By Mark Gutglueck
A recently released audit of the San Bernardino City Unified School District’s expenditures on contracted services offers at least a partial insight on what was at the root of the discontent among some of the members of the school board with now-departing Superintendent Doc Ervin that manifested last year and came to a crescendo earlier this year, resulting in his resignation.
Last year, Ervin was lured away from the Bakersfield City School District, where he was the superintendent there, to take the helm at San Bernardino City Unified in the aftermath of former Superintendent Dale Marsden’s 2020 exit. Ervin was hired and initially embraced by virtually the entirety of the school board and the district’s senior faculty based upon his aggressive and dedicated efforts to boost academic achievement among students, particularly as the district was lagging well behind the average level of scholastic achievement as determined through districtwide student performance on California’s Standardized Testing and Reporting program. Continue reading →

More than four-and-a-half years after he was arrested by the FBI, Former Adelanto City Councilman Jermaine Wright on June 22 was found guilty by a jury on federal criminal charges that he accepted a $10,000 cash bribe and that he hired a man to burn down his restaurant so he could fraudulently collect hundreds of thousands of dollars in insurance proceeds.
Wright, 46, of Riverside, was found guilty late Wednesday afternoon of one count of bribery involving an entity receiving federal funds and one count of attempted arson of a building affecting interstate commerce. Wright was remanded into federal custody following the verdict’s announcement. Continue reading →

Redlands has joined with the cities of Chino and Colton in imposing a temporary moratorium on the further construction of warehouses in San Bernardino County.
In October, Chino placed a 45-day moratorium on property readily available and properly zoned for warehousing, which lies primarily within the city’s southwest triangle formed by Monte Vista and Chino avenues, the northeast corner of Yorba and Schaefer avenues and the southwest corner of Chino and Central avenues.
In May 2021, Colton slapped a temporary, 45-day ban on warehouse development in that 16.04-square mile city, subsequently extending the ban to a full year.
One source, unverified by the Sentinel, holds that there are 3,013 warehouses in San Bernardino County Continue reading →

Notice is hereby given pursuant to
Sections 3071 of the Civil Code of the tate of California the undersigned will sell the following vehicle(s) at lien sale at said address below on: 07/08/2022 09:00 AM
Year of Car / Make of Car / Vehicle ID No. / License No. (State)
2015 HONDA 19XFB2F55FE223220 7JQB569 CA
To be sold by AIR EXPRESSWAY TOWING 17435 CATALPA STREET HESPERIA CA 92345
Said sale is for the purpose of satisfying lien for together with costs of advertising and expenses of sale.
Published in the San Bernardino County Sentinel on June 24, 2022.

Notice is hereby given pursuant to
Sections 3071 of the Civil Code of the State of California the undersigned will sell the following vehicle(s) at lien sale at said address below on: 07/08/2022 09:00 AM
Year of Car / Make of Car / Vehicle ID No. / License No. (State)
2017 BMW WBA4U7C57H5D42744 8PJL436 CA
To be sold by AIR EXPRESSWAY TOWING 17435 CATALPA STREET HESPERIA CA 92345
Said sale is for the purpose of satisfying lien for together with costs of advertising and expenses of sale.
Published in the San Bernardino County Sentinel on June 24, 2022.

Notice is hereby given pursuant to
Sections 3071 of the Civil Code of the State of California the undersigned will sell the following vehicle(s) at lien sale at said address below on: 07/08/2022 09:00 AM
Year of Car / Make of Car / Vehicle ID No. / License No. (State)
2005 HYUNDAI 3H3V532C65T098027 4TC6457 CA
To be sold by LUIS TOWING & TRANSPORT, LLC 15995 CERES AVE FONTANA CA 92335 Continue reading →

     Former Adelanto City Councilman Jermaine Wright was found guilty by a jury of federal criminal charges for accepting a $10,000 cash bribe and hiring a man to burn down his restaurant so he could fraudulently collect hundreds of thousands of dollars in insurance proceeds, the Justice Department announced today.

      Wright, 46, of Riverside, was found guilty late Wednesday afternoon of one count of bribery of programs receiving federal funds and one count of attempted arson of a building affecting interstate commerce. Wright was remanded into federal custody following the verdict’s announcement. Continue reading →

Below is a PDF of the June 17 edition of the San Bernardino County Sentinel.

The official conclusion of this year’s election that resulted in the reelection of five countywide incumbents was not in compliance with the county’s charter, two lawsuits filed last week contend.
According to a lawsuit filed by Robert Conaway on his own behalf and another Conaway filed on behalf of sheriff candidate Cliff Harris, San Bernardino County’s charter, as adjusted ten years ago in 2012, requires that the five countywide positions elected in the years corresponding with California’s gubernatorial elections – sheriff, district attorney, treasure/tax collector/auditor controller, assessor/county clerk and county superintendent of schools – are to be held in the November general election. According to Conaway’s and Harris’s suits, the county’s practice of declaring a candidate for any of those five offices to be Continue reading →

There is concern among both San Bernardino Mayor John Valdivia’s constituents and his political supporters that a significant amount of the more than $850,000 he amassed into his electioneering fund is being diverted to what will eventually become his personal use.
Valdivia, who has held elective office since 2012 following his 2011 election to the city council and who has been the mayor of what is both San Bernardino County’s largest city and its county seat since 2018, has himself contemplated being, and been considered by others as, a potential candidate for higher office, such as U.S. Congressman or a position in the California legislature. On June 7, however, he finished in third place for reelection as mayor, an event which instantaneously transformed him into a lame duck. Moreover, the nature of his loss and the events surrounding him and what led up to his defeat knells, a large number of the county’s more sophisticated political observers have indicated, the end of his viability as a politician, at least locally. Continue reading →