Inland Empire Progressive

The financial crisis. The Libor scandal. Regulatory capture. When will Congress stand up to the banks? There have been no major arrests or serious congressional investigations into the wide spread corruption in the financial sector. Rep. Gary Miller can easily criticize the Treasury Secretary. However, can he bring himself to be critical of the banks. The banks play casino with our PERS, Social Security, and our 401Ks, privatizing the profits while socializing the losses. As a ranking member of the Financial Services Committee, Mr. Miller has sat idle while the world largest banks suck our investments dry. In fact he protects these entities as job creators. He calls for the full repeal of Frank-Dodd, while replacing it with nothing. Doing nothing is what got us into this mess in the first place, by allowing a culture of corruption to breed on Wall Street. We have a crisis of confidence in capitalism because the financial system itself is corrupt to the core. Banks have robbed us of...

After reading over the budget stabilization plan, I think we should pursue these 3 policies: Generate a serious small business marketing plan in conjunction with the San Bernardino Area Chamber of Commerce. The Primary Focus should be on targeting San Bernardino’s largest employers: CSUSB, San Manuel, Community Hospital. Secondary Focus on: SBVC, Omnitrans, Saint Bernadine’s, SBUSD. We need an All Hands on Deck approach that is comprehensive to include every business and encompasses every Ward. Maximize Land Use. Productive use of land parcels with specific focus on Tax Exempt Properties, Personal (Unsec) properties, Vacant Properties. These land use categories represent over 10,000 pieces of land that are under productive. Further Consolidation. Combine design engineering, public works, refuse, and building inspection departments to create the Infrastructure Services Department.

  My concerns with Rep. Miller and State Sen. Dutton are that they will seek to sell the most valuable asset of the Inland Empire to outside interests. That asset is land. Orange County and Los Angeles developers are currently buying and salivating over the prospects of turning our county into a mega bedroom community. Do we have the water to support more cookie cutter housing projects? While the housing industry will create short-term jobs, in the long run these jobs are not the best in pay or skill sets unless you are a developer that is.

I have lost trust in our elected leaders, civil servants, and public safety officials to fight for and maintain the interests of San Bernardino. Excuses, misrepresentation, and lack of civility on the council has constantly made our city the laughing stock of not only the county, but the nation. The residents of San Bernardino need accountability that comes not only from the ballot box. We need justice that ends in jail time. Only then can we send the message that incompetence and greed will not be tolerated in our city. A Grand Jury Investigation would be a start to get to the bottom of what and why this inconceivable thing happened. Please go to the Grand Jury website and file a citizen complaint. It is time we end the corruption and incompetence. It is time for justice. 

This is what I would like to see in the upcoming budget. 1) No structural deficits. This means no deferments or gimmicks. Let’s do what needs to be done the first time so we won’t keep attracting negative press to San Bernardino governance. 2) A back to basics budget that focuses on streets, lights, and infrastructure. Curb appeal should be a high priority, even with constrained budgetary resources. 3) Radical changes are needed to our city charter to meet the demands of 21 st Governance for the city of San Bernardino. For me, this means changes in pay that reflect the median income of our city and other changes. 4) Finally, A focus on local control of all city assets in both capital and operating budget decisions. I have come to believe that a majority of current civil servants and public safety personnel do not reside in this city and therefore do not have a stake in the outcome of this city. The citizens of San Bernardino must demand local control in helping rebuild this commun...

This was another piece that I was going to write on why voters (specifically Democrats) should not support Pete Aguilar. Besides being a DINO (Democrat in Name Only), he sits on SANBAG’s Commuter Transit and Rail Committee which is railroading (pun intended) this project by the communities throat.  Redlands Rail is a transportation project that is doomed to failure. Not only did the Federal Transit Authority reject matching funds for this project, it is poorly designed. It just runs in a circle around Redlands and that’s it. In addition, the ridership will be low. How this is being paid for is that currently, all transit agencies are undergoing individual  Comprehensive Operational Analysis’ (COA) to determine their “efficiencies” . The cost of this analysis for Omintrans is about $1M dollars. During meetings with Omnitran’s employees AECOM (who is conducting the study), transparently admitted that it is conducting this study to achieve cost savings. So basically we are t...