Citizens throughout the Southern California region were left shaking and scratching their heads as Governor Gavin Newsom and officials with the California Department of Housing and Community Development upbraided the City of Montclair and warned its officials that the city is not doing enough to comply with state policy and laws intended to create affordable housing.
Montclair was called onto the carpet over its alleged lack of compliance with Sacramento’s mandates despite being within the top one percent to three percent of the state’s cities which is actually meeting the state’s demands that local governmental entities facilitate the construction of homes and/or apartments to offset California’s housing shortage.
The rebuke from the state that included threatened legal action against the city, which already stands as the most densely populated municipality in San Bernardino County, came as Montclair has embarked on preparations to accommodate what is anticipated to be the most intensive series of high-rise residential complexes in the Inland Empire.
According to a March 25 press release from the governor’s office, Montclair, together with 14 other California cities and/or counties, has not laid out plans to allow for the construction of new housing across all income levels.
The next course of action after the warning is a lawsuit, the release said.
“I’m disappointed on behalf of the state and the people of California that after years of effort, we still have communities that aren’t meeting the needs of their residents,” Newsom said in the release. Continue reading →

In less than a month, three federal court rulings have strengthened the Chino Valley Unified School District’s position in what once seemed a quixotic battle with multiple layers of the state’s bureaucracy over parental notification.
Victories in what is considered by many to be a basic element in the conservative-liberal cultural war playing out throughout the country have been mounting on the school district’s side of the ledger, while less than three years ago, the district and its far-right leaning school board could not notch a single win.
In July 2023, Chino Valley Unified School District – or more accurately four of its five board members – challenged what was for them a “progressive” orthodoxy that had been adopted by virtually every one of the State of California’s 1,015 school districts. That doctrine held that students who at school present themselves as being of a gender different from that one imputed to them at birth are entitled to personal privacy to the extent that the faculty and teachers a the schools they attend should actively collude with them from preventing their parents or legal guardians from knowing about that transition.
On July 20, 2023, Sonja Shaw, Jon Monroe, James Na, and Andrew Cruz prevailed on a 4-to-1 vote in which Board member Don Bridge dissented adopting a parental notification policy, whereby the district’s teachers were required to inform parents within three days if one of their children assumed a gender identity different from the sexual identification they were given at birth and/or what appeared on his or her birth certificate. Continue reading →

In pressing local residents to support the continuation of Measure I, county and local municipal officials are omitting disclosure of what is perhaps the San Bernardino County Transportation Agency’s deepest and most untoward secret: the substantial and continuing debt the entity took on from immediately after the measure’s taxing authority was approved by county residents 37 years ago.
San Bernardino Associated Governments, known as SANBAG, was created in 1973 as San Bernardino County’s council of governments and its regional planning agency. It subsequently took on the role of the county’s transportation agency overseeing freeway construction projects, regional and local road improvements, train and bus transportation, railroad crossings, call boxes, ridesharing, congestion management efforts, freeway service patrols and emergency freeway service, and continued to serve as the county’s council of governments. In 1989 a collection of local municipal and county officials proposed placing before the county’s voters a half-cent sales tax override, the proceeds from which were to be used to finance transportation improvements countywide. When the voters approved the measure, SANBAG was entrusted with the administration of that funding. Continue reading →

