Friday, December 30, 2011

Victorville: City defaults on two bonds related to airport.... Technical payment results in default.. by Kimberly Pierceall staff writer


VICTORVILLE: City defaults on two bonds related to airport

A technical payment mistake hits the city and the Southern California Logistics Airport

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Southern California Logistics Airport seen in Victorville Thursday, July 28, 2005.
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Victorville has defaulted on two of several municipal bonds used to make improvements to the Southern California Logistics Airport, according to letters from the Bank of New York Mellon.
The city tried to pay $535,000 in principal payments by Dec. 1 with money held in a reserve account, an action the bank doesn’t allow which triggered the default, according to the bank’s letters.
The airport is the result of public and private efforts to redevelop 8,500 acres of the former George Air Force Base. Victorville owns the airport and the City Council oversees it as the Southern California Logistics Airport Authority.
The two bonds, issued in 2007 and 2008, are valued at $55.3 million not counting interest.
As first reported by the Daily Press in Victorville, a majority of bondholders could demand that the entire amount still owed — $173 million — be paid immediately. Other alternatives include litigation or amending the bond agreements, according to the letters.
Southern California Logistics Airport has lost far more than it has earned in recent years.
The airport reported a deficit of $101.3 million at the end of June 2010, twice what it was at the beginning of that fiscal year because of a $50million legal settlement, according to an annual financial report for the airport authority.
Victorville Councilman Mike Rothschild, reached by phone, said city leaders were dealing with the issue when he left for vacation and elected officials were told not to discuss it publicly in the meantime.
He described it as a technical issue that the city would solve and one that was a direct result of the state’s attempt to dissolve redevelopment agencies. Victorville froze funds its redevelopment agencies might owe the state if the decision is upheld.
The California State Supreme Court is expected to decide on a case challenging the state’s decision today. Rothschild said that if the decision is reversed and redevelopment agencies are allowed to remain, Victorville agencies would have enough money to pay the principal amount and interest owed on bond debts

California's Redevelopment Nightmare Coming to an END!!.. Ca. Supreme Court UPholds Law Abolishing Redevelopment Agencies... December 29, 2011


California’s Redevelopment Nightmare Coming To An End
California Supreme Court Upholds Law Abolishing Redevelopment Agencies
Arlington, Va.—In a landmark victory for private property owners in the Golden State, the California Supreme Court today upheld a statute abolishing the nearly 400 redevelopment agencies across the state.  The court also struck down a law that would have allowed these agencies to buy their way back into existence.  The final outcome of the case is that, in 2012, California’s decades-long redevelopment nightmare will finally come to an end.
California redevelopment agencies have been some of the worst abusers of eminent domain for decades, violating the private property rights of tens of thousands of home, business, church and farm owners.  The Institute for Justice has catalogued more than 200 abuses of eminent domain across California during the past ten years alone.  In California Scheming: What Every Californian Should Know About Eminent Domain Abuse, the Institute for Justice exposed the enormous amounts of taxpayer money used to fund these illegitimate land grabs.  In fiscal year 2005-2006 alone, redevelopment agencies’ revenues were an astonishing $8.7 billion.  In other words, 12 percent of all property taxes in California that year were sent to these bureaucrats.
As part of the state’s response to its fiscal emergency and to stop this drain on the state’s resources, the legislature passed, and Governor Jerry Brown signed, two laws:  Assembly Bill 1X 26, which dissolves redevelopment agencies, and Assembly Bill 1X 27, which exempted agencies that agreed to make payments into funds benefiting the state’s schools and special districts.  The California Redevelopment Association and the League of California Cities, among others, challenged both laws, arguing that they violated the California Constitution.
The court held that AB 1X 26, the law barring the agencies from engaging in new business and providing for their windup and dissolution, was “a proper exercise of the legislative power vested in the Legislature by the state Constitution.”   The court concluded that the Legislature has both the power to create such agencies “and the corollary power to dissolve those same entities when the Legislature deems it necessary and proper.”  In contrast, the court concluded that AB 1X 27, which allowed the agencies to continue to exist if they made certain payments, violated a provision of the California Constitution that prohibits the Legislature from requiring payments from redevelopment agencies to the state.
“This decision represents the worst of all worlds for California redevelopment agencies—and the best of all worlds for California property owners and renters,” said Dana Berliner, a senior attorney with the Institute for Justice.  “The agencies managed to achieve a decision that upholds their dissolution while striking down a law that gave these agencies a way to stay in existence.  The agencies’ arrogance, so often employed against property owners, finally proved their undoing.”  The Institute for Justice is a public interest law firm that is the nation’s leading defender of victims of eminent domain abuse—when the government seizes perfectly fine property not for public use, but for private development—across the country, including in California.
While the decision focused on specific provisions of the California Constitution, its practical effect represents a significant victory for California property owners.  “Redevelopment in California has been a billion-dollar, state-subsidized boondoggle that has completely eroded private property rights through the abuse of eminent domain for private gain,” said Christina Walsh, the Institute’s director of activism and coalitions.  “With the court’s decision, redevelopment has finally met its long-overdue end, and property owners who have been living in terror across the state can finally rest safe in what they’ve worked so hard to own.”
IJ attorney Bill Maurer said, “Today’s decision reaffirms the common-sense conclusion that state agencies do not have a constitutional right to perpetual existence.  More importantly, it means that California is no longer lagging behind the rest of the country in respecting private property.  Rather than interfering with California’s recovery, this decision should encourage it, as people considering moving to or staying in California now know that their property cannot be seized and transferred to a private entity by out-of-control, unaccountable redevelopment agencies.”
###
Best,
Christina Walsh
Director of Activism and Coalitions
Institute for Justice
901 N. Glebe Road, Suite 900
Arlington, VA 22203
(703) 682-9320
(703)-682-9321 (fax)
www.ij.org
www.castlecoalition.org

