Councilman Henry Nickel said he is seeking reelection in the March 3 election to get the voters’ consent to serve in what will be his third term as San Bernardino’s Fifth Ward councilman “because we have a lot of work to do.”
In enumerating his accomplishments in office, Nickel first said, “We have gotten through bankruptcy.”
The councilman’s reference was to the city’s 2012 filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, which came just about a year-and-a-half before his victory in a special election held on February 4, 2014 to replace Chas Kelley, who was forced to resign as a consequence of his having misused campaign funds.
“Our priority was to get the city back on sound financial footing,” Nickel said. “We now have reserves, we have balanced the budget, and implemented the plan of adjustment. We are moving ahead with our recovery plan.  We did what we promised to do four years ago and now the city needs to build on its tax base. Our main focus over the next four years will be on rebuilding the city.”
Nickel said he is able to function effectively as an elected official by campaigning hard as a politician, but is also able, after the election season is over, to cooperate with both his rivals and allies that head local government.
“My record shows I am working across party lines,” he said. “We received  $3 million from Assemblyman [James] Ramos [a Democrat against whom the Republican Nickel vied in the 2018 election to represent the 40th Assembly District]. I am able to work with the council and other officeholders so my constituents don’t fall victim to the petty factionalism that historically divides the city.  We need to get past the personal differences that prevent cooperation in key areas. Holding political grudges is not being responsible toward our residents. I meet with residents of my ward twice a month before council meetings and I take every opportunity to continue to work together with everyone in the city.”
According to Nickel, “Our major challenge immediately is our available revenue is 60 percent of what it is for comparable cities in our region. It is only in the last few decades that we have become an impoverished community. It was always a middle class city prior to that. We have experienced an economic disaster, so we have to work hard over the next four years to change our trajectory. I am paying attention to our businesses and residents. We need to streamline the delivery of public service in accordance with our plan of adjustment. We have brought down our pension obligation and we should start to realize a return on that over the next decade. We need to convince people that this is a safe and clean environment and a sustainable place they can call home that will attract middle and upper income families we have to this point lost from the city, families with $60,000 plus per year per household income. That is what we need. If you look at San Bernardino right now,  we are at $37,000 per year per household median income. You can’t sustain a city with that kind of income. With those limitations on our finances, we won’t have the tax base to keep the city operating at the level we need to. As our revenues are declining, our need for services goes up. So, as revenues are declining,  you are seeing more crime, more blight. Businesses leave and our income declines. We are in a death spiral. We cannot sustain a city in this situation. We need to implement our plan of adjustment to fix this.”
Nickel continued, “The other key component is we updated our charter in order to get past the dysfunctional politics of the past and adopt a model that is much more aligned with the cities surrounding us and that are in line with best practices of the other cities round us and across the nation. I have never fallen into the trap of of negativity. I think San Bernardino is the most well-placed city within the overall environment of the Inland Empire. It offers opportunities that are unique.  There is no reason for us to remain as the most impoverished city in the Inland Empire, given our position and resources.”
Nickel decried the city’s problems as being ones brought on by senseless rivalries and bickering. “A lot of that is the dysfunctional politics,” he said. “My goal is to rise to a level that is above this political dysfunction and work with my colleagues, and I feel I have done that.”
The city needs to work on the nuts and bolts of municipal function, including advanced urban planning befitting an entity that has been a metropolitan center for more than a century, Nickel said.
“We need to improve our general plan,” Nickel said. “Our development code is a shambles. Refining our codes and making improvements to our land use polices is a key component of or future if businesses are to be convinced to locate here. We need for them to have confidence that their customers are going to be safe. We are not going to be able to attract the type of businesses you need to improve the quality of life without that.”
He said, “Law enforcement is a key component, as is code enforcement. There is a need to address the blight and vacant properties throughout the city. Eliminating blight will contribute to the quality of life and create an opportunity for us to attract businesses. If you look around the 5th Ward, you can see it is doing quite well and is able to sustain itself. The 5th Ward has neighborhoods with higher home values than most other areas of the city. We have worked hard to protect those home values and the area in general. We have to do the same with other areas of the city, and I have a record of doing that, as well.”
Asked why the 5th Ward’s voters should support him rather than any of his five opponents in the March 3 election, Nickel said, “I think the voters have to do their homework and look at what all of the different candidates bring to the table in terms of experience, their records of accomplishment, life experience. Ultimately, it is up to the voters to decide. I cannot tell them I am the best candidate. I would tell them to look at experience and qualifications. Look at what I have done. I think most of the voters will find I have served them in a way that will give them confidence in me. Unfortunately, many people in office believe they are in charge. They are not in charge. I believe that once you are elected you need to maintain humility, to know you are not in charge and that you are there to represent your constituency. I have always listened to my constituency. There are, I know, members of my constituency that disagree with my ideas. I have always respected my constituency’s ideas and sense of direction, and I follow it on the dais.”
Nickel said, “I am working hard to stay in touch with the residents of the 5th Ward and I appreciate the feedback I am getting from from the city’s residents. I look forward to working with the other candidates in the 5th Ward after the election, no matter the outcome, to pull together and do what is right for the 5th Ward and the city. For anyone to take on being a candidate and offer their services, you have to admire and respect that.”
Nickel responded to criticism leveled at him from several quarters within the city and in particular by one of his challengers, Brian Davison, with regard to the city council’s move in June to reduce the compensation of the city’s outgoing city attorney and city clerk.
In 2016, San Bernardino’s voters passed a municipal charter makeover plan which, among other reforms, eliminated the city’s elected city attorney and city clerk posts, designating them as appointed positions, simultaneously moving the city’s elections from odd-numbered to even-numbered years. Despite that, both Gary Saenz and Georgeann Hanna, were entitled to remain, respectively, in the elected city attorney and elected city clerk posts they had been reelected to in 2015, with their terms running concurrently until March 3, 2020. Last May, Mayor John Valdvia formed a subcommittee of the city council to consider cost-saving measures, to which he appointed Nickel, Councilman Ted Sanchez and Councilman Juan Figueroa. After just two such meetings, on May 30 and June 5, the Nickel, Sanchez and Figueroa troika called for reducing by 45.8 percent the compensation Saenz was to receive during the nine months of 2019-2020 that he had remaining in office, and reducing the compensation Hanna was to receive during the remaining duration of her tenure by 59.2 percent. Prior to the charter change, the city had set Saenz’ total annual compensation at $246,266, including salary, benefits and add-ons. Hanna had been provided with $171,466 in total annual compensation as city clerk, including salary, benefits and add-ons. The subcommittee passed on to the full city council a proposal to reduce the compensation Saenz was to receive from July 1, 2019 until March 3, 2020 from $184,700 to $100,000 and the compensation Hanna was to receive over the same nine-month span from $128,600 to $52,500. Thus, Saenz was being called upon to see his compensation reduced by $84,700. Hanna was to sustain a reduction of $76,100.
