(August 14)

After four years on the city council in Yucaipa, Greg Bogh said he is ready to serve another term. Hence, he is running for office against incumbent Tom Masner and challengers David Avila and Tom Powell.
“I think I accomplished quite a few things,” Bogh said. “The number one thing is we have more business prospects in Yucaipa. You can see that the vacancy rate in our business district has gone down. People are spending money. People are locating businesses here and more people want to locate businesses here.”
He continued, “One of the things we accomplished was the agreement with the chicken ranches and with [city franchise trash hauler] Burrtech to regularly collect their manure. That has definitely helped in that area. We brought back the Fourth of July event. We restarted the farmers market and the arts festival. We will be starting a winter arts festival. We worked with the school district in putting a track in at the high school. We have continued the trend of Yucaipa becoming a better place. I would hate to see it go back in the wrong direction. There are still some economically depressed areas. We have a few mobile home parks that need help. We need to focus our energy in helping them improve or rezoning them into something different. I’m not sure of the exact solutions but we can come up with something. We are continuing to work on the uptown area and we need to improve the Dunlop area.”
The formula for dealing with the city’s major challenges, Bogh said, is pursuing prosperity.
“The number one way to fix most issues is economics,” he said. “We need to bring in jobs and create a good business environment. Money has to keep moving. Commerce is what truly brings people out of their economic problems. We need to keep building an economic base for the community. We have the money to make improvements. In some of our mobile home parks we need to go through and clean them up, get the police department [i.e., the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department, which provides contract law enforcement service to Yucaipa] to come in, since some of the mobile home parks have crime problems. I think rezoning the parks will give some of the owners an opportunity to convert them into something different, commercial areas and so forth.”
Bogh said he merits reelection and is distinguishable from the competition he faces.
“Look at my record,” he said. “Over the past four years, things have changed tremendously. Speak to anyone and ask if they like the direction Yucaipa is going in and if they think it is better off now than four years ago. There has been a lot of change. Yucaipa has been dominated by specific individuals. I think I am an independent voice. I did not take money from anyone other than my family. When I vote on issues, my vote is not connected to anybody. It doesn’t really require that much money to run for office in Yucaipa, but if you are taking money from special interests that can make a difference in the way you vote. When I was running for years ago, I told everyone, ‘My kids go to Yucaipa schools. I want to do a good job so when they get out of school, they will want to stay in Yucaipa.’ The test of whether I have been a good councilman will come down to whether the decisions I am making are creating huge problems for my city to the point that my kids don’t want to be here or do they want to stay. I try to make my votes and decisions as to what this will do twenty years into the future.”
Bogh attended San Bernardino High School and Cal State San Bernardino, where he majored in business. He is part owner of his family’s construction business. He is married with three children.

(September 16)

Tom Powell, a retired Caltrans project manager who has lived in Yucaipa for ten years, said he is running for the Yucaipa City Council in November because he wants “to bring a fresh perspective to City Hall and new voice to Yucaipa residents who have not been represented fully. It’s time all the residents of Yucaipa, in all our neighborhoods [to be] represented and treated equally with the same opportunity, not just the same few entrenched people over and over again.”
While he served as the project manager on multiple million dollar projects in the region while working with Caltrans, Powell maintains he is nonetheless committed to keeping the scale and pace of development in Yucaipa at a modest level. “It’s important,” he said, “that our beautiful community, nestled in our snowcapped foothills maintains the great small town atmosphere and charm it always has.” Powell pledged to “support main street businesses over huge parking lots with rows of glaring white lights.”
He acknowledged that some progress must take place because “Yucaipa needs necessary services, conveniences and entertainment for its residents who are already here.”
Powell enunciated a clear difference between himself and several of the council incumbents with regard to the issue of maintaining Yucaipa’s several aging mobile home parks as a feature of the city.
“As your next city council member I will vote to support and protect our mobile home park residents in Yucaipa. I will support mobile home rent control and affordable housing. Mobile home rent control is important! I understand the investment and security our mobile home park residents have in their homes. I will work to protect our residents from unfair and unreasonable rent hikes that could mean that they lose their homes. I will work to be firm in maintaining fair and reasonable rent controls that are already in place. The mobile home residents and seniors of Yucaipa will always have a friend, and a voice in me.”