Wednesday, December 28, 2011

Jails call on Cellphone-Sniffing Dogs By Sarah Burge Dec. 26, 2011

REGION: Jails call on cellphone-sniffing dogs

Inland prisons and jails have a new tool to keep smuggled cellphones out of the hands of inmates.
Sniffing dogs are now on duty.
Contraband in lockups is not a new problem, and Inland corrections officials have used drug-sniffing dogs for years. But in the past decade, cellphones have changed the game.
Authorities discover thousands of contraband cellphones at prisons across the country every year — more than 12,000 this year in California alone.
Inmates aren’t using the phones just to call home.
Corrections officials say cellphones have been used to facilitate drug deals, order gang hits, harass crime victims and thwart prison security.
Inmates have used cellphones with Internet access to search the Megan’s Law database and then attack sex offenders in prison.
Unlike calls from land lines, contraband cellphone conversations cannot be monitored by corrections officials.
Phones reach inmates in many ways, said Paul Verke, a spokesman for the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. Visitors smuggle them, sometimes in body cavities. Prison workers have brought them in. They also have been stashed in shipping boxes among other goods and even thrown over prison walls. And pick-ups have been coordinated with inmate work crews.
“You take a cellphone away from an inmate today and it seems like tomorrow he’s got another one,” said Sgt. Wayne Conrad, the department’s statewide canine coordinator.
Conrad said dogs make finding contraband cellphones quicker by targeting specific areas for staff to search. Dogs have discovered hundreds of phones in the department’s prisons since the program launched in 2008. In the past year, cellphone-sniffing Belgian malinois — also known as Belgian shepherds — have been placed at state facilities in Chino, Norco and Blythe.
Riverside County sheriff’s officials said cellphones have not been a significant problem in the jails. Deputies found one, in July 2010, during a routine search, jail officials said. But the Sheriff’s Department is taking measures to deter inmates from trying to obtain them.
When the department purchased a contraband dog last year, officials also trained it to detect cellphones. Since December 2010, the yellow Labrador retriever has been traveling to the county’s five jails in search of drugs, tobacco, cellphones and “pruno” — a foul alcoholic concoction brewed by inmates using fruit and sugary items.
The San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department has found very few contraband cellphones and has no dogs assigned to its jails or trained to detect cellphones, sheriff’s spokeswoman Cindy Bachman said.
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K-9 handlers say dogs trained to find cellphones can distinguish between the scent of a cellphone and other electronics.
Correctional Officer Paul Diaz, who is based at the California Institution for Men in Chino, became a K-9 handler this year. He called it baffling but said there’s something about the odor of a cellphone that draws his dog.
“He will not find a DVD player. He will not find a Walkman. He will not find a TV,” Diaz said.
Being able to tell the difference is important in the prisons, where many inmates have televisions and other electronics in their cells.
Prison and jail officials won’t say what gives cellphones their unique odor. But some trainers have said the battery is among the components dogs detect.
When the dogs detect contraband they paw furiously at the source of the scent and bark. Their reward is play — a game of tug with the handler.
Though the Riverside County jailhouse dog, Zuki, has yet to encounter a contraband cellphone, she found drugs, tobacco and more than three gallons of pruno during her first six months on the job, said her handler, Deputy Brent Cisneros.
Unlike the prison dogs’ aggressive alerts, Zuki sits when she finds contraband.
FLOOD OF PHONES
K-9 handlers said the element of surprise is key to catching inmates with phones.
When they arrive for searches at conservation camps, the facilities that house inmate fire and other work crews, Conrad said “You can actually see the phones flying out the windows.”
And when the dogs make their way into a cell block, toilets flush all down the line, the handlers said.
Conrad said the Department of Corrections has had drug-sniffing dogs for decades but acquired its first cellphone sniffing dog in January 2008. A Temecula breeder sold the Belgian malinois to the department for $350 — far less than it was worth — and after a few months of training, it went to work, Conrad said. It was quickly joined by a second dog donated by the same breeder. Since then, all of the department’s cellphone dogs have been donated or purchased for a small fee, Conrad said.
Correctional Officer Paul Diaz said he has seen phones and other contraband hidden in every nook and cranny of a cell block, both inside the cells and in common areas. Inmates try to be creative with their hiding places, he said, wrapping contraband in cellophane and stuffing it in a jar of peanut butter, for instance, or tucking it in light fixtures.
In prison, Conrad said, a $49 cellphone can sell for $300 to $800. A Blackberry or smart phone can go as high as $1,500, he said.
In 2007, staff discovered nearly 1,400 contraband cellphones, according to department officials. By last year, that number had grown to 10,760.
This year, through October, 12,625 cellphones were found in prisons and conservation camps. At the California Institution for Men in Chino, 126 cellphones were found, some of them by Diaz and his Belgian malinois that began working there in May.
Corrections officials said they hope a bill Gov. Jerry Brown signed into law in October will help stem the tide. In the past, inmates could lose privileges and employees could be fired if caught with contraband cellphones. The new law will make possessing a cellphone in prison or trying to bring a phone into a prison a misdemeanor. It carries a fine of $5,000 per device. Inmates also can lose up to 90 days’ credit on their prison sentence.
Though sniffing dogs have proven effective at finding cellphones, Conrad said taking away the phones alone will not solve the problem. The enforcement needs teeth — a criminal penalty — to deter cellphone smuggling.
“These prisons are like small cities,” Conrad said. “They’re going to get in.”

Anonymous Plans for "Violent Revolution": Hacking group that aided Occupy Protests warns of "Bloody Mess"! by Breaking News... Dec. 27, 2011

Anonymous plans for ‘violent revolution’: Hacking group that aided Occupy protests warns of ‘bloody mess.’