When the council took up the compensation reduction issue on June 10, 2019, Nickel, Sanchez and Figueroa were joined by Councilwoman Bessine Richard in a 4-to-2 vote, with Councilman Jim Mulvihill absent and councilmembers Sandra Ibarra and Fred Shorett dissenting, to make the reductions. Subsequently, however, both Saenz and Hanna sued, contesting the pay cuts. In August 2019, a ruling by Judge David Cohn disallowed the pay reductions, and he ordered that the duo’s pay be restored, with back pay. The council dug in its heels and appealed that ruling, in the course of which it expended more than $75,000 in legal fees. Ultimately, this week, the council decided to drop the appeal.  Thus, the ploy suggested by Nickel, Sanchez and Figueroa to save the city $160,800 instead ended up costing the city’s taxpayers more than $75,000.
Nickel was unapologetic over the issue, explaining that it was in response to his constituents’ demands that the city discontinue the inflated pay for the two elected posts that motivated him to seek the pay reform.
“Ever since the new charter was approved more than three years ago, I have been receiving comments asking me why after those posts were eliminated we are continuing to pay Gigi [Hanna] and Gary what amounted to more than a million dollars,” Nickel said. “The positions were eliminated as elected posts. I looked into it and asked that question on behalf of the voters, the residents, the city’s taxpayers. I never got a good answer. There have been few cases in California where there is a change in the elected status of an official and that official continues to receive pay at what is, after all, a significant level above what is paid for similar work in the private sector. This was nothing personal against Gigi or Gary, but they were being paid very handsomely after the voters of the city voted to eliminate the positions they held. We merely attempted to scale down their pay in accordance with the work they were yet in place, and assigned, to do. The input I was receiving from my constituents was that we had to reduce their pay, since we could not justify in any way paying them the more than a million dollars we were paying them and providing them in benefits. That question was especially appropriate, since just a few years before that vote to change the charter this city had filed for bankruptcy and was still in bankruptcy at the time of that vote to redo the charter. Obviously, we lost at the trial court level, and my decision, after that decision, was to not support moving this into the appellate court after that.”
Nickel studied at Crafton Hills College in Yucaipa, latter transferring to American University in Washington, DC where he received his undergraduate degree in communication, legal institutions, economics and government in 1999. He also has a graduate degree from California State University San Bernardino in national security studies.
In 2012 he was elected to the San Bernardino County Republican Party Central Committee and was chosen by his colleagues in that body to serve as the secretary of the county party shortly thereafter. Nickel is the chairman of the city’s ways and means committee and a member of the legislative review committee. He is a board member of the League of California Cities’ Transportation, Communication and Public Works Committee and its Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender Queer Caucus.
-M.G.

The Walmart Corporation has pulled the plug on its nearly 15 year-long effort to establish a supercenter in Redlands.
Legal challenges over the years had delayed the undertaking, and now other considerations and a changing commercial environment convinced the retail giant, the largest and currently most successful company in the world which at the moment occupies the pinnacle number one spot on the Fortune 500 list of world corporations, to abandon the plan to establish a 256,000 square foot retail center anchored by a 210,00 square foot megastore at the southeast corner of San Bernardino Avenue and Tennessee Street.
The proposal to locate a Walmart on a 33-acre patch of ground at the location was first publicly floated in 2005. The Redlands Good Neighbor Coalition in short order inserted itself into the approval process. One issue that group seized upon was an argument that the project was in conflict with the city’s growth limitation regulations, in particular, Measure U, which was passed by the city’s voters in 1997. Measure U put a premium on preserving the “unique character of the City of Redlands as a quiet university town surrounded by agricultural and citrus producing lands,” and maintaining “principles of managed development within the City of Redlands to accommodate growth over time in a manner that will not lead to a deterioration of the quality of life enjoyed by the citizens of Redlands.”
The coalition filed two lawsuits, which ultimately failed to halt the development plans at the time they were adjudicated in 2013 and 2014. Further delays, ensued, however, as appeals on those lawsuits were pursued. In the meantime, in October 2012, the Redlands City Council gave the project official go-ahead in a 4-to-1, over heavy public opposition. For a variety of reasons, work on the project never actually began. Still, Walmart kept the project concept alive, by seeking on a regular annual basis a multitude of one-year extensions for its conditional use permits and parcel map, such that it did not need to submit a new application for approval of the project to the city. The last extension on the project was signed off on in April 2019.
Support for the project had remained solid at City Hall, which looked forward to the considerable sales tax revenue the store would bring to the city. City officials believed that the city would achieve a synergy with the completion of the project, which would in effect create a series of power centers in close proximity to one another, which included the Mountain Grove at Citrus Plaza and other close by retail attractions, that counted T.J. Max, Ulta, Aldi’s, Kay Jewelers, Nordstom Rack, Banana Republic, Hobby Loddy, Old Navy, Ross, Nike, as well as other customer attractions like 24 Hour Fitness and Harkins Theater. Redlands officials had hoped the concentration of retail options in such a relatively close environment would lure shoppers away from the Montclair Plaza, The Shoppes in Chino Hills, The Tyler Mall in Riverside and The Mills in Ontario.
Nevertheless, during the last half dozen years the entire retail industry has experienced a sea change, as traditional brick and mortar sales outlets have been in some measure supplanted by internet sales. While Walmart, with 11,277 stores and affiliated Sam’s Clubs in 27 countries, remains at the top of the Fortune 500 list, Amazon, which began as an on-line retailer of books and audio and video media, has branched into the sale of virtually every type of consumer product, and has climbed to the position of sixth on the Fortune 500 list, doing so without having made an major investment in physical locations where customers shop. This has prompted Walmart to begin experimenting with its own on-line retail sales approach in places such as Indiana, and made it rethink its aggressive effort to develop more and more stores. In some cases, Walmart employs home delivery vehicles to drop its merchandise off at the homes of customers. In other cases, the customers go to store locations or warehouses to pick up their purchases from a loading dock. In many locations, Walmart stores have seen both subtle and dramatic drop-offs in sales. Last year Walmart initiated or completed the closure of 27 stores throughout the United States and Canada.
