Joe Nelson, Staff Writer
Posted: 05/22/2012 04:00:23 PM PDT

SAN BERNARDINO – High unemployment and a staggering number of people underwater on their mortgages continues to vex San Bernardino County, with no relief expected until late 2015, according to a budget report approved by the Board of Supervisors on Tuesday.

The county added 15,600 jobs in the first three months of 2012, but its unemployment rate, as of March, was still hovering at 12.7 percent, higher than the national unemployment rate of 8.4 percent and California’s unemployment rate of 11.5 percent.

Roughly 264,122 of the 488,422 single family homes in the county have been underwater on their mortgages – in which owners owe more than the home is worth – at some point in the last four years.

Of the underwater homes, 63.7 percent of the homeowners had received notices of default. As a result, a housing recovery is not likely until late 2015, according to the budget report.

“It is clearly my opinion and the opinion of the Board of Supervisors that our economy is still struggling,” said Greg Devereaux, the county’s chief executive officer.

He said the local economy will not rebound until developers start building homes again and more businesses set up shop.

But before that can happen, the county must first get its arms around the foreclosure problem and the high number of people underwater on their mortgages.

“Hence the desire for the board to form a JPA (joint powers authority) with some of our cities and explore what’s out there,” said Devereaux.

The county is pushing to form a JPA that would create a program to assist these troubled homeowners. The cities of Fontana and Ontario have agreed to join the county in the plan.

Hesperia Mayor Russell Blewett has also expressed a strong interest in the program, but his city has yet to embrace the proposal.

County spokesman David Wert said a number of private companies and/or organizations are developing or have developed programs targeting underwater homeowners. The federal Home Affordable Refinance Program (HARP) is another option, he said.

Despite the projected delay in the recovery of the housing market, it’s not all bad news. The median home price in the county has leveled out at $150,000, and for March that median price was 9.5 percent above the April 2009 low, an affordable price for 77 percent of local families.

David Mlynarski, chief financial officer for the Inland Empire Economic Recovery Corp., a public-private partnership that purchases foreclosed homes, refurbishes them and sells them to first-time homebuyers, said the county must become more business friendly if it wants to attract business to the region and spur job growth.

“We are at the bottom of the list when it comes to being business-friendly and job-friendly,” Mlynarski said.

To read entire story, click here.

Neil Derry

Point of View

Supervisor Neil Derry
Posted: 05/22/2012 02:44:33 PM PDT

The people of San Bernardino County are tired of being unemployed or underemployed. They are tired of feeling like they just can’t get ahead. And they are tired of feeling like nothing is ever going to change.

There is a limit to what a county government can do to improve an economy that is subject to state, national and global pressures. But that doesn’t absolve us from working hard to make a positive impact in areas where we can make a difference.

The seeds of economic recovery and sustained vibrancy begin to sprout when communities evaluate their strengths and weakness, assess the landscape for opportunities, and leverage available assets and resources to maximize growth and create jobs.

Understanding who we are as a community is essential to developing a strategy to achieve economic renewal. Communities that competently take inventory of these factors possess the confidence and patience to chart the long-term course to achieve these objectives.

The county of San Bernardino is preparing to embark upon this journey.

Our economic development agency recently entered into a collaborative partnership with Loma Linda University that we believe will mark the beginning of a multi-decade development of a biotech and life science industry complex. Loma Linda University owns many patents and innovations as a result of its vaunted research programs and decades of innovative practices and applications. To date, the value of these incredibly marketable assets has not been fully extracted.

Through our ability to apply for special tax credits from the federal government under the New Market Tax Credit fund, we believe we can entice firms to relocate or establish themselves here and facilitate the introduction of these intellectual assets owned by the university to the marketplace. These tax credits are designed to promote investment in low-income communities by permitting individual and corporate investors to receive the tax credit spread out over seven years in exchange for making equity investments through a community development entity controlled by the county. Areas surrounding LLU qualify under this program. Investors receive a 39 percent credit against the original investment amount. Obviously, this is an enticing carrot given to investors that engage in a very high-risk investment with a long-term horizon.

To read entire story, click here.

BY MICHELLE L. KLAMPE
STAFF WRITER
mklampe@pe.com

Published: 21 May 2012 10:14 PM

A record number of California schools, including 31 in the Inland Empire, may not be able to pay their bills in the next couple of years, the California Department of Education announced Monday, May 20.

Nearly 20 percent of California school districts and other local education agencies such as county education offices are in financial jeopardy, according to a list compiled by state officials using financial reports from March. The list includes 18 of 23 school districts in Riverside County and 13 of 33 school districts in San Bernardino County.

Twelve districts — none in the Inland Empire — have indicated they cannot meet their financial obligations this fiscal year or next, a budget status known as negative certification. Another 176 districts indicated they may not be able to pay their bills this year or in 2012-13 or 2013-14, a qualified certification.

Districts with a qualified budget could become insolvent within two years unless they make additional cuts or bring in more revenue. Districts with a negative budget cannot pay their bills this year or in 2012-13. Under both conditions, districts face increased supervision and sometimes intervention from the county office of education to ensure they don’t become insolvent.

The number of agencies on the financial edge has increased by 61 since the list was last released in February and up 45 over the previous year’s list, state officials said. In 2006-07, just 24 school districts had a negative or qualified certification, and none were in the Inland region.

“Having 13 is crazy,” said Dan Evans, a spokesman for the San Bernardino County office of education. “That is a stunning number that should give everybody pause to say, ‘What’s going on here?’”

State and local education officials said the dramatic increase is a by-product of the prolonged state budget crisis and the unknowns surrounding tax measures being proposed to help fund schools. Paul Jessup, deputy superintendent of the Riverside County office of education, said moving school districts back onto solid financial footing will be difficult as long as the state’s financial woes continue.

“We’re in desperate need of an honest state spending plan,” he said. “We keep on getting budgets built on hope. Hope is not a plan.”

Districts have been required since the 1990s to file two financial reports, known as interim reports, one each by Dec. 15 and March 15. Districts review their fiscal health for the current year and two subsequent years. The reports look at cash flow, reserves, deficit spending, enrollment and attendance, status of labor agreements and more.

The county office of education reviews the reports and submits them to the state Department of Education. When districts have qualified or negative certification, they face additional oversight from the county office, which can step in to veto decisions on spending. In the worst case scenarios, a school district that has run out of money can seek an emergency loan from the state Department of Education.

To read entire story, click here.

Andrew Edwards, Staff Writer
Created: 05/18/2012 10:23:47 AM PDT

A reported drop in the Inland Empire’s unemployment rate to 11.7 percent would seem to signal an improving job market, but a closer look at the numbers shows the jobless rate dropped not because of a surge in hiring, but because the region’s work force shrunk.

San Bernardino and Riverside counties somehow lost some 24,000 people from their combined work force from March to April, according to government numbers released Friday.

That oddity – a 1.3 percent decline in the estimated size of the Inland Empire’s labor force – made it possible for the region’s unemployment rate to fall a full percentage point even though nonfarm employment decreased.

But whether the sudden drop in the reported labor force is a result of a statistical glitch or a mass exodus of discouraged workers from the Inland Empire’s labor force is unknown.

“I don’t think you can find anyone who realizes what’s going on,” said University of Redlands economist Johannes Moenius.

Los Angeles County numbers showed a pattern similar to the Inland Empire’s.

In the state’s most populous county, the unemployment rate fell from 11.8 percent to 11.6 percent in April.

