Incorporated November 17, 1911, the City of Rialto covers 28 square miles. Citizens enjoy the services of City-owned water, fire, and police departments, as well as community recreation facilities. The Police Department offers a variety of services and assignments to include Field Patrol, K-9 Units, School Resource Officer (SRO), Multiple Enforcement Team (MET), Investigations, Traffic, Narcotics, Training and Backgrounds, SWAT and Crisis Negotiations.
Anti-street crime officers seized heroin worth $500,000 during a routine traffic stop in Rialto, marking that city's largest ever seizure of the drug, police officials say.
“The driver was a Mexican national who was driving on a suspended license,” Capt. Randy De Anda said of the lunchtime car stop along I-210 at Ayala Avenue.
Officers searched the car and found two large suitcases that attracted the attention of a narcotics dog and yielded 12.4 pounds heroin, De Anda said.
The driver’s name has not been released. Investigators haven‘t determined the source of the heroin or its intended destination, De Anda said.
Street Crime Attack Team officers focused on the car solely because of traffic violations and pulled it over after the driver – the car’s sole occupant – entered the freeway’s carpool lane, De Anda said.
RIALTO: Rodney King drowns in own pool; autopsy report pending
TERRY PIERSON/STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER
Rialto Police Detective Carla McCullough, left watches as technician Noretta Barker photographs evidence by the pool in Rialto where Rodney King was found dead, Sunday, June 17, 2012.
Rodney King, whose videotaped beating at the hands of Los Angeles police officers set in motion events that would lead to the deadly Los Angeles riots of 1992, died after an apparent drowning in the backyard swimming pool of his Rialto home. He was 47.
The encounter with LAPD officers in 1991 brought King his unwanted fame. And it was law enforcement officers who provided the coda to his life early Sunday, June 17, when they jumped into the pool wearing their uniforms and equipment in an effort to save him.
His death was not regarded as suspicious, police said. But neighbors said it followed a Saturday night party that led into a late-night and early-morning argument, or at least noisy exchanges, between King and his fiancée that were loud enough to cause some neighbors to shout out a request to stop the ruckus.
An autopsy was scheduled for Monday morning June 18, said San Bernardino County Sheriff's spokeswoman Jodi Miller. She said toxicology tests were also being performed.
The results will take weeks to return, she said. The county coroner releases autopsy and toxicology results at the same time, she said.
Rialto police Capt. Randy De Anda said in a Sunday June 17 afternoon news conference that it was not unusual for King to go swimming at any hour, including the early morning.
He said that King's fiancée, Cynthia Kelley, discovered at about 5:25 a.m. that King was at the deep-end bottom of the pool. "She said she heard a splash in the rear yard … she found Mr. King … at the bottom of the pool. He was at the deep end," De Anda said earlier Sunday.
He said Kelley, whom he described as "not a strong swimmer," tried to pull King out, and called 911 when she could not.
Responding officers jumped in and retrieved King. They tried to give him cardiopulmonary resuscitation. Rialto Fire Department paramedics also treated King at the scene. He was taken to Arrowhead Regional Medical Center in Colton, and pronounced dead at 6:11 a.m.
"Last night I heard a commotion," said neighbor Bob Carlberg, 53, who lives two doors away. "It really wasn't like a fight-fight-fight, but it was like yelling back and forth," he said. "He had a little party yesterday."
"He had something going on all night … the neighbors that live behind him were kind of yelling over to be quiet … the people who actually live next door to him said it was really loud," Carlberg said.
Carlberg said the disturbances were uncharacteristic of King, who lived on East Jackson Street, which is lined with single-story ranch-style and tract homes with well-trimmed lawns and shade trees. "He really kept to himself. The last couple of weeks he had more people over because he was planning his marriage. That's only my theory."
A neighbor of King said that around 3 a.m. she heard music and people talking next door and what sounded like someone who was very emotional.
"It seemed like someone was really crying, like really deep emotions," said Sandra Gardea, 31, a dental hygienist instructor who recently moved in. "And it just got louder and louder. Everybody woke up. Even the kids woke up."
She described the sound as "like moaning, like in pain. Like tired or sad, you know?"
Gardea said this went on for some time and then stopped.
