, and would construct a single tunnel at a cost of about $11 billion.
Last month, the Los Angeles contingent of the Metropolitan Water District Alliance, hyperconscious that the city of Los Angeles is bearing a significant degree of the financial burden, expressed reluctance at sustaining the $4.3 billion commitment. The Los Angeles City Council voted to oppose the WaterFix project if the MWD was consigned to paying in excess of 47 percent of the $11 billion – i.e., $5.17 billion – in completing the one-tunnel version of the project or 26 percent – $4.42 billion – of the cost of the $17 billion two-tunnel project.
But among the other Metropolitan Water District board members – which consist of representatives from various water agencies in Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside, San Bernardino, San Diego and Ventura counties – there is concern that Los Angeles has institutional dibs on a major portion of the water the Metropolitan Water District obtains and that they need to act to ensure future water supplies now. Simultaneously, Governor Jerry Brown was engaged in an intensive round of lobbying to induce the board members to ensure the project is completed at the earliest possible date and to the two tunnel capacity originally envisioned.
In making his pitch, Brown asserted that Central Valley agricultural interests will eventually realize that the Northern California water is essential to their future viability and will come around with a significant portion of the yet-to-be-assured funding for the project. Conversely, Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti pressed all five members of the Metropolitan Water District board he appointed to hold the line, and not commit the funding Brown was requesting. One of those, John Murray Jr., who is the vice chairman of the Metropolitan Water District board, said the confidence the governor expressed that the growers and water districts in the San Joaquin Valley, in Bakersfield, Fresno and both Kern County and King County will sign on to the funding of the project is too optimistic. He said it was irresponsible in the extreme to commit the $11 billion without knowing if the remaining 35.3 percent of the funding would be forthcoming. The Los Angeles contingent asked for a delay on the vote until some order of commitment from the Central Valley water districts could be brokered.
Over the objection of Los Angeles, the vote proceeded and the board voted 27-10 to fund the two-tunnel project. Rarely does the Metropolitan Water District depart significantly from the wishes of the City of Los Angeles. Historically and in many other respects, the Metropolitan Water District is a creature of the City of Los Angeles and Los Angeles County, having been established in 1928 under an act of the California Legislature to build and operate the 242-mile Colorado River Aqueduct to Los Angeles. Despite Los Angeles’ considerable influence over the Metropolitan Water Agency, the Los Angeles City Council does not exercise direct control over the district, which is headed by its 37 member board.
The City of Pasadena in 1927 initiated the organization of the district by mailing to various cities in Southern California an invitation to submit to their citizens the proposition of joining the Metropolitan Water District. Twelve cities took Pasadena up on the offer and submitted the proposition to their voters, with voters in eleven cities electing to join the collective. Of the original eleven chartering cities, seven – Los Angeles, Pasadena, Santa Monica, San Marino, Beverly Hills, Glendale and Burbank – fell within Los Angeles County. Two – Anaheim and Santa Ana – were Orange County entities and two – San Bernardino and Colton – enclosed by San Bernardino County. In 1931, Compton, Fullerton, Long Beach and Torrance joined the Metropolitan Water District, tipping the balance of control of the district even more heavily in favor of Los Angeles and Orange counties. San Bernardino and Colton were participating as members under the impression and assurance that the route of the Colorado River Aqueduct would come across the Mojave Desert, down the Cajon Pass and through their jurisdictions. By the 1940s, however, the passage for the aqueduct was changed to bring it through the San Gorgonio Pass in Riverside County, while Orange County, serving in a proxy capacity for several of the other members, successfully sued San Bernardino over the amount of water it was going to receive as a consequence of the project. As a consequence, both San Bernardino and Colton withdrew from the Metropolitan Water District. At present, the Metropolitan Water District’s participating municipalities are the cities of Anaheim, Fullerton and Santa Ana in Orange County and the cities of Beverly Hills, Burbank, Compton, Glendale, Long Beach, Los Angeles, Pasadena, San Fernando, San Marino, Santa Monica and Torrance in Los Angeles County. Other agencies now participating in the Metropolitan Water District, which is sometimes referred to simply as Metropolitan or by its acronym MWD or as the Met, are the Calleguas Municipal Water District, which serves southern Ventura County and the northwestern part of the Greater Los Angeles Area; the Central Basin Municipal Water District, serving the City of Los Angeles and the City of Commerce; the Eastern Municipal Water District in Riverside County; the Foothill Municipal Water District in Pasadena; the Las Virgenes Municipal Water District in Calabasas in Los Angeles County, the Municipal Water District of Orange County; the San Diego County Water Authority; Three Valleys Municipal Water District, serving the Pomona, Walnut and eastern San Gabriel Valleys; the Upper San Gabriel Valley Municipal Water District, serving El Monte and the surrounding area; the West Basin Municipal Water District, serving 17 cities and unincorporated areas of Los Angeles County; the Western Municipal Water District of Riverside County; and the Inland Empire Utilities Agency, known by its acronym IEUA.
The Inland Empire Utilities Agency is a regional wastewater treatment agency and wholesale distributor of imported water to the various water agencies in southwestern San Bernardino County, covering the cities of Chino Hills, Chino, Montclair, Ontario, Upland, San Antonio Heights, Rancho Cucamonga, Guasti and adjacent unincorporated county areas. Some 875,000 people live within the service borders of the IEUA, which encompasses over 242 square miles. Among the services the agency is devoted to is treating wastewater, developing recycled water, local water resources, and conservation programs to reduce the region’s dependence on imported water supplies and drought-proof the service area.
Because a significant amount of the water imported into the southwestern corner of San Bernardino County comes through the Inland Empire Utilities Agency, that portion of San Bernardino County served by the Inland Empire Utilities Agency is within the Metropolitan Water District’s sphere of influence. San Benradino County’s sole representative on the Metropolitan Water District board is Michael Camacho, a resident of Rancho Cucamonga.