Word emanating from Walmart’s corporate headquarters in Bentonville, Arkansas was that Walmart’s strategy to remain at the tip of the retail came was evolving toward the proper mix of traditional stores and e-commerce, and that at present the company needs to reduce the number of physical stores to achieve that balance. Thus, as of last month, Walmart was pursuing the construction of only two further stores in all of California. Following what corporate officers characterized as a “standard, periodic review process protocol” a determination was made that the expense of following through with the development of the Redlands store was contrary to the corporation’s overall strategy and plans at this time. An illustration of Walmart’s move away from store construction exists in the consideration that a little more than five years ago, in 2014, Walmart held 198 grand openings at newly completed locations in the United States, with that number zooming to 313 more in 2015. By 2019, that number had declined to just eight new stores.
Reportedly, the calculation that went into the decision included both the general migration of the retail industry away from expensive physical stores but the general approval and regulatory trend in Redlands as elsewhere in California entailing long term delays between the time of proposal and actual completion of a project. Despite California’s burgeoning population, which makes it an attractive place for operating huge department stores such as Walmart, which typically features 200,000 different products or items for sale, the governmental regulations for building and opening a large retail facility is prohibitive, experts in the development and retail industry say. Walmart’s plans for a supercenter in Fontana and in Rancho Cucamonga are now on hold.
Still, the same, Walmart is not abandoning the lion’s share of its existing stores. On the contrary, it spent $145 million in California alone, remodeling and refurbishing stores in the Golden State.
Walmart now plans to sell the 33-acre property.
Though city officials had apparently known of Walmart’s decision for a fortnight, it was only earlier this week that the public at large was informed.
On the rebound from Walmart’s decision, city officials had already begun talking about departing from the intent to have the property developed for commercial purposes to openly considering rezoning the property for high density residential purposes.
eleoped ropping intentions the

I’ve been really digging the western look. So much, that I’m noticing a trend of people dressing like the Madonna of the Trail over on Euclid Avenue in Upland. You know: the long dress, with boots and bonnet. Missing would be the rifle and children. Well, the look is really neat and fun. There are skirts with ruffled tops, and dresses that cover up the neck. And with this nippy weather, who doesn’t dig a pair of cool boots? History always repeats itself, and fashion likewise comes and goes. Eras don’t really make a difference; one blends into another and in the fashion world time leapfrogs forwards and backwards.  The difference comes  in how you wear what you wear. It’s always neat to see people create a fun modern outfit with a hint of history. With that said, enjoy going West, using your creativity and reinventing the Madonna look on your own trail.

“You either know fashion or you don’t.” – Anna Wintour

By clicking on the blue portal below, you can download a PDF of the Janaury 31 edition of the San Bernardino County Sentinel.

Sentinel 01-31-20

Last fall, San Bernardino County transportation officials pulled the plug on their part of the Los Angeles-to-Ontario Airport Gold Line light rail system after more than a decade of planning and the outlay of more than a billion dollars by Los Angeles County and the State of California to bring the tracks for the train as far east as Azusa, while another $803 million is being spent to extend the line to Pomona. Dismayed at what he perceives to be wrongheaded intransigence to regional cooperation intended to provide the foundation of what is to become the commuting methodology of the future, Assemblyman Chris Holden is sponsoring legislation to form a separate construction agency that will bypass the San Bernardino County Transportation Agency to extend the Gold Line to Ontario International Airport perhaps as early as 2032.
Historically, there was a light rail line that connected Los Angeles with San Bernardino County, extending as far east as Mentone. San Bernardino County was a participant in Pacific Electric’s Red Car Line, the  privately owned mass transit system in Southern California that extended out from Los Angeles, consisting of electrically powered streetcars, and light rail that existed between 1901 and 1961. Ultimately, organized around the city centers of Los Angeles and San Bernardino, by the 1920s it was the largest electric railway system in the world.
In 1901, building upon the electric trolleys that first traveled in Los Angeles in 1887, the Pacific Electric Railroad was established by railroad executive Henry Huntington and banker Isaias W. Hellman after they had success developing a trolley system in San Francisco. Together, Huntington and Hellman purchased some existing rail lines in downtown Los Angeles, which they standardized and organized into one network called the Los Angeles Railway.
The San Bernardino line, Pomona branch, Temple City branch via Alhambra’s Main St., San Bernardino’s Mountain View local to 34th St., Santa Monica Blvd. via Beverly Hills, and all remaining Pasadena local service were cut in 1941. The last vestige of the Red Car system into San Bernardino County was the interurban railroad post office service operated by Pacific Electric on its San Bernardino Line. This was inaugurated comparatively late, on September 2, 1947. It left LA’s Union Station interurban yard on the west side of the terminal turning north onto Alameda Street at 12:45 pm and reached San Bernardino at 4:40 pm daily, taking nearly four hours for the trip. It did not operate on Sundays or holidays. This last railroad post office was pulled off May 6, 1950. Pacific Electric’s Red Car Line fell victim to an effort spearheaded by Arthur P. Sloan, the president and CEO of General Motors from 1923 until 1956, to close out public transportation systems, which greatly profited General Motors.
In 1992, the MetroLink commuter rail system was established between Union Station in Los Angeles and the City of San Bernardino on a long existing track originally designed for heavy engines pulling freight cars. MetroLink utilizes diesel engines to pull its passenger cars and features departures every half hour.