"I heard someone say, 'OK, Please stop. Go inside the house.' … We heard quiet for a few minutes. Then after that we heard a splash in the back. And that's when a few minutes later we see the cops arrive and everyone arrive and we see him being taken in a gurney."
"You didn't see parties here or a lot of people. He was very withdrawn, and (kept) to himself," said neighbor Tondalaya Baker, 55, who lives around the corner from King's home. She said she most often saw him when he was working on his lawn or the front of his home.
De Anda said King was "poolside throughout the early morning, and he was in verbal contact with his fiancée throughout the morning. She was having a conversation through the rear sliding-glass door, and apparently when she heard the splash."
He said he did not know the content of the conversation. "At this time I do not know what Mr. King's toxicology was, or if he was intoxicated, or whether he was under the influence of any substances." He said detectives would try to determine what was going on at the moment King fell into the pool.
On Sunday afternoon, evidence was being carted away from King's home, including what looked like a marijuana plant. King had said in interviews last year that he had a doctor's recommendation to use medical marijuana. Medical marijuana users are permitted some legal cultivation.
De Anda said a coroner's investigation will include an autopsy and a toxicology report. He said there were no signs of drugs or alcohol near the pool when officers arrived, and that detectives had interviewed Kelley as a routine matter. Kelley had been one of the jurors who awarded King $3.8 million in his lawsuit against Los Angeles over the beating. King said recently he had spent most of the money.
Neighbors described King as friendly and willing to talk about anything except what happened in Los Angeles two decades ago. "The best neighbor in the neighborhood," said Baker, who said she spoke to him frequently.
Asked if King ever discussed his past, Baker said, "he never wanted to talk about that. He really just stayed to himself … he was extremely private." She said he often kept his drapes drawn at the home.
Carlberg said he liked to talk about cars with King.
"He was a pretty nice guy. Seemed like a real nice guy, I had no problems," Carlberg said.
Carlberg described the neighborhood "real quiet, peaceful, friendly. Everybody gets along. Everybody talks to everybody."
Two decades ago, King uttered five words that captured the sentiment of millions of Americans horrified by the scenes of death and destruction in the Los Angeles riots.
"I just want to say, you know, 'Can we all get along?'," King said in a quavering voice after rioters ravaged Southern California neighborhoods.
King was pulled over by LAPD officers in 1991 for speeding. He was drunk but unarmed. Officers responded to King's lack of cooperation by beating him with batons and kicking him repeatedly.
The beating was video-taped by a bystander, which elevated the case to international headlines.
Four of the officers, all white, went to trial. Their acquittal sparked the infamous Southern California riots on April 29, 1992. At least 53 people were killed, more than 2,000 were injured and more than $1 billion in property was damaged or destroyed.
King reflected in an interview with The Press-Enterprise in early April on how his lawyers handed him a four-page statement to read at a news conference. It was 1992, two days after the beginning of the disturbances that began when four Los Angeles police officers were acquitted of beating him.
But instead of reading the statement, King improvised.
"I spoke from my heart, you know," King said. "I felt there was a need to say something from the heart."
King moved to Inland Southern California from Los Angeles County in 1999 to escape some of the continued attention.
"At the time, I felt a little too much heat," he said. "The smoke hadn't cleared in Los Angeles for me. I thought it would be more comfortable for me to be in the IE."
Recently, King said he supported himself in part by doing handyman and construction work. He's also made money on reality-TV appearances, including "Celebrity Rehab."
The headlines that followed King during his 13 years in the Inland area generally had not been complimentary. He wasn arrested several times, including for driving under the influence and domestic violence.
In the latest case, he pleaded guilty in February to reckless driving after he was pulled over in Moreno Valley.
King acknowledged his mistakes. He wrote about them in his book, "The Riot Within," which was released in April.
He said his days of drinking heavily were over — although he said he hadn't quit alcohol entirely.
"I sip now," said King, whose father was an alcoholic. "I'm not guzzling drinks anymore. No one knows the future, but I sure feel comfortable where I am today with myself."
Staff writer David Olson, dolson@pe.com, and the Associated Press contributed to this report.
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Valet parking and VIP lounges are among the latest suggestions and strategies offered by the city of Los Angeles to best boost traffic at its Ontario International Airport.