Los Angeles County numbers also show, however, that the area lost 7,100 nonfarm jobs and the labor force declined by 16,000 people.

For the state as a whole, California’s official unemployment rate ticked down to 10.9percent in April. California had an 11percent unemployment rate in March.

California’s nonfarm employment, however, declined by 4,200 jobs and the state’s labor force was reduced by 4,900 jobs. April was the first time in nine months the state lost nonfarm jobs.

Looking at employment trends instead of the March-to-April shifts in job numbers, current employment levels are above 2011 levels, although job growth has slowed in the spring.

“April was not encouraging, but we remain certainly optimistic,” said Jordan Levine of the Los Angeles-based Beacon Economics.

Beacon analysts have tended to be bullish in recent months, saying long-term trends favor growth and predicting the U.S. economy can withstand any fallout if the feared collapse of the Greek economy happens.

California’s overall nonfarm employment level in April was 1.2percent greater than it was one year prior.

To read entire story, click here.

Congressman Joe Baca

Liset Marquez, Staff Writer
Created: 05/18/2012 12:01:03 PM PDT

Rep. Joe Baca has introduced a bill to expedite the transfer of L.A./Ontario International Airport to local control.

The Transfer Control of Ontario Airport Now Act gives Los Angeles World Airports, which manages ONT, 60 days to turn over operations and ownership.

It also calls on the Federal Aviation Administration to withhold all funding from LAWA if no action is taken within the first 60 days after the bill’s enactment.

“If LAWA is not going to give our airport a fair shot at success, then we must do everything in our power to return Ontario to local control,” said Baca, D-San Bernardino.

A commission also would be created to determine a fair market value for the sale of ONT.

LAWA would then be forced to sell the airport to Ontario at the commission’s determined, fair market price, according to the bill.

“LAWA’s continued mismanagement of Ontario airport has led to exorbitant operating costs, large reductions in flight traffic, weakened security, and a significant loss of jobs and revenue for our local Inland economies,” Baca said.

Earlier in the week, speaking to a group in the Inland Empire, LAWA Executive Director Gina Marie warned those pushing for Ontario to regain operations of the airport.

“Local control, in and of itself, is not going to be a panacea,” she said.

ONT saw about 4.2 million passengers in 2011, figures not seen since the late 1980s. It’s a drastic decline from the peak traffic of 7.2 million in 2007.

Addressing the continued decline in ONT passenger traffic figures, Lindsey said airlines are retreating from smaller hub facilities like ONT.

Introduction of the legislation was news to Ontario Councilman Alan Wapner, who has been the city’s liaison on the issue.

“We’ve very supportive of what the congressmen is trying to do,” he said.

Wapner noted that Baca has backed Ontario throughout the entire process but said he looks forward to speaking to the congressman and updating him on Ontario’s latest efforts.

To read entire story, click here.

Sandra Emerson, Staff Writer
Created: 05/17/2012 07:23:12 PM PDT

UPLAND – The City Council has been updated on the condition of the city’s budget and will meet next week to decide where to make cuts.

City Manager Stephen Dunn presented the council with an update on the city’s fiscal condition during a special meeting on Wednesday, asking it to set its priorities so staff could find a way to absorb $3.4 million in obligated expenses.

“I have $400,000 in new revenues I can apply to services in the general fund. I have $3.8 million in what we call obligated expenditures, so I am saying that I am already short $3.4 million from where we are right now,” Dunn said.

The council asked Dunn for more information on the impact of the cuts and scheduled another special meeting at 7 p.m. Wednesday.

Dunn asked the council to consider reallocating resources, which would take money from selected departments to give to others. Or, make each department absorb its own obligated expenditures, which would result in a higher service level reduction in public safety.

Councilman Ken Willis asked Dunn to have staff prepare two budget scenarios for the next meeting.

“My recommendation is that we share across the board. It’s not fair for one individual group to take the brunt of it,” said Councilwoman Debbie Stone. “This is something we need to look at and figure out a way to make it work.”

The city expects to see about $2.2 million increase in its general fund revenues – $400,000 in new revenues and $1.8 million in budgetary accounting changes.

The city has identified about $3.8 million in obligated expenditures that will need to be absorbed moving into the 2012-13 fiscal year. The $400,000 in new revenue makes the shortfall from the current fiscal year $3.4 million.

Of the $3.8 million, $2.3 million is in labor costs, $400,000 is in operational costs and $1.1 million is in legal costs.

The police contract is estimated to cost the city about $700,000. However, police unions Wednesday presented Dunn with a list of concessions they are willing to make that will reduce their impact on the budget.

“I will be in the process of analyzing those concessions,” Dunn said. “They realized what’s happening with us, and they stepped up to the plate, so I really appreciate that.”

Contractual merit increases add up to $400,000, but Dunn said he will be asking employee groups to forego the increases.

The city is obligated by the Public Employees Retirement System to pay $1.2 million in the next fiscal year.

The rest of the shortfall is in operational expenses as well as legal expenses.

About $1 million of the $1.1 million in increased legal costs is for the San Bernardino County Flood Control’s lawsuit against the city.

To read entire story, click here.

San Bernardino County Supervisor Brad Mitzelfelt

Supervisor: Attracting out-of-state business vital to the county’s growth
May 17, 2012 9:37 AM
RENE DE LA CRUZ, Special to the Daily Press

While it was billed as a State of County presentation, San Bernardino County 1st District Supervisor Brad Mitzelfelt said his address Wednesday should have been titled “county of the state” because of Sacramento’s insistence on passing its responsibilities down to the county level.

“We’ve now been put in the prison business,” Mitzelfelt said during the Apple Valley Chamber of Commerce luncheon. “We have someone in county jail serving an eightyear sentence right now. A country jail is not built to hold people for eight years. I guess the Legislature didn’t get the memo.”

Unless there is a change of course in the state’s prison realignment plan that releases low-level offenders to county facilities or parole, an additional 17,000 stateheld felons will be released to county control over the next three years, Mitzelfelt said.

“That is not a pretty picture, and that is an understatement,” said Mitzelfelt, who is working on county programs to help with the crisis. “We’re already full, and under court order not to get any more full.”

The county will receive $27 million from the state for costs associated with the implementation of the realignment plan through June 30, according to a country report, but Mitzelfelt said the county has asked for constitutional guarantees on those funds.

“The governor has added that to his tax increase initiative, so its fate is now tied to the tax measure,” Mitzelfelt said.

Community leader Bob Tinsley asked if the county could copy Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s tent city concept, to save money and add additional space for the incarcerated.

“We would if we could, but the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation sets the standards for county jails,” Mitzelfelt said. “We tried to do tents with our juvenile population, but the state required wood frames in the tents, air conditioning and heating.”

The elimination of the state’s redevelopment program, which helped finance infrastructure to attract out-of-state business, was another stake in the heart to municipalities across the county.

“Partnerships and cooperation are critical in this post-redevelopment time,” Mitzelfelt said. “We have to find another path toward something other than redevelopment. We can’t accept it when the state comes and takes our dollars, we have to fight.”

In an effort to fight housing sprawl and change growth to “smart growth,” Senate Bill 375 was passed in 2008, with one of its goals to do away with single-family, detached, large lot residential construction.

“The state views Apple Valley as sprawl. I view it as elbow-room,” Mitzelfelt said. “The state planners are telling the board of directors at the Southern California Association of Governments that we have enough detached housing.”

The bill, which targets greenhouse gas emission reduction tied to land use, requires regional planning agencies to create strategies to meet those reduction requirements.

To read entire story, click here.

