(October 17) Opposition to Measure C, the five percent utility tax proposal being put forth by the city of  Grand Terrace, has formed.
The group, headed by Doug Wilson, Jeffrey McConnell and Mark Jolstead, have created a website and are undertaking an informational campaign aimed at convincing the voters in 12,040 population Grand Terrace, the third smallest of the county’s 24 cities, that the tax is unnecessary and that judicious budget cuts in city operations, including reductions in what the group characterizes as overly generous salaries and benefits to the city’s remaining workers, will stave off the financial crisis city officials claim justifies their call for the tax.
Calling Measure C a “business killing tax,” the group charged the city with both “scare tactics” and a disingenuous and selective presentation of data in its try to convince the city’s residents that the municipal budget needs to be supplemented with more taxpayer money.
“We believe we should live within our means and not spend more than we have,” the group’s web site states. “We don’t want the politicians and bureaucrats at City Hall threatening us and our families with closing our parks and senior center to bully us into spending more of our hard earned paychecks to help supplement theirs. We know there is another way and the ‘Yes On Measure C’ people refuse to tell voters there are other options. We have more than one option to this 5% utility tax.”
The group said the prime movers behind the tax measure are a relatively limited set of people, led by Grand Terrace Mayor Walt Stanckiewitz and councilman Bernardo Sandoval.
“There are two councilmen and their troops walking door to door telling the people that our city is going to close down if you don’t vote for this tax,” the web site states. “They are lying to their constituents that they took an oath to represent. This city will not disincorporate nor will it become Colton. This has been a nasty, untrue rumor fed to the people by these two guys verbally at council meetings and through their interviews in the newspapers over the last several years.”
The process for disincorporation is far more involved and complicated than the tax proponents have suggested, the tax opponents insist.
“Disincorporation is an option that the people of Grand Terrace will never vote for,” the web site states. “It was made clear in the April 2013 council meeting by the Local Agency Formation Commission representative that no city has ever disincorporated unwillingly in California’s history. The Local Agency Formation Commission also made clear in the September 24, 2013 council meeting that it is a years-long process and that it must go before we the people, the voters, with a 2/3 vote to disincorporate. Plus, disincorporation does not wipe out our debt. We must also at the same time that we are voting to disincorporate vote to tax ourselves to pay off our long term debt that our previous politicians and bureaucrats have so graciously left us with.”
Those in opposition to the tax say city officials are making misrepresentations to justify the tax.
“We can operate as an ‘independent’ city without this tax,” the web site states. “The political action committee that is run by Mayor Stankiewitz and his faithful sidekick Sandoval keeps saying ‘Pass this tax to keep Grand Terrace independent.’ Once again they are trying to deceive you into thinking we will disincorporate if the tax fails.”
Instead of burdening its businesses and residents with the utility tax, the city should instead “cut the budget” and outsource for certain services, the tax opponents say.
“Our very own city manager, who makes more than $200,000 in salary & benefits in this 12,000+ city, has prepared several budget cut scenarios in case the tax measure fails,” the web site states. “Each one shows that we can live within our means. We don’t agree with their choice of cuts… but since this information was presented to the council…..then why are a couple of them telling the people we have no choice? The council already passed a budget resolution that keeps us in the black if the tax should fail.”
The web site states, “City Hall will be open only 2 days a week. That’s great! Why has City Hall always believed that this little city needs a full time, fully staffed City Hall? How often do you have to go to our ‘business unfriendly’ City Hall? If you did visit….ever have to wait in line? Ever see anyone else other than you in the lobby? When this city was founded in 1978 the city was run as a ‘contract city’ for many years. We were a member of ‘Contract Cities of California.’ In other words, we contracted almost all of our services out. We contracted with experienced people, other municipalities and organizations to do our work.  We ran a very tight ship on a very small budget. The redevelopment agency big bucks came along and as the city budget grew so did the city bureaucracy. But now Governor Jerry Brown shut down all the California redevelopment agencies and Grand Terrace now has a $735,000 budget shortfall, not $1.1 million or even a $1.5 million as some councilmen want you to believe. We lived without the redevelopment money before and we can do it again! Our tax base is much higher than it was in 1978.”
By shrinking the size of government, those opposed to the tax assert, problems that loom large in Grand Terrace will redress themselves.
“How many of the current employees will stick around for a 2 day a week job?” the web site continues. “When they leave, replace them with contract employees! This is your ‘golden opportunity’ to stop the fat salaries at City Hall. All you have to do is to vote no on November 5th. If you don’t, you will be stuck paying their high salaries as well as the $8 million in unfunded pensions that we still have to pay for. And it will continue to grow. This is what’s bankrupting San Bernardino, Stockton, Vallejo and other cities across America. Stop feeding the monster now! If you don’t stop them now…the monster will continue to grow and the bureaucrats will be back to ask for more money just like the Colton Joint Unified School District did when they asked us to pass a second bond measure for our already approved new high school. Colton School District is at it again! They are currently trying to extort more money from all youth groups that use any portion of the school campuses or sports fields or the district will kick them out.”
McConnell told the Sentinel that Stanckiewitz and other city officials are exploiting the consideration that Grand Terrace is “filled with soccer moms and dads. Youth sports are a big part of this community. The politicians are threatening to close the city parks and take away the playing fields if we don’t vote for this tax. It’s a bullying tactic. It is a scare tactic.”
The tax opponents say the threat of having Colton subsume the city is a similar scare tactic. “We love our law enforcement and safe community. We don’t want to end up one day contracting with Colton Police just because they may be less expensive,” the web site states.
Stanckiewitz disputed much of what the anti-tax group said, asserting “It is easy to make blanket statements. We have answered their allegations with facts, yet they continue to spread rumors and inaccurate information.
“As far as the allegation that [city manager] Betsy Adams is overpaid,” Stanckiewitz continued, we completed a survey of fifty cities in the Riverside/San Bernardino County region on total compensation for city managers.  Betsy is ranked 39th out of 50 in total compensation.  That equates to the bottom third of the cities.  This information was obtained from municipal records available to the public.”
Stanckiewitz insisted that instituting a tax was the least expensive and most sensible way for Grand Terrace to maintain its identity as a community.
“We do not think the city will opt to disincorporate either,” he said. “It requires a 2/3 vote of the registered voters and would cost the property owners much more in property tax assessments than the utility tax is asking for.  Some residents would like to go back to county control, but that alternative comes with a steep price tag.  We have had the Local Agency Formation Commission representative out to two council meetings to explain the process.  It is not a pretty picture.”

