At the end of the year, Josie Gonzales, the senior member of the San Bernardino County Board of Supervisors who has represented the county’s Fifth Supervisorial District since 2004, will leave office, being obliged to do so as a consequence of the three term limit that was placed on the board as a consequence of the 2006 passage of Measure P, which raised the annual salaries of the members of the board of supervisors from $99,000 to $151,000 but reduced the time they could remain in the capacity of county supervisor from that point going forward. As the first term to which Gonzales was elected, running from 2004 to 2008, did not fall under the Measure P restriction, she was eligible to be reelected in 2008, 2012 and 2016. She was successful in remaining in office with each of those election cycles.
Gonzales is now looking to turn the Fifth District’s reins over to her chief of staff, Dan Flores. Like Gonzales, Flores is a Democrat.
Though county offices are considered nonpartisan ones, in San Bernardino County party affiliation is a major factor in the determination of who will hold public office. For some 40 years beginning in the mid-to-late-1960s, San Bernardino County was a Republican Party stronghold, with the number of registered Republicans outnumbering registered Democrats. The lone area of the county where the Republican command was attenuated was in the county’s heavily blue collar Fifth District. Even so, the Republicans often asserted themselves there, where Republican Bob Hammock was the Fifth District supervisor from 1976 until 1992. In 2009, the number of Republicans in San Bernardino County were eclipsed by the number of Democrats. Nevertheless, the number of Republican officeholders continues to outrun the number of Democrat Party-affiliated elected leaders overall in San Bernardino County, largely on the basis of much stronger voter turnout among Republicans than Democrats.
At present, the Fifth District is overwhelmingly Democratic, with 49.7 percent, or 91,248 of its 183,646 voters registered as members of the Democratic Party and 33,607 voters or 18.3 percent registered as Republicans. At present, the Fifth District is the only district in the county with a Democrat serving as supervisor. Although in all of the county’s districts registered Democrats outnumber Republicans, nowhere is that disparity as pronounced as it is in the Fifth District.
Another Democrat, Joe Baca, Jr. is also running for supervisor in the Fifth District. Baca, a Rialto City Councilman, is the son of former California Assemblyman, State Senator and Congressman Joe Baca. As such, young Baca enjoys somewhat better name recognition than Flores, who in addition to being Gonzales’s top staffer, is also a member of the Colton Joint Unified School District’s Board of Trustees. Three factors, however, offset Baca’s name recognition advantage with regard to Flores. First, Flores has Gonzales’s endorsement. Second, he has a substantial fundraising lead over the rest of the field, including Baca, with $231,100 in his campaign war chest. Third, Gonzales has $691,237.10 in her electioneering kitty, and she is free to expend that money in support or other candidates, including Flores.
Baca currently has $25,290 in his campaign coffer.
Another candidate in the race is Nadia Renner, a businesswoman, who until recently served as a bilingual radio host for Entravision Communications and was a regular interviewer on a local talk show covering county issues. Available records show she has $4,700 in her supervisorial campaign fund. Renner has no party affiliation.
Fontana City Councilman Jesse Armendarez, a Republican, is also running. He outmaneuvered another Republican, Dr. Clifford Young, for the endorsement of the San Bernardino County Republican Central Committee earlier this year. Young was the appointed Fifth District supervisor in 2003 and 2004 before Gonzales was elected to that position. Young was contemplating again seeking the Fifth District supervisorial post, but ended his preparations to run when Armendarez captured the GOP endorsement.
Armendarez, who is a member of the ruling coalition on the Fontana City Council headed by Mayor Acquanetta Warren, has also obtained Warren’s endorsement for the supervisorial position.
Armendarez currently has $44,636.49 in his political account.
While any Republican vying for supervisor in the Fifth District is considered to be a long shot given the voter registration numbers therein which so heavily favor the Democrats, Republican strategists hold out hope that the Democratic vote in the March 3 contest will be split between Baca and Flores in such a way that Armendarez can capture first or second place in that race. Thereafter, the Republicans hope to concentrate their firepower on Armendarez’s November opponent, whoever that proves to be, in a way that will give Armendarez a chance to win.