But few, if any, of those ideas have taken off since Los Angeles World Airports began pitching them in 2008 when traffic began to plummet.
Shuttles to Disneyland, a discount for airlines and a proposal to farm out Ontario airport's management to someone else have all been brought up by consultants hired by the LA public agency that owns and operates LAX and the Ontario and Van Nuys airports. None have been implemented.
In the meantime, traffic has dropped by 37 percent at the airport to levels unseen since the 1988, a decade before two twin terminals were built to serve 10 million passengers every year. Less than half that number of travelers used the airport in 2009, 2010 and 2011.
"Right now, if you go out to Ontario, the terminal is about half full. A lot of the concessions are shuttered throughout the day. That's not a good story," said Edward Shelswell-White, a consultant hired by LAWA who presented his ideas to re-brand the Inland airport during a May 7 meeting of the board of airport commissioners.
But a half-empty terminal isn't half bad, said airport commissioner Robert Beyer, since travelers could see it as an advantage to use Ontario instead of busier airports.
"What's the reason to drive traffic there?" Beyer asked Shelswell-White during the meeting.
Spreading air traffic to LAWA's other Southern California airports isn't a charitable goal for the agency. Los Angeles has been bound by a 2005 legal settlement with the neighborhoods surrounding LAX that opposed expansion at that airport. In it, LAWA agreed to develop a regional strategy and grow traffic at "underutilized" airports it owns, namely Ontario airport, updating that strategy annually starting Dec. 31, 2006.
Costs have been cut by more than $19 million at the airport in part by shifting employees from Ontario to LAX when possible and closing portions of the terminals with an aim to make it less expensive for airlines to do business there.
FOCUS IS RENEWED, MANAGER SAYS
Now, LAWA is focused on building up the airport's business, said Ontario International Airport manager Jess Romo.
Why has it taken this long? Romo said the agency has had a lot of competing priorities and that there was no expectation that the passenger declines would have gone on as long as they have.
"We will be doing a number of things," Romo said matter of factly, now that consultant Shelswell-White is on board.
In his presentation, Shelswell-White made conceptual suggestions that Ontario could re-brand itself, boost revenue and compete with John Wayne Airport in Orange County by offering features that would appeal to travelers with higher-end tastes such as valet parking, reserved parking or a club lounge.
Beyer wasn't convinced. Doing that "in a place that's devastated economically doesn't exactly ring as an intelligent avenue," he said.
LAWA leaders have long blamed the economy for dragging Ontario and other midsize airports down with it.
But leaders in the city of Ontario have said LAWA's neglect has played more of a role in the precipitous drop in traffic, and in 2008 they began talking openly about taking back the airport they signed over to Los Angeles in 1967 to manage and then in 1985 to own. That movement has since grown into the SetONTarioFree campaign.
At the May 7 meeting, the consultant said it would behoove LAWA to counter the campaign with its own competing vision.
"There is little confidence that the situation will get better," he said. The city of Ontario's campaign has even questioned if the airport will remain open under LAWA's ownership. "Of course it will," Shelswell-White said.
He also suggested temporarily doing away with the $4.50 passenger facility charge levied to airlines on every fare, an idea first suggested in 2010 by another hired consultant. Ultimately, the board of directors — who are all Los Angeles-area residents — delayed making any endorsement for a strategy until the consultant came back with more facts and data to back up a plan.
YEARS OF FEW RESULTS
The board has heard suggestions for years.
There was a plan in 2008 to shift Los Angeles World Airports' marketing resources from Palmdale airport to Ontario instead. At the time Mike Molina, the agency's senior director of external affairs, said, "Ontario shows the greatest potential for increasing our regionalization efforts."
But the budget shift didn't happen.
Then there was the idea to divert Disneyland visitors to the Inland airport with airfare rebates, shuttle rides to the theme parks and even early admission to encourage fliers to go to Ontario instead of John Wayne Airport in Orange County.
Los Angeles World Airports hired Peggy Ducey, who developed the Disneyland plan, to be the agency's "regionalization coordinator" in July 2009 to come up with a strategy. Two years later she submitted a report but no action was ever taken.
"The work that was submitted really lacked a lot of data," Romo said.
