While your salary goes down, is your department head's going up?

The Riverside City Council is having its bi-weekly council meetings that it holds during the summer months and per usual, it packs a crowded agenda of items including six public hearings and three discussion items including this one about the use of Fox Theater.


The city council through Councilman Steve Adams, the ex-police officer who retired after hurting his leg in the line of duty or playing basketball depending on who you ask, is honoring three Riverside Police Department officers, Frank Hoyos, Silvio Macias, and Henry Parks (who's the first Korean speaking officer hailing from Rialto Police Department). It's not clear what they're being honored for but it's very ironic that the city council has chosen to honor its city police officers when at least 80 of them haven't received their bonus or step up pay. Are any of these three officers included on the list? And it's ironic that it's honoring city employees even as some department heads have threatened to layoff employees if they don't take the raises that are part of their MOU, including SEIU members who had a 2% raise that was to go in effect this summer as part of their last contract signed in the summer of 2006.

So Adams will be broadcast on Charter to city residents as bolstering his pro-law enforcement image by giving these awards but behind closed doors, what's his actions and those of others involving the issue of the bonus pay? Is he or the council advocating for that, or are they aware that allegations of threats by department heads about laying off employees have been floating around the city for months? Maybe, maybe not. The city council members who just hand the reins of the entire city government to their direct employees wouldn't have a clue. Those who are a little bit more active and remember their job responsibilities might be paying slightly more attention as they should be.


Rumor is that on Tuesday, July 22 at 6:30 p.m. city employees to protest an environment which has forced salary freezes and threatened layoffs on city employees while department heads and assistant cat city employees will be showing up at the city council meeting on Tuesday, July 14, at 6:30 p.m.


Why when salaries are being frozen for many employees and threats are allegedly being made, have department heads and assistant city managers among other management employees had their maximum ceilings for salary increased raised by up to 15% or even higher? In the middle of a recession, why weren't the ceilings for raises maintained at the same level or even dropped for these employees? Have any of these people gotten these raises (the city says no) and will they get them?


When the police chief signed a new five-year contract late last year, did he agree to a salary cut as one of the conditions? Did he get a salary increase? What about the new fire chief? Did he freeze his salary or take a pay cut?



My advice? Keep an eye on this situation for the rest of the year because why raise the ceiling on raises that can be authorized as being given unless you plan these salaries accordingly down the line? Why even think of doing so and then combine that with enough drive to go out and do it?

If your department head has received a salary raise while you and your other department members are taking salary freezes, cuts and not getting your bonus increases, this blogger would like to know. Contact information is at the top of the blog.


The Riverside County employees will be protecting by forming a human chain at the administrative headquarters in downtown Riverside to protest pay cuts there.





The library in Casa Blanca has been renovated.



(excerpt, Press Enterprise)



Redesigned and expanded the circulation desk with a 360-degree view and added shelving so patrons could access their reserved items themselves.

Created a niche in the back for donated materials and moved the photocopier out front. Recently, Ward 4 City Councilman Paul Davis contributed 500 DVDs worth $5,000 from his personal collection.

Maria Salazar, 33, and her two children, walk over at least three days a week. "I love it here," Salazar said in Spanish. "We use everything."

Her daughter, Karla Salazar, 15, completed homework at a computer. Her brother, Enrique Avalos Jr., 7, curled up in a chair with "The Ultimate Lego Book" while awaiting mime Mark Wenzel, the star of a recent event.

Littlefield said 600 youngsters signed up for the summer reading program. He started working at the original Casa Blanca Library -- just a tiny room with a patio -- a decade ago. The city demolished the building in 2000 and temporarily stashed the collection at Villegas Park while the new facility rose from the dust and plaster.

It now contains 50,000 books, videotapes and CDs, twice the number of the former library.

"We have people waiting outside at 10 o'clock," Garcia said. "And we don't open 'til 11."





Riverside County District Attorney Rod Pacheco has been invited to attend a meeting by the county's chapter of the SEIU.



(excerpt, Press Enterprise)



Service Employees International Union regional director Steve Matthews extended the invitation after receiving a letter from Pacheco seeking a better relationship with the union.

In the letter, Pacheco says he was misquoted by members who criticized him during county budget talks. He asked Matthews to agree not to let others pit his office and the union against one another.

"Clearly from the comments made by Mr. Pacheco, it would seem that he should be out there with us, and I would like to make a public invitation for him to join," Matthews said Friday.