He elaborated, “While there are some park owners who are reasonable and fair, I also know that there are plenty of owners who would not hesitate to prosper and profit from unfair rate hikes and the resale of homes gained from out of control rents. Out of town corporations will never profit at the peril of Yucaipa’s residents.”
Powell said, “Working for the best city services is my top priority. I have the experience to bring great solutions to our challenges. We live in a great town, and maintaining it’s natural beauty, small town atmosphere, and clean, safe streets will be my job #1! I will work and welcome and recruit small businesses that bring in real, sustainable jobs that pay decent wages and benefits. Good jobs will keep our best young talent at home.”
Powell said he is not in league with the status quo and the long-serving current ruling coalition on the city council, and said he represents the political opposition.
“I looked at the pictures in the lobby of City Hall, and it’s the same faces for years and years,” he said. He is in favor of changes in the city’s current political processes that will bring about change and break the hold the political establishment has over the city.
“Electing our city council by districts instead of at large from the whole city will make our city council more responsive and answerable to everyone, not just the privileged few,” Powell said. “This will help guard our city from special interests who do not have the best intentions of our city in mind, other than profit.”
Powell has a Bachelor of Science degree in civil engineering from Cal Poly.
He and his wife are the parents of six grown adults.

(September 14) Ed Graham, the only member of original Chino Hills City Council remaining in office, said he is seeking reelection to the council “because I think I’ve been a pretty effective leader. I love what I do. I love my community. When we started in 1991, we were looking to form a family-oriented community, not a city that had a lot of major industry. We wanted to develop a tight-knit family community. Since then, we’ve grown to a population of 75,000 but it doesn’t feel like it. It feels much smaller.”

When asked what challenges Chino Hills faces, Graham said “We’re like every city in California. We are always worrying about money and the state taking away more of our tax base. That is always a challenge. Our other structural challenge is the Proposition 218 requirements. Our lighting and landscaping districts need funding We have been backfunding that with some of our federal funds and our reserves are drawn down.”
Graham said he merits reelection and he also plugged the two other incumbents in the race, Ray Marquez and Peter Rogers. “Anyone who looks around town can see our parks and that we are a family oriented community and knows we should stay the course with the people from the council who are running with me. People know I can work with them and we can make decisions and move the city along without problems. We have been able to do that over the years. I am one of the members of the original town council. I have been here since 1991. If people enjoy living in the city and raising a family, that speaks volumes. I have been leading this city for 23 years. This is a safe community. We have great shopping. We don’t have tension.”
Graham is a retired school administrator and basketball coach. He is married with three children.

By Mark Gutglueck
Desert Woodrats that live in the Mojave Desert engage in a behavior that at first seems woefully dangerous and antithetical to their survival as a species. They eat deadly poison.
These rodents have an affinity for the creosote bush, a low-lying shrub whose leaves are rich in toxic resins, one of which is nordihydroguaiaretic acid or NDGA—a chemical that wrecks the liver and kidneys of lab mice. Strangely, the NDGA has no seeming effect on the woodrat. For months at a time, a woodrat will consume on a daily basis resin in quantities that would kill a normal mouse.
According to science writer Ed Yong, the reason woodrats are resistant to NDGA and other resins is because their guts are so filled with bacteria, they can digest the deadly chemicals in their diets with no problem.
According to Yong, the microbes in the intestines of the woodrat allow it to detoxify a whole host of chemicals. Researchers found that Mojave woodrats, which have been dining on creosote for something like 17,000 years, have different gut microbes than other desert mice.
In this way, according to Yong, the bacteria in the intestines of the Mojave woodrats have evolved as much or more than the woodratss themselves.
Desert woodrats are relatively small pack rats, measuring 11 to 15 inches in total length, including a 4.7 to 7.9 inch tail. They weigh from 4.3 to 12.3 ounces, with males being larger than females. Their coloring varies between individuals, and can be anything from pale gray to cinnamon to near-black. Regardless of the color on the rest of the body, however, the animal’s underparts and feet are always white, while the otherwise pale fur on the throat region is gray at its base. The tail is distinctly bicolored, and has more hair, and fewer visible scales, than the tails of brown rats. Desert woodrats have a narrow snout, long whiskers, and relatively long ears that are almost the length of the hind feet.