-Mark Gutglueck

Ten local measures will appear on the March 3 ballot, one each in as many localities throughout San Bernardino County. All but one involves proposed taxes or assessments, with the lone exception being a proposed general plan change in Redlands. In the cases of two of the places where the request for a new tax is to be voted upon, within the San Bernardino Mountains Communities Hospital District and the Rim of the World School District, there is a geographical overlap.
Measure Z is a bond proposition to be voted upon by residents within the Mountain View School District in southeastern Ontario.
Known also as the “Mountain View School District Student Safety and School Repair Measure” it will if passed by 55 percent or more of the district’s voters authorize $33 million in bonds for School Facilities Improvement District No. 3 at legal rates, levying on property owners an assessment of 2 cents per $100 of assessed value of their property. The proceeds will be used to update science, technology, engineering, art and math classrooms; upgrade air conditioning, electrical, fire safety, security, lighting, communications/camera systems, classroom locks; and construct, acquire, repair or equip classrooms, facilities and sites.
Measure A is a bond proposition to be voted upon by residents within the Rim of the World School District in the San Bernardino Mountains.
Known also as the “Rim of the World Unified School District Quality Education, Safety, Repair, College/Career Readiness Measure” it will if passed by 55 percent or more of the district’s voters authorize $55.5 million in bond sales to repair deteriorating school facilities, including roofs, plumbing and electrical facilities and improve classrooms and labs for math, science, engineering, arts, skilled trades and college readiness. It will levy on property owners 3 cents per $100 assessed value of their properties.
Measure B is a bond proposition to be voted upon by residents within the Beaumont School District to improve safety and security systems and replace roofs, plumbing and electrical facilities and improve classrooms and labs for math, science, engineering, arts, skilled trades and college readiness. It will levy on property owners $50 per $100,000 of assessed value of their property.
Measure C is a bond proposition to be voted upon by residents within the Morongo Unified School District authorizing the issuance of $55.6 million for classroom safety, renovation and construction projects. It will levy on property owners an assessment of 3.686 cents per $100 of assessed value of their property. It will need at least 55 percent of the vote to pass.
Measure D is a bond proposition to be voted upon by residents within the Victor Elementary School District that if passed by a margin of 55 percent or more will provide for the issuance of $48 million in bonds to increase safety and security of the schools and build more facilities to relieve overcrowding, and support science, technology, math and engineering education. It will levy upon property owners an assessment of $19 per $100,000 of assessed value of their property.
Measure E is a sales tax proposition to be voted upon by residents in the City of Yucaipa. If passed by 50 percent plus one of the voters, it will adopt the City of Yucaipa Transactions and Use Tax Ordinance of 2020, known also as the “Sales Tax Ordinance.” Measure E would increase the city’s existing sales tax rate by 0.5%, or one half of one cent, on every dollar of taxable sales of goods in the city, and on the taxable storage, use or consumption in the city of goods purchased.
The measure proposes a general tax. The city has estimated the tax increase will raise approximately $2.1 million per year in new local revenue for use in the city.
Measure F is a proposition to be voted upon by Barstow residents that would impose a city tax on the sale of marijuana and marijuana products within that municipality.  If passed by two-thirds of the city’s voters, Measure F will impose on those in the city growing marijuana an annual tax of $30 per square foot of cultivating area and impose on businesses engaged in selling marijuana a 15 percent tax on their gross receipts. The city expects the tax to raise roughly $100,000 per year. Fifty percent of the proceeds will go to augment law enforcement function in the city and the other 50 percent will go to the city’s general fund.
Measure G is a general plan amendment to be voted upon by the residents of Redlands. If passed by 50 percent or more of the city’s electorate, Measure G would eliminate a host of previous voter-approved limitations on the intensity of development that can occur in Redlands.