The hackers known as “Anonymous,” who helped organize and support the Occupy movement’s protests, have released an online a survivor guide for citizens “in case of a violent revolution in your country.”
The guide warns protests can be a “bloody mess.” It trains rioters on how to avoid tear gas, rubber bullets and live ammunition.
The 15-page PDF document claims police will not help protesters and may actually be enemies of the revolution while warning that protest groups may be infiltrated by “fake civilians.”
The Anonymous survival guide was published just before the hacker group claimed Sunday to have stolen thousands of credit card numbers and other personal information belonging to clients of U.S.-based security think tank Stratfor.
Anonymous has promised more infiltrations and hacker jobs, saying it has “enough targets lined up to extend the fun fun fun of LulzXmas through the entire next week.”

Tuesday, December 27, 2011

Obama and Eric Holder Have Subverted American Freedomes, Dec. 27, 2011 By Kevin "Coach" Collins

Obama And Eric Holder Have Subverted American Freedoms

We know that Eric Holder is a liar and a criminal facilitator based on what we have learned about his conduct in the Fast and Furious crimes.  We are now finding out Holder has been a Democrat “cleaner” and cover up artist for as far back as the Oklahoma City bombing and maybe Waco and Ruby Ridge as well. Holder is a despicable excuse for a human being and that is why Obama appointed him.
We should have recognized this lowlife’s traits when he not only refused to prosecute “his people” the armed Black Panthers who intimidated Whites attempting to vote, but hounded and harassed any of his deputies who attempted to bring them to justice.
This criminal posing as our Attorney General and his equally anti American boss in the White House have succeeded in turning the purpose of the Department of Justice (DoJ) 180 degrees away from its original mission.
What has been lost in history and smothered by the Democrat controlled media is that when the Republican controlled Congress established the DoJ in 1871 its specific purpose, as outlined by Republican President U.S. Grant, was to fight the Democrats in the Ku Klux Klan who were intimidating and murdering the recently freed African American former slaves living in the Southern States.
At that time we saw Grant, a White Republican President, appoint Amos Akerman a White Attorney General, and instruct him to use the power of the federal government against the Democrat Party’s KKK to enforce the 15th Amendment which gave freed slaves the right to vote.
Today we see Barack Obama, a Black Democrat President, who has appointed Eric Holder, a Black Attorney General allowing and encouraging him to refuse to prosecute club wielding Black Panther thugs who were filmed in the act of intimidating White people attempting to vote. Obama is standing by and watching Holder use the power of the federal government to deny White Americans the right to vote. That both he and Holder only have the right to vote themselves is because of the sacrifice of over 360,000 Union troops on the battlefields of the Civil War means nothing to this criminal duo.
Is it hard to believe what we are now finding out about Holder’s role in the Oklahoma City murder of 168 people?
Turning things upside down is, after all, the mark of the Great Deceiver.

Saturday, December 24, 2011

Obama's Policies Could Cause a Second U.S. Credit Downgrade.. Dec. 23, 2011... By Ben Johnson

Obama's Policies Could Cause a Second U.S. Credit Downgrade


Barack Obama became the first president to preside over a downgrade of the U.S. credit rating. Now, he may cause a second.
Fitch Ratings has warned the United States it may downgrade the U.S. credit rating in 2013 if the nation does not take steps to balance its exploding national deficit. Without a "credible plan" to cut the deficit, the ratings agency warned in a statement, "the sovereign rating will likely be lowered by the end of 2013."
"Federal debt will rise in the absence of expenditure and tax reforms that would address the challenges of rising health and social security spending as the population ages."
Last month Fitch changed the U.S. outlook from "stable" to "negative." Moody's Investors Service also warned of a looming downgrade because of the nation's massive debt load.
In August Standard & Poor's downgraded the U.S. credit rating from its highest level, AAA, to the next lower rating, AA+. S&P warned this new status could last until at least 2029, even if a perfect plan is implemented — and one is not on the horizon.
Since Fitch promised not to act until 2013, the president will be spared any embarrassing situation on the campaign trail. But even if the nation turns Obama out of office, his policies may cause damage that lasts for a generation — and his Republican successor could be blamed.

Local Cops Ready for War With Homeland Security-Funded Military Weapons. Dec. 21, 2011 Andrew Becker & G.W. Schulz of the Center for Investigative Reporting

Local Cops Ready for War With Homeland Security-Funded Military Weapons

Dec 21, 2011 4:45 AM EST

A decade of billions in spending in the name of homeland security has armed local police departments with military-style equipment and a new commando mentality. But has it gone too far? Andrew Becker and G.W. Schulz of the Center for Investigative Reporting report.