Desert woodrats proliferate in the Mojave Desert but also range as far north as southeastern Oregon and southwestern Idaho and as far south as Baja California and extreme northwestern Sonora in Mexico. They are present in Nevada and western Utah and elsewhere in California.
Desert woodrats generally inhabit sagebrush scrub areas, in chaparral, and in deserts and rocky slopes with scattered cactus, yucca, pine/juniper, and other low vegetation, at elevations up to 9,500 ft. They are most abundant in rocky areas with numerous crevices or rock piles in which they can seek shelter from predators.
Twenty three subspecies are recognized, many of them restricted to small islands in the Gulf of California.
They feed on beans and leaves of mesquite, on juniper, and on parts of available cacti, apparently without getting injured by the spines. They also eat creosote bushes, thistles, Ephedra, Mustard plants, sagebrush, and buckwheat. They will also eat other green vegetation, seeds, fruits, acorns, and pine nuts. In desert habitats, they are highly dependent upon prickly pear cacti for water balance, although they can be sustained on creosote year-round. Although they are capable of eating food containing high levels of resins and oxalic acid, such as the leaves of creosote bushes, these affect their water balance and limit their ability to eat other foods, limiting the growth of the woodrats’ population in areas where such plants are common.
Predators include snakes, owls, hawks, coyotes, and other carnivorous mammals. They are also commonly parasitized by bot fly larvae.
Desert woodrats breed in the spring and summer, and give birth to litters of up to five young after a gestation period of 30 to 36 days. The young weigh about 0.35 ounce at birth, and are blind, with only the tips of their hairs visible. Their eyes open after about ten days. The teeth of newborn desert woodrats are initially splayed apart, creating a hexagonal opening between them, with which they clamp themselves to their mother’s teats so firmly that they are difficult to separate. The teeth achieve their normal shape after about twelve days, but the young are not completely weaned until around four weeks of age. They live up to five years in captivity.
Desert woodrats are primarily nocturnal and are aggressively solitary. They may defend water sources, such as succulent plants, against other species, and perhaps prevent other species from obtaining water during droughts.
Desert woodrats sometimes appropriate the burrows of ground squirrels or kangaroo rats, and will fortify the entrance with several cubic yards of sticks and joints collected from jumping and teddy-bear chollas. This provides a formidable defense against predators. Living quarters are also often built against rock crevices, at the base of creosote or cactus plants, or in the lower branches of trees. Rock crevices appear preferred where available, but pack rats generally adapt to any situation.
Woodrats construct houses for nesting, food caching, and predator escape. These can have up to six entrances and eight internal chambers, including both nests and food caches. Houses 14 inches high and around 39 inches across at the base are not unusual. Nests are constructed of dried vegetation, usually fibrous grass parts or shredded stems.
Males mark their territory by rubbing themselves on the ground, depositing musky sebum secreted by large sebaceous glands on their abdomen. Females, however, scent mark by first digging, and then rubbing their flanks, legs or cheeks on the excavated soil. They are active year-round.

By clicking on the portal below you can download a PDF of the September 12 San Bernardino County Sentinel

Sentinel 09-12-14

(September 9)  The long dormant conflict within the administrative level of Upland’s government has now manifested into an actual crisis that has impacted a significant number of employees in the police department and which threatens the continued tenure of either police chief Jeff Mendenhall or administrative services director/city clerk Stephanie Mendenhall, or both.
In 2010, Jeff Mendenhall, then a captain in the police department, was elevated to the position of acting police chief when then-police chief Steve Adams took what was expected to be a temporary stress leave. Adams’ stress leave continued well into 2011 and in September of that year, he retired. Shortly thereafter Jeff Mendenhall was elevated by then-city manager Stephen Dunn to the position of police chief, and that choice was approved by the city council.
Meanwhile, Jeff Mendenhall’s wife, Stephanie, who was Upland’s city clerk, had likewise advanced professionally, having been given the added assignment of administrative services director. Stephanie Mendenhall remained in the post of city clerk in the newly created assignment of administrative services director, which carried with its authority oversight of the city clerk’s office, human resources, information technology, and risk management, and provided her with  a base salary and add-ons of $175,606, plus benefits of  $55,624 for a total annual compensation package  of $231,230.