In 2003, the first link of the light passenger rail Gold Line was established between Union Station and Sierra Madre Villa. Consisting of two lines dedicated entirely to commuter conveyance, it has made steady progress expanding eastward ever since. At present it is a 31-mile line running from Atlantic in Los Angeles west along 3rd Street to Indiana Street to 1st Street west to Little Tokyo through a tunnel under Boyle Heights with two underground stations there, from which it continues on to Alameda Street in Little Tokyo, where the line turns north and crosses over the Hollywood Freeway with a stop at Union Station. From Union Station, the Gold Line heads north on an elevated rail to Chinatown and then crosses the Los Angeles River adjacent to the Interstate 5, continuing north/northeast, running through Lincoln Heights, Mount Washington and Highland Park. Just north of Highland Park, the route crosses over the Arroyo Seco Parkway at the 110 Freeway and continues through South Pasadena and then downtown Pasadena, Old Pasadena and then enters the median of the 210 Freeway, east to Sierra Madre Villa, where east of Pasadena the route crosses over the eastbound lanes of the Foothill Freeway (Interstate 210) west of Santa Anita Avenue, with stops in Arcadia and then Monrovia, thereafter entering Duarte and the City of Hope. Crossing over the San Gabriel River, the Gold Line reaches Irwindale and  continues to its Azusa Station. The Gold Line runs with significantly greater frequency than does MetroLink, with departures and arrivals every five to seven minutes during peak commuting hours and every 12 to 15 minutes during off-peak hours.
The Gold Line Construction Authority right now is in the first stages toward a nine-mile, $806 million extension of the light rail line from Azusa to northern Pomona.  The track will reach Pomona by late 2025. Thereafter, the line was previously slated to be extended another 3.3 miles from Pomona through Claremont to Montclair at that city’s existing Montclair Transit Center. According to the Gold Line Construction Authority, the extension of the line from north Pomona to Claremont will entail a cost of $450 million. Previously, the Gold Line Construction Authority in conjunction with the San Bernardino County Transportation Agency, which was previously known as San Bernardino Associated Governments (SANBAG), intended to continue the line from Claremont to Montclair, and then from Montclair to Ontario Airport.
Accordingy, the San Bernardino County Transportation Authority dedicated $39 million in Measure I dollars toward the Gold Line project and did a joint application with the Los Angeles Metro Transit Agency for a State of California Transit and Intercity Rail Capital Program grant. That application was successful and it brought in $250 million on the Los Angeles County side, which made a significant but not complete inroad on the $850 funding deficit that jurisdiction had, and provided another $41 million of the then-projected $80 million cost for the San Bernardino County portion of the projected expense on the eastern side of the Los Angeles County/San Bernardino County border in terms of getting the line to Montclair.
Subsequently, however, when the project went out to bid, it turned out the cost of building the line from Claremont to Montclair would not contain itself to an earlier $73 million projection or the later $80 million estimate, but had escalated to $96 million.
In reaction to that projected cost overrun, San Bernardino County Transportation Authority Executive Director Ray Wolfe said toward the close of the September 4, 2019 meeting of the authority’s board, “I’m going to come back to you through committee next month and hopefully to the board in November with a recommendation that we throw in the towel.”
Wolfe made good on that at the October 10, 2019 San Bernardino County Transportation Agency’s transit subcommittee meeting. That subcommittee is composed of representatives from the cities of Big Bear Lake, Chino Hills, Colton,  Fontana, Highland, Montclair, Ontario, Rancho Cucamonga, Rialto, Yucaipa and the Third Supervisorial District.
Wolfe’s proposal is to dispense with constructing the new Gold Line Track into San Bernardino County altogether and to instead have Gold Line passengers heading eastward from Los Angeles or the San Gabriel Valley load onto another train at the Claremont Station which will run on the existing MetroLink track. That system will use so-called diesel multiple unit trains in what he said was a “hybrid” plan which he dubbed the “Gold Link.” Wolfe said San Bernardino County would return the $41 million State of California Transit and Intercity Rail Capital Program grant that had been freed up to allow the county to overcome the gap between the $39 million in Measure I money put up to complete the Gold Line extension from Claremont to Montclair and the earlier projected cost of the 1.2-mile extension
According to Wolfe, the hybrid Gold Link concept combined the advantage of not entailing the cost of building another set of tracks and could be extended with relative ease eastward from Montclair to Upland, Ontario, Rancho Cucamonga, Fontana and beyond. The converse holds true, Wolfe suggested, as westbound  commuters could use the Gold Link all the way to Claremont, disembark there and then board MetroLink to Los Angeles or the Gold Line to the San Gabriel Foothill communities.
Ultimately, the transit committee backed Wolfe, with Third District Supervisor Dawn Rowe and the representatives of the cities of Yucaipa, Highland, Rialto, Big Bear Lake, Colton, Fontana and Rancho Cucamonga supporting him. Only Montclair, Ontario and Chino Hills opposed his plan to scrub the county’s support of the Gold Line. That vote essentially killed San Bernardino County’s participation in extending the Gold Line into its jurisdiction.
For advocates of the Gold Line and its extension, however, Wolfe’s formula is lacking with regard to several crucial considerations.
On an immediate level, the low cost of the Gold Line fare and its continuity offers the best draw of commuters, its advocates maintain. Moreover, the frequency of arrivals and departures on the existing track now used by MetroLink cannot match that which the Gold Line will provide. Thus, in the relative short term, traffic will be diverted in greater numbers away from the freeway system if the Gold Line is extended than if the only option given to commuters is using a passenger service on the existing track used for MetroLink and freight hauling.
From a longer term context, according to the Gold Line’s promoters, Wolfe’s solution lacks a wider regional perspective. Inevitably, over the next several decades, they say, greater and greater gridlock will force commuters, whether they are favorably inclined to using rail service or not, to use passenger trains to get to and from Los Angeles. At that point, the ridership volume will outrun the capacity of the existing rail line used by MetroLink. Despite whatever cost inflation there has been on building the Gold Line extension so far, it is better to commit to making that extension now than postponing it, as the cost will continue to escalate, those recommending that San Bernardino County stand by its earlier commitment to the Gold Line say. In this way, they assert, Wolfe’s move to cut costs now will entail far greater future cost.
Among those who believe Wolfe has it all wrong is 41st District Assemblyman Chris Holden, who represents Altadena, Claremont, East Pasadena, La Verne, Monrovia, Pasadena, San Dimas, Sierra Madre and South Psadena in Los Angeles County and Rancho Cucamonga, San Antonio Heights and Upland in San Bernardino County.
Holden introduced a bill this week,  Assembly Bill 2011, which would create the West San Bernardino County Rail Construction Authority, an entity to be dedicated to designing and building the six-mile span of track linking Montclair to Ontario.
