With the February 9 deadline to make a final decision approaching, the U.S. Supreme Court on Wednesday cleared the way for California to use the gerrymandered congressional map Governor Gavin Newsom and his Democrat cohorts were able to get the state’s voters to approve in November which was drafted to result in five of the 12 California Congressional seats now held by Republicans being filled by Democrats following the November 2026 election.
The only change in the state’s electoral map that is likely to impact San Bernardino County consists of the possibility that Republican Congressman Ken Calvert, whose current 41st District in Riverside County was eliminated in a bid by the Democrats to end his political viability entirely, will now challenge 40th District Congresswoman Young Kim, who represents the southwesternmost portion of San Bernardino County.
At present, forty of California’s 52 Congressional seats are held by Democrats. From the outset of the gerrymander effort which began last summer, the Democrats’ intent was to thin the ranks of California’s Republican Congressional delegation even further.
That move required voter approval, which Newsom and the Democratic state legislature obtained by placing an initiative on the ballot in a specially-called election, at a cost of $282.6 million, in November.
A coalition of Republicans challenged the unusual maneuver and the elections outcome, but in a terse, one-sentence order, the justices turned down that request to have the state utilized the electoral map that was drawn in 2021 by a nonpartisan commission using data from the 2020 U.S. Census and which which was used in the last two federal election in California.
The court’s order came two months to the day after the justices, over a dissent by the court’s three Democratic appointees, granted a request from Texas to allow it to use a new map intended to allow Republicans to pick up five additional House seats in that state. Continue reading →

The musicians of the Ontario Chaffey Community Show Band and the Keith Family are proud to present a program entitled “Love Is In The Air” on Monday, February 23, 2026 at 7:30 p.m.
The concert will be held in Gardiner W. Spring Auditorium, located on the campus of Chaffey High School at 1245 N. Euclid Avenue in Ontario.
The Woodwind Celebration Ensemble will present a pre-concert recital in the auditorium lobby at 7:00 p.m. Complimentary coffee and cookies will be served in the lobby prior to the concert. The performance is free to the public.
The February concert will feature many selections related to Valentine’s Day and the spirit of love. The show will be highlighted by special guest artists vocalist Skip Cain and jazz saxophonist and vocalist Jeff Waldon. Show Band soloists will include trumpeters Steve Collins and David Grasmick and a vocal by Show Band Director Pat Arnold.
Skip Cain a becoming a regular with the Chaffey Community Show Band. His vocal repertoire includes songs of joy, romance, and love from yesteryear and today. Skip’s repertoire ranges from Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Sammy Davis Jr., Tom Jones, Lionel Richie, Tony Bennett, James Brown, Wilson Pickett, and Teddy Pendergrass. Skip will perform “I’ve Got You Under My Skin,” “The Way You Look Tonight,” and the Tom Jones megahit “It’s Not Unusual.” Continue reading →

FBN20260000145
The following entity is doing business primarily in San Bernardino County as
ARROW DOG AND CAT HOSPITAL [and] ARROW DOG & CAT HOSPITAL [and] ARROW DOG & CAT VETERINARY HOSPITAL [and] GENERAL DOG & CAT HOSPITAL [and] ADVANCED PET CARE OF MONTCLAIR 5405 ARROW HWY SUITE 108 MONTCLAIR, CA 91763: GENERAL DOG & CAT VETERINARY HOSPITAL, INC. 215 CAMPBELL AVE REDLANDS, CA 92373
Business Mailing Address: 5405 ARROW HWY SUITE 108 MONTCLAIR, CA 91763
The business is conducted by: A CORPORATION registered with the State of California.
The registrant commenced to transact business under the fictitious business name or names listed above on: January 5, 2026.
By signing, I declare that all information in this statement is true and correct. A registrant who declares as true information which he or she knows to be false is guilty of a crime (B&P Code 179130). I am also aware that all information on this statement becomes Public Record upon filing.
/s/ MARIAN M. HABIB, CEO
Statement filed with the County Clerk of San Bernardino on: 01/12/2026
I hereby certify that this copy is a correct copy of the original statement on file in my office San Bernardino County Clerk By:/Deputy F3010
Notice-This fictitious name statement expires five years from the date it was filed in the office of the county clerk. A new fictitious business name statement must be filed before that time. The filing of this statement does not of itself authorize the use in this state of a fictitious business name in violation of the rights of another under federal, state, or common law (see Section 14400 et seq., Business and Professions Code).
Published in the San Bernardino County Sentinel on January 16, 23 & 30 and February 6, 2026.

FBN20250011678
The following entity is doing business primarily in San Bernardino County as
DESTINY RENTAL 15370 CHOLAME RD #3 VICTORVILLE, CA 92391: ROSINA MENDIOLA
Business Mailing Address: 15370 CHOLAME RD #3 VICTORVILLE, CA 92391
The business is conducted by: AN INDIVIDUAL.