There was concern at the time that the promotion of Jeff Mendenhall to the position of police chief created a circumstance that was fraught with conflict and peril for the city and its taxpayers. Essentially, filling the administrative services/city clerk  and the police chief positions, which on occasion require some degree of articulation with one another and/or superintendence of or answerability to one another, with individuals who were married to one another raised the specter of favoritism or the possibility that standards that would otherwise be applied to conduct, actions and the review thereof might be compromised.
City officials, however, sought to downplay such concerns, indicating that arrangement would be permitted, since such conflicts were merely theoretical or potential. They suggested that if such a conflict were to manifest, it would be addressed at that time and Dunn, as city manager, would intervene to alleviate the conflict.
The city had no nepotism policy in place. Previously, the city had faced similar, though not identical circumstances. In the 1980s, while Frank Carpenter was a member of the city council, his wife Dee had been city clerk. In the 1990s, while Gail Horton was a member of the city council, her husband, John Scanlon, was fire chief.
Despite what government reform and open government activists decried as unhealthy arrangements, no scandal over these incestuous relationships in Upland has, until now, erupted.
Within the last two months events have manifested that are threatening to put the Mendenhalls and the concentration of authority over internal municipal administrative processes in their hands in sharp relief, to the embarrassment and potential legal detriment to the City of Gracious Living.
In recent years, the Upland Police Department, like nearly every other law enforcement agency in California, has outfitted its patrol cars with high powered shoulder fired weapons to augment the sidearms their officers carry. In the case of Upland, each patrol car carries an AR-15, a lightweight, intermediate cartridge magazine-fed, air cooled rifle with a rotating-lock bolt, actuated by direct impingement gas operation or long/short stroke piston operation.
The officers almost universally endorse the AR-15 as a highly practical back-up to their 9 millimeter or .45 handguns, which have proven, in some cases, to be inadequate in the face of the heavier weaponry often in the possession of criminals. The AR-15 provides officers with adequate response capability in those circumstances where they encounter armed and determined resistance.
Law enforcement agencies are required to keep their officers up to date in both training and certification for the equipment and weapons they utilize.  In California, the Commission on Police Officers Standards and Training is the state entity that provides the criteria and protocol by which law enforcement officers are given training and certified.
To remain employable in the field, officers must undergo periodic training and certification for the firearms they are issued and use in the course of their employment.
Because the city of Upland through its police department had obtained the AR-15s for its patrol cars, traditionally the department had paid for the periodic AR-15 use training the officers had to undergo, provided them with the means, i.e., the ammunition and shooting range availability, required to complete that training, paid its officers for the time they attended the range certification and the classes related to the AR-15 use, and  reimbursed them for whatever mileage costs they accrued in driving to the range and the class.
This summer, police chief Mendenhall, in keeping with budgetary restraints imposed on his department, informed the officers under his command that they would need to complete their retraining and recertification with regard to the AR-15 entirely at their own expense and on their own time, and that the department would not cover the cost of their ammunition used in the training and certification, that they would not be reimbursed for their mileage in achieving recertification and that they would not be paid for the time they spent attending AR-15 classes and the certification testing.
An individual officer’s failure to attend the training and obtain certification would result, without exception, in his/her disqualification for patrol duty in any department patrol car  outfitted with the AR-15s.
While the change in policy dictated by chief Mendenhall without conferring with the police union was not gladly received by the rank and file, the predominant attitude among officers was that they would comply with the new order of things and that the AR-15 is too important of a tool for them to function without. The officers  begrudgingly agreed to attend the classes at their own expense to obtain the necessary certification.
The officers learned, however, that the sergeant conducting the training for the department was, per chief Mendenhall’s orders, being paid for conducting the classes and was being reimbursed for all his incidental expenses.
The Sentinel has learned that several of the department’s officers, angered by the apparent favoritism shown toward the sergeant, consequently took exception to chief Mendenhall’s order, asserting that he had violated not only the employment contract the city has with its police officers through its union, the Upland Police Officers Association, but California labor law as well.