The assumption is that if the funding for the continuation of the line from Montclair to Ontario is provided by the state, the San Bernardino County Transportation Authority will recommit to the previous effort to construct the Claremont to Montclair link. That is probably likely, given that San Bernardino County has already qualified for $41 million toward the project on its side of the boundary with Los Angeles County in the form of the State of California Transit and Intercity Rail Capital Program grant, meaning the San Bernardino County Transportation Authority will need to come up with $47 million to see the line reach Ontario Airport, a figure that is realistic given the constant proceeds from Measure I that are incoming.
Holden took his inspiration for the bill from one authored by then-State Senator Adam Schiff in 1999, Senate Bill 1847. SB 1847 seized control over the fate of the Foothill Gold Line from the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority, instead entrusting it to a newly-created Foothill Gold Line Construction Authority, which aggressively pushed forward with the project. The authority made a major breakthrough by completing the line to Pasadena in 2003. By 2016, it had been extended to Azusa.
With regard to Assembly Bill 2011, Holden said it would lay the groundwork to extend the Metro Gold Line all the way to Ontario Airport.
“Light-rail is playing a critical role in reducing our carbon footprint, improving air quality, and connecting communities throughout the region,” Holden said “These benefits will expand into San Bernardino County once the Metro Gold Line Extension to Montclair is completed, and have a greater impact if extended to Ontario Airport.”
Holden said he is banking on the train line reaching Montclair, which he described as “six short miles”  from Ontario International Airport, which he characterized as a “critical airport and economic driver for San Bernardino, Riverside, and parts of Los Angeles counties.”
Holden was joined by 52nd District Assemblyman Freddie Rodriguez, who said, “Ontario International Airport is a convenient and rapidly expanding traveling option for many residents across San Bernardino and Los Angeles counties. Though we have seen significant progress in the extension of the Foothill Gold Line, which is planned to terminate in the transit center in the City of Montclair, there is no definitive plan to connect passengers from the transit center to the airport. Creating a nexus between Montclair’s transit center and the Ontario airport is a monumental endeavor, and will require a dedicated construction authority whose sole purpose is constructing a connection that will best serve both San Bernardino and Los Angeles County residents.”
“Electric light rail is the proven solution for dependable public transportation throughout the world,” said Ontario Mayor Paul Leon. “We can no longer have the belief that bigger freeways are better for the environment, travelers, or commuters. It is time to give people the option of using reliable, seamless public transportation instead of driving their cars.”
Holden’s proposal would create the West San Bernardino County Rail Construction Authority that would be responsible for designing and building the extension from Montclair to the airport. The new construction authority would include representation from the San Bernardino County Transportation Authority, Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority, Ontario International Airport Authority, and the cities of Montclair, Upland, Rancho Cucamonga, and Ontario.
Holden is currently chair of the Select Committee on Regional Transportation Solutions. This committee explores solutions to improve multi-modal interconnectivity between communities, establish sustainable transportation infrastructure, and relieve traffic congestion.
At an informational hearing relating to the creation of the authority held in Ontario this morning, Wolfe appeared to back away from his earlier stance to terminate the San Bernardino County Transportation Authority’s support of the Gold Line project.
Holden already submitted a budget request to Governor Gavin Newsom for LA Metro to study the feasibility of an extension to the Hollywood Burbank Airport.
Holden’s history with the Gold Line spans over 30 years. Prior to his election to the Pasadena City Council, Holden served on the Pasadena Light Rail Alignment Task Force established in 1985 to identify the light rail route alternatives in Pasadena. He is a former board president of the Burbank-Glendale-Pasadena Airport Authority where he served as a commissioner for 20 years.
“As a former city council member and mayor of Pasadena, I championed early efforts to establish the Metro Gold Line, which turned out to be more successful than anyone anticipated, just like the recent extension to Azusa,” said Holden. “Extending the Gold Line to Ontario Airport will propel both San Bernardino County and Los Angeles County into our new transportation future.”
Holden’s effort appears to be on a collision course with that of Grand Terrace Mayor Darcy McNaboe, who is currently the president of the San Bernardino County Transportation Authority.  McNaboe has gone on record as saying the Gold Line extension to the airport and therefore to Montclair is “unnecessary and too costly” and will take too much time to complete.
Holden took the high road, looking beyond McNaboe’s pronouncements. “As we begin this process, I look forward to working with stakeholders at the local, regional and state level including San Bernardino County Transportation Authority President Darcy McNaboe, Senator Connie Leyva, and Assemblymember Freddie Rodriguez,” he said.
Ontario Mayor Leon said he hopes that those formerly opposing the Gold Line concept “will soften their positions as this bill moves toward becoming law. Light rail needs to get built. The San Bernardino County Transportation Authority needs to stop dragging its feet. The Gold Line is the first choice of commuters on the other side of the San Bernardino County/Los Angeles County line. We have to make sure we do not alienate people with harsher judgments, but at the same time we have to make people realize there needs to be a future connection between Los Angeles and Ontario Airport, and the Gold Line is logically it.” He called upon McNaboe to end her opposition to the extension of the Gold Line to Montclair.

-Mark Gutglueck

After a series of delays, the preliminary hearing in the case against Alex Opmanis got under way this afternoon. The proceedings are intended to outline a bare-bones version of the prosecution’s case against Opmanis, and convince Judge Charles Umeda that the accused should be bound over for trial in the fatal shooting of Sammy Davis last summer. The prosecution’s effort to demonstrate Opmanis’s action rose to the level of murder offered no startling turns. The testimony of three witnesses today did, however, provide some degree of nuance to a series of violent events that culminated in the death of the 29-year-old Davis.
Opmanis, who was then 27, is accused of gunning down Davis at 9:14 p.m. on July 11, 2019 in the parking lot of Goodwin’s Market, located at 24089 Lake Gregory Drive in Crestline.
Based on the proceedings so far, it does not appear that a crucial piece of evidence, a security video that captured moving images of the shooting itself, will be featured as part of the preliminary hearing when it resumes next week. Nevertheless, the video was referenced repeatedly in testimony today, which confirmed that the video had in some fashion been “chopped up.”