On April 10, the Broadway store at the Montclair Plaza was demolished. The Montclair Broadway was an original element of the Montclair Plaza when it opened in 1968 as the 26th of stores in the chain founded by Arthur Letts, Sr.
Montclair Plaza was a cutting edge shopping venue when it opened, fully enclosed and air conditioned. Broadway was considered an anchor tenant, and it was designed by architect Charles Luckman, who that same year completed the remodeling of Madison Square Garden and who had designed The Forum in Inglewood, completed the previous year. Many considered the Montclair Broadway to be the epitome of the Broadway brand, which had cachet as an upscale shopping venue.
The Montclair Broadway remained in place for 28 years, until 1996, when the entire chain passed into the hands of Federated Department Stores, which converted the majority of the Broadway locations, including Montclair, into Macy’s department stores. In 2007, Macy’s ditched the site for the space on the west end of the mall previously occupied by Robinson-May. The building had been vacant for over a decade, with its escalator, most of its display cases, its fixtures and appurtenances intact. Up until two months ago, well over $800,000 worth of equipment and material remained within it, ready for use by a tenant who never materialized.
According to corporate officers with the CIM Group, which bought the mall in 2014, AMC Theatres will erect what is described as a dine-in theater, featuring twelve screens within 55,000-square feet on the upper level of the new building, and restaurants within the 64,000 square feet of the lower level.
Demolition will not be completed until June, and construction on the theater complex is to begin in September. It is anticipated the AMC Theatre will open in time to accommodate the holiday movie crowd by Thanksgiving/Christmas 2019.

By Count Friedrich von Olsen
Our president has been under attack from shortly after he took office by operatives of the Democratic Party who have suggested, falsely in my view, that he and his campaign conspired with the Russian Government during the 2016 presidential campaign. I have prattled on before about how I do not believe any candidate for office is engaging in wrongdoing by trafficking in information from any source with regard to a political opponent’s behavior. I have also stated that I think our president is being unfairly maligned because he has moved on from the Cold War mentality that for half of a century left the United States at the nuclear brink and at economic/social and political loggerheads with Moscow, and how I believe Russia is at this stage a logical trading partner with the United States. Those are different issues than what has me animated this week…
In Syria last week, in or near the city of Douma,the government apparently made a chemical attack that extended to civilians. Shortly thereafter, our president used Twitter, which I understand is some kind of modern version of the teletype of my day that can be operated from the modern, newfangled smart phones that are at present all the rage, to send out this message, and I quote: “Many dead, including women and children, in mindless chemical attack in Syria. Area of atrocity is in lockdown and encircled by Syrian Army, making it completely inaccessible to outside world. President Putin, Russia and Iran are responsible for backing Animal Assad. Big price to pay. Open area immediately for medical help and verification. Another humanitarian disaster for no reason whatsoever. Sick!”
According to the Russian Foreign Ministry, reports of the chemical attack are a “hoax” and an “information attack.”
What is clear to me is that this establishes that our president is not in the pocket of Russian leader Vladimir Putin…
I do not expect the Democrats to like Donald Trump. I understand they have some legitimate political differences with him. I expect them to push hard for their own agenda. I wish they would play fair and not engage in false and opportunistic lies to achieve their ends…