Nestled amid plains so flat the locals joke you can watch your dog run away for miles, Fargo treasures its placid lifestyle, seldom pierced by the mayhem and violence common in other urban communities. North Dakota's largest city has averaged fewer than two homicides a year since 2005, and there's not been a single international terrorism prosecution in the last decade.
But that hasn't stopped authorities in Fargo and its surrounding county from going on an $8 million buying spree to arm police officers with the sort of gear once reserved only for soldiers fighting foreign wars.
Every city squad car is equipped today with a military-style assault rifle, and officers can don Kevlar helmets able to withstand incoming fire from battlefield-grade ammunition. And for that epic confrontation—if it ever occurs—officers can now summon a new $256,643 armored truck, complete with a rotating turret. For now, though, the menacing truck is used mostly for training and appearances at the annual city picnic, where it's been parked near the children's bounce house.
"Most people are so fascinated by it, because nothing happens here," says Carol Archbold, a Fargo resident and criminal justice professor at North Dakota State University. "There's no terrorism here."
Like Fargo, thousands of other local police departments nationwide have been amassing stockpiles of military-style equipment in the name of homeland security, aided by more than $34 billion in federal grants since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, a Daily Beast investigation conducted by the Center for Investigative Reporting has found.
Capital Police Shooting
Atlanta Police S.W.A.T. members searched a building for a shooting suspect in July of 2010., John Bazemore
The buying spree has transformed local police departments into small, army-like forces, and put intimidating equipment into the hands of civilian officers. And that is raising questions about whether the strategy has gone too far, creating a culture and capability that jeopardizes public safety and civil rights while creating an expensive false sense of security.
"The argument for up-armoring is always based on the least likely of terrorist scenarios," says Mark Randol, a former terrorism expert at the Congressional Research Service, the nonpartisan research arm of Congress. "Anyone can get a gun and shoot up stuff. No amount of SWAT equipment can stop that."
Local police bristle at the suggestion that they've become "militarized," arguing the upgrade in firepower and other equipment is necessary to combat criminals with more lethal capabilities. They point to the 1997 Los Angeles-area bank robbers who pinned police for hours with assault weapons, the gun-wielding student who perpetrated the Virginia Tech massacre in 2007, and the terrorists who waged a bloody rampage in Mumbai, India, that left 164 people dead and 300 wounded in 2008.
The new weaponry and battle gear, they insist, helps save lives in the face of such threats. "I don't see us as militarizing police; I see us as keeping abreast with society," former Los Angeles Police chief William Bratton says. "And we are a gun-crazy society."
"I don't see us as militarizing police; I see us as keeping abreast with society."
Adds Fargo Police Lt. Ross Renner, who commands the regional SWAT team: "It's foolish to not be cognizant of the threats out there, whether it's New York, Los Angeles, or Fargo. Our residents have the right to be protected. We don't have everyday threats here when it comes to terrorism, but we are asked to be prepared."
The skepticism about the Homeland spending spree is less severe for Washington, D.C., Los Angeles and New York, which are presumed to be likelier targets. But questions persist about whether money was handed out elsewhere with any regard for risk assessment or need. And the gap in accounting for the decade-long spending spree is undeniable. The U.S. Homeland Security Department says it doesn't closely track what's been bought with its tax dollars or how the equipment is used. State and local governments don't maintain uniform records either.
To assess the changes in law enforcement for The Daily Beast, the Center for Investigative Reporting conducted interviews and reviewed grant spending records obtained through open records requests in 41 states. The probe found stockpiles of weaponry and military-style protective equipment worthy of a defense contractor's sales catalog.
In Montgomery County, Texas, the sheriff's department owns a $300,000 pilotless surveillance drone, like those used to hunt down al Qaeda terrorists in the remote tribal regions of Pakistan and Afghanistan. In Augusta, Maine, with fewer than 20,000 people and where an officer hasn't died from gunfire in the line of duty in more than 125 years, police bought eight $1,500 tactical vests. Police in Des Moines, Iowa, bought two $180,000 bomb-disarming robots, while an Arizona sheriff is now the proud owner of a surplus Army tank.
The flood of money opened to local police after 9/11, but slowed slightly in recent years. Still, the Department of Homeland Security awarded more than $2 billion in grants to local police in 2011, and President Obama's 2009 American Recovery and Reinvestment Act contributed an additional half-billion dollars.
Law enforcement officials say the armored vehicles, assault weapons, and combat uniforms used by their officers provide a public safety benefit beyond their advertised capabilities, creating a sort of "shock and awe" experience they hope will encourage suspects to surrender more quickly.
"The only time I hear the complaint of 'God, you guys look scary' is if the incident turns out to be nothing," says West Hartford, Conn., Police Lt. Jeremy Clark, who organizes an annual SWAT competition.
A grainy YouTube video from one of Clark's recent competitions shows just how far the police transformation has come, displaying officers in battle fatigues, helmets, and multi-pocketed vests storming a hostile scene. One with a pistol strapped to his hip swings a battering ram into a door. A colleague lobs a flash-bang grenade into a field. Another officer, holding a pistol and wearing a rifle strapped to his back, peeks cautiously inside a bus.
The images unfold to the pulsing, ominous soundtrack of a popular videogame, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2. Though resembling soldiers in a far-flung war zone, the stars of this video are Massachusetts State Police troopers.
The number of SWAT teams participating in Clark's event doubled to 40 between 2004 and 2009 as Homeland's police funding swelled. The competition provides real-life scenarios for training, and Clark believes it is essential, because he fears many SWAT teams are falling below the 16 hours of minimum monthly training recommended by the National Tactical Officers Association.
"Luck is not for cops. Luck is for drunks and fools," Clark said, explaining his devotion to training.
One beneficiary of Homeland's largesse are military contractors, who have found a new market for their wares and sponsor training events like the one Clark oversees in Connecticut or a similar Urban Shield event held in California.
Special ops supplier Blackhawk Industries, founded by a former Navy SEAL, was among several Urban Shield sponsors this year. Other sponsors for such training peddle wares like ThunderSledge breaching tools for smashing open locked or chained doors, Lenco Armored Vehicles bulletproof box trucks, and KDH Defense Systems's body armor.
"As criminal organizations are increasingly armed with military-style weapons, law enforcement operations require the same level of field-tested and combat-proven protection used by soldiers and Marines in Iraq, Afghanistan, and other high-risk locations," boasts an Oshkosh Corp. brochure at a recent police seminar, where the company pitched its "tactical protector vehicle."
The trend shows no sign of abating. The homeland security market for state and local agencies is projected to reach $19.2 billion by 2014, up from an estimated $15.8 billion in fiscal 2009, according to the Homeland Security Research Corp.
The rise of equipment purchases has paralleled an apparent increase in local SWAT teams, but reliable numbers are hard to come by. The National Tactical Officers Association, which provides training and develops SWAT standards, says it currently has about 1,650 team memberships, up from 1,026 in 2000.
Many of America's newly armed officers are ex-military veterans from the front lines of Iraq and Afghanistan. Charles Ramsey, who was police chief in Washington, D.C., on 9/11, upgraded the weaponry when he moved to Philadelphia in 2008. Today, some 1,500 Philly beat cops are trained to use AR-15 assault rifles.
"We have a lot of people here, like most departments, who are ex-military," Ramsey says. "Some people are very much into guns and so forth. So it wasn't hard to find volunteers."
Some real-life episodes, however, are sparking a debate about whether all that gear also creates a more militarized mind-set for local police that exceeds their mission or risks public safety.
In one case, dozens of officers in combat-style gear raided a youth rave in Utah as a police helicopter buzzed overhead. An online video shows the battle-ready team wearing masks and brandishing rifles as they holler for the music to be shut off and pin partygoers to the ground.
And Arizona tactical officers this year sprayed the home of ex-Marine Jose Guerena with gunfire as he stood in a hallway with a rifle that he did not fire. He was hit 22 times and died. Police had targeted the man's older brother in a narcotics-trafficking probe, but nothing illegal was found in the younger Guerena's home, and no related arrests had been made months after the raid.
In Maryland, officials finally began collecting data on tactical raids after police in 2008 burst into the home of a local mayor and killed his two dogs in a case in which the mayor's home was used as a dropoff for drug deal. The mayor's family had nothing to do with criminal activity.
Such episodes and the sheer magnitude of the expenditures over the last decade raise legitimate questions about whether taxpayers have gotten their money's worth and whether police might have assumed more might and capability than is necessary for civilian forces.
"With local law enforcement, their mission is to solve crimes after they've happened, and to ensure that people's constitutional rights are protected in the process," says Jesselyn McCurdy, senior legislative counsel for the American Civil Liberties Union. "The military obviously has a mission where they are fighting an enemy. When you use military tactics in the context of law enforcement, the missions don't match, and that's when you see trouble with the overmilitarization of police."
The upgrading of local police nonetheless continues. Arizona Sheriff Joe Arpaio now claims to operate his own air armada of private pilots—dubbed Operation Desert Sky—to monitor illegal border crossings, and he recently added a full-size surplus Army tank. New York Police Commissioner Ray Kelly boasted this fall he had a secret capability to shoot down an airliner if one threatened the city again. And the city of Ogden, Utah, is launching a 54-foot, remote-controlled "crime-fighting blimp" with a powerful surveillance camera.
Back in Fargo, nearby corn and soybean farmer Tim Kozojed supports the local police but questions whether the Homeland grants have been spent wisely. "I'm very reluctant to get anxious about a terrorist attack in North Dakota," Kozojed, 31, said. "Why would they bother?"

