Rialto City Public Works Department Targets Businesses & Schools

11 Jun 2015 3 Comments

by rialto-now in Budget, Ca, City of Rialto, Currupt, Ed palmer, Ed Scott, Inland Empire, Rialto, Rialto, Rialto Fire, Rialto Parks, Rialto Police Department, RUSD, Shawn O'Connell, Water Tags: , , , ,

Rialto Water con 2

Tuesday June 9th at the regular city council meeting Robert Eizenbiez and his staff laid out a confusing and hard to understand plan on how to deal with water restrictions sent down by Governor Jerry Brown. Mr. Eizenbiez a new Public Works Director to Rialto is new to his job here but not new to public service working in the largest California city to file for bankruptcy San Bernardino as an engenier and as an interim Public Works Director. City Council moved the public works presentation up to the June 9th meeting as they were waiting for over a month to hear why they should approve harsh regulations on the community of Rialto when no presentation has ever been made? Councilman O’connell said at a past meeting that he would like to see a healthy education component before they started attacking the community. Councilman Palmer wanted to see language like no watering during high winds and no watering after measureable rain for 48 hours better outlined and Councilman Scott wanted to know why we had a green lawn ordnance if we are now telling people not to water their lawns?

Very few of these questions were answered but we did learn that the city will be asking you to do their job for them and turn in your neighbors via a mobile app that could be located online. Rialto Public Works Department is touting awesome numbers in getting the message out to Rialto water customers their first workshop in March 2015 had 45 people the workshop had 70 people. Ron a local business owner who watched the meeting online said “So a city of 200,000 people an increase of 25 people shows success?” The Rialto Public Works presentation did say that people are calling about rebate programs but are saying the the rebates are too low and don’t provide enough to accomplish the goals that were set. Local marketing professionals and Political Activists say that the rebates are just there to get you to purchase new items you can’t afford. Anthony from Rialto Watch Dogs says “take the Weather based irrigation timers they only give you a $100 rebate yet a inexpensive unit that isn’t reliable will cost you $200 and that’s not including the other materials or labor to install the unit.” Even the Public Works presentation stated that rialto water customers are saying that the $350 max rebate for turf removal doesn’t do much.

Rialto Public Works Department also stated that they will be TARGETING Schools and Local Businesses in an effort to force the 28% water reduction that the Governor laid out in his latest drought plan. The public works Department Presentation says it will begin with education but they can and will levy fines of $100 to $500 for each offense in addition to monetary fines Rialto Water can install water restrictive flow device or shut off the water.

The city of Riverside has sued a state agency over water restrictions intended to combat the drought, claiming the rules are unfair because the city has ample groundwater supplies. The Southern California city argues it has been unfairly ordered to cut water use by 24 percent even though it has groundwater supplies for four years and does not rely on any imported water, according to the lawsuit filed Thursday in Fresno County Superior Court. Riverside, a city of 317,000 people, wants to be allowed to cut water consumption by 4 percent along with some jurisdictions in Northern California that rely on surface water supplies, the suit said. (http://abc7.com/news/riverside-sues-over-california-water-restrictions/776794/ )

Why does it appear that Riverside cares more about their residents than Rialto? Rialto’s City Attorney will attack a citizens right to FREE speech but not protect the communities right to not be unfairly attacked by over reaching legislation.

We made calls to Clarence Mansell the General Manager of Rialto Water Services & Robert Eizenbiez the Public Works Director for the City of Rialto. Calls to Rialto Water Services were not returned but Robert Eizenbiez did talk to us click here http://wp.me/p1Otmn-Da to see what he had to say.

Local people in the City of Rialto are kinda tired of rialto trying to build the plane while in mid flight. This means it seems like every project is thrown together and the community gets to suffer while they feel their way around ill conceived poorly planned ideas.

What are your thoughts on this ordinance?  Comment below or email us at rialtonw@aol.com

Rialto City Council Addresses Cuba & A $500,000 Giveaway

24 Mar 2015 Leave a comment

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March 24th at 6pm Rialto City Council will address many issues on the nights agenda. The public will be given an opportunity to see five presentations, three more approvals for more training, discussion on Fireworks and a $500,000 giveaway. If you only attend a few Council Meetings this one will be one you don’t want to miss here is what we see are the highlights:

Presentations & Proclamations:

Out of the five items under this heading we see three that stand out.