Word emanating from more than one quarter of the county, and indeed from the investigative agency that secured the original video, the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department, is that the video was in some fashion altered in a way to assist the prosecution. A close examination of the video that was turned over to the defense shows that numerous passages were deleted, leaving out what, based upon the remaining parts of the video that were not deleted indicate, seem to be several key sequences. One of those is a crucial 12 seconds just two seconds before the shooting takes place. The images and sounds intact on those portions of the tape just prior to that 12 second deletion and after it suggest that Davis and another individual, 29-year-old Robert Shuey, were physically assaulting Opmanis while they were in immediate physical proximity to him. An earlier excision from the video, while Davis, Shuey and a third man, Shane Codman, are some distance away from Opmanis, featured, according to Opmanis, one or more of the trio taunting and threatening him.
While statements elicited from two of the three witnesses testifying today confirmed that the video was cut up, it remains unclear how the video was piecemealed and by whom, and for what purpose.
Testifying first under direct examination by Deputy District Attorney David Rabb was Detective Gerardo Moreno of the sheriff’s department’s homicide division, who was dispatched to Saint Bernardine Medical Center on the evening of July 11, 2019. Moreno testified that by the time he arrived at the hospital and was cleared to see Davis, who had been transported from the scene of the shooting in Crestline in the west San Bernardino Mountains to San Bernardino, that Davis was dead.
At the hospital, Moreno testified, he spoke with both Dr. Yasmina Boyd, the emergency room physician who was on call when Davis was treated, as well as coroner’s division examiner Brad Coleman.
Moreno said when he first saw Davis, he appeared deceased. He said a thoracotomy, a surgical incision into the chest, had been by that point performed on Davis, but that he was yet able to note a gunshot wound to the left side of his chest and another gunshot wound to his right middle back, along with an abrasion to his left index finger.
Moreno said that Dr. Boyd said she had performed the thoracotomy in an effort to locate the gunshot injury.
During his cross examination of Moreno, Deputy Public Defender David Spiker on behalf of Opmanis, elicited that the two gunshot wounds he had referenced appeared to be an entrance wound to the chest and an exit wound at Davis’s middle right back, signifying that Davis had been shot just once.
Moreno also indicated in response to Spiker’s questioning that the wounds to Davis were consistent with the statements that Opmanis had made to him about the shooting.
Spiker also inquired about when Davis’s blood was drawn. “I was not present when the hospital [staff] drew blood from Mr. Davis,” Moreno responded.
At the conclusion of his testimony as Moreno was leaving the courtroom, he looked toward a group of courtroom spectators that included Davis’s family members, and made a hand gesture of acknowledgment to them.
Detective Kevin McCurdy followed Moreno to the witness stand.
McCurdy related in response to Rabb’s questioning that on July 12 he had spoken with members of the San Bernardino County Fire Division crew that had responded to the parking lot at Goodwin’s Store on the night of July 11. He said one of those crew members, Michael Bass, told him that he and the rest of his crew, which included a captain named Newcomb, a firefighter/paramedic named Perry and a paramedic named Shakula, along with an ambulance operator named Eduardo Gonzales, had responded to the scene of the shooting, and had been delayed at the periphery of the parking lot until they were signaled that it was safe to enter it. Bass, McCurdy said, told him they encountered a “patient lying on the ground with labored breathing” who was “later identified as Sammy Davis.” McCurdy testified that Bass related that Davis had a “gunshot wound near the nipple on the chest and another believed to be an exit wound” on his back and that Bass reported “not seeing blood around the victim” which “indicated that bleeding was internal.”
According to Bass, McCurdy said, the team “immediately began life saving measures,” and given the seriousness of the situation, did what McCurdy referred to as a “load and go,” meaning Davis was put into the ambulance, which left directly to transport him to the hospital, in this case Saint Bernardine’s Hospital in San Bernardino. En route, Bass said, according to McCurdy, he and Paramedic Perry were continuing lifesaving measures, during which Davis’s pulse stopped, so they had performed cardiopulmonary resuscitation and at one point needed to perform an incision to relieve the internal pressure on Davis’s lungs to allow him to breath. Further, according to McCurdy, Bass said Davis had received “two rounds of epinephrine” and that he and Perry were unable to insert a breathing tube down Davis’s throat, so they instead outfitted him with a breathing bag valve mask.
According to McCurdy’s testimony, Bass told him he and Perry were able to restore Davis’s pulse, which was strong at around 115 beats per minute. At the hospital, Davis was unloaded and transferred from the care of the paramedics to the hospital staff, after which Davis’s pulse had stopped and the hospital staff was unable to revive him.
McCurdy indicated he had also spoken with Firefighter/Paramedic Christopher Perry.
McCurdy further testified that he had interviewed or interrogated Alex Opmanis at the Twin Peaks Sheriff’s Station for approximately four hours and that he read him his “Miranda Rights prior to speaking with him.” According to McCurdy, Opmanis “was not in custody but he had been transported in handcuffs” to the sheriff’s station. He said the Miranda Rights notification had been given “to make sure there was no misunderstanding during our interview.”
McCurdy said Opmanis indicated he understood his rights and was willing to speak to him. He said he asked Opmanis if he had fired a gun and that Opmanis said “he did fire a weapon …at an individual.” McCurdy said that Opmanis told him he had “retrieved a pistol out of a lockbox in his vehicle and put it on his driver’s seat.”
Asked if Opmanis had “prior contact” with Davis and those in his company, McCurdy said Opmanis told him he “had been assaulted by the same group of individuals,” one of whom was Robert Shuey.
Opmanis also told him that he was “charged” or “quickly approached” by the person he shot prior to the shooting. Opmanis said that he had retrieved the gun from the lockbox prior to being set upon by those he encountered, but that there was no no round in the chamber nor was the magazine inserted into the firearm at that point.
Opmanis had further stated that he was “grocery shopping prior to his contact with those individuals,” that he had interaction with “an attractive female” after leaving the store and that he had loaded the groceries he had purchased into his car when he heard motorcycles start up and revving. He said that Robert Shuey had yelled at him when the three on their motorcycles passed by him and that one of the motorcyclists turned around, parked and quickly approached him.
McCurdy said the interview/interrogation of Opmanis was “pretty lengthy, a couple of hours… He was very emotional. That’s why it took so long to speak to him.” McCurdy added that Opmanis was “crying” and “vomiting” throughout the exchange at the sheriff’s station.