Specifically, Measure G would eliminate the current requirement that a four-fifths vote of the city council is needed to approve residential densities exceeding 18 dwelling units per acre. Measure G would eliminate the current requirement that a four-fifths vote of the city council is needed to approve residential buildings exceeding two stories or 35 feet in height. Measure G would eliminate the need for developers to ensure that the level of traffic flow that exists at the intersections proximate to their projects prior to the construction of their projects be maintained after the projects are completed. Measure G would eliminate the requirement that the voters of the city rather than the city council be solely authorized to establish any new land use designations in the city. Measure G would eliminate the requirement that the proponents of certain new development projects prepare a socioeconomic‐cost/benefit study before approval of those projects. Measure G would eliminate the requirement that certain residential subdivision projects be subject to competitive review for issuance of building permits. Measure G would eliminate the requirement that the developers of new projects pay 100 percent of the development impact fees that are imposed on those projects. Measure G would rescind voter‐approved measures R, N and U, which prohibit more than 400 residential dwelling units being constructed within the city in any year. Recent state legislation has suspended the city’s enforcement of the measure R, N and U limitation through the year 2025. Approval of Measure G would permanently exempt residential dwelling units constructed within Redlands’ Transit Village Planning Area from the 400 dwelling unit limitation.
Measure H is a special tax proposition to be voted upon by residents within the San Bernardino Mountains Community Hospital District which would make permanent an existing tax that must be renewed every four years. The Measure H tax would as of 2021 impose for each calendar year an assessment of $40 per unimproved parcel, $80 for each parcel containing a single family residence or multiple dwelling units, and $200 per parcel for each parcel developed for commercial purposes. Each calendar year thereafter the amount of the special tax shall increase (but not decrease) by a percentage corresponding to the Consumer Price Index published by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics for all urban consumers in the Riverside-San Bernardino-Ontario region, not to exceed three percent.
Measure H must be approved by two-thirds of the district’s voters.
The San Bernardino Mountains Community Hospital District encompasses Twin Peaks, Grass Valley, Rimforest, Agua Fria, Crest Park, Lake Arrowhead, Skyforest, Cedar Glen, Enchanted Forest, Fredalba, Smiley Park, Running Springs, Arrowbear Lake, Snow Valley, Green Valley Lake and Deer Lodge Park.
Measure I is a special tax proposition to be voted upon by residents within the Big Bear Fire Authority Community Services District that must pass by a two-thirds vote to go into effect. It will levy an annual six cents per square foot assessment on developed property floor area, with a minimum of $35 per assessor’s parcel and a maximum of $2,500 per assessor’s parcel upon developed properties, residential rental properties and hotels, together with a $78 per room hotel tax. It will also impose on two of the area’s ski resorts $375,000 annual assessments. The proceeds are to be used to provide fire protection services.
-Mark Gutglueck

California brickellbush, known scientifically as brickellia californica, is a species of flowering plant in the asteraceae or daisy/sunflower family.
It is native to western North America from Baja California to as far north as Idaho, Northern Mexico, Sonora, Chihuahua, and Coahuila states; and much of the Western United States, across California to Oregon, northeast to Wyoming, and east through the Southwestern states to Colorado, New Mexico, West Texas and Oklahoma. In San Bernardino County it is present in the San Bernardino Mountains and in the Mojave Desert.
It is found below 8,900 feet, in many habitat types including forests, woodlands, scrub, grasslands, and deserts.
It is a common plant in many types of California habitats, including chaparral, coastal sage scrub, oak woodland, valley grassland, yellow pine forest, Sierra Nevada subalpine zones, and Mojave Desert sky islands. It is a common plant especially in dry areas, somewhat more common in the southern coastal part of California.
It is one of the most pleasantly fragrant of California native plants. Although not particularly beautiful even in bloom, its redolence comes out in the summer months when it is flowering, and the scent can carry a considerable distance.
A thickly branching shrub growing from a foot-and-a-half to six feet in height, its fuzzy, hairy leaves are roughly triangular in shape with toothed to serrated edges. The leaves are one-third inch to two-and-a-half inches long. Although it is in the sunflower family, the inconspicuous flowers look nothing like a sunflower, being very small and rayless. The flower clusters at the end of stem branches contain many small leaves and bunches of narrow, cylindrical flower heads. Each head is about 13 millimeters long and wrapped in flat, wide, purplish green overlapping phyllaries. At the tip of the head are a number of long white to pink disc florets. The fruit is a hairy cylindrical achene 3 millimeters long with a pappus of bristles. In the garden it is best used in a location where its fragrance can be appreciated but its lack of showiness will not detract.
The bloom period is August through November.
