Students and faculty members at Fontana Middle School were exposed to potentially harmful levels of asbestos during the first two weeks of the current school year, the district has reluctantly acknowledged.
The exposure came a bout as a consequence of the district failing to complete the demolition and removal of the schools L Building by the start of the current school year on August 7.
Asbestos is a naturally occurring fibrous silicate mineral previously prized for its insulating and fireproofing qualities. Asbestos is composed of particulate fibers that are substantially longer than they are wide, which are friable, meaning they have a tendency to break into smaller pieces under pressure, rubbing or abrasion, becoming airborne. These microscopic fibrils if inhaled can be highly damaging to the lungs of mammals, reptiles and birds, causing dangerous lung conditions, including mesothelioma, asbestosis and lung cancer. In the 19th Century, manufacturers and builders began using asbestos as a thermal and electrical insulator as well as a fire retardant widely incorporated into building materials. Beginning in the 1960s, its adverse on human health began to be recognized and were more generally acknowledged in the 1970s. A substantial number of buildings constructed before the 1980s contained asbestos.
Insulation, flooring, roofing materials, ceiling tiles, drywall, joint compounds and pipes commonly were partially composed of asbestos. Left intact, those items would not result in asbestos fibers being liberated in dangerous quantities, but upon being disturbed, asbestos fibers can be lofted into the air. Consequently, upon the demolition of old buildings, it is advisable to confine the debris beneath coverings such as tarps until it is removed and buried underground in a landfill and for those surfaces where the materials have lain to be wet-wiped and the material capturing the fibers to be likewise deposited and buried in a landfill. Continue reading →

By Mark Gutglueck
Clear contradictions have emerged in the versions of events provided by one of the most recently elected members of the San Bernardino City Council and the city’s police department over what the councilwoman says was the police officers’ union’s use of information that is supposed to be restricted for law enforcement operations against her during her political campaigns.
Ortiz who is now a professor of public administration at California State University San Bernardino, has for years been involved in local political and governmental affairs, having vied unsuccessfully in 2018 for appointment to the San Bernardino County Third District supervisorial post in the aftermath of James Ramos’s departure for the California Assembly, in 2019 unsuccessfully for election to the vacant San Bernardino City Third Ward council position in the aftermath of John Valdivia’s resignation to become San Bernardino mayor and in 2022 unsuccessfully in the race for San Bernardino Mayor when Valdivia was ousted and ultimately replaced by Helen Tran. In 2024, Ortiz, having moved into San Bernardino 7th Ward, ran for election there, capturing first in the March primary and defeating former San Bernardino City Attorney James Penman in the November run-off.
On November 8, 2023, around the time of the opening of the candidate filing period for the March 2024 primary election, Ortiz and Penman met in what by varying accounts was originally scheduled as a friendly meeting that would give either of the two, who by that point had made clear their intentions to challenge then-Seventh Ward City Councilman Damon Alexander in the upcoming race, in which they could discuss one or the other stepping aside so that a concerted effort to defeat the incumbent could take place. During the exchange, Penman told her the Police Officers Association was backing him and that one or more of the police officer had used CLETS, the database shared by California’s law enforcement agencies, to carry out a search of her criminal history and had retrieved information with regard to an incident of domestic violence she had been engaged in some two decades earlier when they ran her name. According to Ortiz, Penman told her the police union, in support of his candidacy, was prepared to use her arrest on the domestic violence charge to launch an attack her during council campaign if she were a candidate. Continue reading →