(October 17) A divided Upland City Council this week passed a resolution calling upon the U.S. Congress to approve a Constitutional amendment limiting the amount of money corporations can contribute to political campaigns.
At its September 23 meeting, the city council heard from members of Common Cause and other local political reform advocates who appealed to the council to join in a nationwide effort to limit the influence of money on the political process.
While a number of laws and reforms have been instituted over the years – including the Federal Election Campaign Act of 1971, the California Political Reform Act of 1974, the Federal Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002 and a campaign finance limitation ordinance passed by the Upland City Council last year that was revamped earlier this year  – those efforts ran into a serious challenge as the result of a Supreme Court Decision that equates the provision of campaign money with free speech.
A group, Citizens United, which sought to be able to utilize money available to it from a disparate number of sources, including private donors, political action committees and corporations, to produce and broadcast films, including movies and documentaries advocating for and against the election or reelection of certain candidates on a national level, brought suit to reaffirm its right to do so. In that suit, Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, the United States Supreme Court in 2010 held in a 5-4 decision that the First Amendment prohibits the government from restricting independent political expenditures by corporations, associations, or labor unions.
Advocates of campaign contribution limits were undeterred by that sharply divided ruling of the highest court in the land. Further strengthened by a dissenting opinion authored by Justice John Paul Stevens that stated, “A democracy cannot function effectively when its constituent members believe laws are being bought and sold,” those advocates, including Common Cause, are undertaking an effort to convince Congress to add an amendment to the U.S. Constitution that would render moot the Supreme Court’s 2010 decision.
On September 23, the Upland City Council voted 4-1, with councilman Brendan Brandt dissenting, to have the city attorney draft a resolution calling upon Congress to effectuate enforceable campaign spending limits by instilling into the U.S. Constitution, through the amendment process, the right to impose campaign donation and spending limits.
For several months now, activists have been approaching local governmental officials, calling upon them to pass resolutions asking Congress for the Constitutional amendment. Prior to Upland’s action this week, 46 city councils in California’s 407 cities had passed such resolutions.
Undoing the Supreme Court’s enabling of unfettered campaign donations is of particular relevance in Upland. Previously, the city council had enacted an ordinance applicable to city campaigns that set the maximum contribution candidates were allowed to receive from any individual, organization or entity to $2,000 per two-year election cycle.
In April, the city council revised that campaign contribution limit ordinance downward, reducing the maximum contribution candidates are allowed to receive from any single donor to $1,000 per election.
City officials collectively expressed the view that such limitations were needed to prevent big money and special interests from having undue influence over the political and governmental process. In Upland, the issue of political influence is of special sensitivity because of the city’s recent travail with former mayor John Pomierski, who dominated the city politically for a decade, utilizing hefty campaign contributions to keep himself in office and ward off any political challenges. Simultaneously, Pomierski was soliciting bribes and utilizing his position at City Hall to ensure project and permit approval from the city’s planning and community development divisions, its planning commission and council for his cronies, his political contributors and those paying him graft money. He was indicted by a federal grand jury, was convicted last year and is now serving his sentence in a federal institution.
The council this week considered two resolution drafts prepared by the city attorney. Two Upland citizens, Mary Lou Williams and Curt Lewis, as well as the Southern California  organizer for Common Cause, John  Smith, who had come before the city council on  September 23 to ask the council to pass the resolution supporting Congressional action in adopting a Constitutional amendment establishing campaign contribution limits were on hand October 14 to reiterate that call. Lewis noted that over $7 billion in political contributions had been made at all levels of government in the 2012 election year.
Prior to voting to endorse the most strongly worded of the two resolutions authored by the city attorney, the council discussed the advisability, practicality and propriety of having the city council, on behalf of Upland and its citizens, directly petition Congress for any action in general or particular.
Councilman Brendan Brandt, while maintaining he was not opposed to the underlying intent of establishing and maintaining campaign contribution limits, said “I don’t believe we as a city council should set a precedent of recommending amendments to the U.S. Constitution. From my perspective, you potentially set a dangerous course when you take on federal issues. I have voted in favor of every campaign finance and ethics [law] in the city of Upland but if we deal with this outside our jurisdiction, we don’t have money for that. If we [vote for the resolution],  when  every group that comes in here wants a resolution against Row vs. Wade or Obamacare, we are not going to have a defense of ‘the city doesn’t get involved in those things.’ I will write my Congressman or Senator or the Supreme Court, but I think we have set upon a slippery slope when groups come down here and ask our city attorney to spend time on things we don’t have money for. I don’t think the city council should be involved in asking for amendments to the U.S. Constitution.”
Councilman Glenn Bozar, upon whose motion on September 23 the council directed the city attorney to draft a resolution, cited the $7 billion Lewis had referenced, and said that people of all political stripe were asking “When is this going to stop? This is a genuine concern about what is going on with this country. I don’t have a problem taking a stand on this on behalf of my city or its citizens. If a poll was taken about money and how it is corrupting the political process, there is going to be a supermajority that believe this. I think we should let Congress know how we stand on it.”
Councilwoman Debby Stone said “We have to do something. We have to stop the money somewhere. If this will help them do that, I am in favor of it.”
Councilman Gino Filippi, who previously supported the drafting of the resolution, made clear he has reconsidered and that he was in the Citizens United camp as opposed to being on Common Cause’s side. The scion of a local winemaking family who had used his family’s wealth to launch his successful political career and fund his run for council, Filippi said, “I treasure my ability to invest my own money in my campaign and I’ve been criticized for that.  Upland has the strictest campaign finance restrictions perhaps of all of the neighboring cities.” He indicated he would abide by the campaign finance regulations that are already in place but would not support restricting any further limiting the ability of those who want to donate to the candidates of their choice from being involved in the political process.
The council voted 3-1 to pass the resolution, with Mayor Ray Musser, Bozar and Stone prevailing over Filippi, who voted against it. Brandt abstained.