False wireworms are the larvae of darkling beetles, which include the desert stink beetle, known scientifically as eleodes hispilabris. They are also referred to as pinacate beetles or clown beetles. Eleodes, derived from the Greek term for “olivelike” describes the general body shape and jet black coloration. Darkling is a common name applied to several genera and over 1,400 species within the family Tenebrionidae. Pinacate comes from the Aztec pinacatl, for “black beetle.” Stinkbug refers to the malodorous secretion emitted from the insect’s rear end. Clown beetle alludes to the habit of these beetles to do a “headstand” when threatened.
Upon being threatened, these beetles will race about and point their hindquarters at the object perceived as a threat and attempt to spray it with a foul-smelling secretion produced in the bug’s glands. Some can spray as far away as 18 inches. The spray does not wash off and can linger for hours.
When walking, pinacate beetles move with their front ends lowered and their rears raised. Their bodies are ovate to oblong, ranging in size between 0.4 and 1.4 inches long, and they are jet black or occasionally dark brown. They may be smooth or rough, and elongate or robust. The head is prominent and slightly narrowed behind the eyes. A few varieties have hair-like structures and what looks like a tail, which is actually elongated wings. Like all insects, they have six legs. Most species have antennae with eleven segments. Adults have five tarsal segments on the first two pairs of legs and only four tarsal segments on the third pair. The thickened, leathery wing covers may be ridged, smooth or granulate and protect the delicate flight wings, which in any case are fused together so the adults can’t fly.
They occur across ecosystems from open dunes to shrubs to mountains. The greatest diversity of the largest and smelliest occur in the deserts. The greatest overall diversity occurs in scrub and mountain regions. The beetles are often found under logs or in other detritus.
Most animals avoid contact with Eleodes due to the insect’s ability to produce its malodorous secretion. Grasshopper mice, however, get around this problem by grabbing the beetle, jamming its behind into the sand, and eating it head first. Other predators include burrowing owls, loggerhead shrikes and skunks.
Active year round, pinacate beetles are crepuscular and nocturnal (active at twilight, night and early sunrise) from spring to autumn. In fall, they revert to a more diurnal lifestyle. Pinacate beetles are one of the great walkers of the desert beetle world and are often encountered, seemingly wandering aimlessly. Studies have shown that they are probably in search of food, which they find by odor. Primarily, they consume detritus of grasses and forbs.
The larvae of certain Eleodes species are known as false wireworms, and they are a pest of some commercial crops in the Midwest, such as the seeds and seedlings of wheat, sorghum, all oilseeds including canola and linola, grain legumes and cereals, particularly in light, draining soils with a high organic content.
False wireworms overwinter as partially grown larvae or adults. Adults become active in the spring and lay their eggs in the soil. Larvae from these eggs hatch and mature by the end of the summer. A second egg-laying period occurs late in the summer. These eggs hatch and the partially grown larvae from this second generation will overwinter along with the surviving adults. The larvae feed on seeds, roots and underground stems of their hosts. With wheat, they usually attack the seed before germination.
From Wikipedia, commons.wikimedia.org, Orkin.com, https://entomology.k-state.edu/ and desertusa.com

We all know dressing up is coordinated to weather, and right now is all about peeping. You see color popping up everywhere and the days are looking sunnier ahead. With that said, this week the attention is to the foot. Yes, the peep toe shoe couldn’t be more appropriate for the changing weather, which is going to be a major player with regard to fun and daily fashion. You can bet the peeping shoe is going to replace the ballet flat, if even just for a minute. They come in daytime comfort styles and, yes, if you’re going out, some of the heels have some creative looks, too. The peep toe foot piece is a neat trend. Therefore, be sure not to pass it up. My personal favorite are the peep toe mules. They are available in flat, block heel, and high heel mules. The peep toe shoe has definitely been updated, and there are many creative styles to choose from out there. Peeping the toe is definitely a statement to the feet and can look fabulous with your current spring and coming summer wardrobe. Get ready to show off your latest pedicure too while peeping.

“The secret of toe cleavage, a very important part of the sexuality of the shoe, is you must only show the first two cracks.”
-Manolo Blahnik