Fontana’s ordinances regulating street vending, one of which has been in place since 2019 and the most recently revised of which has been in place for a 21-month duration, are being challenged in federal court based upon novel constitutional challenges of the municipal authority to license and control local businesses that have evolved in California for well over a century.
Fontana’s first effort to regulate street/sidewalk vending, in the form of Ordinance 1789, was approved by the city council in 2019.
Over the course of two meetings in October and November 2023, the Fontana City Council, gave first and second readings and both preliminary and final approval on identical 4-to-1 votes to a revamped set of street/sidewalk vending regulations, Ordinance 1925. The discussion took place in a fiery atmosphere in which four members of the city council, sympathetic to the challenges faced by traditional brick-and-mortar businesses and restaurants and those concerned about specific public health considerations, were challenged by the advocates for mobile and transitory businesses, such as sidewalk vendors, street vendors and food truck operators.
Those lobbying the council on behalf of the street and sidewalk vendors, who employed excessively aggressive tactics which included efforts to intimidate and physically assault operators of local businesses and members of the Fontana Area and Hispanic chambers of commerce who were encouraging the city council to adopt the ordinance, filed to achieve their goal. Ultimately, nine individuals, most of them residents from outside of Fontana, were arrested as the result of what the Fontana Police Department said were illegal protests mounted on the street where Fontana Mayor Acquanetta Warren lived after the meetings and in the ordinance’s opponents’ expletive-laced verbal encounters with others present in the council chamber and the parking lot at City Hall when the final approval of the ordinance took place. Continue reading →

The developmental imperative in Redlands continued unabated this week as the planning commission gave go-ahead to a mixed-use development proposal along the unimproved stretch of the 900 block of California Street.
The project in question, proposed by JD FUEL, LLC., will be located at 913 California Street, and is to consist of a hotel, coffee shop and car wash. Despite expressed concerns the project’s completion will have on traffic circulation in the area and its potential environmental impact, the project was given approval during the commission’s August 12 meeting, with no dissension, though Commissioner Mat Endsley was not present for the hearing.
According to Redlands Principal Planner Sean Riley, J.D. Fuel had applied for an entitlement to proceed with an energetic project on approximately five-acre site located at 913 California Street, which lies west of California Street, approximately 500 feet south of Interstate 10. The property falls within the property zoned for general commercial in the East Valley Corridor Specific Plan area.
JD Fuel asked for, and Reilly recommended that the planning commission grant, a mitigated negative declaration prepared for the proposed project in accordance with Section 15074 of the California Environmental Quality Act guidelines.
Under the California Environmental Quality Act, an examination of the environmental impacts of a project must be made for it to be given environmental certification. Some discretion is left to the governmental decision-making body that oversees land use issues and possesses approval and/or denial authority regard to a development project as to what type of analysis of the environmental issues is to be carried out and what mitigations of the impacts are to be required. Continue reading →

Detectives and deputies with the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department arrested 52 men and four women and seized 3,500 birds, twelve firearms $259.000 in cash and significant amounts of fentanyl, methamphetamine and cocaine during a more than six-week long investigation into a massive cockfighting ring in San Bernardino County.
The operation, known as “Crowing Rooster,” lasted from June 14 to August 1. It involved the obtaining and serving 26 search warrants at separate locations that were tied to the individuals and activities involved, according to the department.
Of those arrested, ten were charged with felonies. The lion’s share, 48, are San Bernardino County residents, while eight lived in Riverside, Los Angeles or Ventura counties. They ranged in age from 16 to 73 years old.
The San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department’s Rural Crimes Task Force, consisting of deputies from Victor Valley Station Rural Crimes, Victor Valley Station, Twin Peaks Station, San Bernardino County Probation, San Bernardino County District Attorney’s Office, and San Bernardino County Code Enforcement, conducted the operation from June 14, 2025, through August 1, 2025. In addition, San Bernardino County Animal Care Services, Hesperia Animal Control, Hesperia Code Enforcement, and Highland Code Enforcement assisted with the operation. Continue reading →