(October 17) YUCCA VALLEY— Yucca Valley Town Clerk Lesley Copeland has declared the recall effort against town councilmen Robert Lombardo and George Huntington unsuccessful, citing an insufficient number of valid signatures on the filed recall petitions seeking a vote to remove the two from office.
Nevertheless, the leader of the recall drive has contested that finding and is now working with the San Bernardino County Registrar of Voters to ascertain whether Copeland acted properly in disqualifying over 450 of the signatures endorsing Huntington’s removal from office and just under 450 signatures calling for Lombardo’s recall.

Ron Cohen

Ron Cohen led a contingent of some two dozen activists intent on reform at Town Hall. There zeal hit a critical mass after the council voted in February to increase then-town manager Mark Nuaimi’s salary and benefit package to just under $300,000 per year and extend that contract to 2016. All four of those who voted for Nuaimi’s contract came in for criticism, including the mayor, Merle Abel, and councilwoman Dawn Rowe, Lombardo and Huntington. Cohen and his cohorts decided to concentrate their recall efforts against Lombardo and Huntington, who had been reelected to the council without opposition in November 2012, and seek to remove Abel and Rowe when they come up for reelection in 2014.
The recall committee began gathering signatures for the Lomabardo and Huntington recalls in late April. That drive entailed door-to-door canvassing, as well as signature gathering in public areas such as in retail centers and on street corners.

George Huntington

In the case of both Huntington and Lombardo, the recall petitions had to be endorsed with the valid signatures of 2,461 voters residing within the town of Yucca Valley to force the recall vote. Recall proponents insist they carefully screened the signees and, in the case of Huntington, turned in petitions containing 2,712 signatures, and in the case of Lombardo 2,720.
Upon examining the petitions and the signatures, Copeland concluded 458 signatures on the Huntington petition were invalid and 448 on the Lombardo petition were invalid. Thus, according to Copeland, the Huntington petition contained 2,264 valid signatures and the Lombardo petition contained 2,272 valid signatures.
“Each petition needed 2,461 valid signatures to qualify for a recall election,” according to Copeland. “Because of the insufficient number of valid signatures, the current recall process of Robert Lombardo and George Huntington is considered complete.”
Cohen, however, did not take that lying down and he approached County Registrar of Voters Michael Scarpello to demand that Copeland’s processing of the petitions be double-checked. Accordingly, Cohen had sojourned from Yucca Valley to the county seat on October 11 and, after a three day hiatus over the weekend and the Columbus Day Holiday, again on October 15 to carry out a thorough analysis of all of the petition signatures deemed by Copeland as “unvalidated.” When he spoke with the Sentinel on the evening of October 15, Cohen said he intended to return to the registrar’s office in San Bernardino on October 16, 17 and 18.
“I am working every day, from 8 to 5, going over every single unvalidated signature, making sure they are in fact unvalidated,” Cohen said. He said that he has demonstrated to the registrar’s satisfaction that many of the signatures Copeland had disqualified were in fact valid.
“I would rather not disclose at this point how many,” Cohen said. “The ROV has already admitted there are some anomalies. We won’t know how many until we’re done. We will be completed on George tomorrow [Wednesday, October 16] and then we will move on to Dr. Lombardo.”
Cohen told the Sentinel that Copeland, in her original consultation with the registrar, had invalidated the  458 signatures on the Huntington petitions and the 448 signatures on the Lombardo petitions on multiple grounds, including claims that the signees either were not registered to vote, were registered improperly or the addresses at which they were registered were misreported; discrepancies with regard to whether signees actually lived within the Yucca Valley town limits or whether they resided in the unincorporated county area just outside town, a confusion that came about because both areas share the 92284 zip code; that some signers signed more than once; that some signers signed without an address or used a post office box as opposed to a physical address; that some signers’ signatures did not match the signature on the voters’ registration cards; and that some of the signers had withdrawn or rescinded their signatures.
Cohen said that as he has steadily gone through the rejected signature petitions with the registrar staff, previously unvalidated signatures have been proven to be valid.
For example, he said, some of the signers determined by Copeland to not be properly registered or at addresses not recognized actually lived in newly constructed homes where previously addresses for them had not existed and were thus not recognized by the town even though they were valid. Another example he gave were signatures discarded because Copeland had deemed them to be repeat signatures from the same person when in fact they were different signatures of different individuals living at the same address.
Cohen told the Sentinel that there were not a significant number of signatures that were thrown out because they did not match the signatures on file with the registrar.
The issue of recissions or withdrawals is not a major one, Cohen said. “In each case it is 26 or less,” Cohen said. On September 9, prior to Cohen’s group turning the petitions over to Copeland, a court action he had previously filed, M. Ronald Cohen v. Town of Yucca Valley, San Bernardino Superior Court Case No. CIVDS1310686, had a hearing before Judge Bryan Foster.  Cohen, who had anticipated that the town would seek to invalidate large numbers of the petitions because anti-recall advocates were out actively seeking recissions from those who had signed the recall petitions, was represented by attorneys Cristyl Meyers and Matthew Pappas. Meyers and Pappas obtained an emergency court order from Foster that the town of Yucca Valley was to immediately provide Cohen with the total number of written requests received by the town to remove signatures from the recall petitions.
Cohen said he believed it possible that Copeland’s disqualification of the recall will be overturned.
“We do not have to prove that every one of the signatures thrown out are valid,” Cohen said. “In the case of George Huntington, we need to reverse the town clerk’s finding on 197 of the signatures.  In Dr. Lombardo’s case, we need to reverse the town clerk’s finding on 189 of the signatures. The recall is not over and it will not be over until the amounts of signatures that are truly unvalidated are determined.”