The registrant commenced to transact business under the fictitious business name or names listed above on: December 15, 2025.
By signing, I declare that all information in this statement is true and correct. A registrant who declares as true information which he or she knows to be false is guilty of a crime (B&P Code 179130). I am also aware that all information on this statement becomes Public Record upon filing.
/s/ ROSINA MENDIOLA, Owner
Statement filed with the County Clerk of San Bernardino on: 12/15/2025
I hereby certify that this copy is a correct copy of the original statement on file in my office San Bernardino County Clerk By:/Deputy K1587 Hesperia
Notice-This fictitious name statement expires five years from the date it was filed in the office of the county clerk. A new fictitious business name statement must be filed before that time. The filing of this statement does not of itself authorize the use in this state of a fictitious business name in violation of the rights of another under federal, state, or common law (see Section 14400 et seq., Business and Professions Code).
Published in the San Bernardino County Sentinel on January 16, 23 & 30 and February 6, 2026.

Continue reading →

In the midst of the confusion over Adelanto Elementary School District Superintendent Terry Walker’s continuing tenure with the district, the matter grew even more turbulent as Walker and her top-ranked assistant precipitously went out on leave last week. They have not returned.
Simultaneously, Walker’s executive secretary had departed the district, leaving the district essentially rudderless, as there was seemingly no one in place in the district’s executive suite over a period during which preparations for this week’s board meeting needed to be tended to, resulting in the meeting being canceled.
While Walker’s executive secretary, Xenia Lovett, has now returned to her post, the district appears to be running on autopilot, as both Walker and the assistant superintendent of academic services Walker hired in September, Saida Valdez, remain absent.
Among Adelanto residents, in particular parents of students in the district, there has been speculation at the reason for the interruption in normal district operations. The most recurrent and obvious theory to emerge from that speculation is the 3-to-2 divide on the school board that has manifested in recent months in which the majority has become disenchanted with Walker’s oversight of district operations created an atmosphere which has made her day-to-day function uncomfortable. Based on Walker’s contract, which was ratified by the school board in November 2024 and which runs through June 2028, she cannot be terminated on anything less than a 4-to-1 vote of the school board.
Though the board majority does not have sufficient votes to force the superintendent’s departure at this time, the two members of the board who are yet standing behind her, La Shawn Love-French and Christina Steward, are due to stand for reelection later this year. With the prospect that Love-French or Steward might opt out of seeking reelection or could be displaced in the voting if they do run, Walker is acutely aware that she may not be able to serve out the entirety of the time specified in her contract, which provides her with $282,782, in salary and another $92,635 in perquisites and benefits for a total annual compensation of $375,417. Accordingly, it appears, at least to some people involved with the district either as parents, employees or officials, that Walker has been engaging in strategizing to either keep her job long-term or maximize the amount of money she can arrange to receive if she comes to some early termination/separation agreement with the district.
In this way, it appears that what occurred last week and what is continuing into this week was an effort to illustrate that Walker, if not absolutely indispensable to the district’s operations, is of substantial value and key to keeping thing running smoothly. That Walker, Valdez and Lovett all went out on leave together and without any forewarning was either an extraordinary coincidence or deliberately calculated, several of those contemplating it have observed.
During the work week of January 19 through 23, Lovett, Valdez and Walker were gone, reportedly having taken simultaneously unspecified leave, unofficially described as sick leave or medical leave. When Board President Miguel Soto Jr. made a routine inquiry early in the week about progress on finalizing the agenda for the regularly scheduled board meeting that was to take place on January 27, he received no response. Through further inquiry, he learned that Walker, Valdez and Lovett were not present at the district headquarters and, further, could not be reached by phone, text or email.
Somewhat inexplicably, armed security guards employed by the Blue-Nite Protection Agency were in place at the district office beginning on January 20 and remained in place until January 23. Blue-Nite Protection Agency, which is owned and operated by Jerry Plascencia, had been previously contracted with by the district to provide security at the district’s board meetings, but was never employed by the district outside that context. There was no explanation given to district staff either by text message, email or verbally as to why they security guards were there or that they were going to be there ahead of time. No one at the district had any information as to who had hired them for the district office security detail. No vote to have them in place was made by the school board. It is not clear on whose authority they were hired. The scope of work specified in the district’s contract with the company extends only to board meetings held twice monthly.
Under the Ralph M. Brown Act, California’s open public meeting law, the items, issues for discussion, actions or votes to take place at a meeting must be given preview in an agenda for the meeting, which must be posted in a place or forum accessible to the public at least 72 hours in advance of the meeting. Given that the meeting was to commence in the evening of January 27 and the district’s offices close for the weekend, there was a deadline of 5:30 p.m. on Friday January 23 by which the agenda had to be completed and posted.