The sobriquet that many in the Fontana community and beyond have come to apply to Mayor Acquanetta will remain intact, following recent action by the Fontana Planning Commission.
A plan to erect what are in essence two warehouses that has lain dormant for more than six-and-a-half was given actuation by the planning commission on March 17.
On that date last month, the planning commission unanimously approved a proposal by Orange-based C. VanDerHoek Architects, Inc. to construct two new industrial/commerce center buildings,one totaling 41,218 square feet and the other consisting of 30,767 square feet under roof.
C. VanDerHoek Architects, Inc. originally brought the project forward in 2019. both buildings were on a trajectory toward approval when the Supporters Alliance for Environmental Responsibility (SAFER) challenged the undertakings on environmental and procedural grounds. City staff formulated an answer to the issues the Supporters Alliance for Environmental Responsibility raised, whereupon it came up for a hearing before the planning commission on June 4, 2019.
“At that time, staff presented a memo to the planning commission requesting that the project be continued off calendar so that staff could adequately respond to a general comment letter submitted by SAFER,” the staff report relating to the action taken on March 17, 2026 stated. “The applicant has submitted a justification memo with technical studies to support the categorical exemptions under California Environmental Quality Act Guidelines Section 15332. Staff has reviewed and concurred with the analysis in the justification memo.” Continue reading →

Washington: “I cannot tell a lie.”
Nixon: “I cannot tell the truth.”
Trump: “I cannot tell the difference.” —- from a popular internet meme

I’ve been a fan of Garry Trudeau’s comic strip, Doonesbury, since my junior college days back in the early Seventies, always amazed through the years at how well he’s continued to capture the “character” and “temper” of our times, and one Sunday strip was yet another example of how well he can “nail it.”
This one, from August 7, 2022, focused on a conversation between two women, apparently active in D.C. political circles, as they stand amid the columns of our capital musing about the deterioration of discourse in the era of MAGA hats; hateful chants; opportunistic politicians; and those willing to swear allegiance to lies.
“I wonder,” one says, “what archaeologists will make of this place when they shift through the rubble 1,000 years from now.” (Yes, I guess we should give Trudeau credit for some optimism to counter his well-known cynicism since he appears to assume that there will be people 1,000 years from now.)
In the concluding panel, an archeologist, wearing a miner’s spotlight helmet, is seen quoting from an ancient text he’s uncovered in some diggings with the words: “Character counts,” to which the one behind him, with a pensive scratch of his chin, responds: “Hmm… What do you suppose it meant?” Continue reading →

NOTICE OF PETITION TO ADMINISTER ESTATE OF: YVONNE RAE BEST aka YVONNE R BEST aka YVONNE BEST
CASE NO. PROVA2600171
To all heirs, beneficiaries, creditors, contingent creditors, and persons who may otherwise be interested in the will or estate, or both of YVONNE RAE BEST:
A PETITION FOR PROBATE has been filed by FRANCHESKA RAE BYMA in the Superior Court of California, County of SAN BERNARDINO.
THE PETITION FOR PROBATE requests that FRANCHESKA RAE BYMA be appointed as personal representatives 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. F-2 at 9:00 a.m. on April 23, 2026.
San Bernardino County Superior Court Fontana District
Department F2 – Fontana
17780 Arrow Boulevard
Fontana, CA 92335
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.
Attorney for Franscheska Rae Byma:
ANTONIETTE JAUREGUI (SBN 192624)
1894 COMMERCENTER WEST, SUITE 108
SAN BERNARDINO, CA 92408
Telephone No: (909) 890-2350
Fax No: (909) 890-0106
ajprobatelaw@gmail.com
Published in the San Bernardino County Sentinel on March 13, 20 & 27, 2026.

ORDER TO SHOW CAUSE FOR CHANGE OF NAME CASE
NUMBER CIV SB 2605994,
TO ALL INTERESTED PERSONS: Petitioner MARIE PIERRETTE LOUISE COOK filed with this court for a decree changing names as follows: MARIE PIERRETTE LOUISE COOK to LOUISE PIERRETTE COOK
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: 04/24/2026, Time: 08:30 AM, Department: S37
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 SBCS Rancho Cucamonga in San Bernardino County California, once a week for four successive weeks prior to the date set for hearing of the petition.
Dated: 03/12/2026
Stephanie Garcia, Deputy Clerk of the Court
Judge of the Superior Court: Joseph T. Ortiz
Published in the San Bernardino County Sentinel on March 13, 20 & 27 and April 3, 2026.