Wrongful Death Case Reveals Eric Holder's Role in OKC Bombing Cover-Up, Dec. 23, 2011 by Doug Book

Wrongful Death Case Reveals Eric Holder's Role in OKC Bombing Cover-up


"You need to know that Eric Holder…played a key role in covering up the torture-murder death of my brother, Kenneth Michael Trentadue."[1]
This is what Salt Lake City attorney Jesse Trentadue wrote in December 2008 to prospective incoming chairman of the Senate Justice Committee, Patrick Leahy. The newly elected Barack Obama had made Holder his choice for Attorney General and Trentadue was going to do everything in his power to stop this shameful appointment from going forward.
Kenneth Trentadue was killed in Oklahoma City on August 21, 1995, four months after the bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah building. He had been taken into custody by the FBI and placed in an isolation cell at a federal facility in El Reno, Oklahoma.
The official government report on cause of death presented to Trentadue's family stated that Kenneth had hanged himself in his cell. But massive bruises and lacerations all over his body compelled even the Oklahoma City medical examiner to state "very likely he was murdered."[2]
Unable to get satisfactory information from government officials on what had happened to his brother, in 1997 Jesse Trentadue filed a federal wrongful death lawsuit against the Department of Justice. In it, Trentadue made the extraordinary claim that the Department had hidden and "destroyed evidence that would have exposed my brother's murderers."
As a result of that lawsuit, in 2001 the Trentadue family was awarded $1.1 million, and the federal judge indeed later ruled that "the FBI had lied in court…and destroyed evidence."[3]
Using e-mails and handwritten notes acquired in that lawsuit,  Trentadue demonstrated in his correspondence to Patrick Leahy that then-Deputy Attorney General Eric Holder had engineered a scheme to sidetrack any investigation into his brother's death in order to "deflect congressional oversight and media attention."
Calling their agenda the "Trentadue mission," members of Holder's DOJ team compared their efforts to "coordinating the invasion of Normandy." They referred to "meeting with [Holder] to discuss 'Trentadue-does' and 'Trentadue-don't'," concerning a carefully crafted press release designed to announce that a federal grand jury had just concluded its work and found no reason to charge anyone with a crime.
Of course that October 9 press release failed to say the grand jury had actually, secretly concluded its business in August, having been supplied with only the "evidence" the Department of Justice saw fit to provide.
The lengths to which Eric Holder and others went to stifle any investigation of the Trentadue affair make it clear that it was not simply a federal prisoner interrogation that went too far. CoachIsRight.com will present the known history of this extraordinary Clinton administration affair and cover-up through the coming days.