A law enforcement professional who was in contact with the Sentinel said that what he characterized as a “significant minority” of the department’s officers – as many as a dozen or more – expressed a belief that the filing of a grievance over the matter was called for.  No such grievance was filed, however, the Sentinel is told, because the individual with whom such grievances are lodged would be Stephanie Mendenhall, who in her capacity as administrative services director is the head of human resources, i.e., personnel.
“No one wants to go into her office and say, ‘Your husband just did this to us and we don’t think it’s right,’” a law enforcement officer told the Sentinel. “If it wasn’t his wife, people would go right down there and complain. But they can’t because of who she’s married to and the fear of retaliation and harassment. No one believes they could really get a fair hearing in that situation. People just have to accept it. In this case there really isn’t a grievance process.”
Stephanie Mendenhall declined the Sentinel’s invitation to discuss the matter.
“I don’t have a comment for you,” she said. “Sorry.”
As chance had it, however, at this week’s city council meeting, the council was poised to consider the proposed reorganization of the city’s executive staff, which included the elimination of an executive assistant in the city manager’s office, filling the vacant position of accounting supervisor in the finance department and arranging it so that the finance manager reports directly to the city manager.
When that item came up for a vote, councilwoman Debbie Stone made a motion to amend the reorganization proposal such that the city would eliminate the position of administrative services director altogether. Saying he believed elimination of the administrative services position would, ironically, help to meet chief Mendenhall’s call for the hiring of more police officers, Councilman Gino Filippi seconded Stone’s motion and supported it with his vote. The motion died, however, when Mayor Ray Musser and councilmen Glenn Bozar and Brendan Brandt voted against it. They approved the reorganization proposal, as originally put forth by interim city manager Martin Lomeli and incoming city manager Rod Butler.
Lomeli, who is vacationing in Hawaii, was not present at the meeting. Chief Mendenhall was filling in for him as stand-in city manager. Chief Mendenhall did not appear pleased at Stone’s motion to terminate his wife, nor at Filippi’s support of the gambit.
After the meeting, Stone told the Sentinel, “I want to make it clear on why I made the motion that I did tonight in regards to the administrative services director. The position of administrative services director was created in 2011 to justify the high compensation of the then city clerk, by creating a position.   Now that the finance manager directly reports to the city manager and is adding another employee in the form of an accounting supervisor to the tune of approximately $90,000, it seems that further reorganization is in order.  We are on this council to make the hard calls and this is one of them.”
When she was informed about the looming controversy in the police department relating to officers’ reluctance to utilize the grievance process because they must file those complaints with the police chief’s wife, Stone said she had not been aware of the matter.
“We are all professionals here and if there are emotions or personal relationships involved  then we should still expect that those people have to be able to look beyond that and do what their job requires,” Stone said. “If we have people who are not willing to file a grievance because of that relationship, then it is a problem and we are going to have to do something about it.”

(September 9) Susan Berk said she is running for the Upland City Council because “Upland needs strategic and experienced leadership focused on getting our financial house in order.   The water and sewer privatization issue spurred me to action; I realized we are going down the wrong track and we can no longer maintain the status quo.   Returning the same council members or electing the former city manager to the city council is not a good path forward.   These people are the ones who put us where we are now.   They say they have unfinished business.   Their business is not unfinished; it’s an approach that has moved us in the wrong direction and it must be stopped.”
Berk told the Sentinel “Protecting management of our water and sewer asset  is the most significant issue facing us today, and I am disappointed that a vote on it has been pushed out until after the election.    Outsourcing management of our water and sewer assets is a bad idea and it is an end run around securing rate increase approvals.   This concept will do nothing to reduce our costs; in fact, predictions are it will more than double our water and sewer bills.   It’s a ploy to get more money to cover past management mistakes.   We need look no further than Claremont or Rialto to understand the negative long-term effect on the city.   I am against outsourcing management of our water and sewer assets.   It’s a shortsighted, bad idea with severe ramifications for the people of Upland.”
At the same time, Berk said, “I am firmly against any tax increases and any new taxes.   If there’s anything we don’t need, it is more taxes.  I will use the management skills I’ve honed in industry to identify cost reduction opportunities and assets with which we can generate cash, and to build our fund reserves.  We have to learn to live within our means.”