Early last year, the agency sought "expressions of interest" from airport management firms to gauge whether there was willingness by an outsider to run the airport and what the advantages might be. Ten firms applied but nothing happened.
"There were concerns in the report regarding public-private partnerships including, but not limited to, labor issues, FAA regulations and other uncertainties," Romo said in an e-mailed response.
At the same time, the budget to recruit both airlines and travelers to the airport was cut by 95 percent compared to pre-2008 levels, and the agency's managers made public statements that indicated Ontario airport's traffic wasn't a priority. One such statement came from LAWA's Executive Director Gina Marie Lindsay, who was hired in 2007.
KEEPING FLIERS IN LA?
"Continuing to pursue a strategy that actively pushes traffic away from the city of Los Angeles and into other jurisdictions could be viewed as a little self-destructive," she said during a 2010 meeting of the agency's board.
Behind the scenes, the agency's leaders and its air service marketing director, Mark Thorpe, had differing opinions on what to do. Thorpe proposed offering incentives directly to airlines to encourage more routes or cheaper fares, a common tool others airports use.
He said he was told by LAWA's management that it would be too difficult to renegotiate the long-term lease agreement the agency had with its current airlines at Ontario airport. While the agency has cut significant costs, Thorpe said incentives and rebates would do more in the short term to attract airlines.
Thorpe left LAWA in January to be the assistant vice president of air service development at Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport.
At Dallas/Fort Worth, the airport offers airlines starting new international routes or expanding existing routes rebates on all their airport fees and rent for the first two years, plus $400,000 worth of advertising and marketing. It can add up to $5 million per qualifying route. There are deals for airlines offering new U.S. routes, too, including $125,000 worth of advertising and a full rebate on airport fees and rent for a year.
And if the airport makes more in nonaviation revenue than it expected to, it shares the profits with its airlines, he said.
The cost for airlines to do business at Ontario airport per passenger has been the highest in Southern California, and as fewer airlines and passengers have used the airport, those that remain cover the airport's expenses.
"When I would talk to airlines, cost did matter," especially when two airports with a similar market were competing for one airline, Thorpe said of his work to recruit new service at Ontario airport.
AIRPORT: Closing Rialto Municipal has gotten more complex
STAN LIM/STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER
A runway not in use at the Rialto Municipal Airport on March 27. In 2005, Congress authorized the airport to close to make way for homes and shops. The airport has remained open, though, while the city of Rialto and developers wait out the economic downturn and face questions about what the end of redevelopment agencies may mean for the property.
It should have been simple, or as simple as it can be to shut down an airport after securing the first difficult-to-get go-ahead to make way for homes, shopping and industry.
But closing Rialto Municipal Airport has been anything but easy.
Seven years after a rare act of Congress authorized the airport to close — a workaround that avoided a showdown with the Federal Aviation Administration that had funded the airport's development — it's still open and none of the tenants have been moved to nearby San Bernardino International Airport as planned.
The economy's swift and enduring downfall put plans to develop homes, shops and a business park on hold and made land prices of 2005 unrealistic. By the time land entitlements were complete and a specific plan approved in 2010, "the economy was long gone," said Robb Steel, assistant to the city of Rialto's administrator.
The airport's fate has only been made more complicated with the dissolution of California's redevelopment agencies.
The city's redevelopment agency owned the airport property and had the agreements with a private developer and San Bernardino airport. That agency no longer exists.
"The economy kicked us in the gut and then the state kicked us in the gut," Steel said.
The plan has already cost the city of Rialto and the developer millions of dollars, and the delay kept San Bernardino airport officials waiting for a windfall that hasn't arrived.
In addition to transferring the land to the city of Rialto — which later transferred it to the city's redevelopment agency — Congress required that nearby San Bernardino International Airport would have a 45 percent claim on the appraised value of the land. Those funds, paid by Rialto, would be used for relocating tenants and building hangars to house planes and businesses that had been at the closed airport.
The tenants that remain at Rialto today pay rent month-to-month, knowing the airport will close, just not when.
New tenants have arrived knowing there's still time, including Fontana Police Department's air support and an owner who has ketchup bottles sitting on tables in a soon-to-open restaurant at the airport.
To kick start development, Rialto's City Council approved raising $30 million through a complex financing deal for management of the city's water system that would raise residential rates between 97 percent and 115 percent.