The Navajo and Kumeyaay (Diegueño) peoples used it as a traditional medicinal plant for fevers, coughs, and prenatal complications.

From Wikipedia and the California Native Plan Society’s website Calscape.

It’s only 2020 and fashion has just begun. We have fringes, leather, fluorescent green, polka dots, and layers kicking off the new year. If you like to preplan your wardrobe, these pieces are ready to inspire. Fringes are great with boots, leather is coming in many colors and shapes, polka dots are something to look at, and fluorescent is a thing of the moment. All these pieces are great mix-and-matchers and good for just about any time of the day. Make the new year special and bright by sharing your favorite outfits on the streets of California. There’s always something refreshing about starting anew and we should thank fashion for all the new trends. Stay tuned for more fashion as we keep ringing in the New Year.

“The joy of dressing is an art.” —John Galliano

By clicking on the blue portal below, you can download a PDF of the December 27 edition of the San Bernardino County Sentinel.

Sentinel 12-27-19

By Mark Gutglueck
Questions remain about not only the propriety but the legality of the City of Yucaipa’s move to once again sell off for development property that was donated to the Yucaipa community two generations ago by the Finkelstein Brothers for the express purpose of public rather than private use.
Last week, the Yucaipa Planning Commission cleared the way for the Yucaipa City Council to sell off for the second time in less than a year land that for 52 years has been designated exclusively and what was said to have been irrevocably for use as parkland or variously for educational or public institutional purposes.
At the March 25, 2019 Yucaipa City Council meeting, the council approved the sale of 0.87 acres at the northwest corner of Yucaipa Boulevard and 13th Street to JADE Real Estate Holdings, Inc. for $500,000. That property is located east of the Crafton Hills Fire Station on the same parcel which included the footprint upon which the fire station was sited.
In 1964, Ruben and Lester Finkelstein gave indication that they would potentially provide, through their foundation, property upon which a community college in the then-unincorporated community of Yucaipa would be built. In 1966, the Finklesteins made good on that offer with an initial donation of 167 acres, following that original bequest with the provision of 76 more acres in 1970 and subsequently donating 251 acres of additional land.
Those donations entailed deed restrictions that limited the use of the land to those for charitable, educational and recreational purposes. A significant portion of the donated land was used for the campus of Crafton Hills College, which opened in 1972. When the City of Yucaipa incorporated in 1989, title to the remainder of the property not comprising the college campus transferred to the city. The deed restrictions remained in effect.
The land in the general vicinity of the college over the years has been utilized for public purposes, including one of the city’s sports complexes, which is administered by the Yucaipa Parks and Recreation District.
On November 19. 2018, the city received a letter from JADE Real Estate Holdings that expressed interest in purchasing 0.87 acres of property located at the northwest corner of Yucaipa Boulevard and 13th Street. JADE’s intention related to possible commercial development of the property. Shortly thereafter, during a closed session at its December 9, 2018 meeting, the city council gave direction to staff, despite the deed restriction relating to the property, to pursue disposition of the parcel.
For the property to developed commercially, the deed restriction had to be removed.
At the Yucaipa City Council meeting on March 25, 2019, a consideration of what that evening’s agenda designated as “the disposition of city property: 0,87 acre parcel, northwest corner of Yucaipa Boulevard and 13th Street (portion of assessor parcel number 299-321-62)” took place.
In a report to the city council relating to the item, Paul Toomey, Yucaipa’s director of community development, wrote that he recommended the city council “Find the city disposition of a portion of assessor parcel number 299-321-62 is consistent with the general plan; and adopt a categorical exemption pursuant to the California Environmental Quality Act of 1970 guidelines; and direct staff to file a notice of exemption; and approve the sale of city-owned property located at the northwest corner of Yucaipa Boulevard and 13th Street, further defined as a portion of assessor parcel number 299-321-62, for an amount of $500,000 to JADE Real Estate Holdings, Inc.; and authorize staff to establish an amount from the proceeds of the sale of the property sufficient to pay the city’s share of closing costs and expenses; and authorize the city manager to make any necessary non-substantive revisions and execute a purchase and sale agreement and other necessary documentation in order to complete the property disposition process; and allocate the net proceeds from the sale to the general fund one time capital projects fund for recreational facility improvements.”
