For the fourth time in less than three months, Fontana Mayor Acquanetta Warren has sustained a solid blow that threatens to lessen or even expunge her once preeminent position among the region’s local political leaders.
Having staked her reputation as the champion of warehouse construction in the Inland Empire by welcoming, since she became mayor in 2010, virtually every proposal to construct logistics facilities and distribution centers anywhere in the 43.07-square mile, 214, 307-population city she leads, she saw the tables turn drastically against her with the revelation that of the 168 warehouses in Fontana, 83 of them, or more than 49 percent, are out of compliance with the South Coast Air Quality Management District’s Rule 2305, also known as its Warehouse Indirect Source Rule.
Rule 2305 pertains to excessive nitrogen oxide and diesel particulate matter emissions from those warehouses.
Throughout her tenure as mayor, Warren has insisted that warehouse construction represents an economic and social boon to Fontana, in that the building of warehouses constitutes easy “economic advancement” for the community, which allows those with capital to acquire or tie up property and quickly convert the land into logistics facilities consisting of tilt-up buildings, thereby generating fast money and investment in the local economy. She has been so aggressive in accommodating warehouses that she has become known by those who both oppose and favor warehouse development as “Warehouse Warren.” Continue reading →

The recent focus by Yucaipa municipal officials on revamping the city’s standards and protocols relating to the conversion of the city’s existing mobilehome parks into different land uses is being interpreted in many quarters of the city as part of City Manager Chris Mann’s strategy to facilitate development in the city at a pace than has historically been the case.
In particular, among residents of the city’s 41 mobilehome parks, there is concern that City Hall is clearing the way for the development industry to, in essence, shutter a significant number of the city’s trailer parks and transform those properties into residential subdivisions.
In 2016, city officials adjusted the Yucaipa General Plan and its specified policy with regard to maintaining existing mobile home parks or converting them to some other use, while putting in place a third mobilehome park overlay district. Concomitantly, the city cataloged seven of the city’s threadbare mobile home parks as antiquated, thereby offering to facilitate the reuse of the properties for other purposes.
At the Yucaipa Planning Commission meeting on September 6, the commission took up an item “proposing amendments to streamline the review process initially developed as part of Ordinance 344 [passed by the city council in 2016]… establishing mobilehome park conversion standards to comply with the city’s housing element.” Continue reading →