From the Southland to the Bay Area, California’s housing market showed strength last month as median prices rose and sales outperformed the same month last year.

The Golden State’s median home price popped 6% in April to $264,000, according to real estate information firm DataQuick of San Diego. The median is the point at which half the homes in the state sold for more and half for less.

In Southern California and the Bay Area, the share of home sales that were foreclosures declined significantly, which economists see as key because sales of those homes tend to drag prices down.

“It appears that the market is taking a step in the direction of normalization, but only a step,” DataQuick President John Walsh said. “The mortgage market is critical, as is market mix and the receding importance of foreclosure resales.”

To read entire story, click here.

LAX/Ontario International Airport Terminal (Courtesy: The P-E)

By Liset Marquez
Created: 05/16/2012 03:23:20 PM PDT

DIAMOND BAR – A lively discussion about LA/Ontario International Airport, which was supposed to focus on the medium-hub facility’s importance to the region’s economy, quickly turned into a debate on the merits of local control.

For more than an hour Wednesday, a five-member panel discussed a bevy of issues and circumstances facing ONT at the Four Corners Coalition 2012 Economic Summit at the Diamond Bar Center.

The discussion pitted Gina Marie Lindsey, executive director of Los Angeles World Airports – which manages ONT – against proponents of local control, including Ontario Councilman Alan Wapner. Riverside Mayor Ron Loveridge, Michael Armstrong with Southern California Association of Governments, and Denny Schneider, whose group Alliance for a Regional Solution to Airport Congestion has long battled LAWA over Los Angeles International Airport’s growth, also participated.

“It is silly that we are fighting with each other over who owns the airport, we ought to be leaning in together and figuring a path forward on how to make this airport thrive in a very challenging economy,” Lindsey said in a stern voice.

But Lindsey went on to warn those pushing for Ontario to regain operations of the airports.

“Local control, in and out of itself, is not going to be a panacea,” she said.

For this year, month-over-month, ONT has lost between 4 and 7 percent in air traffic, Lindsey said. The economy, however, is not a reflection of that drop, rather it’s a shift in the way airlines do business, she said.

Addressing the continued decline in ONT passenger traffic figures, Lindsey said airlines are retreating from smaller hub facilities like ONT.

“So what is it that we should be doing different together? Let the local versus L.A. control of the airport, let that battle fight itself out, but, in the meantime, we ought to be working together to see what we can do to stem exodus,” she said.

Wapner, who met Lindsey for the first time at the spirited discussion, said he saw it differently. Calling LAWA an absentee landlord, Wapner argued Ontario’s motives in getting involved in the local control effort.

The interest that the city has isn’t about any financial gain, it’s in the region which could have seen a $20 million economic boost if passenger traffic was up, Wapner said.

“I want to commend Gina Marie because I think she is doing an excellent job as the executive director of Los Angeles World Airport,” he said, adding that she is doing her job, given to her by the policymakers in Los Angeles, which is to get the expansion completed of Tom Bradley Terminal International at LAX.

“Unfortunately, it’s been at the expense of Ontario.”

ONT has long been viewed by officials in Ontario as the region’s largest economic engine.

City officials said they are fighting to regain control not only to stop the hemorrhaging of passenger traffic but to control their economic destiny.

Michael Armstrong, who handles the transportation and aviation issues for Southern California Association of Governments, presented figures in Ontario’s favor.

Using factors developed by a regional economic impact study completed for SCAG in 2004, Armstrong said ONT was on pace to reach 31 million annual passengers by 2030. It’s also a figure the agency is continuing to forecast for the airport in its latest study.

“It would no doubt be a tremendous economic boom to the Inland Empire,” he said.

According to the forecast, had Ontario continued to grow, it would have generated a projected 134,000 of direct and indirect jobs and injected about $20 billion into the local economy, he said.

Calling ONT an important piece of the overall aviation puzzle for Southern California, Lindsey said it also remains a very important and long-term strategic asset for LAWA.

“I understand the sentiment and concern, and I think we are the easy target – we may have even done some things that made us an easy target. Our intent is absolutely to see this airport thrive,” Lindsey said.

Officials in Los Angeles are focusing on airlines, and trying to provide more seats and more routes but have not been successful, she said.

To read entire story, click here.

By Judy Lin, Associated Press Writer
Posted: 05/15/2012 09:21:09 PM PDT
Updated: 05/15/2012 09:22:38 PM PDT

SACRAMENTO – Gov. Jerry Brown is pleading with Californians to raise their taxes as part of his solution for solving the state’s budget deficit, but it’s uncertain whether voters will be in an accepting mood come November.

Polls show voters want more money for schools but don’t want to tax themselves to pay for it. They continue to be pessimistic about the economy in a state with one of the highest jobless rates in the nation. And they distrust the Legislature, which oversees the budget.

Brown is facing a tough environment after announcing over the weekend that the state’s deficit had risen to $15.7 billion, much larger than he said a few months ago, said Jack Pitney, a political science professor at Claremont McKenna College in Pomona.

“When the governor says devastating things are going to happen, people will say, `Look, you said the shortfall was going to be a lot smaller than it was. You were wrong then; why should we believe you now?”‘ Pitney said. “The governor is facing a trust deficit as well as a fiscal deficit.”

On Tuesday, the Democratic governor defended his plan to raise the statewide sales tax and seek higher income taxes on the wealthy, warning of deep cuts that include a school year shortened by as much as three weeks if voters reject his taxes.

He said it was not a scare tactic but rather the stark reality of a state that is not taking in enough tax revenue to cover its expenses. His administration projected that California’s economy will continue to recover at a modest pace but housing and unemployment continue to be a drag.

To read entire story, click here.

Watching the sad spectacle of Governor Gandalf yet again expounding on California’s budget horrors Monday was like going to see one of those dreadful, anemic sequels to a long-ago tapped-out blockbuster franchise.

“Jaws 5: Devouring the Poor,” maybe, or “Die Hard Drowning in Red Ink” or even, “Groundhog Day 2: Punxsutawney Phil’s May Revise.”

The only thing worse was reading the inane Back East commentary, written by the usual assortment of Romney-sniffing blowhards, ill-informed thumbsuckers and right-wing mantra-chanters whose knowledge and understanding of California politics seems proscribed by the collected rantings of Flashreport freelancers and the world’s shortest book, viz. The Wit and Wisdom of Jon Coupal.

By far the day’s dumbest offering was submitted by the Wall Street Journal’s William McGurn, who must have spent at least 10 or 15 minutes after lunch coughing up his hairball analysis comparing Jerry Brown to Chris “Two Man” Christie without mentioning what you might call some of your Key Differences between California and New Jersey like, oh say Prop. 13, Prop. 98 or the two-thirds vote. But we digress.

The funniest comment came from the governor his own self, who put a new entry into Krusty’s Collected Coinages by characterizing the maze of interlocking and convoluted political and financial entanglements that define the chronic budget mess as “a pretzel palace of incredible complexity.”

Spurred by that fine phrase, utterly exhausted by watching the wheezy old Lakers vainly try to run with the OKC Thunder and certain that, as past is prologue, everything worth saying about the budget plague has long ago been said, we burrowed deeply into our incomparable Dustbin of History Archive, returning to the surface with three Calbuzz Classics that frame the issue for all time:

Why California is still broke(n). Once upon a time, before anyone had heard of Tanning Mom, Instagram or Dubstep, we proved with geometric logic that the state’s fiscal woes, far more than a simple matter of budgetary arithmetic, in fact result from a confluence of mind-numbing political calculus.