Under the district’s standard procedure, the agenda is formulated by the superintendent assisted by the superintendent’s executive secretary, incorporating items earmarked for discussion and votes by members of the school board ahead of time as well as routine business items such as payments to material vendors or service providers which are intrinsic to ongoing and continuing district functions. Without Walker available, the board sought to draft an agenda, but upon completing the title, date, time and location for the document, bogged down when seeking to lay out the topics for discussion, as this required the provision of back-up or accompanying materials pertaining to the schedule of actions/votes. Lovett, they learned, was the only district employee who had access to the programs on the district’s computers that would allow for the uploading of the documents that needed to be included with the agenda.
With the January 23 5:30 p.m. deadline approaching and Lovett nowhere to be found and unavailable for contact telephonically or online, a decision was made to cancel the January 27 meeting.
The implication of Walker, Valdez and Lovett checking out with seemingly no warning last week is still being felt. Though Lovett returned on Monday January 26, Walker and Valdez are out of the office, incommunicado with both the public and at least three and quite possibly all five of the board’s members.
Efforts by the Sentinel to reach both Walker and Valdez were routed to answering systems, which engendered no response, or to district personnel who had no information as to where either was or when they were to return.
Walker’s tenure as the superintendent grew problematic shortly after she was promoted into the acting/interim superintendents’ post in September 2024, a mere month after having been brought in as the interim assistant superintendent for personnel in August 2024. Walker was moved into the acting superintendent’s role because of the abrupt resignation of John Albert, the district’s one-time assistant superintendent for human resources, who had himself been moved into the interim superintendent’s position following a move by what was then the board majority, consisting of Christine Turner, La Shawn Love-French and Christina Steward, to place then-Superintendent Michael Krause on leave in March 2024. Krause and the district reached a separation agreement in June 2024, whereupon the following month he took out nomination papers to run in the November 2024 election for the Area 1 board position against Turner.
After temporarily promoting Walker to the interim superintendent’s post, the school board the following month voted to hire the executive headhunting firm of Leadership Associates to carry out a nationwide search for a superintendent to occupy the position on a permanent basis.
As the Fall 2024 campaign heated up, Walker acceded to requests by the then-board majority to hire, at the district’s expense, an attorney, Dominic Quiller, to author a letter that was sent to Krause, asserting that his candidacy and campaign for the school board constituted an abrogation of his separation agreement with the district, in particular its non-disparagement clause which required that the district and Krause mutually refrain from making any statements about the other that could be construed as critical. Dominic informed Krause that the district was immediately discontinuing the scheduled monthly payments and accompanying medical coverage he was receiving as in accordance with the six-month severance pay-out contained in the separation agreement and that if he did not immediately withdraw from the board race, the district would sue him.
Krause did not discontinue his candidacy. As a result of the poll voting at the three precincts in the Adelanto School District Area 1 on November 5, 2024 and the mail-in ballots received by the San Bernardino County Registrar of Voters Office prior to, the day of and after the election, Krause defeated Turner by a margin of more than 5.5 percent, as he claimed 1,720 or 52.78 percent of the total 3,259 votes cast to Turner’s 1,539 votes or 47.22 percent. With the election concluded, Turner’s remaining time on the board was reduced to just over a month, with four-year term to which she had been elected in 2020 due to expire in December 2024.
In that interregnum, one week after the election, on November 12, 2024, Turner, Steward and Love-French voted to dispense with the nationwide search for a superintendent and instead permanentize Walker as superintendent, approving a contract with her that runs until June 30, 2028. The contract was not, as required by law, made public on the November 12, 2024 agenda. The contract conferred upon Walker a compensation package that dwarfed that of any previous superintendent, consisting of a yearly salary of $282,782, perquisites and pay add-ons of $16,747 and benefits of $75,888 for a total annual compensation of $375,417. Moreover, it involved providing Walker with a level of job security never provided to earlier superintendents. Terminating her under the contract, either with cause or without cause, required under the contract’s terms, a supermajority vote of the board, that is, four of five votes.
The vote to hire Walker was made on a 3-to-2 vote of the board on November 12, 2024, with Turner, Steward and Love-French prevailing and board members Miguel Soto Jr. and Stephanie Kyer, who were not provided with a copy of Walker’s proposed contract, in opposition.