By Richard Hernandez and Mark Gutglueck
It does not appear that Governor Gavin Newsom nor his Democratic loyalists in the California Legislature will target either of the Republican members of Congress for removal with the virtually unheard of plan to redistrict the Golden State’s political map to reduce the number of the Republican delegation to Congress from its current nine to four.
The genesis for the California redistricting effort, which was whispered about very early this month but which was taken up with a renewed sense of urgency this week is a plan by the Republican-controlled Texas Legislature and that state’s Republican governor, Greg Abbott, in response to a request by President Donald Trump to redraw the Lone Star State’s political map mid-decade to ensure that Texas has five more congressional district seats that favor the Republicans than it now does, thus greatly increasing the chances that there will be five fewer Democrats and five more Republicans from Texas in the House of Representatives after the mid-term 2026 election.
Doing something like that in Texas is relatively easy, as the formulation of voting districts and their timing is left up to the legislature there. Historically, in the United States, at least since the mid-19th Century, presidents in power have a tendency to start their terms with a majority in one or both houses of Congress – the House of Representatives and the Senate – and to see that advantage diminish in the mid-term election two years later. There are multiple examples of U.S. presidents who had comfortable or even commanding majorities in both houses during their initial tenure in office but saw their party lose its majority in one or both of the county’s legislative bodies, creating administrative challenges as they were unable to obtain passage of bills they considered key to their agendas. In January, at his second inaugural following four years out of office, Donald Trump took office with narrow a narrow 220-to-215 Republican majority in the House of Representatives and a 53-Republican to 45-Democrat/2-Independent breakdown in the Senate. The Trump Administration-backed redistricting ploy in Texas appears aimed at preserving the Republican legislative advantage in the face of what is expected to be a minor migration of support away from the Republicans in the November 2026 election. Continue reading →

ORDER TO SHOW CAUSE FOR CHANGE OF NAME CASE
NUMBER CIV SB 2520496
TO ALL INTERESTED PERSONS: Petitioner: EDWARD JOSE ESTRADA filed with this court for a decree changing names as follows: EDWARD JOSE ESTRADA to EDWARD JOE ESTRADA
THE COURT ORDERS that all persons interested in this matter appear before this court at the hearing indicated below to show cause, if any, why the petition for change of name should not be granted. Any person objecting to the name changes described above must file a written objection that includes the reasons for the objection at least two court days before the matter is scheduled to be heard and must appear at the hearing to show cause why the petition should not be granted. If no written objection is timely filed, the court may grant the petition without a hearing.
Notice of Hearing:
Date: 09/05/2025, Time: 08:30 AM, Department: S 37
The address of the court is Superior Court of California, County of San Bernardino, San Bernardino District-Civil Division, 247 West Third Street, San Bernardino, CA 92415
IT IS FURTHER ORDERED that a copy of this order be published in the San Bernardino County Sentinel, once a week for four successive weeks prior to the date set for hearing of the petition.
Dated: 07/23/2025
Judge of the Superior Court: Gilbert G. Ochoa
Shuai Zhou, Deputy Clerk of the Court
Published in the San Bernardino County Sentinel on July 25 and August 1, 8 & 15, 2025.

ORDER TO SHOW CAUSE FOR CHANGE OF NAME CASE
NUMBER CIV SB 2520102
TO ALL INTERESTED PERSONS: Petitioner: JANET ELIZABETH ZEDAN filed with this court for a decree changing names as follows: NICHOLAS ANTHONY DELGADO to NICHOLAS ANTHONY ZEDAN-DELGADO
THE COURT ORDERS that all persons interested in this matter appear before this court at the hearing indicated below to show cause, if any, why the petition for change of name should not be granted. Any person objecting to the name changes described above must file a written objection that includes the reasons for the objection at least two court days before the matter is scheduled to be heard and must appear at the hearing to show cause why the petition should not be granted. If no written objection is timely filed, the court may grant the petition without a hearing.
Notice of Hearing:
Date: 09/08/2025, Time: 01:30 PM, Department: S 14
The address of the court is Superior Court of California, County of San Bernardino, San Bernardino District-Civil Division, 247 West Third Street, San Bernardino, CA 92415
IT IS FURTHER ORDERED that a copy of this order be published in the San Bernardino County Sentinel, once a week for four successive weeks prior to the date set for hearing of the petition.
Dated: 07/21/2025
Judge of the Superior Court: Gilbert G. Ochoa
Gilberto Villegas, Deputy Clerk of the Court
Published in the San Bernardino County Sentinel on July 25 and August 1, 8 & 15, 2025.

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