  • Rialto resident Don Griggs as Assembly Member Brown’s 2015 Unsung Hero.
  • Cuba Sister City Presentation
  • Introduction of new Rialto Police Officers

There are a lot of questions over the Mayor and Councilmember Scott pushing Rialto into a position that should be left up to our Federal Government. Also it will be nice to meet the three new police officer that Rialto recently graduated from the academy.

Consent Calendar & Miscellaneous:

The Consent Calendar is the place where large amounts of money is spent, more and more people are being sent to travel all over the country on the cities dime and policy can be changes without a serious vote. Items to watch for include:

  • $23,213.95 for purchase of office furniture for Rialto Police Detectives.
  • Travel request for City Clerk Barbara McGee.
  • Travel request to Vegas for two planning commissioners.

The office furniture for the Rialto Police Detectives what is a problem is $67,935 is being spent from within the Miscellaneous portion of the agenda. Many times this portion is quickly approved with little oversight so unless someone catches an item that is not in line with the communities needs. The travel on the other hand is getting out of control once again. Two years ago a special audit was done to find that Rialto officials were abusing travel in regards to public funds. The two years following travel has been at a minimum and under control. Now that Ed Scott is back on council it seems every single agenda has travel requests inside. We can’t afford to fix our own water system without jacking up water rates or fix our roads but we can spend thousands to send elected officials all over the country.

Tab Items:

This is a longer meeting agenda with 12 tab items this meeting won’t be short by any means. This agenda includes a discussion of Fireworks Enforcement in the city of Rialto, a $500,00 one time giveaway, road contracts and a contract to develop an affordable housing project.

Fireworks in Rialto are out of control and for some reason the city claims to be doing more but the community never sees any results. Last year there was talk of more money and resources that were utilized to reduce illegal Firework use. Even though the police and fire departments held their heads high our community suffered. Veterans suffer from serious reactions to the popular 4th of July activity as seen here in this news story.

The addition of Safe And Sane fireworks was to replace the aerial Fireworks that can be so dangerous. So when people decide to stay home from the major aerial displays they should not have to be bombarded with fireworks falling on their heads and military grade explosives shaking their homes. Many of the people who complain year after year have the same people breaking the fireworks law each year yet police seem to not be able to get them in line. Last year the community was further insulted by the addition of a special hotline where senior citizens that could not hear you or understand you feilding calls. Police dispatch would transfer you or just hang up!!!!! The main reason they give for not being able to shut them down is we can’t prove that they have illegal fireworks because they put them away when we arrive. So how are they going to cite property owners for what they claim they can’t see?

  • One time $500,000 give back.

For those employees that gave and sacrificed during the tough years of Rialto recovering from the housing recession the city is going to show them that their efforts did not fall on blind eyes well almost all employees. FULL TIME employees that are not currently on probation will receive a one time bonus.

Rialto City currently has 134 part time employees & 268 full time employees that are eligible for this one time bonus of 1,838.62.  If employees have been with the city for less than 1 year as a full time employee ( which means you are on probation), they would not be eligible for the bonus.

This comes from six departments (excluding the City Administrator, City Attorney, City Treasurer and City Clerk.  They are Police, Fire, Development Services, Administrative and Community Services, Management Services & Public Works. City Council, City Treasurer, City Clerk, City Attorney, City Administrator and department heads will not be receiving  the bonus.

Why are the Part Time employees being overlooked? We reached out to Councilman Shawn O’connell and asked this very question. His response was that the original reason to give this to full time employees is they took pay cuts, paid more towards retirement & paid more for their benefits to help the city in a hard time. What people who have not worked in todays part time environment is we have part time staff doing the work of a full time staffer. When full time staff get squeezed full time staff dumps more work on an already underpaid, under compensated part time staff member. Also Rialto part time staff are at the lowest end of the pay scale. Rialto part time staff make minimum wage and climb up a small payscale ladder very, very slowly. Many of the people we depend on the most daily are part time staff from recreation, child services and senior center staff are part time but we count on them to provide us with top notch professional service.