While Berk said the city should maintain ownership of its water division, she said the city did possess property and operations it could conceivably dispense with.
“Upland has land and other assets that are not being used to our advantage,” she said. “We need a complete list of all city assets including our land holdings, and we need to either find ways to put these to work for us or sell them.  This information has been hard to obtain; it won’t be when I am on the city council.”
Berk called for reducing the city’s reliance on consultants.
“Our senior city executives are extremely well paid to manage and to do their own analysis,” she intoned. “That’s their job – it’s not to hire consultants every time a tough budgetary decision comes along.   We recently threw $27K away by having a team of consultants ask Upland citizens if they were in favor of higher taxes.    There are many troubling things about this, including the city’s initial decision to not release the survey results.   The city initially claimed attorney-client privilege as the reason for not releasing this information, which is outrageous.   It required the involvement of the First Amendment Coalition to make the report public.”
The city has been plagued by less than diligent government oversight, she maintained.
“I view the city council’s job to be the same as a board of directors in a publicly-held corporation,” she said. “The council is there to provide strategic oversight, to guide the city manager, and to always have the best interests of the citizens of Upland, who are the shareholders of the city, as their number one priority.   That hasn’t happened in recent years.   I see the failure of our city council to prevent or even detect the unethical and unprofessional behavior that has occurred in Upland city government as the most pressing reason for significant change.   I owe nothing to the special interests.   I will work for the citizens of Upland, and I will answer to them.”
In identifying her game plan for governance if elected, Berk said “Upland needs to get its financial house in order, and that will be my first priority.”
Berk said the city should leave well enough alone and not even consider  water and sewer privatization. “We’re not having problems in these areas,” she said. “It doesn’t make sense to ‘fix’ something that isn’t broken.    I will oppose this backdoor tax increase.   We aren’t going to get out of our current situation by digging deeper into our residents’ wallets.”
Berk said the city can avoid the need for sales or business tax increases by “getting our spending under control.   That starts with defining budgets for every department and holding those department managers accountable.   If they feel they don’t have enough, it will be up to them to find solutions, and the default answer cannot always be ‘I need more money.’   My industry experience is that when people realize there is no more money, they find solutions.   That’s what I believe has been missing in Upland.  We have a lot of good people a level or two below top management and I know they are interested in finding solutions to our budget problems if we engage them in the process.”
Berk said Upland, as other cities, must come to terms with having made unrealistic and financially onerous commitments to provide its employees with overly generous pensions.
“We have a huge issue with our pension obligation,” Berk said. “It’s growing and Upland can’t solve this problem on its own; it’s a state-wide problem.   We certainly need to honor the pension obligations we have already made.  Upland has a two-tier pension system for new employees, but that’s a solution that will only start to work 20 years or more down the road.   We are where we are now because of terrible prior management decisions.  In order to address this problem now, we need to take a very hard and very public look at our future negotiations in the upcoming contract renewals.   One of our former city managers and his finance director worked a deal where their compensation was based on what the public safety unions negotiated, so that if the  public safety folks got more, these executives got more.   That’s a blatant conflict of interest and it should have never happened.   That’s the kind of unethical behavior I won’t allow, and which I’ll make sure the public knows about.”
Berk said “We need to critically review all city assets and all planned expenditures.   We need to determine what we can afford, and which of our assets we either need to sell, thereby raising cash, or put them to good use.   Some might argue that privatizing our water and sewer management will do this, but it won’t.   It will just increase the price of these services to our citizens, even though the cost of providing these services hasn’t gone up.”
If entrusted with a position on the council, Berk said, “I’ll take a very hard look at the proposed use of any consultants.   My first question to any manager who wants to hire a consultant will always be:  ‘Why can’t you do this?’”
Berk said she has the moxie to take on the job of directing the city through the rough times ahead.
“I didn’t get to where I am today as a senior executive by being timid,” she said. “I will work with the other council members and the mayor to develop solutions that benefit Upland residents and to ensure that the city manager follows our direction.”