After the election results were certified, Krause was sworn in. Over the next several months, a new majority on the board evolved. Soto and Kyer previously had not been aligned with Turner, Love-French and Steward and had not joined in with them in March 2023 in voting to place then-Superintendent Krause on administrative leave. Nor had they supported hiring Quiller to write the letter to Krause in October 2024 in an effort to persuade him to drop out of the race and they were unsupportive of the decision to extend and approve a contract with Walker while the district was yet engaged in a nationwide superintendent recruitment effort. With Krause having joined Soto and Kyer on the board dais and with Turner gone, the 3-to-2 majority of Turner, Love-French and Steward prevailing over Soto and Kyer became a 2-to-3 minority, with Love-French and Steward dissenting to the predominating Soto, Kyer and Krause.
Initially, at least, Soto, Kyer and Krause sought to make the best of things, as the imperative to educate the district’s 7,742 students beckoned constantly, and keeping things moving at the 14 campuses – nine elementary schools, three middle schools, two kindergarten to 8th grade schools – and its three alternative programs took precedence over whatever matters of personality conflicts or differences that cropped up among the board members.
In time, however, particularly during the two-and-a-half month summer break from regular academics, issues developed that created tension between Walker and the board majority.
In the summer of 2025, Julie St. John-Gonzales, the district’s assistant superintendent of business services, precipitously jumped ship, leaving the employ of the Adelanto Elementary School District with no forewarning and little more than a second-hand explanation that she had been offered a higher paying opportunity elsewhere. St. John-Gonzales’s departure caught the board, which had been satisfied with her performance, unawares and sent the Adelanto Elementary School District scrambling to replace her. In fielding a set of potential candidates to replace St. John-Gonzales, Walker offered the board a short list of applicants to interview and choose from. When it emerged that information about the background of at least some of those candidates had been withheld, members of the board majority became concerned about the level of openness and transparency that Walker was maintaining.
Inquiries with regard to some other issues highlighted what members of the board majority characterized as communication problems or the withholding of what some said was crucial information upon which they were basing their decisions. Soto, Kyer and Krause, observing what they interpreted as Walker’s reluctance to provide them with information and documentation they were seeking, grew concerned that there was a hidden agenda they were not privy to that was playing out in the district they were sworn to oversee. This resulted in the board members going to the extraordinary effort of filing requests and California’s Public Records Act for the district records and internal documents, material that under most circumstances is routinely available to board members. In some cases, records and documents were said to be missing or did not exist. The claim that records the district kept as a normal consequence of its operations were nonexistent was perceived as a deliberate effort by Walker to stymie the board’s exercise of oversight. In other cases, the board learned of some expenditures which seemed to have no or questionable value toward the education of the students in the district. While some were relatively minor expenditures, there were several which pertained to the district engaging in outsourcing of services traditionally provided inhouse, such as securing bus service from outside transportation companies when the district has buses and drivers of its own. Another involved the district’s receipt of $150,000 in Expanded Learning Opportunities Program funds from the California Department of Education. Those knowledgeable about how that money was spent described a substantial amount having gone toward purchases they say were unnecessary and in no way represented an effort toward expanded learning opportunities.
Over the course of more than five months, the board majority had compiled 75 pages of documentation obtained through the California Public Records Act request process which indicated district money was being expended on items or services of no or little conceivable application toward educating the district’s students.
For a time, the board majority’s focus, at least partially, turned toward hiring decisions Walker had engaged in. While school boards generally have the ultimate authority with regard to whom they hire as superintendent, beyond that hiring authority for the remainder of the school district’s personnel lies with the superintendent together with the district’s personnel director, commonly referred to in recent years as the human resources manager or director. While the board is empowered to have input with regard to the hiring decisions, it is the superintendent’s judgment in making such decisions that prevails.
Evolving out of the emerging board majority’s dissatisfaction with Walker was concern over the standards being applied in both hiring and the setting of salary levels.
Soto and Kyer began pressing for an audit of the superintendent’s office and a comprehensive fiscal audit of the district.
Reportedly, a topic that emerged in the board’s closed-door executive discussions relating to the superintendent’s performance was what options the district had in finding another superintendent, which would require that Walker be eased out of the post. The termination clause in her contract, however, required that no fewer than four of the board’s members vote to terminate her.
For months, the 3-to-2 board majority has been faced with the reality that despite their dissatisfaction with Walker’s performance, they do not have the political muscle to terminate the superintendent.
As the actuality of the situation has become more and more apparent, there has been a wellspring of support in the community – extending to the political backers of Love-French, Steward and the currently out-of-office Turner – for Walker. Walker’s supporters include parents of some of the district’s children, some teachers and at least a handful of other district employees. The show of support they have put on has been intended to make the board majority think twice about pressing forward with an effort to force her out.
While the three apparent votes against Walker are not at this time sufficient to hand her a pink slip, there is a possibility that by the end of 2026, a fourth vote to remove her as superintendent will materialize. Both Love-French and Steward must stand for reelection this year and succeed to remain in office. Love-French, whose children are no longer students in the district, has made public statement indicating she might not run for re-election. Reportedly, the union representing teachers in the Adelanto Elementary School District, the Adelanto District Teachers Association, which is affiliated with the California Teachers Association and the National Education Association, will oppose both Steward and Love-French if they run.