Since then, some incremental progress has been made in addressing the utterly dysfunctional structure of state government, most notably the terrific job done by the Citizen’s Redistricting Commission and the electorate’s willingness to throw down a bet on the new top-two primary system as a way to send at least a few more pragmatic pols and a few less ideological hacks to the swampland of Sacramento. Sadly, the bottom line remains the same:

As state and local officials struggle to weather a fiscal crisis that threatens to drive California into insolvency, they wield power with the damaged machinery of a patchwork government system that lacks accountability, encourages stalemate and drifts but cannot be steered.

Friends make the worst enemies. Of all the budgetary idiocy that’s unfolded since Gandalf took office, not least of it the Department of Finance’s blue-sky, rosy scenario revenue projections last summer, the single lamest move may be the legislative leadership’s delay of previously agreed-to cuts that made the current awful problem worse, a shining example of a political dynamic we described with a major assist from Calbuzz Poet Laureate William Butler Yeats.

But for a governor of California in recent years – at least since the days of Pete Wilson and Willie Brown, when leaders had power and deals could be made and enforced — finding that one’s most difficult challenge is the opposition party is actually an anomaly. For Gray Davis, Arnold Schwarzenegger — and this year Jerry Brown — the most debilitating opposition force in Sacramento is the extreme wing of his own party…

Jerry Brown is a centrist. Like Wilson, Davis, Schwarzenegger, he is trying to hold the center while those filled with passionate intensity flap and swirl around him. It is no service to the civic good for those on his left to set loose mere anarchy…

To read entire story, click here.

California Governor Jerry Brown

By Kevin Yamamura
kyamamura@sacbee.com
Published: Tuesday, May. 15, 2012 – 12:00 am | Page 1A
Last Modified: Tuesday, May. 15, 2012 – 6:17 am

Gov. Jerry Brown announced Monday that the state budget deficit had grown by a remarkable 70 percent since January, but fiscal experts said the economy had little to do with it.

They instead blamed a bad marriage of volatile capital gains and political intransigence that led state leaders last year to count on a huge upswing in revenues that never materialized. At the same time, corporate tax changes from 2009 appear to have cost California more than state officials ever realized.

The Democratic governor says the general fund deficit has mushroomed from $9.2 billion to $15.7 billion. Most of the widening gap comes from acknowledging that his previous forecast was too optimistic, a concern that economists voiced last summer.

“I think the sense we were all getting last year was that we were getting to the end of our rope in solutions,” observed Brad Williams, a fiscal forecaster who previously worked for the Legislative Analyst’s Office. “This was what was left – an aggressive forecast.”

The recession has had a lasting impact on a general fund budget that dropped from $103 billion in 2007-08 to $86 billion this year.

But nothing significant has changed in the California economy this spring to warrant such a dramatic growth in the deficit.

While housing and government jobs have yet to experience much recovery, taxes from paycheck withholding and sales are slowly growing. Export and high-tech sectors are robust.

“There’s nothing wrong with the economy,” said Chris Thornberg of Beacon Economics. “The problem here is the process. Simple as that.”

The deficit also grew because federal judges and administrators rejected cuts to Medi-Cal and in-home care programs. The state owes more to schools in 2012-13 because of how funding formulas work, another symptom of the faulty revenue projection.

A year ago, Brown issued a different May budget on an upbeat note after state coffers overflowed in April 2011.

That tax boost put the state on a higher glide path, but Democratic lawmakers and Brown doubled down when May and June also saw more revenues and they could not persuade Republicans to support a tax measure.

They turned to more optimistic projections after the governor vetoed Democrats’ first budget, which contained a sale of state buildings, use of First 5 early childhood money that has since been blocked by a judge and a questionable maneuver to pass a quarter-cent sales tax by majority vote.

Their eventual budget deal had the state counting on another $4 billion more in 2011-12. Brown’s Department of Finance now predicts the state won’t collect the $4 billion and will fall an additional $1.2 billion short.

Capital gains have become an increasingly significant part of California revenues over the past two decades, and with it comes instability in state revenues and forecasting.

The upcoming sale of Facebook stock is expected to net $1.5 billion for the state through June 2013, and possibly an additional $400 million if voters pass the governor’s tax hike on wealthy earners.

Brown said Monday he thought last year’s actions were “reasonable when we did it.” He blamed the missed projection on the volatile nature of the state’s tax system and called the state budget “a pretzel palace of incredible complexity.”

Twice, he referenced JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon, whose firm recently revealed a $2 billion trading loss, calling that “a big miss.”

“The capitalist system is not coincident with your expectations of exactitude,” Brown said. “It doesn’t play out like we may want it to.”

To balance this year’s budget, Brown has proposed a mix of spending cuts, fund shifts and his $8.5 billion tax hike on sales and wealthy earners. Some of the deepest reductions hit poor Californians, such as stricter requirements in welfare-to-work, lower payments to Medi-Cal providers and a reduction in Cal Grants. He also has proposed trimming the 40-hour workweek by two hours for state workers.

To read entire story, click here.

Gov. Jerry Brown’s announcement that the state’s deficit has swelled to $16 billion (from a $9.2-billion estimate in January) means that a new array of budget cuts are likely.

But where to cut?

Talk back LAAs The Times’ Anthony York and Christopher Megerian reported Sunday, Brown’s announcement doubled as a sales pitch for tax hikes that he hopes voters approve at the ballot box in November. He said budget cuts, primarily to public education, would be even worse without increasing the sales tax a quarter-cent for four years and raising levies on incomes of $250,000 or more by 1 to 3 percentage points for seven years.

“We can’t fill a hole of this magnitude with cuts alone without doing severe damage to our schools,” Brown says. “That’s why I’m bypassing the gridlock and asking you, the people of California, to approve a plan that avoids cuts to schools and public safety.”

Assembly Speaker John A. Pérez (D-Los Angeles) said severe spending reductions in previous years have left few places for lawmakers to make more cuts, meaning higher taxes are needed to close the larger-than-expected deficit.

To read entire story, click here.

California Governor Jerry Brown (AP Photo/Reed Saxon)

By Kevin Yamamura
kyamamura@sacbee.com
Published: Sunday, May. 13, 2012 – 12:00 am | Page 1A
Last Modified: Sunday, May. 13, 2012 – 10:48 am

In a gloomy preview of his May budget release, Gov. Jerry Brown said Saturday that California’s deficit has mushroomed to $16 billion, nearly $7 billion higher than he last estimated.

The Democratic governor blamed a slow economic recovery, as well as federal judges and administrators who blocked cuts to health care for the poor. Brown had previously pegged the deficit at $9.2 billion.

“This means that we will have to go much further, and make cuts far greater, than I asked for at the beginning of the year,” Brown said in a video released on YouTube. “But we can’t fill a hole of this magnitude with cuts alone without doing severe damage to our schools.”

The governor then made a campaign pitch, asking voters to approve his November ballot initiative to raise taxes on sales and wealthy earners.

Fiscal experts for months warned that Brown had been too optimistic in his January plan, particularly in his assumption that capital gains from California’s wealthiest residents would propel the state’s funding higher.

The nonpartisan Legislative Analyst’s Office warned in February that Brown had overstated tax growth, a concern borne out when California ended last month $3 billion in the red for the fiscal year.

The governor is slated to release his revised budget Monday, and no sector that relies on state funding is likely to escape deeper cuts. Brown has already told state worker unions to expect at least a 5 percent compensation reduction.