McCurdy said he had gone “briefly” to Goodwin’s Market before the interview, where the entire parking lot was roped off as a crime scene. He said he saw Opmanis’s vehicle, which, while he was on the witness stand, he could not describe as to make, model or color, “somewhat centralized in the parking lot.”
McCurdy testified that the call to the fire/paramedic crew had come in at 21:18 [i.e., 9:18 p.m.], and that it took the crew about ten minutes to get to the scene, after which it was delayed by five minutes before the firefighters were cleared to render assistance to Davis, presumably because the sheriff’s department was seeking to verify that there was not an armed and active shooter yet in place on the premises. McCurdy testified that it took the ambulance another “20 to 25 minutes” to make its run to the hospital with Davis aboard.
Under cross examination by Spiker, McCurdy said that throughout the interview/interrogation Opmanis had the right to walk away and that if indeed Opmanis had left, he would have let him go.
Spiker questioned McCurdy about the security video of the activity in the Goodwin’s Market parking lot prior to, during and after the shooting.
At that point, McCurdy said he had only cursorily examined the video and that there “was a breakdown of the video by another detective.”
McCurdy acknowledged that Opmanis’s statements made to him during the course of the interview/interrogations were consistent with his investigation of the shooting, including his review of the video, which essentially verified that prior to the time of the shooting, Opmanis was near or at his vehicle and was approached by three motorcyclists, including Davis and Shuey. McCurdy identified the third motorcyclist as Shane Codman. The video did show, McCurdy said in his testimony, Opmanis remaining near his vehicle, and that one of the motorcyclists dismounted and then walked aggressively toward Opmanis.
McCurdy testified that Opmanis during the interview related to him that Shuey had assaulted him previously, putting him in the hospital, and that Opmanis had experienced night sweats and “major trauma” as a result. McCurdy said Opmanis claimed to him that he had suffered post traumatic stress as well as a traumatic brain injury and memory loss as a consequence of the beating.
Spiker asked McCurdy if he had verified Opmanis’s account of what he was experiencing and McCurdy said he had not. To Spiker’s follow-up question about whether he had found anything to disprove what Opmanis had claimed, McCurdy said he had not. McCurdy did say that Opmanis’s relating of how he had been beaten by Shuey prior to the shooting incident prompted him to be less than aggressive in his questioning of Opmanis, that is, that he had used “kid gloves” in conducting his inquiry, which contributed, he said, to the length of the interview/interrogation.
Spiker asked McCurdy if he was able to in fact verify that Opmanis had sustained serious injury at the hands of Shuey. McCurdy said “I located a prior battery report where the two were involved with each other.” Spiker asked if McCurdy had found anything to disprove what Opmanis had said about his prior encounter with Shuey.
“No,” McCurdy responded.
Spiker asked McCurdy if Opmanis had told him that he had no prior issues with Davis, no prior problems with Davis and had suffered no prior beatings by Davis.
“Correct,” McCurdy said.
McCurdy also testified that he had not passed along to the lead detective and case agent on the shooting, Eric Ogaz, that Opmanis had told him that he was afraid of Shuey, that he believed Shuey was in some way associated with the Hell’s Angels motorcycle gang and that Opmanis had related that he suffered from post traumatic stress. “It did not come up,” McCurdy said.
McCurdy acknowledged under questioning by Spiker that Opmanis had told him that Davis was being aggressive, that Opmanis was “basically standing his ground by the car,” and that Davis had punched Opmanis multiple times in the head.
McCurdy acknowledged that Opmanis had told him he had undergone reconstructive surgery and had two metal plates in his head, and that he believed being hit in the head put him at serious risk.
Spiker then read directly from a transcript of the interview/interrogation in which Opmanis said, “I thought they were going to kill me. I was so scared, man.”
McCurdy acknowledged that was an accurate reflection of what Opmanis said during the interview and that he had responded to Opmanis, “Don’t beat yourself up.”
McCurdy acknowledged that he had told Opmanis that he would track down Shuey and Codman but that ultimately that did not occur for several weeks.
McCurdy acknowledged Opmanis discussed with him that he had multiple head injuries, that he was being assaulted by being punched in the head, that he fired the gun in self defense and that he used the gun because he was in fear of his life.
Spiker asked if an effort was made by the sheriff’s department to determine if Davis’s DNA was present on the ripped hoodie that Opmanis was wearing when the shooting occurred.
McCurdy was unable to say whether that had been done.
Spiker asked McCurdy if Opmains’s statement that he had yelled at Shuey, “Get Back! Get Back!” in the seconds after the shooting had been verified by what was on the video.
McCurdy at that point indicated he had only briefly viewed the video.
McCurdy said viewing the video was not a priority at that time. He acknowledged a decision was made at that time not to arrest Opmanis, and that Opmanis needed medical attention, so he was released to paramedics who transported him to a hospital for treatment. Spiker pursued the issue, stating that just because a suspect requires medical care, an arrest can still be effectuated, and McCurdy stated that Opmanis was permitted to return home without being arrested after his release from the hospital.
Spiker further succeeded in getting McCurdy to put on the record that after the shooing Opmanis had remained on the scene and had been the first person to summon medical assistance and the authorities by making a 911 call. McCurdy also confirmed that Shuey and Codman had left the scene shortly after Opmanis summoned the sheriff’s and fire departments.
McCurdy also testified that Opmanis had told him he didn’t want to leave the parking lot and that he knew the video camera was pointed directly at his vehicle. McCurdy testified as well that Opmanis told him his head was throbbing, he felt his brain was swollen and he wanted to go to the hospital for a CAT scan. McCurdy acknowledged that after the shooting Opmanis said he feared that Shuey would come after him and his family.
McCurdy said that Opmanis was cooperative and had provided him with the password to his phone. He acknowledged that he had told Opmanis, “We want to work on getting you out of here and taken care of.”