It is in this atmosphere that Walker has been contemplating her future. While she would prefer to remain in place as the Adelanto Elementary School District’s superintendent until the end of her contract in June 2028 or even beyond that, it may behoove her to cut herself an exit early, foreclosing the possibility that a newly-composed board at the end of this year or early next year forces her hand by terminating her with or without cause.
There were reports two weeks ago that Walker was engaged in some confidential discussions to see what arrangements could be made for her to step down prior to her contract running its course. Speculation went all over the place. One unconfirmed report was that Walker wanted, and the district was contemplating providing, a guarantee of her contract through to June 2027, a year before her contract is set to expire. In return, she would engage in a wholehearted recruitment drive to find her replacement, essentially reinitiating the search that Leadership Associated was engaged in when the troika of Turner, Love-French and Steward rendered that effort moot by hiring her as the full-fledged superintendent a week after Turner had been voted out of office.
It seems, based on Walker’s action in going out on leave with her second-in-command Valdez and her executive secretary Lovett, that the above-referenced speculation was not quite accurate. Her action has confounded her supporters and those who are in favor of her leaving alike. While the paralysis that gripped the district during the period Walker, Valdez and Lovett were gone did prevent the agenda for the January 27 meeting from being completed and posted, resulting in the cancellation/postponement of the meeting, that was, at best, a temporary interruption. It may have demonstrated the degree to which the district has become dependent on Walker and her team, but such dependence is not absolute. It further alerted the board majority that in the future it will need to have an alternate administration core in place if there is a repetition of what went on from January 19 to January 23.
Moreover, Walker’s lasting absence and that of Valdez has resulted in the loss of what was formerly imputed to her as her morale authority. Many of her supporters had lionized her as someone who put the interest of students first and who was standing up not for herself but for the principle of furthering educational opportunity. Leaving the district and its students in the lurch as she and Vldez have is undercutting her stature in the community.
Walker’s move is inexplicable because of the position it is putting her two crucial supporters on the board – Love-French and Steward – in. Both, for as long as they remain in office, formerly came across as ready to stand unquestionably by Walker. While Love-French remains inextricably tied to Walker, Steward bond to the superintendent is not unbreakable. Indications are that Steward is intent on seeking reelection in November. In the run-up to that contest, she may find it difficult to explain to the voters of Trustee Area 4 why she remains committed to continuing to employ a superintendent who without explanation headed out on an extended leave, departing in such a way that no arrangement for substitute management/administration/leadership put in place first and put the district’s academic mission at risk.
Not just those supporting Walker but others in favor of her departure as well as district observers who have no feelings one way or the other about her continuation as superintendent are baffled by her absence.
Equally mysterious was why Valdez, whose employment with the district began under Walker but whose continuing tenure with the district is by no means necessarily tied to that of the superintendent, seemingly acted in concert with her. The district’s academic services division is arguably that part of its operations most important to the core mission, and there appears to be no one fulfilling Valdez’s function. The district employees the Sentinel spoke with this week seemed genuinely unexpecting of what was ongoing, with one, who spoke guardedly, acknowledging that something was indeed going on, but that only those at the top of the district knew what that was. For the record, none of the board members are making any statements as to Walker’s status.

The City of Fontana will tear out its existing 27,000-square foot City Hall which has existed since 1964 and replace it with a structure of roughly 45,000 square feet.
Going with the old building is some history city officials and residents would like to remember, some history city officials and residents would like to forget and some lessons taxpayers might lose sight of at their own peril.
City officials intend to have the new edifice ready for occupancy two years from now – in January 2028 – a reasonable target but one that might not be met.
The city is spending $58 million to construct the new municipal accommodations, which is intended to house virtually all of the city’s departments other than its police department. It will provide quarters for the fire department, with offices for the fire chief, battalion chiefs and fire administration, within its expanse.
Though some are hailing the construction of a new City Hall as one that is welcome and past due, there are others who consider the undertaking to be self-indulgent and overblown. They consider the existing civic facility to be adequate if somewhat undersized and far from having eclipsed its useful life. They question why the city is going to knock it down and build a new one when it could instead keep it in place and augment it with an annex at cost of around have that of the $58 million the city is going to expend to recreate an edifice from scratch.
The project’s general contractor is PENTA Building Group.
The city is using Fontana Senior Engineer Christopher Smethurst and Lindsay Lomeli, who was recently hired by PENTA Building Group Construction Corporation after having left Uprite Construction Corporation in Los Angeles, as the  project managers.
