When Chino Police Chief Wes Simmons closes out his active law enforcement career on August 10, he will be succeeded by his deputy chief, Kevin Mensen.
City Manager Linda Reich, in consultation with Simmons and City Councilwoman Karen Comstock, who used to be the city’s police chief, settled on promoting Mensen rather than looking elsewhere by conducting a recruitment or promoting one of the department’s other officers currently serving under Simmons and Mensen.
There is a likelihood that Mensen will remain in place as chief longer than Simmons, who in April, at the age of 50, announced his readiness to retire and set the August 10 date for doing so.
As recently as early this year, many anticipated that Simmons would remain as police chief perhaps until 2030 or slightly beyond. Under legal mandate, he would have been required to retire upon reaching the age of 62, but that would not come until 2035. At 50, however, Simmons became eligible to retire. Having now been a police officer for 28 years, he opted to head off into the sunset. Continue reading →

Chen Weiming’s most recently completed artwork is now on display at Liberty Sculpture Park in Yermo.
The three-dimensional piece was dropped into place in early June and unveiled in a ceremony held on June 4, 2023.
Known by the title “Chained Woman,” the sculpture embodies Weiming’s reaction to the video of a chained woman in Feng County, Xuzhou, Jiangsu, People’s Republic of China recorded in January 2022 and posted to social media.
An artist and human rights anti-communist activist and advocate for Chinese democracy, Weiming works in three-dimensional media to capture images of injustice and repression in the country of his birth. Weiming was born in Hangzhou, China, and emigrated to New Zealand in 1988. He holds a New Zealand passport as well as permanent residence in the United States, living in both countries. Continue reading →

FBN 20230005852
The following entities are doing business primarily in San Bernardino County as
TOGETHER WE ROSE 203 E. CALIFORNIA ST. ONTARIO, CA 91761: ALAN ESTRADA 203 E. CALIFORNIA ST. ONTARIO, CA 91761
The business is conducted by: AN INDIVIDUAL.
The registrant commenced to transact business under the fictitious business name or names listed above on: May 17, 2017.
By signing, I declare that all information in this statement is true and correct. A registrant who declares as true information which he or she knows to be false is guilty of a crime (B&P Code 179130. I am also aware that all information on this statement becomes Public Record upon filing.
s/ ALAN ESTRADA, Founder and CEO
Statement filed with the County Clerk of San Bernardino on: 6/8/2023
I hereby certify that this copy is a correct copy of the original statement on file in my office San Bernardino County Clerk By:/Deputy J2522
Notice-This fictitious name statement expires five years from the date it was filed in the office of the county clerk. A new fictitious business name statement must be filed before that time. The filing of this statement does not of itself authorize the use in this state of a fictitious business name in violation of the rights of another under federal, state, or common law (see Section 14400 et seq., Business and Professions Code).
Published in the San Bernardino County Sentinel on June 16, 23, 30 & July 7, 2023.

NOTICE OF PETITION TO ADMINISTER ESTATE OF:
CARMEN GONZALES Case NO. PROSB2300714
To all heirs, beneficiaries, creditors, contingent creditors, and persons who may otherwise be interested in the will or estate, or both of CARMEN GONZALES A PETITION FOR PROBATE has been filed by CARMEN P. GONZALES in the Superior Court of California, County of San Bernardino.
THE PETITION FOR PROBATE requests that CARMEN P. GONZALES be appointed as personal representative to administer the estate of the decedent.
THE PETITION requests authority to administer the estate under the Independent Administration of Estates Act. (This authority will allow the personal representative to take many actions without obtaining court approval. Before taking certain very important actions, however, the personal representative will be required to give notice to interested persons unless they have waived notice or consented to the proposed action.) The independent administration authority will be granted unless an interested person files an objection to the petition and shows good cause why the court should not grant the authority.
A hearing on the petition will be held in Dept. S36 at 09:00 AM on 07/20/2023 at Superior Court of California, County of San Bernardino, 247 West Third Street, San Bernardino, CA 92415, San Bernardino District-Probate Division
IF YOU OBJECT to the granting of the petition, you should appear at the hearing and state your objections or file written objections with the court before the hearing. Your appearance may be in person or by your attorney.
IF YOU ARE A CREDITOR or a contingent creditor of the decedent, you must file your claim with the court and mail a copy to the personal representative appointed by the court within the later of either (1) four months from the date of first issuance of letters to a general personal representative, as defined in section 58(b) of the California Probate Code, or (2) 60 days from the date of mailing or personal delivery to you of a notice under Section 9052 of the California Probate Code.
Other California statutes and legal authority may affect your rights as a creditor. You may want to consult with an attorney knowledgeable in California law.
YOU MAY EXAMINE the file kept by the court. If you are a person interested in the estate, you may file with the court a Request for Special Notice (form DE-154) of the filing of an inventory and appraisal of estate assets or of any petition or account as provided in Probate Code section 1250. A Request for Special Notice form is available from the court clerk.
STEVEN P. JANIS:
10788 CIVIC CENTER DR. RANCHO CUCAMONGA CA 91730
Telephone No: 909-980-0677
Published in the San Bernardino County Sentinel on:
06/23/2023, 06/30/2023, 07/07/2023