  • Road Contracts

There are two different road contracts on the agenda tonight. What makes this stand out is Monday their was a information meeting for a road contract and it appears nobody was notified until after it was already started. Proving once again Rialto is behind in notifying the community.

  •  New affordable housing projects

TAB Seven is a request to give some select companies access and ability to build a new low income project in the city of Rialto. Watch tonight as certain people are connected to these companies that may not be illegal but they look really bad and raise some serious questions.

These are the items that stand out to us here at Rialto Now but this is in no way a complete list of the entire agenda. We encourage everyone to go to http://www.rialtoca.gov and look at the entire agenda for themselves.

Video by rialto-now

City Council Meeting Items To Watch For

24 Feb 2015 Leave a comment

by rialto-now in Ca, Rialto Tags: , , , , ,

Yes today is yet another Council Meeting brought to you by the Rialto City Council. This new council session has not kicked off in a smooth manner. The first meeting of 2015 was kicked off by community members being skipped when they submitted intention to speak on given items, council member yell at community members when campaign contributions were brought into the conversation and transparency has gone from a goal to a joke among a majority of the seated council.

Set Public Hearing

D.2 is a public hearing to adopt another landscape and lighting district. We anticipate Mayor Robertson having to step aside on this one because she lives so close to one of the districts. Public Hearing will be held March 10th.

Miscellaneous

E.3 & E.4 are items having to do with the payments to the escrow accounts for the FAILED WATER DEAL of the Century. We have a team combing over past documents and have yet to get to these yet.

E.7 is yet more traveling requests that we doubt anyone but us are willing to question. Mr. Scott has been on council less than 3 months & has had travel requests on the agenda that have included him almost every single time. Also for some reason Mr. Scotts travel costs exceed the Mayors on this trip to Lake Arrowhead. The destination is only labeled as a City-County Conference and nothing else. What is most interesting is it looks like for this travel opportunity they will be going back in time. As you can see below it appears they are traveling from March 26th and going back to March 17th:

Council Travel

 

If they can’t fill out a simple form right should we trust them to speak on behalf of 100,000 people?

E.8 So it looks like the most expensive Jazz Fest to hit the IE is now requesting their Liquor license. The event online shows ZERO tickets sold and no performers slated to preform:

RIALTO "DROP IN" JAZZ FESTIVAL Rialto, California – February 10, 2015 - In appreciation of International Jazz Month, the City of Rialto will be hosting the 3rd Annual “Drop in” Jazz Festival, presented by Mayor Deborah Robertson. Intertwining jazz and art, this one day festival will take place on Saturday, April 25, 2015, beginning at 12 noon inside Frisbie Park, 598 E. Easton St. Rialto, CA 92376. The festival will showcase a wide array of jazz talent with performances and activities that feature an “All-Star” band, smooth R&B, the City’s finest food vendors and a wine and beer garden. Cost: Payment required - $85/General Admission $135/VIP $500/Cabana

Online the tickets start out at:

RIALTO “DROP IN” JAZZ FESTIVAL

“Rialto, California – February 10, 2015 – In appreciation of International Jazz Month, the City of Rialto will be hosting the 3rd Annual “Drop in” Jazz Festival, presented by Mayor Deborah Robertson. Intertwining jazz and art, this one day festival will take place on Saturday, April 25, 2015, beginning at 12 noon inside Frisbie Park, 598 E. Easton St. Rialto, CA 92376. The festival will showcase a wide array of jazz talent with performances and activities that feature an “All-Star” band, smooth R&B, the City’s finest food vendors and a wine and beer garden. Cost: Payment required – $85/General Admission $135/VIP $500/Cabana”

Rialto Jazz Fest Flyer

Now the city flyer shows lots of acts and old celebrities and a different general admission price so once again the right hand doesn’t know what the left is doing. I am not against music or raising money, what gets me is when a Neighborhood Watch Association wanted to bring a Skateboard event for local youth to their park the city shut them down and forced them to move it far away from their community. They did this under the guise that they could not use a majority of a public park for something other than its intended purpose. Last time I checked Frisbee Park was not a Concert Hall. Three quarters of the park is sports fields. So once again the rules only apply to the community but not the elected officials.