(October 17) By Ruth Musser-Lopez
The opportunities for converting historic structures to modern uses are only limited by one’s imagination.  Privatizing or leasing out space in a publicly owned structure may prove to be a very suitable way to finance a regular maintenance strategy, and in so doing can stabilize and extend the life of the historic property.  Though not a comprehensive list, here are some more ideas for reusing historic structures with the focus on San Bernardino County’s railroad depots.
One grand ATSF depot recently restored and reused lays at what was historically a critical juncture of San Bernardino County’s rail system. Barstow’s   “Casa de Desierto,” is a 1910-1913 hybridized 16th century Spanish/Southwest American Indian style depot and Harvey House designed by talented Mary Colter.  Like the El Garces in Needles, looters had plundered the delicate fixtures and features of Desierto and vagrants also trashed the once magnificent building.  The city of Barstow acquired, restored and reopened it in 1999, rented out space and it became  home to the Route 66 Mother Road Museum and the Western American Railroad Museum.
The Kelso Clubhouse and Restaurant is the 1920s Los Angeles and Salt Lake Railroad depot in Kelso designed after the Mission Revival and Colonial Revival architectural style.  It was also deteriorating in the 1980s but was restored, then reopened in 2005 and now serves as the East Mojave Headquarters and Visitor Center for the National Park Service (more info at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kelso_Depot).          Built in 1937 by ATSF, the depot in Downtown Upland’s historic district is a handsome, but modest version of the Mission Revival style.  Currently, this “gentleman” is reused as the “Cigar Exchange” and the location of Pacific Wine Merchants, which caters to a clientele that includes foot traffic from the adjacent Metrolink station.
In Redlands, a more “feminine” looking Santa Fe depot was built around 1910, restored, maintained and now reused, in part, as the Rose of Sharon hair and beauty salon.
The Santa Fe depot in Etiwanda appears to have a bright future.  Currently sitting idle, it has been fenced off for protection and is located within the immediate area of a historic district actively being restored and reused by the Rancho Cucamonga community. The integrity of a historic structure’s architecture and style is dependent upon using “in kind” materials for replacement or restoration and this applies to the landscape and outdoor setting as well.  The district acts as a sort of outdoor historic building museum preserve within the traditional Etiwanda Historic district.   Historic structures are relocated to the “preserve” when they would otherwise be razed in the path of “improvements” and new community developments.
Hopes are great for restoration and reuse of the Etiwanda Depot, given the enthusiasm of the Etiwanda Historical Society.
A previous “Glimpse” column mentioned the availability of tax incentives and grants set aside for the preservation of cultural properties.   Restoration with “in kind” replacements is typically a prerequisite of such historic preservation grants.

(October 17) Many of us who watched cartoons from the 50’s to the 80’s, remember Wile E. Coyote always being outsmarted by the Road Runner! That bird was just so fast, and ran circles around that wild dog!  The Greater Roadrunner, Geococcyx californianus, is known to run 17-24 miles an hour on land, and is the fastest running bird that can fly (but only for a short period of time, sometimes just seconds).
Preferring to sprint rather then fly, this species was nicknamed the Ground Cuckoo because it made a habit of running along paths in front of horse drawn carriages!  Being a member of the Cuckoo family, known for their curiosity, they won’t hesitate approaching humans.  The male roadrunner’s low dove-like coos in a descending pitch are quite attractive to the female roadrunners, along with a preet-preet call.  Adding to its odd behavior, the male also performs a unique courtship, wagging its tail while bowing and tempting the female with a morsel of lizard or snake dangling from his beak.
Even though this bird prefers arid deserts and chaparrals in the Southwestern United States, we see the roadrunner in the San Bernardino Mountains at Wildhaven Ranch. To find cover while hunting, they can also be found in grasslands, brush habitat and at the edges of woodlands in Southern California.
The head, neck, back and wings are dark brown-black, heavily streaked with white, while the breast is mostly white. Its eyes are bright yellow with a barely seen streak of bare blue and red skin surrounding the eye. His crest of black feathers can be raised or lowered for necessary displays to allure intruders away from nests, or simply to make a statement!  The greater roadrunner is about 20-24 inches in length with a 32 inch wingspan, and it can alternate with several shallow rapid wing beats with long glides if flushed from a bush or crossing obstacles.
While the male collects the nest materials of sticks, grass, feathers, snakeskin or dung; the female builds most of the construction in low trees, in a bush or a cactus about 2 1/2 feet off the ground. Their diet varies from insects, spiders, lizards, snakes, small birds to small mice.  Scanning for prey as they walk rapidly, they ascend on their target with great gusto, and may jump in the air to catch an insect!  After capturing a small rodent, they will deftly smash the head against a rock and swallow it whole, many times its prey left hanging out of its mouth while being digested!   Their lifespan is 7 to 8 years, a long time considering that their predators are species of hawks, skunks, raccoons, cats, and yes, coyotes!
Quite the character, the greater roadrunner is important to the ecosystem by eliminating pests like mice and poisonous insects. Both predator and prey, this valuable bird helps balance our natural environment while captivating humans by their comical antics in the wild!  Recalling again the absurdly complex contraptions and elaborate plans to pursue his quarry, Wile E. Coyote never did get his Road Runner, while the latter would “beep-beep” out of grasp.
Hopefully, we can continue to conserve the habitat for this funny, unusual and special cuckoo bird!
Wildhaven Ranch is a wildlife sanctuary in the San Bernardino Mountains specializing in educating the public about one of our natural resources, wildlife, in our ecosystem. Visit it at www.wildhavenranch.org or call for tours at (909) 337-7389.