A program manager with Raytheon for the last 17 years who previously worked at  Lockheed for four years, TRW for 10 years, and Honeywell for four years, Berk said she is qualified to serve on the council, because “I’ve run large defense and commercial programs with budgets of up to $200 million with diverse stakeholders – those to whom I report, those who report to me, subcontractors, and customers.    Our primary stakeholders here are the residents of Upland and I’ll never forget that.  I have a strong management and operations background.    I’ve written five books on management and financial analysis.   I’m tireless and I’m relentless in doing the right thing.   And, I love Upland. I’ve lived here for 30 years.   I want the next stories in The Daily Bulletin and The San Bernardino County Sentinel to be about something good going on in Upland City Hall.
I’m the only city council candidate with the financial management experience to dig us out of the hole our prior poor leadership put us in.   I want the residents of Upland to know that I will answer to them and not the special interests.   I won’t allow the city to keep secrets from the people who live here.   Most importantly, you won’t be making a mistake when you vote for me.”
Berk graduated from Arroyo High School in El Monte and obtained a bachelor of science degree in mathematics from Cal Poly, Pomona. She returned to Cal Poly to obtain a Master of Business Administration degree after she had been employed for a few years. She is a member of the  Howard Jarvis Taxpayer Association and Leadership California, a group of senior woman business leaders who address California business issues.
She has been married for 31 years and has two adult children.

(September 10) Public employees’ continuing use of  the tactic of pension spiking, a practice  that has now been made inapplicable to their colleagues hired since January 1, 2013, will cost California’s taxpayers and local governments close to $800 million over the next twenty years, according to California Controller John Chiang.
Chiang said he came to that conclusion based on his office’s most recently completed audit of the California Public Employees’ Retirement System, which provides benefits to 1.7 million retired state and local government workers and their spouses out of what is currently a $301.5-billion investment portfolio funded by taxpayers.
The audit that focused on eleven state and local government agencies turned up no direct evidence of illegal pension enhancements, or “spiking,” but found that the California Public Employees’ Retirement System has not conscientiously monitored the payroll records of its  3,100 constituent agencies.
Pension spiking is the process whereby employees inflate their compensation, either by promotion or the reception of long accumulated benefits in the years or even final year preceding their retirement in order to receive larger pensions than they otherwise would be entitled to. The California Public Employees Retirement System calculates its members’ pensions based upon the compensation they received during the three years of  highest compensation.
Public pension spiking in California was outlawed in 1938, but that law went largely unenforced. In 2012, the state legislature prohibited its practice by any government employees in California hired on or after January 1, 2013.
Chiang highlighted his concern with regard to 97 local agencies which he said routinely increased  a worker’s pay during his or her final year of employment when the collective bargaining agreements in place in those jurisdictions call for the agency to pay both the employer’s and the employee’s share of the total pension contribution.
This is projected to cost the state and local agencies and taxpayers roughly $796 million in additional pension costs over the next two decades, Chiang said. .
In its response to Chang’s audit and accompanying remarks, the California Public Employees’ Retirement System  said it has no discretion to prevent such legal spiking when the local agency has complied with the law. It said that the subject of pension spiking fell “outside the stated scope of the audit.”
The California Public Employees’ Retirement System lacks sufficient audit capacity, said Chiang, who stated, “On the current audit schedule a local government that contracts with the California Public Employees Retirement System, for example, would only face an audit once in every 66 years.”
In recent years there has been increasing concern that the cost of funding the retirement benefits of public employees is consuming an ever greater share of the revenue available to both local and state government to the point that the traditional function of local governments, i.e., the provision of services at all levels, are being neglected.
In many jurisdictions, the cost of pension payments exceeds that of current payroll and in some jurisdictions, the cost of pensions exceeds the cost of all current operations

(September 10) On a split vote, the board members of the Chino Valley Unified School District moved to up the stipend they are provided for their service.
Board members Irene Hernandez-Blair, Charles Dickie and Sylvia Orozco voted to increase their compensation by five percent, elevating from $747 to  $784 each board member’s monthly pay.
Trustees James Na and Andrew Cruz voted against the raise.
The salary increase, which went into effect on September 5, will add $2,050 to the district’s annual $52 million budget.