City officials offered somewhat contradictory statements as to who is responsible for the project’s design. City officials acknowledge that the architectural firm Carrier Johnson + Culture did design work on the project. Nevertheless, Assistant Fontana City Manager Phil Burum in October told the Fontana Herald News, “Rather than having an architect design it, go through the plan, get bids approved, bid for contractors and then ultimately construct it, we lumped it all together with one team and a contractor involved in the design process to compress the development schedule and then also get the most efficient product we could get.”
For the mnemonically-gifted or, depending on how you look at it, the mnemonically-afflicted, the city razing of the existing City Hall is somewhat galling.
In 1982, then-City Manager Jack Ratelle committed the city to a $769,800 renovation of the then-18-year-old City Hall. He gave members of the city council assurances that he would be able to get the job done on the cheap by getting discounts on several elements of the work that had to be done to complete the job, but was unclear as to the specifics. What Ratelle had in mind was that a handful of unofficial trades with contractors and developers by which he had given them assurances project proposals they had in the pipeline would get “expedited” treatment with the city’s planning division in exchange for work on the City Hall renovation to be done at cost or no cost with the city paying for materials.
The project was completed in 1983 and its cost defrayed through transfers and “borrowings” from multiple municipal funds and accounts, including one for $336,000 in one fell swoop from the city’s sewer bond debt reserve fund which Ratelle did not bother to inform the council about.
Eventually, a small group of civically-minded residents discovered that the amount of money in the city’s sewer fund had precipitously dropped from $668,000 to $332,000, without any indication of a disbursement for purposes related to wastewater treatment or the city’s sewer or effluent conveyance systems. Ongoing development at that time was placing a burden on the city’s existing sewage treatment system, necessitating, ultimately, increases in the sewer service rates charged to domestic, commercial and industrial users. After residents and businesses brought the vanishing of money from the city’s sewer fund to the attention of the city council, council members demanded an explanation from Ratelle. Without acknowledging explicitly that the money had been used for the City Hall expansion project, Ratelle assuaged the city council by suggesting that was the case, whereupon the city council acceded to a citizen committee’s recommendation that the city discontinue using money in sequestered municipal accounts intended or earmarked for specific purposes, such as the sewer fund, to pay for unrelated municipal projects and programs, such as the City Hall expansion.
In late 1983, at the city council’s direction, Ratelle and then Finance Director Ed Luekemeyer transferred $400,000 that had been appropriated for civic projects unrelated to maintaining or expanding the sewer system back into the sewer bond debt reserve fund. This was seen by many knowledgeable residents as an admission by city officials that the city was gouging its residents in charging them for the provision of basic services and diverting the inflated proceeds for unauthorized and illegitimate purposes and uses. In response, the city council, Ratelle and other top administrators offered an assurance that the money the city was taking in was being well spent. They said the City Hall expansion was intended to promote the civic center’s usefulness for another half century or beyond, perhaps extending City Hall’s life to the century mark in 2064.
It is clear from what the current city council is doing that its members do not believe they need to honor the commitments made by their predecessors in the 1980s and early 1990s.
Some have suggested that the mayor and current members of the council – Acquanetta Warren, John Roberts, Jesse Sandoval, Phil Cothran, Jr. and Pete Garcia – are throwing economic conservatism to the wind largely because they see an opportunity to provide themselves with a form of immortality of a sort – getting their names on the cornerstone of the new City Hall, a shrine that will outlive them and perpetuate their renown, at least in Fontana, until the 22nd Century.
While Warren, Roberts, Sandoval, Cothran and Garcia are intoxicated with the idea of their grandchildren’s grandchildren being able to proudly point out to their contemporaries who their great-great-grandmother or great-great-grandfather was, the cost the cost the city is taking on is sobering.
Revizto, Tech 24 Construction and MannLee Building Materials are in rough concurrence that constructing a 45,000-square-foot public building, such as a library, community center, or government office typically ranges from $13.5 million to over $26 million, based on average commercial costs of $300 to $600+ per square foot. Allowances for a deviation in cost is made for construction specialized public buildings, such as police stations, which can reach upward to $580/square foot, since complex community facilities can and often do fall on the higher end of the stated range. This is consistent with the cost Fontana city officials spoke about when they were discussing the City Hall project as recently as two years ago, when the figure[s] $27 million-to-$29 million were being thrown around.
At this point, the price tag has more than doubled, reaching $58 million. Approximately calculating that the currently existing City Hall’s 27,000 square feet represent 60 percent of the 45,000 square feet of the new City Hall, given that the yet-existing but now empty quarters remain fully functional, the value of the facility to be torn down is $34.8 million.
It has been observed that three of the members of the council are current or former government employees who are provided with generous and/or comfortable salaries and benefits or pensions paid for by the taxpayers.