(October 17) So many things are happening in fashion this fall. There’s a cutting edge in the fashion world, and coming back in style  is grunge. This weekend I was in the city of Los Angeles and there’s always a vanguard of Angelenos setting the next trend. This time it wasn’t elegant that rocked but grunge. The revival of grunge is under way and with it comes the cuffed jeans, tights, and plaid shirts. It is a very rocky look, adding big black felt hats, baby doll dresses in granny prints, and biker jackets which are great for the weather. The granny print dresses are adorable and straight from London, too. It’s all a bit shocking in the fashion world. Forget about high fashion, and dress in grunge!  The fashion world has  definitely revived grunge. Interestingly it’s become alive in Los Angeles, spilling over into San Bernardino County. This is a very interesting time in fashion. Here’s to the revival of grunge in California. Keep free falling, because grunge is back.

“I’m the mold that grunge was grown in.”  -Townes Van Zandt

(October 11) A controversy has developed involving  Upland Assistant Public Works Director Acquanetta Warren and her participation in recommending an extension and revision of Upland’s trash hauling franchise contract.
At issue is that in addition to being Upland’s assistant public works director, Warren is also the mayor of Fontana. Fontana, like Upland,  has a longstanding franchise arrangement with Burrtec Waste Industries for the provision of refuse service.  Burrtec and its principals and employees collectively are one of Warren’s major political supporters in terms of donations to her various campaign funds, including those relating to her city council, mayoral and Assembly runs. And while under California law Warren is free to vote and support Burrtec with regard to the city of Fontana’s franchising of the company,  provisions of the California Political Reform Act which are now part of the state’s government code prohibit her from engaging in any governmental  decision making process involving the waste handling company outside of her elected capacity in Fontana.