Advocates for low-income residents expect another proposed round of deep cuts to health and welfare programs beyond what the governor sought in January, when Brown asked for a $1 billion reduction in welfare-to-work.

They predicted Brown will make another run at cuts in Medi-Cal health care for the poor that federal officials and courts rejected in recent months.

“It’s bad, it’s big and it’ll mean brutal cuts,” said Anthony Wright, executive director of Health Access California. “The kind of cuts left to make will have huge impacts not just on families but the economy. There’s no good news here.”

After disappointing tax revenues last month, the Legislative Analyst’s Office said the state should expect a “few billion dollars” less than Brown projected through June 2013.

Brad Williams, a former budget forecaster for the analyst’s office, said Saturday that Brown not only had to assume $3 billion less through June, but he likely reduced his expectations for the 2012-13 fiscal year by a similar amount.

On top of that, the governor alluded to federal court and administrative decisions that blocked spending cuts he had counted on in January.

Federal officials in February rejected $575 million in annual savings from requiring low-income patients to submit co-payments for medical services. A federal judge also has blocked about $500 million in annual savings from reducing payments to doctors, pharmacists and other Medi-Cal providers.

Meanwhile, a judge blocked a $100 million cut to in-home care providers who serve low-income elderly and disabled residents.

“It’s a daunting number,” said Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg, D-Sacramento, of the governor’s new deficit estimate. “We’ve dealt with a larger number before, but … the choices are even more difficult this time.”

To read entire story, click here.

Andrew Edwards, Staff Writer
Posted: 05/11/2012 05:23:52 PM PDT

An estimated 93,000 Californians lost unemployment benefits as of today when the federal government cut off funding that allowed the state to provide extended aid to the jobless since 2009.

California’s unemployment is still in the double digits – 11 percent – but even that rate is not high enough to meet the threshold for Washington to continue financing extended unemployment aid.

The federal government had provided a financial boost to California’s unemployment insurance program since March 2009. Federal dollars made it possible for jobless Californians to receive unemployment aid for up to 99 weeks, a much longer period than the previous 26-week time frame.

As of March, some 726,000 Californians, roughly 35 percent of the state’s unemployed, have been without work for at least one year.

The Inland Empire’s long-term unemployed include people like Daniel Wineberg, 58, of Rancho Cucamonga. Wineberg has been out of work since September 2010.

Wineberg receives $382 in unemployment benefits every two weeks and will be able claim benefits for only another month or two, he said while browsing for jobs at the Employment Resource Center in Rancho Cucamonga.

The job seeker worked as a security guard before losing his job. He was then studying appliance repair but has yet to find work in that or a related field.

“It (job searching) hasn’t been too good at this point,” he said. “At the time I went to school for that field, it was wide open, but now it’s starting to shrink.”

As benefits expire, Inland Empire officials said they are advising the region’s long-term unemployed to join job-hunting classes or apply for welfare benefits.

Many people enduring lengthy periods of unemployment have fallen behind on job hunting skills, said Tony Gomez, manager of the San Bernardino County Workforce Investment Board’s job center in Rancho Cucamonga.

That’s why, he said, he is advising people losing jobless benefits to attend the job center’s workshops teaching resume writing, networking and other skills.

“A lot of these people – you know what? – they’re resumes are outdated. They don’t know how to interview,” Gomez said.

To read entire story, click here.

Ryan Hagen, Staff Writer
Posted: 05/10/2012 09:02:22 PM PDT

SAN BERNARDINO – Final layoff notices for 224 teachers were approved at an emergency school board meeting Thursday so the notices could be sent before a state-mandated deadline.

The decision, made by the board of the San Bernardino City Unified School District at a sparsely attended meeting, was an expected consequence of earlier budget decisions.

The number is lower than the record 251 preliminary layoffs approved March 7, and it’s significantly higher than the number of people they think will actually be forced out.

But a combination of budget constraints and legal requirements mean teachers need to be given the notice now, said board member Judi Penman.

“I know it’s painful, and it’s painful for us, too, because we’re the bad guys,” Penman said. “Hopefully, we’ll be able to retain everyone, or ask everyone to come back, but we don’t know that yet. …The bottom line is we have to follow the law.”

State law requires districts to notify teachers no later than May 14 in most cases – a day before the board’s next scheduled meeting Tuesday – if being laid off is a possibility.

Laid-off teacher Malissa Esquibel said district administrators should have worked faster to account for teachers who accepted early retirement offers, which is expected to significantly reduce the number of layoffs.

“Once they lay people off, we lose our school site, and you get seniority based on your school site,” Esquibel said. “They don’t put us on track where we used to be – they say they’re going to try but they can’t guarantee it.”

Besides extra stress, that means a greater chance of being laid off in the future, said Esquibel, a fourth-grade teacher at Muscoy Elementary who has received a preliminary layoff notice each of her four years of teaching and a final layoff twice.

Sending large numbers of “final” layoff notices and then rehiring those people before the start of the year has become an annual ritual in recent years, as districts statewide deal with tight funds and an uncertain budget based largely on numbers the Governor’s Office doesn’t release until layoff notification deadlines have passed.

To read entire story, click here.

By David Siders and Torey Van Oot
dsiders@sacbee.com
Published: Friday, May. 11, 2012 – 12:00 am | Page 3A

In one choreographed appearance at the office of the Sacramento County Registrar of Voters, Gov. Jerry Brown’s campaign to raise taxes appeared on Friday to take shape.

A week after announcing he had collected enough signatures to qualify the initiative for the November ballot, Brown – accompanied by a new political consultant, the first lady and his dog – turned several boxes of them in.

The event came just days before Brown is expected to propose deeper spending reductions in a budget revision Monday to deal with a deficit that likely has grown beyond $10 billion.

The Democratic governor cast his tax measure as necessary to avert more dire cuts.

“It’s balanced, it’s fair and it will take a major step forward in putting California in a very solid position,” Brown said, leaning into a lectern outside the registrar’s office and flanked by about two dozen supporters. “We are facing a world that is full of economic uncertainties, but with this tax measure, and with the cuts that I’ll be proposing on Monday, California will put itself in a very, very strong position.”

Brown declined to discuss his budget revision in detail, but he said it “will be a difficult day in Sacramento.”

Brown, who proposes to raise the state sales tax and income taxes on California’s highest earners, was accompanied by political consultant Ace Smith, whose company, SCN Strategies, will run the campaign.

The signatures are the first of about 1.5 million Brown will submit statewide.

Brown is likely to compete on the November ballot with a tax measure backed by wealthy civil rights lawyer Molly Munger and the California State PTA. Munger, whose initiative would raise income taxes on all but the poorest Californians, said earlier this week that cooperation with Brown’s campaign remains a possibility.

Brown on Thursday was noncommittal, saying only that he would “work with anyone to achieve a protection of our schools and a firm financial footing.”

The taxes Brown proposes are a major part of his budget agenda. Republicans oppose the measure, while Democrats have been resistant to cuts Brown has suggested.

Legislative Democrats are bracing for “more work on the cuts side” once Brown revises his budget plan next week, said Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg.

“We have not shied away from doing what we have to do and we won’t shy away now,” the Sacramento Democrat said. “But we will certainly fight to save more than we lose.”

Brown’s budget is expected to rely on up to $9 billion in revenue from his proposed tax initiative, which would temporarily raise income taxes for top earners and enact a one-quarter of 1 percent increase in the state sales tax – with a round of “trigger” cuts after the election if the ballot measure fails.

To read entire story, click here.