Anticipating that the city council was amenable to designating the 0.87 acres as “surplus property” which could be sold, Toomey asserted in the body of the report that a necessary requisite of the rescission of the deed restriction on the property had been met. “In July 2018, the Finkelstein heirs executed a termination of deed restriction, permitting the property to be developed as proposed, subject to the condition that the net proceeds from the sale of the land be used for recreational purposes,” Toomey wrote in the report. Nowhere in the report, dated, March 25, 2019, did Toomey explain how it was that someone with the city had the prescience to obtain the termination of deed restriction from the Finkelstein heirs in July 2018, some four months before JADE Real Estate Holdings, Inc. sent the city a letter indicating its interest in purchasing the property.
This month, at its December 18 meeting, the Yucaipa Planning Commission took up a proposal that the city make a  minor general plan amendment to change the land use designation of approximately 1.67 acres adjacent to the Crafton Hills Fire Station, yet another portion of the land gifted to the community by the Finkelstein Brothers, to general commercial zoning. The land use designation change requested is to impact portions of vacant property adjacent to 32664 Yucaipa Boulevard, referred to as assessor parcel numbers 0299-321-61, 84 and 85. The 1.67 acres of land is proximate to the 0.87 acres sold to JADE near the corner of Yucaipa Boulevard and 13th Street. One of the lots Is east of the Crafton Hills Fire Station, and the other west of the fire station.
As part of the March 25, 2019 action, the city council approved along with the sale agreement a land use designation/zoning change that was applicable to the 0.87 acre piece. Last week the planning commission recommended that the city council make the same change to the two other parcels totaling 1.67 acres.
In his capacity as director of community development, Toomey recommended that the planning commission upon conducting a public hearing on December 18 adopt a resolution approving the general plan amendment/land use district change to alter the zoning on both pieces on either side of the fire station to general commercial, make the necessary amendments to reflect the change in the city’s zoning ordinance and find that the commercial project to be built on the property is exempt from the environmental review requirements of the California Environmental Quality Act, despite the consideration that no specific use for the site or sites is planned.
The planning commission did as recommended by Toomey.
Questions attend the city’s action. At issue is whether the city, as the inheritor of the property donated under conditions specified by Ruben and Lester Finkelstein, can defy the Finkelstein Brothers’ wishes as articulated in the  deed restriction. Moreover, the timing of sale of the 0.87 acres to JADE,Real Estate Holdings, Inc., four months after JADE made an overture to the city to buy the property, which followed by four months the alleged execution of the termination of deed restriction by the Finkelstein heirs, has pushed some Yuciapa residents to the conclusion that the sales arrangement was riddled with fraud. At issue is the influence that JADE Real Estate Holdings, Inc. has over Yucaipa city officials.
JADE Real Estate Holdings, Inc. is registered in Wyoming as a corporation and in California as a foreign limited-liability company. The filing with the California secretary of state’s office was made on April 9, 2018. The registered agent on file for the company in California is Debra Hanna, with the company headquartered at 25772 Lawton, Loma Linda, California 92354. The company’s principal address is 25772 Lawton in Loma Linda. The company has two principals on record, Hanna, who is shown as residing in Loma Linda, and Janet Jones, who lives in Redlands.
While Jade Real Estate Holdings, LLC was the purchaser of the 0.87-acre parcel, the purchaser or purchaser of the two parcels totaling 1.67 acres has or have yet to be identified, though it has been suggested JADE is the intended buyer.
Persistent suggestions are that JADE or its principals have provided inducements to Yucaipa city officials to obtain the city’s consent to sell the property.
For reasons that are not clear, Yucaipa  Deputy City Manager/City Clerk Jennifer Crawford has elected to not post the campaign disclosure filings of Yucaipa’s mayor and city council members on the city’s website, making a determination of whether JADE, Hanna or Jones have made monetary contributions to the campaigns of Yucaipa Mayor David Avila, and council members Denise Allen, Greg Bogh, Bobby Duncan and Dick Riddell difficult.
Nor has Crawford posted on the city’s website the mayor’s or council members’ statements of economic interest, which would reveal if any of the city’s elected leadership has received money from JADE other than campaign donations.