Continue reading →

The paradox, ruthlessness, absurdity and inherent inconsistency of what some consider the bane, and others see as a positive attribute, of local government was on display in Grand Terrace this week.
Two decades ago, when Grand Terrace could still lay claim to being one of the county’s more affluent bedroom communities, city officials reigned supreme over the 3.5-square mile municipality’s citizenry. At present, city officials, buffeted by financial blow after financial blow and no longer able to wield the authority of government like a cudgel against anyone who stood in their way or challenged them, cower before an animated and energized electorate.
For nearly a century, code enforcement has been, if not an everyday, then a recurrent element of Southern California urban life. Municipal codes, which can vary slightly or substantially from place to place, extend to the texture of shared existence and the social contract among those living in community with one another. Those codes touch on a myriad of issues, from the colors you can paint your house, to requirements that you cultivate a lawn and landscape your yard to mandates that you not let your grass grow too tall nor water it on a date that is neither odd nor, in the alternative, even, to how many people can dwell in your home, to how long you can leave your vehicle parked in front of your home, to how loud or late you can play music, to what sort of repair work you can engage in inside your garage, to how many dogs or cats you can own, to whether or not and where you can hang your clean laundry out to dry in the sun and the wind, to how long you can delay in retrieving your empty garbage cans, to how high you can allow a hedge to grow or construct a fence or wall, to what items you can store outside, to how long you can leave a garage door open, to how many guests or nonresidents you can welcome onto your premises in any 24 hours and, literally, hundreds of other regulations relating to the conditions of a landowner’s property or activities a resident or those on his or her property can or cannot engage in.
Code enforcement officers can be somewhat officious, and enforcement can be draconian. Given government’s reach and extensive assets and financial means, not to mention the consideration that it controls the forum in which citations are adjudicated, resistance to code enforcement is likely to prove entirely futile, giving object demonstration of the phrase, “You can’t fight City Hall.” Continue reading →

Governor Gavin Newsom and both houses of the California legislature this week carried the torch across the finish line after environmentalists’ efforts to effectuate protection of the western Joshua tree through administrative appeals to the California Department of Fish and Wildlife and the California Fish and Game Commission matched with legal action carried out over the last eight years failed.
As a consequence of the legislation carved out as part of this year’s legislative budgetary process, the yucca brevifolia Engelm, referred to in common parlance as the western Joshua tree, will be given what environmentalists say is crucial insulation that will shield the distinctive desert plants from encroaching development and climate change.
Environmentalists in 2015 asked the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, which is a division of the U.S. Department of the Interior, to study the status of the trees, their fragility and prospect for survival, seeking a determination that the Joshua Tree is threatened and therefore in need of certain protections. That examination, which began during the Barack Obama Administration, extended itself into the Donald Trump Administration. Slightly more than halfway into President Trump’s tenure in office, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service found the listing “not warranted.” Continue reading →

At its specially rescheduled meeting on Wednesday of next week, the Redlands City Council is set to raise City Manager Charles Duggan’s salary by seven percent from $280,000 to $299,600.
If the council, as anticipated, grants Duggan the raise, he will see his total annual compensation jump from its current $400,650.74, consisting of $280,000 in salary plus perquisites and add-ons of $12,131.92 in addition to $108,518.82 in benefits, to $420,250.74.
In addition, the council, which is going to meet on July 5 next week rather than Tuesday because its normal meeting day of the first Tuesday of the month is preempted by the July 4 holiday, will further sign off on giving Duggan a two percent raise in July 2024, upping the $299,600 he will be receiving at that time to $305,592. It also appears that the city may intend to provide Duggan with a two percent raise from $305,592 to $311,703.84 in July 2025. Because of what is likely a typographical error that substituted “2023” for “2025” on the staff report for the agenda item, that point remains unclear at press time.
Given the degree of apathy with regard to the function of local government that is typically the case throughout Southern California, the vast majority of residents in Redlands do not seem to have an opinion one way or the other with regard to Duggan’s performance since he became city manager in Redlands in January 2020. Nevertheless, among residents of the 36.4-square mile city of 73,168 population who are animated with regard to issues of governance, Duggan is far less popular than he is with the five-member city council. Continue reading →

San Bernardino County’s transportation agency is gambling that gambling will remain as popular throughout the rest of the 21st Century as it is today.
Using a $25 million stake granted it by the federal government, The San Bernardino County Transportation Authority is betting that money on the prospect that Brightline West will make good on completing its Las Vegas to Los Angeles highspeed trainline.
Brightline for a decade has been proposing to construct a high-speed rail line – one on which a train will reach a maximum of 180 miles per hour – that in time will stretch from Las Vegas in the east, variously, 264 miles to Anaheim or 270 miles to Union Station in Los Angeles. Brightline committed to breaking ground on the first phase of the project, which previously was to run on an electrified rail line some 190 miles to Victorville and is now slated to run 187 miles to Apple Valley. That line is to be constructed on right-of-way adjacent to Interstate 15 leased from Caltrans and the Nevada Department of Transportation. According to Brightline, the trip between the Nevada gambling mecca and Apple Valley would take just under 90 minutes. Another stop on the line will be in Hesperia and, eventually, the Metrolink rail station in Rancho Cucamonga.
In a rare arrangement, the federal government approved providing the $25 million grant to the San Bernardino County Transportation Authority, formerly known as San Bernardino Associated Governments (SanBAG), and Brightline West for the purposes of constructing the train stations in Apple Valley and Hesperia. Continue reading →