After Spiker ended his cross examination of McCurdy, the court took a short recess, during which Rabb and McCurdy conferred. In Rabb’s redirect examination after the break, the prosecutor pursued a line of questioning that related to the video which appeared to be aimed at establishing that the video had not been altered after it was obtained from Goodwin’s Market. That questioning elicited a response that was different in tenor and substance than what McCurdy had provided during his testimony under cross examination by Spiker. Whereas in response to Spiker’s questions, McCurdy underplayed the significance of the video and represented that he had only a vague recollection of it, in response to Rabb’s questions, McCurdy evinced a far greater definitude, describing the video in much greater detail, saying that he had watched it on a colleague’s laptop perched on a vehicle in the Goodwin’s Market parking lot. The description he gave of the video in large measure matched the nature of the evidence that has been turned over to the defense. That video is not continuous, but chopped up into multiple sections, with passages missing, including a crucial 12 seconds just prior to the shooting having been removed entirely.
In response to Rabb, McCurdy said he had viewed “multiple clips” that had required “a significant amount of time” to watch as each clip had to load in the laptop’s video buffer.
McCurdy said the entirety of the parking lot was considered the crime scene and had been taped off, an area he estimated to be about two acres.
He said that Opmanis had been released to the paramedics to be taken to the hospital and was not arrested at that point because the  investigation “was not complete at that time.”
Upon leaving the courtroom after his testimony, McCurdy made no eye contact with anyone in the group that included Davis’s family members, and walked straight out of the courtroom.
Also testifying on Friday was San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Deputy Victor Ruiz, who was the first law enforcement responder to the Davis death scene.
Ruiz said when he came into the Goodwin’s Market parking lot he observed a male subject on his back, with three individuals around him who were rendering assistance. He said he noticed no weapon or weapons around Davis.
He indicated he was at the site from seven to 15 minutes before the arrival of the  paramedics, at which point Davis in short order was put into the ambulance to be transported to the hospital. He said he had spoken with the defendant, whom he identified from the witness stand as seated at the counsel table in the courtroom. Ruiz said there were several vehicles in the parking lot when he arrived, and that Davis was prone on the ground six to ten feet behind a black Mercedes and approximately five to ten feet from a motorcycle.
Asked by Rabb what he noticed in his initial brief examination of the area, Ruiz said, “I didn’t see a large amount of blood anywhere.”
Ruiz testified that at some point he had gone into the store to see if he could get the video. He said that some other deputy had to wait for the owner to provide the video.
Ruiz testified that he spoke to Kyle Boggs, an employee of the market. Boggs stated to him, he said, that he heard while he was in the store that there was a fight outside. Ruiz also testified that Boggs said he had not seen the person who had fired the gun. Ruiz testified that Boggs had told him Opmanis had at one point screamed, “I didn’t want to do this! I didn’t want to do this!”
Ruiz testified that Opmanis had remained at the scene of the shooting.
On cross examination by Spiker, Ruiz stated that he had spoken with Opmanis.
“Did Mr. Opmanis tell you anything about motorcycles circling him?” Spiker asked.
“Yes,” Ruiz said.
Ruiz recounted, in response to Spiker’s questions, that the three bikers had driven past Opmanis in leaving the parking lot but then circled back and parked next to him and his vehicle, that Opmanis told him he had been hit several times and that he was in fear. Ruiz said his interview with Opmanis was approximately five minutes long. Ruiz said Opmanis admitted he did shoot a gun and that he had shot because he was being assaulted.
Spiker asked if Opmanis had been cooperative with law enforcement officers who arrived on the scene and Ruiz acknowledged that Opmanis was.
Spiker asked Ruiz if Opmanis had told him of a prior confrontation with Robert Shuey, and Ruiz said Opmanis had told him “he was assaulted by Robert Shuey because he had thrown up in Mr. Shuey’s residence” and that “they were picking on him.” Ruiz also indicated that Opmanis at that time had told him about sustaining a facial fracture and black eyes from the assault by Shuey.
Ruiz said he handcuffed Opmanis and put him in his patrol car, and that while Opmanis was in his patrol vehicle, “he was making sounds like he was trying to throw up.”
Ruiz indicated that Opmanis, after purchasing groceries, had remained in the parking lot for an extended period of time after the three motorcyclists were in the parking lot. Ruiz said Opmanis had indicated to him “he was doing some other things inside his vehicle.”
Asked “When did he [Opmanis] reach into his vehicle?” Ruiz responded, “After he heard the subject yelling and cursing at him.”
Ruiz said Opmanis described staying in place in the parking lot for approximately two to three minutes until the time the three motorcyclists encircled him. Opmanis told him that it was when he was hit from several different directions that he racked and loaded the gun. Opmanis told him, Ruiz said, that he only shot the gun once and didn’t aim the weapon.
Ruiz said that Opmanis was “fairly calm” in relating the incidents pertaining to and leading up to the shooting.
Prior to testimony, there was discussion with regard to information the defense was seeking to obtain relating to a DUI arrest and ongoing prosecution of Eric Dyberg, one of the detectives from the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Departments working the homicide detail of the Specialized Investigations Division who was assigned to investigate the Davis shooting. Spiker was recently informed of Dyberg’s arrest and pending prosecution, and is seeking the police report relating to that matter to ascertain if there are any statements that Dyberg made which are at a demonstrable variance to the evidence that accompanies the case file. Without prejudging Dyberg’s guilt or innocence, Spiker said, if the police report provides an indication that Dyberg in any fashion made misrepresentations within an official police report, that would cut to the heart of Dyberg’s credibility.
Dyberg’s believability is of some moment in the Opmanis prosecution because of Dyberg’s relationship to the video of Opmanis’s shooting of Davis. The provenance of the video the prosecution provided to the defense is an issue, as the fragmented nature of the video and several crucial elements of it that are missing have led to suggestions that it was purposefully altered to assist the prosecution of Opmanis and hinder his defense.
Under standard protocol in criminal trials throughout the United States, prosecutors are mandated to provide to the defense any exculpatory, meaning potentially exonerating, evidence that the prosecution obtains or which is generated by the law enforcement agency investigating the circumstances of the alleged crime. Failing to make full and adequate disclosure of such materials to the defense is referred to, in legal parlance, as a Brady violation. On Monday morning, February 3, Judge Umeda is to conduct a special hearing relating to Brady issues and the information pertaining to Detective Dyberg that should be provided to Striker in order to aid him in his defense of Opmanis.
The remainder of Opmanis’s preliminary hearing is set to resume on Friday, February 7,  before Judge Umeda in Department S-2 at the San Bernardino Justice Center.
-Mark Gutglueck