Andrew Edwards
Posted: 05/08/2012 04:10:11 PM PDT

SAN BERNARDINO – Stater Bros. Markets reported a $16.4 million profit for its more recent quarter, an amount nearly double what the grocery company reported for the comparable period one year prior.

The San Bernardino-based Stater Bros. earned roughly $9.3 million during the comparable three-month period last year.

Stater Bros. reported nearly $938 million in sales for the company’s second quarter, up from $913 million on year prior.

To read entire brief, click here.

Recent signs suggest the Inland Empire’s office market may be returning to health, but the market may be at least three years from a full recovery.

That’s the word from Lee Spence, a principle at DAUM Commercial Services branch in Ontario, who based his prediction on his firm’s analysis of companies gradually moving in to the many vacant offices of San Bernardino and Riverside counties.

An analyst for another brokerage said Spence’s timeline may be too optimistic, but while data available from multiple commercial brokerages differ on specifics, the numbers show some slight improvements for the Inland Empire’s ailing office markets.

Spence’s analysis rests on DAUM’s observation that office users signing new leases during the first three months of 2012 reduced the region’s office vacancy rate from 19.2 percent to 18.7 percent and absorbed some 210,000 square feet of office space.

If absorption continues at that pace, office vacancies could decline to something closer to 10 percent before the end of 2015, Spence said.

A 10 percent vacancy rate would allow landlords to deal with tenants on a more equal footing than they can today, he said. That would push office rents up and give owners more financial stability.

“That’s the kind of thing that stops that downward spiral. If we keep this pace up, we can be out of the woods in three and a half years,” Spence said.

Recent market conditions have not supported higher rates. Numbers from DAUM as well as Voit Real Estate Services and Colliers International show that although vacancy rates dropped during the first quarter, office rents also fell a bit.

DAUM’s numbers show Inland Empire office rates falling one cent to $1.68, quarter-to-quarter. Rates stood at $1.75 per square foot one year prior.

Spence’s prediction rests on the assumption that there will be no sudden improvements or shocks to the local economy nor any new office construction in San Bernardino and Riverside counties.

Inland Empire office construction has been at a near halt since the post-2007 downturn.

To read entire story, click here.

Tuesday, May 8, 2012 – 08:00 a.m.

San Bernardino County, Calif. – San Bernardino County’s budget woes are likely to worsen in the coming fiscal year as employee pension fund returns fail to not only deliver relief, but instead bring more pain.

The San Bernardino County Employees Retirement Association (SBCERA) has, to date, only generated a 0.6% return for its 2011-2012 fiscal year.

The return is 7.15% below the actuarial-required annual assumption of 7.75%.

This means in order to break even the fund needs to earn 7.75% each and every year on average. And with only three months remianing in the current fiscal year it’s likely the fund will once again miss the mark.

The five-year average investment return is a meager 1.0%.

A return symptomatic of chaotic investment markets and a U.S. economy on life support.

The following return benchmarks were released on the pension funds website yesterday.

________________________________________________________________________

FY Performance

The following is the annualized returns for SBCERA for periods ending 3/31/12. The SBCERA Fiscal Year runs from July 1 through June 30.

________________________________________________________________________

Any shortfall in funding must be offset by increased pension contributions approved by the San Bernardino County Board of Supervisors.

The current situation is likely to further impact labor negotiations between the county and its employee unions.

Former Los Angeles Dodgers Manager Tommy Lasorda

Administrator’s Note: This front-page article was published in last week’s Wall Street Journal.

THE A-HED
Updated May 2, 2012, 12:44 p.m. ET

Locals Call In Baseball’s Tommy Lasorda to Rally for Ontario; Hearing Birds Chirp

By TAMARA AUDI

ONTARIO, Calif.—The Ontario International Airport, 35 miles east of Los Angeles, offers nonstop flights to just 15 cities. Daily departures have plummeted to 62, less than half the number five years ago.

Baseball legend Tommy Lasorda has pitched for the Dodgers and for Rolaids and Slim Fast. Now he’s doing commercials for a struggling regional airport trying to win independence from Los Angeles.

The international airport has one nonstop passenger flight out of the country, a three-hour trip to Guadalajara, Mexico. Security officials stand around waiting for a passenger to screen, coffee shops and bookstores are empty, and the runways are quiet enough to hear the rustle of trees and birds chirping.

Ontario city officials believe part of the problem is the airport’s ownership by Los Angeles and have waged a long battle to wrest back control of it. The campaign hadn’t gained much buzz in L.A., until locals recently brought in a pinch hitter: Tommy Lasorda.

The 84-year-old Baseball Hall of Famer has pitched for the Dodgers, the antacid tablet Rolaids, the diet drink Slim-Fast and 1990s videogame-maker Sega Genesis. Still, Mr. Lasorda’s latest pitch—on behalf of a struggling regional airport fighting for independence from Los Angeles—is out of left field.

“Hi everybody I’m Tommy Lasorda and I firmly believe without a doubt that Ontario International Airport should be under local control and not managed from a distant city,” Mr. Lasorda says in a two-minute online commercial scheduled to begin airing on local television this month. “Come on L.A., let’s set Ontario free!”

The Ontario campaign has used Facebook, Twitter and old-fashioned lobbying—more than 80 local governments, elected officials and civic groups publicly support the transfer of the airport back to Ontario, according to Ontario city officials.

Then Mr. Lasorda stepped up to bat. “We’ve been at this for over two years and we’ve finally got people’s attention,” says Paul Haney, who works for the public relations firm that represents Ontario.

Ontario has offered L.A. $50 million to regain control of its airport and end a 45-year relationship that allowed L.A. to run its airport.

Ontario mounted a “Set ONTario Free” campaign to convince the Los Angeles City Council to approve the breakup. ONT is the airport’s code.

Ontario city officials blame Los Angeles for poor management of Ontario International Airport, shown here, and are fighting to take back control of the facility.

Last year, more than 62 million people flew through L.A.’s main airport, LAX, as it is known. About 4.5 million came through Ontario.

Los Angeles has managed Ontario’s airport since 1967 and took ownership of it in 1985, in what was thought to be a good plan for both cities at the time.

But Ontario says that under L.A.’s management, its airport has seen traffic steadily decline, showing a 36% drop in passengers since 2007.

Local leaders blame L.A. for ignoring the needs of Ontario in favor of boosting traffic at LAX.

Los Angeles officials say they are committed to Ontario and that broader economic problems are to blame for the dwindling traffic there.

“I’m a Dodger fan. I’m a Tommy Lasorda fan,” says Mary Grady, a spokeswoman for Los Angeles World Airports, the agency that runs the airports. “He is certainly entitled to his opinion, but I would invite him to spend some time with us so we can explain to him the facts about the causes of passenger decline at Ontario.”

Of his pitch for Ontario’s airport, Mr. Lasorda says, “I did it for my friend, and I was happy to do it because I believe in local ownership of that nature.”

Passengers walk through Ontario International Airport, 35 miles east of Los Angeles. The airport, which is managed and owned by Los Angeles, has lost a third of its passengers since 2007.

He has raised money for charities in and around Ontario—often at the behest of his friend, Chris Leggio, who owns a car dealership in Ontario. They met 15 years ago when Mr. Lasorda was signing autographs at a conference for auto dealers.

Mr. Leggio, who helped to fund Mr. Lasorda’s portrait at the Smithsonian Institution, said he asked Mr. Lasorda to appear in the commercial after Ontario city officials contacted him with the idea.

The city paid $78,000 to film the commercial, including a $10,000 fee for Mr. Lasorda.