Tabs Unfinished Business

TAB 2 looks like the city wants to spend 1.3 million to expand the Metrolink station parking lot. Sounds like a lot to me but what I want to see happen tonight is the council send a message to the Contractor that their will be no last minute increases to the cost. As has happened with the In & Out retail pad and the Rails to Trails project we end up spending hundreds of Thousands of Dollars in last minute costs.

TAB 4-6 have to do with the Water & Waste Water Concession agreement for the last few months and the next six months.

We need to watch, engage and make our voices heard Rialto!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

 

Rialto City Council Meeting Update

30 Jan 2015 Leave a comment

by rialto-now in Budget, Ca, city attorney, City of Rialto, Colton, Crime, davidsMarketing, Deborah Robertson, Ed palmer, Ed Scott, Inland Empire, Joe Baca Jr, Mike Story, Public Safety, Rialto, Rialto, Rialto Fire, Rialto Police Department, Ron Pharris, San Bernardino, Shawn O'Connell, Veolia Tags: , ,

Hello Rialto Now readers and fans. If you were watching from the audience or watching on TV it looks like every council meeting will go on and on no matter how short the agenda may appear. This meeting had six tab items in total and even had one pulled and at 9pm they only moved through half of the tab items.

Consent Calendar

Two items were pulled from the Consent Calendar for seperate approval or vote.

C.1 the regular city council meeting minutes from the meeting January 13th 2015 had a seperate vote and Councilman Ed Palmer voted no. We plan to reach out to Councilman Palmer this weekend and find out why he voted no on these minutes and we will update so stay tuned.

E.4 was pulled to explain that the City Treasurer wanted approval from the City Council to allow a few select investments go beyond the 5 year maturity limit to retain maximum benifit and a larger profit.

Tab Items & Public Hearings

Tab.1 was approving the ability to move forward with the Lytle Creek Development project. the developers need approval from the City to present the anexation application to the Local Agency Formation Commission for San Bernardino County this project in its entirety consitsts of 4 neighborhoods. Neighborhoods two and three will be anexed to the city of Rialto and Neighborhoods one and four will remain in the county of San Bernardino. Now let me first say I am not a fan of this project it has destoryed Rialto’s Country Club Area & Golf Course as well as extremely reduced property values in the Country Club Area. Nonetheless the developer has spent years and money going through stall tactics and lawsuits to finally get to this point. It appeared that even though there were questions about the real intentions of the project it was going to be approved to recive county approval, that is until Councilman Ed Scott spoke up. Councilman Ed Scott stated that since the developer had not come to him and meet with him privatly that he wanted to table this vote for two weeks. So this will be the second time just two months into a four year city council term that Councilman Ed Scott wants to delay things because he is unprepared. Also why should a developer be having special secret meetings with City Council Members? I know Councilman Ed Scott took alot of money from developers to get elected and that is one of the many reasons that I feel uncomfortable with Councilman Ed Scott acting as the Gate Keeper to Development here in Rialto. Councilman Shawn O’Connell had no problem voting to continue the item for two weeks but did say that when he has a question on an agenda item he calls city staff prior to the meeting and gets answers verses dropping them on staff in the meeting and creating delays. Councilman Ed Plamer said that this action has been delayed for far to long and voted no on continuing the issue for two more weeks.