Acquanetta Warren

Thus, in making statements to the Upland  Finance Committee on September 30 in her capacity as assistant public works director that were generally interpreted as a recommendation that the city extend Burrtec’s contract for at least another 15 years and in so doing confer upon that company a contract with a total value  in the neighborhood of $150 million, Warren appears to have run afoul of Government Code Section 87100, pertaining to conflicts of interest involving public officials.
Since 2000, Burrtec has had a franchise within the city of Upland for the hauling of trash. In 2001, Burrtec obtained a $17 million per year contract with the county of San Bernardino to run its landfill system. Shortly thereafter, the company had landed trash hauling franchises in 16 of the county’s 24 incorporated cities and 35 of its unincorporated communities, putting Burrtec literally and figuratively at the top of the trash hauling heap in the county.
In 2004, Burrtec, after extensive dialogue with then-Upland mayor John Pomierski, altered its franchise contract with Upland to put in place a so-called “evergreen” clause, which renewed the franchise contract for seven years every year unless Upland gave notice it wanted to rebid the contract, in which case the franchise would then have six years to run. In 2007, Pomierski again huddled with Burrtec executives and  and then-Upland city manager Robb Quincey, and altered the  franchise contract to provide for revenue sharing on recyclable conversion and retrofit Burrtec’s Upland operation with newer vehicles and trash bins.
In April of this year, the county board of supervisors, upon the recommendation of county public works director Gerry Newcombe, elected against renewing the landfill management contract with Burrtec, instead going with Los Angeles County-based Athens Services. While Burrtec remains a major player in the San Bernardino County waste industry, the loss of the landfill contract was a significant one. At the corporate level, Burrtec began casting about for a strategy to maintain its profitability into the coming decades.
Part of that strategy is to consolidate and extend for as long as possible its existing franchises. An early major test of that strategy is now playing out in the city of Upland. In May, Burrtec executive vice president Michael Arreguin wrote a letter to Upland Public Works Director Rosemary Hoerning, proposing a franchise contract revision that called for the company taking on the additional  responsibility for  recycling, paying the city a vehicle weight fee to offset the cost of repairs to the city’s streets necessitated by the weight of Burrtec’s trucks, providing street sweeping throughout the city, and offering household hazardous disposal as well as medical waste disposal to its Upland customers. As part of the revision, Burrtec asked that the city allow it to increase the rate it charges Upland’s customers by 7.2 percent for the remainder of 2013-14; another 2.1 percent in July 2014; 2.1 percent in July 2015; 2.3 percent in July 2016; and 2.4 percent in 2017. Increases beyond that would be tied to the Consumer Price Index. Perhaps the most significant change the company requested was the extension of the evergreen term by eight years from seven to fifteen years, thus ensuring that Burrtec will remain as Upland’s trash hauler at least until 2028.
As public works director, Hoerning was ultimately responsible for analyzing the Burrtec proposal and making a recommendation on it to city manager Stephen Dunn. Because of her heavy workload, however, Hoerning begged off on that assignment. Logically, responsibility for the analysis would have next fallen to Warren, as Hoerning’s top assistant. Warren, however, possibly because of her relationship with Burrtec as mayor in Fontana and a recipient of at least $11,578 in campaign contributions from that company  or its principals over the years, was not given the assignment either. Instead, Dunn, using his authority to spend up to $50,000 per vendor without prior city council approval, hired Northern California-based R3 Consulting Services to evaluate the Burrtec proposal.
R3 returned a report that highlighted the benefits of Burrtec’s revised franchise contract proposal, and Hoerning, without seeking outside bids or any further input, then cited R3’s endorsement of the concept in making a staff recommendation that the city council approve the revision and extension. As one of the final parts of the vetting procedure, the revision was scheduled to come before the city council’s finance committee, consisting of councilmen Glenn Bozar and Brendan Brandt. Brandt, however, has indicated he will abstain from voting on the matter because his law firm has done work for Athens Services, one of  Burrtec’s competitors, resulting in a conflict of interest. Thus, when the committee considered the revision on September 30, councilwoman Debbie Stone, as the alternate member of the finance committee, substituted for Brandt.
Present at the September 30 committee meeting was Arreguin,  who laid out and touted his company’s revision proposal. City staff present included Dunn, Hoerning and Warren, as well as elected city treasurer Dan Morgan. Stone found Arrequin’s presentation, the R3 report and the recommendations by Dunn and Hoerning persuasive, indicating she was amenable to voting as a member of the committee to recommend that the entire council approve the franchise contract revision as Burrtec has presented it. She said Burrtec’s past performance and the familiarity of its personnel with Upland and its routes convinced her that keeping Burrtec in place was in the city’s interest.
Bozar, however, proved to be a much harder sell and said he was not in favor of the 15-year evergreen clause, which he said would have the immediate practical effect of conferring upon Burrtec a franchise contract that would have a total contract value approaching  $150 million over the next 15 years, while creating a situation in which the franchise would remain in effect for at least 28 years unchecked by any competitive bidding process for that entire length of time. He indicated he wanted to explore revising the franchise contract to remove the evergreen clause altogether.
In the go-round that ensued, city staff restated the case for the city retaining Burrtec and approving its franchise contract revisal as presented, including input by Warren, in which she commended Burrtec for the efforts it has made in improving the level of trash service in Upland and responding to her own requests and those of other city officials in taking care of problems and difficulties that have cropped up during its tenure as the city’s trash hauler.
It was this advocacy by Warren on behalf of Burrtec that has created the current controversy.
According to California Government Code Section 87100, “No public official at any level of state or local government shall make, participate in making or in any way attempt to use his/her official position to influence a governmental decision in which (s)he knows or has reason to know (s)he has a financial interest.”
Gov. Code Section  87103 (e) states “A public official has a financial interest in a decision within the meaning of Section 87100 if it is reasonably foreseeable that the decision will have a material financial effect, distinguishable from its effect on the public generally, on the official, a member of his or her immediate family, or… any donor of, or any intermediary or agent for a donor of, a gift or gifts aggregating two hundred fifty dollars ($250) or more in value provided to, received by, or promised to the public official within 12 months prior to the time when the decision is made.”
According to the California Fair Political Practices Commission’s website, “If a public official has a conflict of interest, the official may be required to disqualify himself or herself from making or participating in a governmental decision, or using his or her official position to influence or attempt to influence a governmental decision.”
The California Fair Political Practices Commission (FPPC) makes further reference to California Government Code Section 84308 in pointing out that governmental officials serving in an appointed governmental position are subject to greater restrictions than are elected officials with regard to influencing or voting upon issues impacting a campaign donor.
“In most cases, the receipt of campaign contributions is not the basis for disqualification by a public official,” the FPPC website states. “However, certain public officials who make decisions in proceedings involving licenses, permits, or other entitlements for use (e.g., planning commissioners, board members of joint powers authorities and other regional governing or planning agencies, and members of other state and local boards and commissions) are subject to the restrictions of Gov. Code Section 84308. Section 84308 prohibits solicitation or receipt of campaign contributions from parties, participants, or their agents, in proceedings involving licenses, permits, or other entitlements for use. The law also requires an official’s disqualification in those proceedings if the official has received campaign contributions of more than $250 from a party or participant within the 12 months preceding the decision. Finally, Section 84308 requires disclosure of such campaign contributions.”
The website further states, “Elected state officers, judges, and members of local government agencies who are directly elected by the voters (e.g., board of supervisors, city council, school board) are exempt from Section 84308 when they are acting as members of the agency to which they are elected. However, if one of these individuals is also a voting member of another nonexempt body, such as a joint powers agency or regional planning agency, he or she is covered by the law with respect to license, permit or other entitlement for use proceedings before the nonexempt body. For example, if three city councilmembers and two county supervisors sit on a city-county joint powers authority, Section 84308 applies to the license, permit or other entitlement for use proceedings before the joint powers authority because the officials were not elected directly to the authority. It does not apply to the officials when they are voting on matters before the city council or board of supervisors.”
While Warren is not a voting member of the Upland Finance and Economic Development Committee, as an appointed (i.e., hired) member of city staff, she does and has supplied information to the committee and city council to inform their decision making process and thus has served “to influence a governmental decision” as is prohibited in Government Code Section 87100.
Warren may also have failed to meet the reporting burden in Government Code Section 84308. In her statement of economic interest, known as a California Form 700, on file with the Upland city clerk’s office, she made no disclosure of the campaign donations she has received from Burrtec.
When contacted by the Sentinel, Warren said she would not respond to questions relating to the Burrtec contract extension proposal or her role in making recommendations related to it. Nor would she discuss her understanding of the restrictions Government Code Section 87100 places upon her in her professional capacity in Upland as a consequence of the political contributions she has received as an elected official.
“I’m not making any comment, sorry,” she said. “You’ll have to speak to Rosemary [Hoerning] about that.”
Hoerning told the Sentinel that the ultimate decision with regard to Burrtec’s franchise contract revision proposal will be made not at the staff level but by the city council.
“That is a policy question that is being placed before the city for their final decision,” she said.
Hoerning acknowledged there were elements of the proposal that were advantageous to Burrtec, in particular the 15-year evergreen clause, but that this was offset by benefits to the city and its ratepayers.
“That is a long period of time but Burrtec’s proposal has provisions that have merit and are of value to the residents of Upland,” she said. “The contract involves limitations on the rate structure and it imposes a maximum increase cap that will protect the ratepayers.”
Hoerning said she could not speak to whether Warren had violated any parts of the government code.
“I am not familiar at all with  the restrictions placed on her as a consequence of her political leadership role with any other agencies,” Hoerning said. “She works on our staff with responsibilities related to the city of Upland’s public works function. I did not rely upon her in making my recommendation. I am relying primarily upon what the city’s consultant, R3, determined, which is that the city should extend the contract. That is what I am recommending to the city council independent of her, along with the city manager. [Burrtec] provides service rates that are below or comparable to what the costs are in other cities, by my review.”
The Sentinel has learned that less than a week after the September 30 Upland Finance and Economic Development Committee meeting, on October 5 Warren hosted a fundraiser for the Fontana Boys and Girls Club, billed as the “Mayor’s Ball.” Burrtec was a major sponsor of that event.
Upland Mayor Ray Musser was non-committal in his response to questions about his city’s assistant public works director’s involvement in a decision making process that has allegedly been tainted by her receipt of money from the company  seeking a lucrative contract extension from the city. Nor would he offer his personal assessment of whether Warren’s recommendation at the September 30 meeting was a violation of Government Code Section 871000.
“The city attorney is looking into that,” he said.