Friday, December 23, 2011

San Bernardino: Scot Spencer's Airport Management to END! by Kimberly Pierceall

SAN BERNARDINO: Scot Spencer’s airport management to end


KURT MILLER/STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER
Scot Spencer, listens during a July meeting of the San Bernardino International Airport Authority and Inland Valley Development Agency.
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The San Bernardino International Airport Authority was poised to retake control of the airport’s management as of 5:01 p.m. Friday from Scot Spencer, the focus of an FBI-led investigation into possible wrongdoing at the airport.
Spencer’s company, San Bernardino Airport Management LLC, had until Friday to sign a contract with a third-party airport manager since the last one, AvPorts, severed its ties with Spencer after not being paid. He didn’t, so the contract was terminated. Bill Ingraham, the authority’s aviation director, would assume management oversight of the airport.
“In 10 minutes, it’s my airport again,” he said shortly before 5 p.m. The authority has agreed to pay Spencer’s management employees through Dec. 30, though, as it works on a more permanent solution to managing the airport, Ingraham said. The authority has always covered the cost of Spencer’s management payroll but in this case, his employees will report to the airport authority, not him, for one week. What will happen to Spencer’s employees in the long-term is unclear.
Tim Sabo, legal counsel for the airport authority and the related Inland Valley Development Agency, said Spencer could choose to keep the employees at his own cost but they wouldn’t have any role in the airport’s management or operations. If Spencer laid off the employees, the airport could choose to rehire them, possibly through a temporary employment service, Sabo said.
Sabo said it was unfortunate that the employees had been caught in the middle. The only event that could prevent Spencer’s management agreement from being dissolved would be if Spencer’s company filed for bankruptcy or another legal action. As of Friday afternoon, it wasn’t clear if any legal action had been made by San Bernardino Airport Management.
In September 2010, the airport authority transferred 23 employees to Spencer’s San Bernardino Airport Management LLC which had hired Virginia-based AvPorts to oversee day-to-day operations where there are no scheduled commercial flights.
Spencer whose role at the airport expanded since 2003 as the companies he managed went from renting space to being the landlord of a hangar, to developing the airport and managing it – was also the focus of a critical San Bernardino County civil grand jury report that raised questions about how the airport was being managed and Spencer’s role.
Norton Property Management Services LLC, the company that has been the landlord of one of the largest hangars at the airport, filed for bankruptcy on Dec. 7, the same day that Spencer’s role with the company was terminated, according to bankruptcy filings. Spencer’s vice president or co-manager in other ventures, T. Milford Harrison, is listed as the company’s sole manager.
Harrison, a former Loma Linda city councilman and mayor, led the airport authority and Inland Valley Development Agency for years before joining Spencer’s companies. The FBI and other authorities conducted a search of airport offices on Sept. 21 and Spencer, Harrison and others were named in the search warrant.
Spencer remains the manager of San Bernardino Airport Management, though, which owns 100 percent of Norton Property Management.
San Bernardino Airport Management, in turn, is owned by Norton Airport Investment LLC. Among the investors listed for Norton Airport Investment are Millionaire Development Company LLC (27.5 percent share), SBD Properties LLC (27.5 percent), Tristar Norton Holdings (25.27 percent share) and Omni Enterprises LLC (8.61 percent share), according to the bankruptcy filings.
Norton Property Management had until Dec. 21 to file necessary financial records with the U.S. Bankruptcy Court or risk the case being dismissed.
In the filings, the company says it has $1.04 million worth of personal property including its security deposit to rent the airport’s hangar worth $108,000, improvements it made to the hangar worth $507,082, an unknown amount of rent from another company managed by Spencer and a $192,500 proposed settlement agreement with tenant AeroPro regarding disputed rent payments.
The company lists $1.32 million worth of liabilities including a $540,000 loan from Spencer’s San Bernardino Airport Management to Norton Property Management.

Thursday, December 22, 2011

Fire Destroys Rialto Golf Course Building By Melissa Pinion-Whitt, San Berdo Sun, Dec. 21, 2011


Fire destroys Rialto golf course building


A fire destroyed a building at El Rancho Verde Golf Course in Rialto this morning.Twenty-one Rialto firefighters came to the golf course at 355 E. Country Club Drive at 1:40 a.m. They had received reports of a structure and trees on fire. Callers also reported hearing explosions, firefighters said.
Firefighters could see smoke and flames from blocks away.
Rialto and San Bernardino County firefighters extinguished the blaze in about two hours. There were no reported injuries.
Firefighters are investigating the cause of the fire.

N/B I-215 to W/B Hwy. 210 Transition OPEN!! Press-Enterprise Writers, Dec. 22, 2011

I-215/Hwy. 210 transition open


STAN LIM/STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER
A large truck transitions from the I-215 northbound connector ramp to Hwy. 210 westbound in San Bernardino after the connector opened earlier in the morning on Thursday, December 22, 2011.
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Crews opened the connector ramp between northbound Interstate 215 and westbound Highway 210 north of downtown San Bernardino on Thursday morning.
It eliminates the need for drivers to leave the freeway and use city streets to get from I-215 to the 210 heading west.
MCM Construction expedited work on the ramp, which is part of a $65.5 million project to widen the freeway and rebuild the 215/210 interchange. A ramp connecting the eastbound 210 to I-215 southbound will open in March, Caltrans officials said.
Crews are widening I-215 from Second Street to University Parkway. Work is expected to take until spring 2013, officials said.