Tab.2 was to approve one of the many warehouses that will be dropped in the city of Rialto. Niagra Bottling Company wants to bring a $200,000,000.00 bottling and packing warehouse to the Renaissance plan development operated by Niagra Bottling Company. Below is a image of the many diffrent companies they bottle and create water for:

20150127_200637As you see they bottle water for alot of different  companies and they have a history of giving back. Thier were questions if they would add language holding the city of Rialto Harmless form any actions this project would ensue. I was unsure why they said that until I began reciving phone calls apperently WVWD and City of Colton are suing Niagara becuase they are taking too much water from the Basin appreently. That dosen’t bother me much they need to get the water from somewhere so I can buy it from Costco. Makes me wonder though how can Niagara turn nasty IE water into what I love to drink???? Oh this is the Tab item where Councilman Ed Scott tried to make it sound like he was the only one that executives from Niagara Bottling reached out to. It wasn’t until Councilman Shawn O’Connell said that the Niagara Reps reached out to all of the Council and Mayor.

Tab.3 was yet another warehouse in Rialto and though its going to bring jobs its also going to bring problems like increased truck traffic large buildings that normally have empty streets that attract street racing, drug use/sales and opportunities for other elicit behaviors. What is even worse is that this warehouse will be giving extra sales tax revenue to………. ONTARIO!!!!!! Yes our city has been working on this project for almost 10 years and have yet to figure out how to work a sales tax benifit for Rialto but man o man we sure know how to send that tax money elsewhere. Maybe we need San Bernardino to come in and show us how to secure a tax base from warehouses.

Take what you wish from this weeks Council Meeting but I think its time we show up more often and keep their eye on the ball.

Can’t make the council meetings follow us on Twitter and get the high points of each meeting we cover.

http://www.twitter.com/rialtosnow or #rialtocitycouncil

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What’s on tap in Rialto this week

26 Jan 2015 Leave a comment

by rialto-now in Ca, davidsMarketing, Rialto Tags: , , , ,

Being plugged in is very important to a healthy thriving community. Here at Rialto Now we are here to fill the gap that the print media leaves by not adequetly covering Rialto and to act as a education tool for the community.

This week is a busy week here in the city of Rialto. There are opportunities to get information from regular meetings and then we have some special meetings and events coming up this week. Here is a list of what’s going on this week:

Monday – Area Command Meeting Area’s 3 & 4: January 26, 2015 – St. Catherine of Siena Church, 339 N. Sycamore Avenue, 7:00 – 8:30 pm. For additional information please contact Lieutenant Bill Wilson at 909-421-7276 or email to wwilson@rialtopd.com / Lieutenant Jim Kurkoske at 909-820-2568 or email to jkurkoske@rialtopd.com.

Tuesday – Rialto City Council Meeting

Wednesday – Rialto’s Certified Farmers’ Market is held every Wednesday, 10:00 am – 2:00 pm. Farmers’ Market is located at City Hall where vendors sell a variety of fresh vegetables, fruits and nuts at a reasonable cost to consumers. Come out and see what our local growers have to offer.

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Thursday – Mayor Deborah Robertson and City Council invite Rialto residents to attend the first community forum of 2015 on Thursday, January 29, 2015, from 6:30 to 8:30 pm. The meeting will be held in the City Hall Council Chambers located at 150 South Palm Ave. City Department Heads will be available to receive comments and answer questions from the residents. Mayor Robertson and City Council are looking forward to candid dialog with community members to help understand and take into consideration perspectives from residents as the City Council prepares for the 2015/2016 Fiscal Year. Mayor Robertson and the City Council understand the success of the City of Rialto is directly related to meeting the needs of our community. Come share your thoughts on issues that matter to you and our community. For additional information, contact Angela Perry or Pam Kennedy at (909) 421-4991, or visit our website at http://www.rialtoca.gov.

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Saturday – On January 31, 2015, the City is hosting it’s first annual Rialto Police Officer Memorial 5K Run/Walk. This event takes place at the Rialto Police Department, 128 N. Willow Avenue, Rialto, CA on the south lawn. Sign ups begin at 7:00 am and the Race starts at 8:00 am. An awards ceremony and festivities will take place after the race. Please click here to register.