But first, the city has to regain ownership of the airport property and sign new agreements with the developer and San Bernardino airport.
POTENTIAL PROFITS
In 2005, the city had visions of grandeur — development that would include 4,000 homes, shops, restaurants, a corporate park, a school, even a new City Hall — with the project dubbed "Renaissance Rialto."
Lewis-Hillwood Rialto LLC, a combination of the Upland-based Lewis Group of Companies that developed Victoria Gardens and Hillwood, which developed all of the non-aviation space at San Bernardino International Airport, agreed to eventually buy more than 500 acres of what would be the 1,400-acre Renaissance Rialto development.
Early on, the developer agreed to take on all the costs.
Rialto would get paid for the land and share in the profits of development. But the economy inspired a shift in responsibilities as well as a scaled back plan. The two sides were in the midst of negotiating a new agreement when redevelopment went away.
The standstill and uncertainty now is in stark contrast to the speed at which plans and agreements were falling into place between 2005 and 2007, including moving Westpac Restorations, one of the largest tenants at the airport, to Colorado Springs, Colo., at a cost of close to $10 million.
"In 2008, the door shut," Steel said, referring to the economic downturn.
Lewis-Hillwood has spent more than $30 million relocating tenants and securing land entitlements among other costs, "and we are still excited about moving forward," said Executive Vice President Randall Lewis in an email. The city's redevelopment agency has spent about $8.4 million paying back Lewis-Hillwood for some of the costs.
The pay-off was expected to more than make up for the spending. Rialto was poised to make at least $26 million from land sales, not counting a share of profits from the development, as a result of the airport's closure.
The amount the city's redevelopment agency ultimately agreed to pay the San Bernardino International Airport Authority to take on its tenants before the development stalled: $49.5 million.
Recently, negotiations have been revived to move the San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department to San Bernardino airport. The agency brought its helicopters and planes to Rialto airport in 1978 and has since outgrown its 20,000 square feet of space. Capt. Jeff Rose said the department could use 65,000 square feet.
The hangar at San Bernardino airport could cost an estimated $8.7 million. A large part — $4.2 million — would come from the city of Rialto when it sells airport property to pay for relocation costs. In prior plans, the Sheriff's Department agreed to pay $1 million, and San Bernardino airport's related Inland Valley Development Agency which oversees redevelopment of former Norton Air Force Base property would cover the rest of the cost and recoup what was spent by leasing the building back to the county for at least 25 years. More than a year ago, the San Bernardino airport authority approved — in concept — to build the space.
Under a new proposed plan, the city of Rialto would pay a $375,000 cash down payment — an advance on the $4.2 million — toward the design of the new hangar. The remainder would still be paid from land sales, if and when that happens. It's a risk because Rialto would only pay the rest if the land is sold, Steel said.
"Now, we've got a few more potholes in front of us," he said.
Gas prices could double if Iran acts to close the Strait of Hormuz to oil-tanker traffic near the beginning of next year, cutting global economic growth by more than 25%, a leading energy-consulting firm says.
Iran lacks the military might to close the strait for long, but it may be able to disrupt global oil supplies for up to three months by laying mines in the 6-mile-wide shipping passage that the U.S. and its allies would have to find and remove, analysts at IHS Global Insight said on a conference call with reporters Wednesday. About 17 million barrels of oil a day pass through the strait, or nearly 20% of the global market.
Brent crude oil prices could briefly hit $240 a barrel in the first quarter of 2013, said Sara Johnson, senior research director for Global Economics at IHS. Brent, the benchmark European oil, which IHS uses as a proxy for global prices, closed at $123.07 in London Thursday. In the U.S., West Texas Intermediate, the benchmark U.S. crude oil, closed at $105.35 a barrel.
Prices could stay as high as $160 in the second quarter before reverting to somewhere around $120, she said. The firm forecast that such an oil shock could bring back gas lines in much of the world, and shave global economic growth next year to 2.6% from a current forecast of 3.6%.
"If it did hit $240, you're looking at about a doubling of where gas prices are now," said Jim Burkhard, managing director of the global oil group at IHS CERA, the firm's energy-research arm. "And the U.S. is at $4."