Taking the raise was a symbolic show of confidence in the future, following more than half a decade of dwindling revenue to the district in the face of the stagnating economy that has beset the nation, state and region since 2007.  Because deficits of $8.1 million were projected for the current 2014-15 academic year and a $9 million deficit in 2015-16, the board was earlier reluctant to up its own compensation.
The raise means that members will get roughly $470 per meeting. The board met 27 times in 2012 and 27 times in 2013. In 2014 it has 20 meetings scheduled. Meetings typically last three hours, meaning the board members get about $157 per hour if meeting time alone is calculated.
Board members are provided with staff reports relating to the materials contained in the meeting agenda, which they are expected to review prior to the meetings. There is no set amount of time required of them to do such reviews.
The move came at the same time that the board approved a raise for district superintendent Wayne Joseph. The board agreed to increase Joseph’s contract, which had been providing him with an annual $195,575 salary,  to reflect a 3 percent salary increase for 2013-14, retroactive to July 1, 2013; a 2 percent salary increase for 2014-15. The board also agreed to provide Josephs with a 10 percent increase in the district’s contribution towards his benefits, which are provided in addition to his salary, for this school year.

(September 9) Former Yucca Valley Town Councilwoman Lori Herbel, who served a single term on the council from 2006 until 2010, said she is running to regain a position her position  to “address the concerns of the people and the business community by holding quarterly open Town Hall community meetings and to encourage the growth of local small businesses by making it the town’s primary goal to understand expectations and assist in making the permitting process easy.”
If elected, Herbel said she would “examine the annual budget line-by-line to justify all expenditures and restore the Hi-Desert Nature Museum to full service and honor its past contributions to community education and cultural activities.”
Herbel said it is vital that the town “expand and enhance community programs for our youth and seniors.” She said she was committed to “engage the community, the town council and Hi-Desert Water District in an immediate and intensive effort to make the sewer affordable for all.”
She elaborated on this last point.
“Our greatest challenge is the prohibition on septic discharge placed on property owners in Yucca Valley by the Colorado River Water Quality Control Board (CRWQCB),” Herbel said. “The Hi-Desert Water District (HDWD), the sewer authority, is doing their best to address this prohibition with plans for a town-wide sewer collection system and waste water treatment plant. In 1974 the CRWQCB warned Yucca Valley that it needed a sewer. With no enforcement, permits for septic systems continued. When the town was incorporated in 1991,  first priorities identified in the general plan was to work with the HDWD to ensure the town had a sewer. Unfortunately, this infrastructure was neglected, now property owners are dealt a huge financial shock and the daunting task of how to deal with the cost of the septic prohibition.”
Herbel said, “Compliance is the responsibility of individual property owners; the town isn’t responsible for individual compliance, and neither is the HDWD nor the CRWQCB. We must solve this together and it must be affordable for all, otherwise, we are going to suffer greatly as community.”
During her previous tenure on the council, Herbel said, “My votes were always informed, I came to each council meeting well studied and prepared with a listening ear to the voice of the people.”
She said the town needs to come to terms with “the cost of the sewer. Phase 1 is estimated at $146 million.”
She said solutions to the town’s challenges can be had by “engaging the community, the town council and Hi-Desert Water District in an immediate and intensive effort to make the sewer affordable for all.”
What qualifies her to be returned to the council, Herbel said, is that “as a resident of Yucca Valley for the past 11 years, a business woman, founder of Certified Farmers’ Market and communication trainer for companion animals, I am highly aware of the challenges facing our citizens and business community. I have the time, the will, to faithfully listen and serve the people of Yucca Valley.”
In touching on what she said she believes distinguishes her from the other candidates for town council, she said, “I have the highest regards for anyone that steps up to the plate to serve their community. It takes a lot of time and commitment. Each candidate is to be commended. Because of my experience as an elected town council member, I understand the workings of the town government and have kept abreast of relevant issues, I will be able to immediately focus on mitigating challenges facing our town. My business life keeps me in touch with the people. As a council member, I will listen to their concerns and respond.”
She vowed, “I will listen and represent the people with common sense, compassion and courage.”
Herbel graduated from Lowell High School in Whittier and obtained an A.A. degree from Fullerton College in Orange County.