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Follow all that is going on with rialto on our Facebook Page http://www.facebook.com/rialtonow

Rialto Residents Weigh In On Broken Promises Tuesday

26 Jan 2015 1 Comment

by rialto-now in Ca, City of Rialto, Currupt, Inland Empire, Rialto, Rialto Tags: , , , ,

Airport

At this weeks City Council Meeting Rialto Residents will be able to voice their thoughts on a variety of issues that require a public hearing. Tab 1 is the Lytle Creek Project that destroyed the beauty of the Country Club Area, Ruined Property Values and Removed the only golf course rialto had. Tab 2 & 3 are approvals to give away vital retail land to massive warehouses. The current landscape of warehouses brings rude truck drivers that refuse to obey simple traffic laws, higher crime and increased vandalism.

 

 

When the 210 Freeway was under construction the Rialto City Council placed a moratorium on building along the freeway and other cities built and now are reaping the benefits of a increased tax base. Rialto shuts down an airport to bring in more warehouses? How does that give the Rialto resident the ability to spend their money here versus taking it elsewhere.

People in the community please come out and demand that this city council finally keep its word to the residents of Rialto.

Final Rialto Candidate Forum Today

27 Oct 2014 Leave a comment

by rialto-now in Ca, city attorney, City of Rialto, Community Coalition, Crime, Currupt, Deborah Robertson, Ed Scott, In & Out, Inland Empire, Joe Baca Jr, Josef (Joe) Britt, Lillie Houston, Lynn Hirtz, Public Safety, RDA, Rialto, Rialto, Rialto Fire, Rialto Parks, Rialto Police Department, rialto unified school district, RUSD, Russel Sliva, SB Sun, SCAT, Shawn O'Connell, SWAT, Taxes, Veolia, Water, wwwstoprialtowaterratehikes.com, youth Tags: , , ,

The final candidate forum of the 2014 election year is today and will only highlight two of the may areas up for grabs on November 4th. The two areas that will be covered are City Council ( two seats open out of four candidates ) and Rialto Unified School Board ( two seats open with six people for the seats ). One interesting portion of this event is it appears Ed Scott will poke his head out and finally speak publicly on the race which he has primarily done through private fundraisers and mailers & signs. It will be nice to see a majority of the candidates out together and we can hear their view points at the same time. The event is at the Rialto Senior Center on South Riverside Ave. See flyer below for more info.

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City Council Meeting 9-23-14

23 Sep 2014 Leave a comment

by rialto-now in Ca, Rialto Tags: , , , ,

Tuesdays City Council meeting is more than just business as usual. There are some major issues to address especially when it comes to some issues with spending.

Request City Council to Approve Resolution No. 6641 for a

Professional Services Agreement Extension with ClientFirst for One

Year for $33,000 per Month to Provide Information Technology Systems

Services and Support for $396,000 and an additional $14,400 per

month for Project Management Services or an additional $172,800 per

year, for a total not to exceed of $568,800.

The First issue is with the company Client First and their contract with the city to run the website and IT services. Right now we pay them $33,000 a month and they would like to increase that an additional $14,400 a month giving them a total paid amount over 12 months of $568,800. So that’s more than half a million dollars to run the cities website? As someone who visits the cities website regularly and often I don’t think we’re getting our money’s worth. The website has failures all the time site is down information drops off and is lost and if it happens on a Friday good luck getting it fixed until Monday. So if money is important to you we need to pay attention to this item.

Request City Council to Adopt Resolution No. 6642 directing staff to

analyze the proposed Revisions to the Renaissance Specific Plan.

So years later after all the warnings from those of us in the community the city council is finally hearing the bad news, well sort of. Even though those of us in the community have known that Target is a far gone conclusion the contractors and some on the council refuse to see the writing on the wall. Those of us that have been fighting for a little common sense in putting this project together were constantly ignored in the early stages of this project by Ed Scott, Joe Baca, Deborah Robertson and Ed Palmer. Now it looks like the city is finally finding out this deal isn’t a sure thing. At an Area Command Meeting Joe Baca Jr said to the group that Target is still part of this deal. We have heard from many professionals in this area of work that Target was out of the deal years ago. If you attend or watch this meeting from home or online watch this one and the spin zone that will ensue. Also pay close attention to the three phase plans it goes from a dream to flooding Rialto with truck traffic and warehouse’s.