The fee is less than the $40,000 or so he usually charges for speaking engagements.

To read entire story, click here.

BY IMRAN GHORI
STAFF WRITER
ighori@pe.com

Published: 07 May 2012 10:03 PM

The San Bernardino City Council is looking at leasing more city property for cellphone towers to help solve its budget troubles, but has tabled for now a proposal to bring parking meters downtown.

The proposals were brought to the council Monday night, May 7, after it rejected a plan last month that would have relied on across-the-board cuts and holding some positions vacant.

The council majority — controlled since March by critics of San Bernardino Mayor Pat Morris — had balked at any public safety cuts and voted against the recommendations brought by then-City Manager Charles McNeely on a 4-3 vote.

Councilman Chas Kelley introduced the two measures as a way “to look at all funding opportunities for the city.”

The council voted, 6-0, to direct city staff to study the cellphone lease proposal. Councilman Rikke Van Johnson was absent.

The city already earns about $19,000 a month from cellphone tower leases but Kelley suggested that it could seek up-front lump payments of about $1.5 million.

The possibility of bringing parking meters downtown was studied several years ago but the council decided not to pursue it at the time because of concerns that it could hurt businesses.

To read entire story, click here.

BY DAYNA STRAEHLEY
STAFF WRITER
dstraehley@pe.com

Published: 07 May 2012 10:39 PM

The Riverside Unified School District Board of Education voted 3-2 late Monday to send final layoff notices to 84 teachers for the 2012-13 school year, said Tim Martin, president of the Riverside City Teachers Association.

Board members Tom Hunt and Patricia Lock-Dawson opposed the resolution to lay off teachers, he said, just as they had opposed sending preliminary notices.

The 84 teachers to get final layoff notices before a May 15 deadline are among 106 who got preliminary notices before a March 15 deadline set by state education law. The district must adopt a balanced budget by June 30.

Martin said he and other teachers had hoped to convince the board to use some of the district’s reserve fund to continue the current support levels and a full school year for students in 2012-13. If voters reject tax increases proposed for the November ballot, then teachers would have been willing to discuss such budget reductions, he said.

To read entire story, click here.

Liset Marquez, Staff Writer
Created: 05/07/2012 05:31:41 PM PDT

A marketing plan that was supposed to address the steep decline in passenger traffic at LA/Ontario International Airport was criticized by Los Angeles World Airports’ governing body Monday.

Los Angeles Board of Airport Commissioners, a seven-member civilian board that governs LAWA airports – such as ONT – and staff, including a longtime airline industry expert, discussed marketing strategies that could turn things around at the struggling airport.

But a proposal, which looked at rebranding ONT as a high-end facility, was met with criticism from the commission.

After more than an hour discussing the plan, the board directed staff to continue to research marketing strategies for ONT and come back with a report.

“If we want Ontario airport to thrive or grow at a faster rate than the economy would allow it then we have to do something unusual,” explained Edward Shelswell White, who has been tasked with addressing the marketing situation at ONT.

White, who is a senior director of market strategy and performance with The Aloft Group, has been in the airline industry for more than two decades with expertise in rebranding and commercial service.

Among White’s suggestion was that ONT offer valet parking and VIP amenities to attract more customers and airlines.

“Ontario has a weak brand in the minds of customers and airlines,” White told the board.

But commissioners quickly questioned the direction, citing the fact that Inland Empire has been hit hard by the recession. In addition, LAWA staff has long cited the economy as one of the reasons for the downturn in air travel out of ONT.

Monday’s discussion was in response to a request made by the commission in late December after the departure of a LAWA employee who handled the marketing for medium-hub facility.

During the discussions, Gina Marie Lindsey, executive director of LAWA, told the board that they were seeking its endorsement as well as guidance on further direction on the marketing proposal.

To read entire story, click here.

Dan Walters

By Dan Walters
Published: Tuesday, May. 8, 2012 – 12:00 am | Page 3A

California is struggling to emerge from the worst recession since the Great Depression and has more than 2 million unemployed workers, plus countless others who have given up seeking work out of frustration and/or have fled to other states.

Clearly the state needs many billions of dollars in job-creating investment. But its attractiveness to that investment is, to say the least, problematic, given its relatively high tax burden, its dense regulatory structure, its deficiencies in education, transportation and water supply, and its tangled government finances.

Chief Executive magazine’s most recent survey of corporate leaders finds that California ranks dead last among the states in business climate for the eighth straight year.

Given that, one might think that Gov. Jerry Brown and other political figures would place improving the state’s investment climate at the top of their agendas. But they may be making California less competitive.

Brown’s tax increase ballot measure, for instance, would sharply increase state income taxes on those at the top of the economic pecking order. And Brown and other politicians are fiddling around with corporate taxation, aiming to increase taxation of out-of-state corporations by about a billion dollars a year.

Requiring multistate corporations to base their California tax liability on what’s called a “single-sales factor” would, if enacted, tax out-of-staters more while, it’s said, benefiting in-state companies.

But that’s a bit specious because the in-staters already have the option of using sales only to apportion taxable income, if they wish, thanks to a change in law three years ago.

Two years ago, voters turned down a measure to impose the single-sales factor on all corporations, but it’s back this year.

To read entire column, click here.

Liset Marquez, Staff Writer
Created: 05/06/2012 03:27:45 PM PDT

ONTARIO – It’s no secret that finding daily flights in and out of LA/Ontario International Airport can be a bit of an issue.

For the past five years, since the peak of travel at ONT, the facility has lost more than 40 percent of its seat capacity.

The cause for the decline in air service?

Ontario officials – who are fighting to regain control of ONT – say the airport has been hemorrhaging passengers at the expense of its operator, which has neglected to market the medium-hub facility to airlines.

Los Angeles World Airports, the agency that operates ONT, Van Nuys and Los Angeles International airports, contends the economy has had an impact on the Inland Empire traveling industry.

Despite that, officials in Los Angeles say they are addressing the issue with the creation of a task force.

Today, the Los Angeles Board of Airport Commissioners, a seven-member civilian board that governs the airports, is expected to review the creation of the task force that will focus on air service marketing at ONT.

In addition, LAWA officials last week announced Jess Romo, airport manager for both Van Nuys and ONT, would be assuming more responsibilities at the airport, including its marketing.

“Jess will actively participate in the ONT Task Force, along with other LAWA executive staff, and will take an active role in determining service levels from other divisions at the two airports for which he has accountability,” said Gina Marie Lindsey, executive director of LAWA.

LAWA spokeswoman Mary Grady said she couldn’t elaborate on the task force because it has yet to be discussed with the commissioners.

The marketing of ONT has been a sticking point for City of Ontario officials who have been involved in a multi-year dispute with LAWA over the control of the facility.

LAWA officials have said ONT’s situation is not unique, with 30 other medium-hub airports in the United States experiencing similar declines.

“It’s not a problem that is going to change overnight. This is something that’s going to take time,” she said. “There is a task force to work through the Ontario issues.”

But, in response, city officials point to ONT’S marketing budget, which they say has been slashed over the years. Wapner said ONT cannot be marketed properly if there are no flights or if it’s not competitive with similar-sized airports.

“They’re playing the same game and not changing anything substantial,” Councilman Alan Wapner said.

“That’s what it’s going to take to change things around there.”

As a result, Ontario officials said there has been a notable drop in the frequency of flights. A prime example, in 2007 there were 36 nonstop destinations at ONT; that has now dropped to 14 daily nonstop flight options.