Friday, December 16, 2011

Ontario Officials Reject LAWA's Report


Ontario officials reject LAWA's report


ONTARIO - City officials have rejected Los Angeles World Airports' recommendations aimed to increase air service at LA/Ontario International Airport, calling the suggestions as impractical and unhelpful.A day after LAWA officials discussed shutting down one terminal to save money, Ontario officials criticized the agency - which operates ONT and Los Angeles International Airport - for failing to produce a solution to reducing costs at the local airport.
For several years, Ontario officials have lobbied for local control, claiming they would be able to convert the medium-hub facility into a competitive regional airport.
"It is clear that LAWA still has no plan to turn around ONT," said Ontario Councilman Alan Wapner, who has been the city's liaison on the issue.
An updated economic analysis by the firm Oliver Wyman has found the decline in air service at ONT between 2007 and 2011 has meant a $495 million economic hit to the Inland Empire. The decline at ONT in the last four years has also meant a loss of 9,250 jobs to the region.
Passenger traffic has declined in recent years by nearly 30 percent at ONT while Los Angeles International Airport has gotten busier.
ONT has lost a third of its ridership since 2007, when travel at ONT peaked at 7.2 million passengers. Only 3.7 million passengers had flown through the facility through October this year.
During Thursday's Los Angeles Board of Airport Commissioners meeting,

members were briefed on possible solutions for the struggling airport.Shutting down one terminal could help the facility, since costs for terminal maintenance and operating two sets of baggage handling systems are becoming burdensome as fewer flights and travelers pass through the airport, LAWA officials said on Thursday.
This is not the first time the airport has discussed the idea of closing a terminal at ONT, said Jess Romo, airport manager.
The idea was studied several years ago but officials rejected it because it would severely impact the customer experience, Romo said. The concern was greater wait times at checkpoints and screening areas with only one terminal, he said.
Romo said Gina Marie Lindsey, executive director of LAWA, "put this out there but this is not a definitive project we would be working on."
The idea could be worth revisiting now because passenger traffic levels are lower from when the proposal was first discussed, he said.
Wapner said he feels LAWA is wasting its time exploring ideas that have been already been considered, or proposals that are likely to fail.
"What's needed are lower airport charges, aggressive marketing and - most importantly - airport management solely focused on developing ONT. This can only be accomplished when the airport is under local control," he said.
Mark Thorpe, director of air service marketing for LAWA, said the airport staff has taken significant strides to improve the situation at ONT.
Among the solutions discussed on Thursday was to consider offering a consortium for airlines, he said. As part of the agreement, airlines would assume certain costs at the facility which in turn would reduce operation costs at ONT.
They would also look at reducing the $4.50 passenger facility charge a passenger has to pay when boarding a flight at ONT.
But Thorpe credited ONT staff for reducing the costs for airlines to do business. In 2010, airlines at ONT were paying $13.50 per passenger. That has now dropped to $11.76 per passenger. ONT's figure is even lower than the $12 per passenger airlines have to pay at LAX, he said.
Romo said he has been able to reduce operating expense by 23 percent, which amounts to $19 million since 2010. ONT officials are still looking at ways to reduce overhead costs, he said.
"We want to be able to have a chance of attracting more carriers," Romo said.
Thorpe said, "What's being done at ONT is impressive. When the economy turns, Ontario is going to be competitive on an advantageous level with LAX."
In order for the airport to succeed, Thorpe said ONT is going to need to focus on its business travelers which have largely supported the traffic at the airport in recent years.
Ontario city officials are not the only ones concerned about conditions at ONT. Political leaders throughout the Inland Empire reacted to the news that LAWA may once again discuss the possibility of closing a terminal at ONT.
"I'm glad that LAWA is looking to contain costs, but closing down a terminal is not a reasonable option. The number of terminals is not the source of any problems they are having with over-staffing," said Greg Devereaux, San Bernardino County's CEO and former Ontario city manager.
Assemblyman Curt Hagman, R-Chino Hills, said he wants to get ONT out of the hands of Los Angeles officials and back to local control.
"LAWA has done a horrible job at managing the the airport," he said.
Hagman said the focus should be about building more terminals rather than closing one.
Rep. Joe Baca, D-San Bernardino said he is "extremely" disappointed that LAWA officials are once again considering the idea of closing a terminal. It also serves as another reason why Ontario airport should be returned to local control.
Last month, Baca sent a letter to Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa asking LAWA to cede the airport to local control.
"How can LAWA arbitrarily make decisions that impact the well-being of the Inland Empire without involving local stakeholders?" Baca said.
An increase in air traffic, would mean more local jobs and economic development, more travel flexibility for Inland residents, and more revenues for local governments, Baca said.
"As long as LAWA controls our airport, we will continue to play second fiddle to LAX," Baca said.
Reach Liset via email, call her at 909-483-8556, or find her on Twitter @DBOntarioNow.

Wednesday, December 14, 2011

Rialto Police Chief to trade badge for Collage Professor's lectern By Jim Steinberg writer


Rialto police chief to trade badge for college professor's lectern


Rialto Police Chief Mark Kling talks with residents of the Senior Apartment Complex about the neighborhood watch program Wednesday July 21, 2010 in Rialto. (File Photo)
RIALTO - After 5 1/2 years, Police Chief Mark Kling is calling it quits.The veteran police official, with a doctorate in public administration, is going to teach at the undergraduate and graduate level at Riverside's California Baptist University, retiring from police work after more than 30 years.
Kling, 54, said he will be revamping the university's criminal justice program, will teach within the program and also will teach public administration and political science.
"I came here to do a job and I have done that job and it is time to move on," said Kling, who for six months this year wore the hat of both police chief and city administrator.
His last day as police chief will be Dec. 29.
Kling said he will be replaced by Tony Farrar, who has been employed by the Rialto Police Department for 22 years. During the last five years, he served as captain with the responsibility for the department's field operations.
Farrar holds a master's degree in the administration of justice and an MBA.
Kling said that he took no additional salary while serving as interim city administrator, an action that saved the city considerable money.
"It was my way of giving back to the community for their support," Kling said in an interview Tuesday.
When Kling arrived in Rialto, he walked into a demoralized Police Department that had been slated for elimination a few months before.
A large community outcry kept policing in Rialto under local control instead of under contract with the San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department.
During his tenure, Kling transformed the department, giving it tools to increase productivity and restoring its pride, said City Council member Joe Baca Jr.
"He brought back the gang unit, brought injunctions against gangs and took many other actions that had never been done in this city," Baca said.
Kling's tenure, however, was blemished by an embarrassing
Rialto Chief of Police Mark Kling as seen in his office October 16, 2008. (File Photo)
sex scandal in 2010 when a female employee at a Rialto strip club alleged she and an on-duty officer had sex three times at the Rialto Police Benefit Association's union hall.Prior to those allegations becoming public, Kling began installing vehicle locators on all police cars, to allow supervisors to pinpoint where officers are during their shift.
That process was completed in mid-2010.
Earlier this year, a Rialto police officer and an Orange County defense attorney were arrested by FBI agents on bribery charges.
Baca said Kling took swift action against those whose conduct fell short of the department's standards.
"Chief Kling took personal responsibility for mishaps within the department. He didn't try to hide anything....One of the things you can't do as a leader is control what the troops do," Baca said in an interview Wednesday.
Kling said that his leadership style includes "moving a lot of people out of organizations that probably should have never been there."
As city administrator, Kling fired a contract employee at the Rialto Municipal Airport after he found documents suggesting financial irregularities there.
"Kling really trained his support staff to become leaders," Baca said.
By grooming Farrar, he saved Rialto a significant amount of money because the city didn't have to hire a headhunter to find its next police chief, Baca said.
Kling said he pushed department members to pursue educational opportunities "at every level."
Studies show there is a correlation between the education level of a police department and how it treats its community, Kling said.
"I have no doubt in my mind that Tony Farrar is the best candidate for police chief, not just here, but anywhere," Kling said.