Councilman Pete Garcia, who works for the State of California’s Department of Toxic Substances Control, draws a $194,572.36 salary and $58,719.30 in benefits for an annual total compensation of $253,291.66.
Councilman John Roberts, who is retired as a firefighter with San Bernardino County, draws an annual pension of $137,240.91
Mayor Acquanetta Warren, who is a retired municipal employee primarily with the City of Upland, draws an annual pension of $98,421.24, based on her 24 years and 7.5 months as a city official.
Councilman Jesse Sandoval, who is a retired municipal employee with the City of San Bernardino, is pulling an annual pension of $69,862.07.
In this way, a majority of the city’s current decisionmakers, as government employees or former employees in the public sector who do not or did not feel the pinch of taxation in the same way that the majority of city residents, who are employed within the private sector and are subject to the vicissitudes of not just their own tax burden but taxation as levied upon their private sector employers. It is the mayor’s and city council’s easy come, easy go relationship with and perception of public money that might account, some believe, in the way in which the city is willing to knock down a building worth $34.8 million to replace it with one costing $58 million.
For Mayor Warren and councilmen Roberts, Cothran and Garcia, all of whom are Republicans, the razing of the existing City Hall harbors a highly personalized bonus. Doing so will allow for the removal of famed Italian sculptor Michele Paszyn’s 40-inch high by 32-inch by 16-inch cast bronze bust of John F. Kennedy, mounted on a 49-inch high by 33-inch by 25-inch granite-faced plinth on a stepped concrete base that was dedicated on November 22, 1964, one year to the day after Kennedy’s assassination and publicly unveiled on December 6, 1964. It has remained in front of City Hall ever since. Kennedy was a Democrat.

The San Bernardino County Board of Supervisors took several actions at its January 13 and January 27 regularly scheduled meetings.
The board approved at its January 13 meeting a $3.1 million revenue agreement with the California Department of Public Health for the continued provision of mandated newborn screening specimen collection and courier services through June 30, 2029.
The San Bernardino County Public Health Department will perform these screenings at local birthing hospitals and clinics, ensuring early detection of more than 80 congenital disorders. The agreement allows the county to receive reimbursement for coordination and collection services and supports efforts to improve early treatment and outcomes for infants born in San Bernardino County.
At the January 13 meeting, the board also signed off on accepting federal reimbursement for joint fugitive task force participation.
The San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department is receiving a reimbursement from the U.S. Marshals Service for participation in the Pacific Southwest Regional Fugitive Task Force through September 30, 2029. The reimbursement provides up to $31,900 annually for overtime and vehicle fuel costs associated with apprehending federal fugitives.
By participating in the task force, the Sheriff’s Department enhances collaboration between federal and local law enforcement, increases regional safety and supports the Sheriff’s priority of locating and arresting violent offenders, which aligns with the county’s declared goals.
At the same meeting, the board apprved providing mental health support for drug court participants.
The board approved an amendment to an agreement with MFI Recovery Center, Inc., adding approximately $418,000 in funding for a total not to exceed approximately $3.1 million through June 30. Utilizing these partnerships, the San Bernardino County Department of Behavioral Health provides outpatient, intensive outpatient and recovery services for adult participants in the San Bernardino County Superior Court’s Drug Court programs, which divert individuals from incarceration into treatment. The contract amendment ensures continued access to behavioral health services that support sobriety, accountability and reduced recidivism as part of the county’s collaborative justice approach.
The San Bernardino County Land Use Services is amending the county development code to consolidate and update regulations governing accessory dwelling units (ADUs) and junior accessory dwelling units (JADUs), ensuring compliance with recent changes in state law. The amendments create a new stand-alone chapter—Chapter 84.36—by consolidating three existing chapters: accessory structures and uses, allowed projections, and parking and loading.
The revised ordinance establishes new development standards, including maximum building heights of 25 feet for attached ADUs, 18 feet for detached ADUs and 16 feet for ADUs permitted by right. Minimum unit sizes are now set at 200 square feet for ADUs and 150 square feet for JADUs. To streamline approvals, Land Use Services will adopt the state-mandated permitting timelines: 75 calendar days for standard plan applications and 45 calendar days for pre-approved plan applications.
At the board’s January 27 meeting, the panel approved discretionary funding allocations to support various community initiatives through what the county calls the district specific priorities program.
The county will appropriate:
– $433,500 from Second District Supervisor Jesse Armendarez’s district specific priorities program to the Fontana Unified School District to enhance school safety through a new crisis alert platform program for $418,500 and to support Summit High School Cheer Boosters for $15,000.
– $150,000 from Armendarez’s district specific priorities program to the City of Fontana to support its Downtown Economic Development Plan, including cultural programming, artist development and small business activation.