Continue reading →

By Mark Gutglueck
In recent months, residential neighborhoods in the community of Oak Hills at the top of and just north of Cajon Summit and south of Hesperia have become a magnet for projects converting what were or are single family homes into adult group care/treatment facilities or quarters for recovering drug addicts or halfway homes for convicted criminals/parolees/probationers.
The number and intensity of such conversions or attempted conversions, some of which were properly and formally registered with the overseeing governmental authority and some of which were not, have sparked concern that the trend is part of a concerted effort to create multiple precedents which will have the practical effect of obliterating the land use and zoning standards that have historically and by tradition and law previously applied, and will substantially intensify land use in Oak Hills’ residential neighborhoods to a level far greater than that of single family residential homes.
A solid cross section of those in the Oak Hills community are adamantly opposed to elements that are out of character with the rustic residential neighborhoods in which they live being foisted upon them without their consent and contrary to the land use standards that were in place when they purchased their properties and which they thus had reason to believe would remain in place and inviolate. Dozens of them have indicated that when they sought to weigh in with regard to those permits for conversions, the employees in the county’s land use department not only disregarded the substance of their objections but appeared to be actively colluding with the applicants to allow them to maneuver around or effectively suspend the land use, zoning, and reconstruction/augmentation standards that normally apply. Continue reading →

The Twentynine Palms City Council on March 23 denied E-Group Solar’s proposal to install 160,000 solar panels the company said are capable of generating 50 megawatts of electricity on 184 acres north of Two Mile Road and west of the Twentynine Palms Public Cemetery.
The decision sets up a showdown between the company, which has given indication it will make use of the legal leverage provided to it by Assembly Bill 205, and the city with regard to whether state law prioritizing clean energy projects requires that the city give, essentially automatic approval to the project.
The matter was complicated by the consideration that the property where E Group wants to build the project is not zoned for industrial scale solar energy projects. What E Group sought was for the city government to amend the Twentynine Palms general plan to establish the renewable energy (e) land use designation and rezone the property in question from that slated for rural living/low density residential development with 5-acre minimum lots to that intended for producing renewable energy, that it alter the property designation and zoning from residential use to renewable energy production use, that it add chapters to the city’s development code and that it approve a conditional use permit authorizing the development of a 184-acre commercial solar field project. In addition, E Group was asking the city council to approve a development agreement for development of the 184-acre commercial solar field project, that it certify an environmental impact report prepared for the project and that it adopt a statement of overriding considerations to the effect that despite some negative implications, impacts, complications and considerations with regard to the project, that the upside of producing renewable energy at the location outweighed them. Continue reading →

As Two Republicans Are Running For Daylight

By Richard Hernandez & Mark Gutglueck
The Democrats’ political domination of California has created a paradoxical, indeed absurdly confounding, circumstance in which Republicans are now on the brink of seizing gubernatorial control in Sacramento as the consequence of a string of Democratic victories both at the polls and within the halls of governmental power. For good measure, the Republican administration of President Donald Trump, in control of the nation’s machinery of governance emanating from Washington, D.C., is now putting its thumb on the scale of shared justice and politics, in an effort to ensure the gubernatorial transformation in favor of the GOP.
California is a blue, that is to say Democratic, state through and through.
Of California’s total 23,206,519 registered voters, 10,396,792 or 44.8 percent are Democrats, while 5,896,203 or 25.41 percent are Republicans. Those who have no party affiliation number 5,336,441 or 23 percent, a number not terribly far off from that of the Republicans. The remaining 1,577,083 voters or 6.8 percent are members of the American Independent, Green, Libertarian, Peace & Freedom or other more obscure parties.
Despite comprising more than one-quarter of the state’s voters, the Republicans hold only 77 percent of the members of the U.S. House of Representatives from California are Democrats as forty of California’s 52 Congressional seats are held by Democrats and 12 by Republicans. Both of California’s U.S. Senators are Democrats. Continue reading →