Read more:http://www.sbsun.com/news/ci_19549007?source=rss#ixzz1gsrsgf00

S.B. AIRPORT: Reduced role expected for airport figure. By Kimberly Pierceall Dec. 14, 2011


S.B. AIRPORT: Reduced role expected for airport figure

The man who had been put in control of nearly every facet of San Bernardino International Airport's development and management could have a diminished role as of Christmas

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San Bernardino International Airport's departures area of the terminal.
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The man who had been put in control of nearly every facet of San Bernardino International Airport's development and management could have a diminished role by Christmas.
Scot Spencer, whose home and airport offices were searched in an FBI-led investigation in late September, has until Dec. 23 to hire a nationally recognized airport management firm after the last firm left because it hadn’t been paid. If he doesn’t, he’ll lose his own management contract with the airport.
Also, to avoid legal action, he has about 30 days to hand over ownership of the airport’s passenger terminal, the Million Air building and a partially finished U.S. Customs facility, and other buildings.
A.J. Wilson, interim executive director of the San Bernardino International Airport Authority and the Inland Valley Development Agency, would take over management of the airport temporarily, according to a vote by the authority on Wednesday.
Wilson has led the airport authority and the development agency for a little more than a month. So far, he has spent more time attempting to solve problems related to Spencer’s companies than anything else, he said at Wednesday’s meeting. Every notice sent to one of Spencer’s companies has entered a “black hole of silence,” Wilson said.
Spencer did not attend Wednesday’s meeting and could not be reached for comment.
In the meantime, Spencer’s company, San Bernardino Airport Management, is still at the helm but without the professional airport management firm that it had hired.
Spencer had contracted with AvPorts, a Virginia-based company that manages several airports. AvPorts left San Bernardino on Monday after Spencer didn't pay the company what it was owed, said AvPorts CEO Ozzie Moore by phone.
If Spencer finds another firm that’s either internationally or nationally recognized for its airport management work, that company still would need to be approved by the authority.
Spencer’s companies at the airport have racked up hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt, including rent owed to the public agencies as well as taxes owed to the county, state and IRS. A Boeing 727 plane owned by his company was recently impounded by the county tax collector, and he has been evicted from space he rents at the airport.
“It’s all about accountability and being current in your obligations,” said San Bernardino Mayor Patrick Morris when asked about Spencer’s diminished role at the airport. Morris is the president and chair of the airport authority and the IVDA. “It’s critically important that we pay our bills.”
Morris acknowledged that Spencer had been given opportunities to catch up on what he owed or given rent credits in the past, based on the recommendation of the airport’s staff at the time. Morris said it was due to the economic downturn affecting Spencer’s businesses and those of his subtenants.
If Spencer loses control of managing and developing the airport, he still would have a role there. His company manages the fuel farm, and he rents space for his Million Air franchise in the luxury private plane terminal at the airport. He doesn’t owe the airport any rent or fees for those two operations, said Tim Sabo, the agencies’ attorney.
The airport has offered to work with Spencer’s management company to oversee the airport and the company’s employees until Dec. 23, but he doesn’t have to accept the help, Sabo said. If Spencer decides to lay off all of the employees in that time the airport authority could rehire them later, Sabo said.
As part of his development agreements with the airport, Spencer’s companies were granted ownership of the physical improvements made to the buildings. The title would have been transferred to the agencies once work was complete.
That transfer hasn’t happened, though, and work on at least a few buildings has not been completed. He has 30 days to hand over the buildings or risk being taken to court by the agencies, Sabo said.
Spencer arrived in 2003 when he started leasing one of the largest hangars at the airport, the former Norton Air Force Base, and in 2005 became the hangar’s landlord through a master lease with the public agency.
The public agencies overseeing the airport awarded him two agreements in 2007 to build the airport’s passenger terminal and a fixed-base operation for fueling private planes. The agencies sought no other bids. Since then, the cost to develop the airport, including the addition of a three-story U.S. Customs building, grew from $45 million to nearly $150 million.
Two years ago, the agency awarded his San Bernardino Airport Management company the contract to oversee airport operations so long as he partnered with an internationally or nationally recognized airport manager.
Spencer has owed hundreds of thousands of dollars in unpaid rent, and the agency recently gave him three days’ notice to pay or leave the hangar. He didn’t pay. His company with that lease filed for bankruptcy Dec. 7, and the agency plans to file an action with the court to evict him.