(October 10) Judith Oakes’ theft of Rialto Unified School District lunch money was so substantial, according to investigators, that once she had begun she could not stop because to do so would have given indication of her past thefts.

Judith Oakes

More than two months after her arrest by Rialto Police, Oakes was charged by the San Bernardino County District Attorney’s Office on October 8 with eight counts of embezzlement by a public or private officer and eight counts of a public officer crime.
Officials believe an audit has confirmed that Oakes, who was an accountant for the district overseeing the school lunch program for nearly 14 years, stole more than $1.8 million since 2005.
According to investigator Jeff Stewart, who was hired by the district to look into the thefts, it is likely that Oakes stole more than $3.1 million since 1999. On top of the $1.8 million in cash Oakes is now documented as having taken in the past eight years, another $1.3 million is unaccounted for in the years between 1999, the year Oakes is believed to have begun her depredations, and 2005. The examination of the disappearance of district money prior to 2005 was less rigorous because those crimes fall outside the statute of limitations.
Oakes was married to Jack Oakes, an educator who eventually rose to the position of school principal in the San Bernardino City Unified School District. In the mid-1990s, Judith Oakes was working as an accountant at the Bank of Redlands, which is now known as Community Bank.
In 1997, she went to work in the Rialto Unified School District as an accountant. Eventually, she was given virtually unfettered oversight of the cash receipts from the district’s school lunch program. Not only did she oversee the crew that had physical custody of the money, she was given ultimate accounting authority over the funds.
Beginning in 1999, Oakes began pilfering roughly $4,000 a week from the batches of bills collected and processed by the district’s money-counting machines prior to bank deposit. Having begun the thefts, it seems Oakes was obliged to continue stealing approximately the same amount of money every week – an average of between $4,100 and $4,300 weekly – so that the pattern of thefts would remain undetected.
According to Stewart, sometime after she was put in charge of the staff counting and bundling the lunch money and then depositing it into a school district account and after she had begun her thefts, Oakes was entrusted with security arrangements in the office where the money was counted, as well as the loss control procedure devised for the money counting function. “The [district nutrition] department has a money-counting machine that counts bills, and informs workers when there’s enough to ‘strap’ into batches,” Stewart said. “Ms. Oakes was involved with the installation of the camera system and was aware of what areas in the room were visible to it,” according to Stewart.
Oakes engaged in two levels of sleight-of-hand in first secreting the money she took out of the money counting room and then obfuscating the books that tallied the lunch receipts district-wide.
In the first instance, according to Stewart, “Oakes reportedly would bind the bills up at the back counter of the room, rather than on the table next to the computer, where she couldn’t be seen on camera. Ms. Oakes would then quite frequently take a strap or two of twenty-dollar bills or other denominations and stuff them down her top after checking to make sure the person at the computer was not looking.”
Oakes, who had an overview all of the money flowing in from all of the district’s schools, at which a total of  26,408 students are now enrolled, would then provide falsified deposit slips after the money was bundled and ready for deposit. Oakes overcame the scrutiny of the district staff member responsible for reconciling the bank statements with the district’s deposits by falsifying a spreadsheet which she substituted for ledgers containing entries related to the checks and cash collected from each school.
On occasion, it appears, some staff members noted inconsistencies and irregularities with regard to the total amount of money counted and the amount deposited, but Oakes was able to use her position and authority to override any questions and staff  members did not, at least until relatively late, make an effort to report those irregularities out of fear of getting on Oakes’ bad side.
The roughly $210,000 Oakes was stealing from the district yearly augmented an already very comfortable $190,000 yearly household income she and her husband pulled down. Jack Oakes, who had ascended to the position of principal at Ramona-Alessandro Elementary School, made $119,771 during the 2009-2010 school year. Judith was making over $70,000 at that time.
In April 2010, Jack Oakes was severely injured in an off-roading accident in the desert and died of a trauma-induced heart attack.
After her husband’s death, Judith Oakes continued the thefts from the district she had previously been engaged in for over a decade. By the end of 2011, it is believed that she had begun a relationship with Harold Cebrun, who had been superintendent in the Compton and Lynwood school districts prior to being hired as superintendent with the Rialto district in March 2009.
In May, discrepancies with regard to the receipt and depositing of district lunch money was suspected. Video cameras showing perspectives from different angles than those Oakes had previously established were installed in the money counting room unbeknownst to Oakes and Cebrun. She was caught on video stuffing money into her brazier on at least two occasions.
When she was arrested on August 7, Oakes had two packets of $2,000 in $20 bills in her possession. More packets were found at her San Bernardino home later when it was searched pursuant to a warrant. Oakes made incriminating statements to police officers, characterized as a confession. She immediately posted $50,000 bond and was released.  She resigned her post on August 8. While the Superior Court’s on-line record shows that a case – number 1308340790 – had been opened against Oakes involving a single charge of PC 459 filed against her on August 12 and that a $50,000 bond had been deposited in conjunction with case 1308340790, the action notation for the following day, August 13, reports that the district attorney was notified but that no case was filed, a seeming contradiction to the previous reference of a PC 459 charge. PC 459 refers to burglary.
That confusion was rendered moot this week, with the 16 charges filed against her. Her bail was raised to $1.8 million, the amount of money she is alleged to have stolen. She was immediately whisked into custody at her arraignment in Fontana Superior Court on October 9 and she remains at West Valley Detention Center in Rancho Cucamonga.