Request the City Council/Rialto Utility Authority to Approve a Final

Construction Work Authorization in the amount of $390,246 to Rialto

Water Services for the Recurring Capital Project (Meter Replacements),

Concession Agreement Capital Recurring Project WA.

We will leave you with Tab 7. This is yet another way that Rialto Water Services (Veolia) is skirting the water contract and not delivering what was promised. From the CIP we were supposed to receive 4000 water meters for just under $500,000 yet for $390,246 were only getting 1600. Really Rialto how much longer are we going to put up with super high water rates with no return on our money?????

Join us at city hall at 6pm for the council meeting or follow us on twitter at http://www.twitter.com/rialtosnow

Rialto Family Festival 2014 Event Re-Cap

22 Sep 2014 Leave a comment

by rialto-now in Assemblymember-Elect Cheryl Brown, Ca, City of Rialto, Community Coalition, davidsMarketing, Deborah Robertson, Inland Empire, Joe Baca Jr, Mike Story, Nieghborhood Watch, Public Safety, Rafael Trujillo, Rialto, Rialto, Rialto Fire, Rialto Police Department, Shawn O'Connell, SWAT, tennis, youth Tags: , , , , ,

Hello Rialto Now Readers hos is everyone on this fine September day? Who went to Rialto’s Family Festival? Well we did and it was quite an amazing time 2nd only to National Night Out. There was literally something for everyone. There were 2 stages, over 50 vendors, kids fun zone, carnival style food court and police K9 demonstrations.

Rialto Police K9 Cars

Rialto Police K9 Cars

With the election so close this event was full of people looking for your vote in November. From Rialto Unified School Board, City Council, Community College Board and even congress the vote stumping was in full force. We were able to put together a nice collage for you of some of the VIP action at the event.

Included in this photo are David Phillips, Joseph Williams, Deborah Robertson, Lynn Hirtz & Cheryl Brown

Included in this photo are David Phillips, Joseph Williams, Deborah Robertson, Lynn Hirtz & Cheryl Brown

This event was full of cool and interesting vendors and they were spread wide and far. This event took over the entire Civic Center.

From the top running right to left we have Market Solutions Services, Russell Silva for School Board, Kiwanas Finger Print Station, Joe Britt for City Council, Mad Jakes Kettle Corn, It Works & Shred Fest.

From the top running right to left we have Market Solutions Services, Russell Silva for School Board, Kiwanas Finger Print Station, Joe Britt for City Council, Mad Jakes Kettle Corn, It Works & Shred Fest.

These were not all of the vendors but just a taste. It was an amazing afternoon of information, resources and fun! Our hats go off to the City Clerk’s Office for pulling this one off.

Mayor Robertsons Trees of the Rialto Civic Center Map

Mayor Robertsons Trees of the Rialto Civic Center Map

Mayor Robertson still had her massive mini tent with seating and tables but she added some healthy games and a map of the many different types of trees and their uses. It was interesting and we can only guess that this was an attempt to silence critics of her hospitality booth last year. Many questioned the need for it or why it wasn’t a joint effort with the entire council? I too wait for the day when we can pool resources and work together to make a great representation of our local government. Maybe next year, with that being said the mayor was very nice and hospitable.

 

We had a booth were we helped the Rialto Community Coalition http://www.facebook.com/rialtocoalition do surveys on Prescription Drug Disposal and we had sponsors from the Ontario Improv comedian Mel Austin from Squeaky Clean Comedy http://ontario.improv.com/event.cfm?id=316184 , Divine Creativity http://www.facebook.com/divinecreativity from Fontana & Paul Chabot http://www.paulchabot.com/

Rialto Squeaky Clean

Rialto City Council Tells Residents We Need Your Money

26 Jul 2014 Leave a comment

by rialto-now in Budget, Ca, City of Rialto, Currupt, Deborah Robertson, Ed palmer, Inland Empire, Joe Baca Jr, Mike Story, Rialto, Shawn O'Connell Tags: , , ,

On Tuesday there was a public hearing to allow residents to voice thier concerns over a series of rate increases on home owner trash rates. The first set of rates were ANTICIPATED rate increases at the San Bernardino County Landfills & a reduction of compenstation Burtecc the cities contracted refuse hauler recives from shipping our recycling materials to China. The second was a highly contriversal Road Repair Tax that would raise money to do over $53 million in backlogged street repairs that the City and Council have refused to address.