Closing the strait probably wouldn't be in Iran's best interests, but its leadership often fails to act in ways that Westerners consider rational, said Farid Abolfathi, senior director of the IHS Risk Center. The firm's analysis assumes the strait would be closed at the start of 2013, as Iran reacts to pressure to stop development work on nuclear weapons.
Sheikh Sabah al-Ahmad al-Sabah, the ruler of Kuwait, said on state media Tuesday that Iran had assured its neighbor it would not close the strait, despite its public threats to do so.
IHS' energy-related forecasts attract attention because of the reputation of Daniel Yergin, chairman of the IHS CERA division, formerly known as Cambridge Energy Research Associates. Yergin's books include the best-seller The Quest, about the evolution of energy markets since the end of the Cold War, and 1993's The Prize, a Pulitzer Prize-winning history of the oil industry.
The firm's outlook is gloomier than some economists' assumptions. In an interview earlier this month, Moody's Analytics chief capital markets economist John Lonski said U.S. gasoline prices would reach $4.75 a gallon if Iran closed the strait.
The impact would be so large because global oil supplies are so tight, said Burkhard. The world has only 1.8 million to 2.5 million barrels a day of unused production capacity, down from 6.2 million in 2009.
Tight inventories magnify the impact of any interruption in crude from nations around the strait, he said. Much Iranian crude has already been taken off world markets because of international sanctions.
If gas prices doubled, consumers could spend an extra $145 a month for gasoline, said Nigel Griffiths, chief economist at IHS Automotive.
Riverside County must supervise nearly 450 more state parolees than first expected under a state law that shifts responsibility for low-level offenders to local authorities, the county’s chief probation officer said Tuesday.
Under the law, known as public-safety realignment or AB 109, Riverside County had expected to oversee 1,688 parolees this year, Chief Alan Crogan told supervisors.
But based on the actual number from October through January, that total is expected to grow to 2,136 by June 30, Crogan said.
Since the program began Oct. 1, Crogan said some early assumptions — including the number of parolees — are proving untrue.
For instance, many of the parolees are classified as low-level offenders, Crogan said. But that is only for their most recent crime, he said.
“Many of them have substantial history of violence in their background,” Crogan said. “This just happens to be the last crime that they committed. We are seeing a much higher-risk group of people.”
Those criminal histories and the higher estimate of parolee numbers add to concerns local officials have long had about whether the state will provide enough money for counties to adequately supervise the parolees.
Under realignment, counties take jurisdiction over inmates released from state prison whose most recent crimes were classified as nonserious, nonviolent and, for sex offenders, non-high risk. In addition, those newly convicted of those same crimes would serve their sentences in county jails rather than state prison.
All of it is part of a statewide plan to meet a federal court order to reduce California’s prison population by 33,000 inmates over the next two years.
The state provided the county about $21 million to fund the program for six months this year. Crogan said the estimated cost for a full year will top $44 million.
Gov. Jerry Brown’s fiscal 2012-2013 budget proposal includes $842.9 million to help pay for realignment statewide, Crogan said. Riverside County’s portion is estimated at $53 million, he said.
Still, without a constitutional guarantee for the funding, Crogan and other county officials remain concerned whether the state will come through with the money next year.
“There are some significant challenges,” Crogan said of implementing the realignment program.
Crogan’s comments came Tuesday as supervisors approved a final plan for the realignment program. The discussion on the number of parolees overseen by local officials moved into a debate on how the county should increase its jail capacity to handle the influx.
The county’s jails are 97percent full. As of Jan. 20, 402 people had been sentenced to jail who normally would have gone to state prison. Another 586 people are serving jail time combined with supervised release, such as home detention.
Supervisor Jeff Stone pressed Sheriff Stan Sniff on what option for increasing jail space he prefers and which would be the most efficient: a large regional jail or expanded facilities in Indio and French Valley.
The county last year backed away from a plan to build a 2,000-bed, $300 million regional jail in Whitewater and decided to focus on enlarging existing jails. Future expansions at the regional jail called for as many as 7,200 beds.
The county currently has 3,904 jail beds.
“Right now, I am kind of like a tin cup,” Sniff said. “Any additional capacity will help us.”
But when pressed by Stone, Sniff said the Sheriff’s Department prefers a new, larger jail in the middle of the county.