(October 10) JOSHUA TREE — The Hi-Desert Medical Center, a nonprofit 59-bed acute primary care hospital that is the primary provider of health services in the Morongo Basin, took on another leadership role late last month when it initiated operation of what is the Morongo Basin’s first wastewater treatment plant outside of Twentynine Palms.
At the initiative of the health care district, the medical center entered into a partnership with the Joshua Basin Water District for the construction and operation of the plant. Originally budgeted as a $2.4 million project, the contractor, Twentynine Palms-based Van Dyke Pipeline Contracting, completed the project at roughly $200,000 under budget. The water district, which supervised the project, obtained permits and licensing for the undertaking. The Morongo Basin Health Care District is picking up the entire cost, construction and operational, of what is dubbed the  Joshua Basin Treatment Plant No. 1.
Located on the east side of White Feather Road, it is capable of handling the current 52,000 to 73,000 gallons of effluent currently discharged per day from the hospital and the nearby Continuing Care Center. It will be able to expand to process the 104,000 to 146,000 gallons of wastewater  per day that it is anticipated will flow from the hospital after its scheduled 23,500-square-foot expansion.
Pipes carry the effluent to the facility’s holding tanks, separators, equalization basin, sludge pre-thickener pumps, and then to the bioreactor and accompanying blowers. In the bioreactor, microorganisms feed on the sludge to break down the sewage, at which point it undergoes further processing and filtration.
The plant provides a model, at both the physical/operational and administrative/financial levels, for the town of Yucca Valley. In Yucca Valley, where the population has grown to 20,700, the entire town and its population utilize septic systems. According to the United States Geological Survey, 880 acre-feet of septic discharge currently reaches the groundwater below the town every year. According to the USGS,  nitrates are accumulating beneath Yucca Valley in ever increasing concentrations and at depths that pose a threat to the groundwater. The California Regional Water Quality Control Board, the state agency responsible for protecting water quality, adopted a resolution identifying the town of Yucca Valley as one of 66 communities throughout the state with groundwater threatened by the continuing overuse of septic systems. The board further declared Yucca Valley as a top priority for eliminating the use of septic systems, meaning Yucca Valley’s is one of the five most seriously threatened water supplies in the state. After local officials resisted taking immediate action and refused to impose any kind of building or development moratorium that would stabilize the problem, the Regional Water Quality Control Board and the Hi-Desert Water District in 2011 forged a memorandum of agreement to allow the city to continue to issue interim permits for new septic systems while imposing state-mandated  septic discharge prohibitions due to be triggered as of May 19, 2016. Under that mandate, phase 1 of a wastewater system must be completed or significantly on its way to completion by that date or the state will initiate enforcement action. The first phase of the project is to cover the downtown area of Yucca Valley, the area most proximate to the heart of the groundwater basin.  Similarly, phase 2 must be completed or nearly completed by May 19, 2019 and phase 3 must be completed by May 19, 2022. The last two phases lie further out where future concentrated development is most likely to occur.
With the May 19, 2016 deadline looming, the Hi-Desert Water District is pushing for the creation of a financing mechanism to pay for the water treatment system, consisting of a municipal sized treatment plant and over 400,000 linear feet of pipe.
Officials believe the system can be built for $125 million. One analysis is that each Yucca Valley  parcel’s share in the debt burden for the creation of the sewer system would be $16,700.
If the $125 million cost of the project could be defrayed over 30 years, households in Yucca Valley would be called upon to pay between $20 and $40 per month for sewer service, according to one calculation.

(October 10) What is known as the 303 Building, which has served as an adjunct to the county’s historic central downtown courthouse for much of the last decade, will be adapted to become the new headquarters for the district attorney’s office  when the new central county courthouse is completed.
The county board of supervisors, which had previously committed $1 million toward making that conversion, this week increased the conversion project budget by $5,300,000 to $6.3 million.
According to Carl Alban, the director of the county’s architecture and engineering division, “The 303 Building is currently occupied by the district attorney on the upper two floors, public defender on the ground level floor, and state courts for courtrooms and administrative space in the remaining five floors. Upon completion of the new State Justice Center located at the southeast corner of W. Third Street and Arrowhead Avenue, court operations will no longer be conducted in the 303 Building.”
Alban said his division is proposing “the demolition and remodel of the areas occupied by the state courts to provide needed office space to relocate DA personnel and operations from multiple locations throughout San Bernardino to a central location as established by the county buildings acquisition and retrofit project implementation plan. This project will also include parking improvements to increase the number of parking spaces from 177 spaces to approximately 300 spaces by the addition of a parking deck over the existing parking lot. Dedicated parking will help to minimize parking burdens created by increased vehicle loads generated by the State Justice Center and Superblock Master Plan, as well as maximize district attorney personnel parking within close proximity to offices and courts.”
According to Alban, “The revised project budget of $6,300,000 is comprised of the following components: project management and inspection costs of $360,000; construction costs of $5,400,000; and a construction contingency of $540,000. The funding source is discretionary general funding approved by the board of supervisors as part of the county buildings acquisition and retrofit project in the 2012-13 and 2013-14 capital improvement program budgets.”
The board of supervisors authorized Alban to release a design-build pre-qualification package, which Alban said will allow the project costs to be identified much earlier in the process; allow design and construction activities to be performed concurrently, reducing the amount of time required to complete the project, and allowing building occupancy at the earliest possible date; reduce the project cost as a result of the close working relationship between the designer and the construction contractor; the incorporation of efficient and economical construction methods into the design; and eliminate disputes and the need for dispute resolution between the design and construction contractor, resulting in the reduction of the likelihood of  litigation and contract modifications.
“The purpose of the pre-qualification package  for the selection of a design-build contractor for this project is to solicit preliminary information from interested design-build contractors,” Alban said. The information submitted will be evaluated by a committee that includes representatives from the county administrative office, district attorney’s office, and architecture and engineering. The evaluation process is intended to identify three design-build firms who, in the opinion of the county, are best qualified to execute successfully the design and construction of the project based on the criteria identified in the pre-qualification package.
Following selection of the three finalists, architecture & engineering staff will return to the board to seek approval to proceed on to the second step of the procurement process. The second step will provide significantly more detail regarding the project requirements and expectations, allowing the three design-build contractors to submit a best and final proposal. The selection of the successful design-build contractor, Alban said, will be based on “best value,” as determined by the evaluation committee.