Not only is it difficult to find flights, but Ontario officials are concerned with how costly it has become to fly out of ONT.

Wapner has said there are several reasons why tickets prices are often higher than those at LAX, including how much it costs airlines to do business out of ONT.

He also blames a 15 percent administrative fee that is tagged on to to the airport’s operating budget.

Those factors hamper ONT’s ability to be competitive in ticketing and attracting flights. If things don’t change, the airport risks closure, Wapner said.

A forecast from the Federal Aviation Administration, paints a bleak future, with only 6.1 million passengers predicted at ONT in 2035, he said.

To make their case, Ontario launched a public relations campaign – called Set ONTario Free – at the start of the year. They have enlisted the help of many area cities, asking them to sign endorsements.

Officials say in 2005, ONT made up 8.2 percent of the service market in Southern California. At that time, LAX made up 69.6 percent of that market.

In 2011, the decline in passengers at ONT has resulted in the facility only taking up 5.1 percent of Southern California’s service market.

To read entire story, click here.

ONTARIO – More than 80 cities, organizations and elected officials have passed resolutions backing Ontario’s efforts to wrest control of LA/Ontario International Airport from Los Angeles.

The Inland Empire initiative, Set ONTario Free, was launched by Ontario at the start of the year. It quickly gained traction with a wave of cities throughout Southern California, including 17 from Los Angeles County, joining a growing number of agencies calling for local control.

“We are overwhelmed by the outpouring of support we have received throughout the region,” Ontario Councilman Alan Wapner said.

“The common thread through these endorsements is that Ontario Airport will be more effectively and efficiently managed under local control. It simply no longer makes sense for L.A. to control ONT.”

In January, the City Council announced it had produced 600 flash drives bearing the slogan “SetONTariofree.com” on one side and “local control” on the other.

The flash drive is packed with information on the city’s three-year campaign to take back ONT.

City officials gave away 600 of the USB flash drives to city managers and mayors in Southern California.

To date, Lake Elsinore has been the only city that has elected not to move forward with a resolution.

To read entire story, click here.

May 06, 2012 6:54 PM
From Staff Reports

As the June 5 primary approaches, the Daily Press asked the 13 candidates running for the newly drawn 8th Congressional District representing the High Desert to weigh in on this question, in 50 words or less: What are your ideas for reducing the federal debt? Where specifically would you cut?

“I would cut from the single fastest growing segment of the national budget, the entitlement programs. These programs are an important part of our social safety net, but there must be cost-containers in place that allow for the programs to be financially sustainable.” — Anthony Adams, no party preference, businessman and attorney from Hesperia

•

“I would reduce the federal debt by: 1. Cut foreign spending. 2. Growing the economy by providing tax incentives to businesses in order for them to increase revenue in an increasing and sustainable way.” — Dennis Albertsen, R, Navy veteran from Apple Valley

•

“Grow the economy by infrastructure expenditures in the U.S. and getting money into the hands of the small businesses with growth models and history. Military cuts as well.” — Jackie Conaway, D, law office manager from Phelan

•

“I favor a systematic review of government to find redundancy, outdated bureaucracies and unneeded functions. Government shouldn’t be structured on talking points, and government programs should not persist without evidence that they’re working.” — Paul Cook, R, Assemblyman from Yucca Valley

•

“First, stop/cease borrowing. We have to produce budget surplus(-es) in order to pay-down federal debt. Regarding cuts, think federal departments as in Education and Energy, and the EPA.” — George Craig, R, plastic surgeon from Apple Valley

•

“Government spending, defund the United Nations, cut redundant agencies like the federal department of education.” — Gregg Imus, R, custom home builder from Lake Arrowhead

•

“We must reduce the federal debt by reducing, if not eliminating, the EPA, IRS, Federal Reserve Responsibilities and the Departments of Energy, Education and Interior.” — Bill Jensen, R, real estate broker from Hesperia

•

“Oppose any attempt to raise the debt ceiling. Audit for spending cuts in every agency, department and program. Cancel unspent stimulus funding and dedicate those funds to debt payment. Enact a budget amendment that requires cuts, not tax increases. Repeal Obamacare. Audit the Federal Reserve. End payouts for illegal immigrants.” — Phillip Liberatore, R, taxpayer advocate and businessman from Lake Arrowhead

•

To read entire story, click here.

Sunday, May 6, 2012 – 10:30 a.m

Ramos struggles through final candidate forum.

Former San Manuel Band of Mission Indians Chairman and San Bernardino County Board of Supe’s candidate James Ramos showed up for the final candidate forum held at Copper Mountain College on Friday night.

Nothing changed.

The conversation was basically between County Supervisor Neil Derry and Former TwentyNine Palms City Councilman and Defense Department employee Jim Bagley.

With all due respect, the can’t we all get along and come together answer to every question is getting old for Ramos.

A county supervisor can’t function by way of reading from a notepad.

To get a flavor for Ramos’ command of the issues, click this link and select county supervisor forum: http://www.channel6bigbear.com .

The link is to a candidate forum sponsored by the Big Bear Democratic Club.

Last week, Ramos ditched a, previously committed to, live on-the-air event on KBHR-FM 93.3.

The key words in the last sentence being on-the-air.

Derry and Bagley did show up.

House of cards about to fall for San Bernardino

The financial house of cards is about to fall for the city of San Bernardino.

That is, now that the piggy bank known as redevelopment money has been turned off.

For years, San Bernardino has been using its economic and redevelopment agencies to augment its general fund operations.

Now that the music has stopped, it’ll be interesting to see just how much the California Department of Finance forces the city to repay.

Expect the city to start leveraging it’s city-owned water department and discuss converting its refuse operation into a franchise.

Three tax measures likely headed to California ballot in November

It looks like three differing tax propositions will be headed to the November ballot in California.

With three measures to consider, voters will likely reject them all.

The measure backed by Governor Jerry Brown, at this point, is polling in the low 50% range.

National debt finally exceeds Gross Domestic Product (GDP)

The U.S. debt is now 101% of the country’s total annual output of goods and services.

As the number climbs the likelihood of a debt default increases.

Expect the percentage to accelerate as deficit spending continues unchecked.

Keep in mind this is the U.S. national debt and does not include state and municipal obligations.

Dan Walters

By Dan Walters
dwalters@sacbee.com
Published: Sunday, May. 6, 2012 – 12:00 am | Page 3A

When Jerry Brown occupied the governor’s Capitol suite nearly four decades ago, he frequently talked about an “era of limits.”

Whatever Brown meant – he often spoke cryptically – the phrase was widely interpreted as meaning California’s powerful, post-World War II spurt of population and economic growth was over and public policies should adjust accordingly.

The postwar baby boom had ended a decade earlier, population growth had flattened and school buildings were being shuttered and sold as enrollment dropped. The industrial economy that had drawn so many to California was clearly in decline.

It was, however, merely a lull before another storm. As a postindustrial economy of technology, services and trade took root, California drew new waves of immigrants, mostly from other countries, and fecund young immigrants ignited a new baby boom.

Its population exploded again in the 1980s, with growth averaging well over 2 percent a year, increasing the total from 24 million in 1980 to 30 million in 1990.

The new population boom generated new demands for public facilities and services, but California’s political process had deteriorated and its infrastructure withered. Highways became congested and ill-maintained while schools and colleges became overcrowded. Water shortages became endemic.

The collapse of the defense/aerospace industry in the early 1990s and the ensuing recession generated a huge, million-person-plus out-migration from California, although foreign immigration and baby production remained high.

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