There were many people speaking out against the rate increases and the tax but it appears the city council didn’t care and came in with thier minds made up already. One resident pointed out that factoring everything together the rates were increasing 30% and that was highway robbery. June Hayes a Utilities Commisioner said she was tired of the city nickel and diming the resdents she was speaking manily to the Road Repair Tax as she has a long close relationship with the cities trash hauler and its manager Riachard Nino who was in attendance but did not speak on this issue.

The study that Public Works Director Marcus Fuller used to draft this tax was a study done by the City of Redlands. Marcus Fuller stated that the study was done to show the amount of damage trash trucks caused to city streets. Mr. Fuller didn’t come right out about who did the study it was long time city resident David Phillips that pointed out that Redlands did the study and looked at the damage and then decided NOT to leavy this tax on thier residents. Mr. Phillips attacked the Road Repair Tax and pointed out the diffrences between Rialto & Redlands. Mr. Phillips asked the City Council to send Mr. Fuller back to the drawing board and get his hands out of the residents pockets.

Council asked Mr. Fuller if Redlands implemented this Tax on thier residents and Mr. Fuller said “no Rialto would be the first in the state of California to approve such a tax”. This isnt the first time Rialto City Officals have used Redlands as a template for Rialto policies. Earlier in the year the Beautification Committee used redlands business beautifications and advertising codes to draft thier plan for Rialto. The two cities are beyond different and should not be used as a template for Rialto City policies especially when it comes to taxing the community at large.

Mr. Fuller was asked if this rate increase was at Burttec’s request and he said no that this was being brought by the city alone. So what does Mr. Fuller do right after the vote to approve his illegal tax on residents? He runs outside to have a secret pow wow with Richard Ninos from Burttec. Hmm so why was it so important to have that conversation? Redlands is smart they have people sitting in council that want to be re-elected and a mayor running for a second time for Congress. They decided to not levy this TAX on their residents because they know that such an action would do considerable damage to their future political aspirations.

Both Ed Palmer and Shawn O’Connell were in full support of taxing the residents because they saw no other way of dealing with the massive amount of ignored street repairs. Mayor Robertson made no noteable comments on this issue. Joe Baca Jr. wanted to wait until after his re-election to vote on this issue and since that was not favorable he voted no, Lynn Hirtz looked at it in a different way. She saw the Road Repair Tax was nessicary way to begin tackling the mountain to road repairs but want to see if it was acctually going to bring in the expected revenues or be a failed method of dealing with the problem at hand. So she made a motion that they move forward with the 5 years of rate increses and approve the Road Repair Tax for one year so they could look at how the program was working and if it was needed. This was the favorable choice and this motion passed 4-1.

Outside after the public hearing many residents stood baffled by the lack of understanding and willingness to listen to the community. Residents asked Mr. Fuller outside of the meeting how much of thier money would it take to subside his hunger for thier pennies and dimes. Mr. Phillips asked Mr. Fuller if he should just sign over his paycheck every month (refering to the Public Works Directors constant money grabs and failed ability to properly bid contracts and waste tax payer dollers). Many of the residents outside the meeting were newer residents and had many questions and blamed actions like this on the reason why mistrust for elected officals was at an all time high.

So Rialto puts $1.5 million each year into road maintenance and this new tax will put out $600,000 the first year and by 2018 it will bring in $4.9 Million a year. As of today we are $53 Million Dollars in the hole with unaddressed road repairs that just isn’t going to cut it. This is like having a glass of water and throwing it at a raging fire its just not going to cut it.

The funny part is the city leavys this tax on the public without a vote from residents but they will be asking us in November to allow them to leavy a heafty fee on the Tank Farms in the southern half of the city that will bring in a reported $5-$10 Million a year. So we ask you here this poll Question:

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