– $125,000 from Armendarez’s district specific priorities program to The Rivers Edge Ranch to launch a women’s residential recovery program in Apple Valley.
– $50,000 from Armendarez’s district specific priorities program to Thundar Lightning and Peace to expand outreach and wellness services for veterans and first responders.
– Up to $50,000 from Fourth District Supervisor Curt Hagman’s district specific priorities program to Chino Post No. 299 American Legion Department of California to support the event hall renovation project at the Chino post.
These investments will enhance recovery services, economic opportunity and public safety through strategic partnerships that will help the county to achieve its declared goals.
The board on January 27 approved the creation of a Child Welfare Ad Hoc Committee to review and recommend policy changes that strengthen child protection and family services. The committee will consist of Vice Chair and Fifth District Supervisor Joe Baca, Jr. and Second District Supervisor Jesse Armendarez.
This newly formed committee will work alongside county departments to evaluate the structure, practices and policies of the county’s child welfare system. In 2025, the San Bernardino County Children and Family Services Department received more than 24,800 referrals and served over 7,100 children, including more than 5,400 in active foster care placements. The committee’s goal is to identify and address barriers to child safety, improve case timelines and enhance long-term outcomes for children and families.
The San Bernardino County Division of Animal Care is partnering with The PAW Mission to expand mobile veterinary services to support animal shelters and community cat programs throughout the county. The $500,000 annual agreement will provide spay/neuter, vaccination and general veterinary care both in the field and at the county’s Devore and Big Bear shelters from February 1 through January. 31, 2028.
The PAW Mission will help reduce overcrowding by preparing more shelter animals for adoption and expanding the Trap-Neuter-Vaccinate-Return program to humanely reduce free-roaming cat populations in unincorporated areas.

The board approved a $1.2 million contract with E-1 Holdings, Inc. to purchase and upfit eight new vehicles to support San Bernardino County Behavioral Health’s Community Crisis Response Teams in their mobile crisis response to strengthen mental heath health care in the field.
The new vehicles will enhance the county’s ability to deliver mental health crisis intervention services directly in the community, often in coordination with law enforcement or emergency medical responders. The units will be equipped with emergency lighting, communications technology, storage and interior modifications to support a safe and effective field response.
By increasing timely access to behavioral health services, the county is making continued progress toward achieving its declared goals.
The San Bernardino County Public Defender received a $1.7 million grant from the U.S. Department of Justice to support holistic defense services in the county. The funding will help to establish an interdisciplinary, client-centered legal representation model, including wraparound services such as social work, mental health support and reentry services.
The board on January 27 accepted more than $45 million in grant funding to support local efforts to prevent infectious disease and improve behavioral health services, including:
Approximately $4.7 million from the California Department of Public Health to San Bernardino County Public Health for the Sexually Transmitted Infection Prevention and Collaboration Program for the period of July 1, 2026, through June 30, 2031.
Funds will support sexually transmitted infection prevention, testing, treatment and care activities focused on high-risk and at-need populations.
At least 50 percent of the funds must be allocated to community-based organizations or nonprofit health care providers selected through a competitive process.
The county is also going to receive approximately $1.7 million from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention which is to be provided to the County Department of Public Health for strengthening public health infrastructure through November 30.
Funding will allow the County Public Health Department to enhance the department’s performance management and accreditation effort, the development of policies and standard practices, updates to the electronic health record system, and financial management and procurement processes.
This is the county’s second award installment under this grant program.
Approximately $39 million from the California Department of Health Care Services for the Bond Behavioral Continuum Infrastructure Program (Round 1: Launch ready grant) to San Bernardino County Behavioral Health through June 30, 2026.
Behavioral Health will utilize approximately $3.9 million in American Rescue Plan Act funding, land contributed to the Pacific Village Platinum Campus and any needed 2011 Support Services funds to meet the 10% local match requirement for the grant award.
The departments will utilize the grant funds toward the construction and rehabilitation of the campus, including facilities for crisis stabilization, crisis residential, community and outpatient behavioral health services and clinically enriched long-term treatment.
By receiving these grant funds, Public Health and Behavioral Health are working toward achieving the health care goals in the Countywide Vision.

Affordable housing and community development investment strategy

San Bernardino County Community Development and Housing presented the proposed 2026–27 U.S. Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Consolidated Annual Action Plan, which serves as the county’s formal grant spending strategy for approximately $9.1 million in anticipated federal entitlement funding from federal programs, including Community Development Block Grant, HOME Investment Partnerships and Emergency Solutions Grant.

The department developed the plan in collaboration with local jurisdictions, service providers, developers and the San Bernardino County Office of Homeless Services.

The final annual action plan will be presented to the board in April for approval and submitted to HUD in April.