Pacheco was on vacation until today and could not be reached about the invitation, said John Hall, spokesman for the district attorney's office.

SEIU Local 721 represents about 6,000 of the county's roughly 20,000 employees. The union is embroiled in contract negotiations with the county, which is seeking concessions as part of its leaner budget for this fiscal year.

Some union members have publicly criticized Pacheco for arguing against proposed across-the-board 10 percent budget cuts to all departments. Pacheco did not submit a budget that included the cuts requested by the county executive office.

"Our office is not a widget factory," Pacheco told supervisors at May 4 budget hearings. "Our office is not about processing cases to process cases. Our office is here to render justice, and if that means that something's in the way, we are going to go through it."



Because Pacheco's name was mentioned in the article, people are already starting to comment about it.


(excerpts)



SEIU members and union leaders must answer this question:

Did Pacheco's arrogant refusal to cut his bloated budget, and his outlandish demand for even more taxpayer money to fund his empire, result in the county demanding MORE money from the pockets of SEIU memebers?

If the answer to that question is yes, then Pacheco has a lot of fence-mending to do with the SEIU and their well-funded political action committee. And he better try and fool the SEIU into believing that he is their "friend," before the next election for DA in 2010.

By the way, if Pacheco does agree to march "hand-in-hand" with hardworking, underpaid, SEIU members, someone better keep an eye on his hands. Someone better make sure that one of Pacheco's hands is not patting SEIU members on their backs, as his other hand reaches deeper into their financially strapped pockets, to increase the size of his office and thereby further his own political ambitions.




The Union and Pacheco must go! Instead of public servants they are self-serving. Overpaying for services by government used to be called graft and corruption, now it is called "union contract" "prevailing wage" and "unfunded liabilities" (ponzi-scheme pensions). It is time to clean house.




Who's the toughest man alive? This Riverside Police Department officer who's been training for a world-wide competition.




The Press Enterprise Editorial Board is still pushing for that ethics commission planned in San Bernardino County. But it warns the county's officials not to water the process down in the process. The Board must have been keeping close tabs on what went on with the City of Riverside's attempts to disregard yet another public vote for a charter amendment by diluting the ethics process down there to something totally self-serving and meaningless.



(excerpt)

An effective commission would also need the power to investigate officials' actions, and authority to levy fines and penalties for violating ethics rules. A commission with no effective way to enforce the rules would merely waste time and money. And the penalties would need to be strong enough to deter misconduct.

But an ethics commission would not be enough to fix the county's shameful political culture. Ethics commissions focus on objective rules about campaign donations, gifts, lobbying and similar concerns. Those types of violations pale compared to the scandals that repeatedly have rocked San Bernardino County.

An ethics commission could not prevent top county officials from taking bribes, as happened in the 1990s. Nor could it prevent the county assessor from creating an unqualified executive staff that did political work at taxpayers' expense, as Bill Postmus did upon becoming assessor in 2007.

San Bernardino County needs to abandon a political tradition that puts self-interest ahead of the public good, favors well-connected insiders over taxpayers and uses government as a personal gravy train. County politicians should discard the longstanding attitude that official misconduct is only an issue when it threatens their particular agendas.

Proposals such as Derry's might help, if not watered down into meaninglessness. But neither an ethics commission nor a sunshine ordinance can change that pattern. The county will continue to see recurrent government scandals as long as the political community keeps enabling corruption.

That sounds majorly important but remember what happened in Riverside? What happened was one of the sadder stories of micromanagement that can be taken from City Hall's Era of Micromanagement.

As you recall, the Charter Review Committee in July 2004 recommended that Measure DD be placed on the ballot that if passed, would place language in the charter to bring an ethics code and complaint process to Riverside.


In November 2004, Measure DD passed with over 73% of the vote, which should have sent a loud message to the city government that this was something its constituents really wanted put in place. In January 2005, Section 202 was added to the city's charter and the process was put together through the help of a committee created of city residents from each ward.

And where can you find information about the ethics code on the city's Web site? On its front page? No, Hidden on the City Clerk's page. And you have to have Adobe Acrobat Reader on your computer to access it.

Here's the FAQS in English and the FAQS in Spanish. The resolution is also included on this page.



If you read the FAQS and the resolution, the problems with the whole process are readily apparent especially in terms of complaints filed against city council members or the mayor. Why? Because as you can see, the complaints go to the Mayor's Nomination and Screening Committee and who's on that committee? The mayor and three city council members. And yes, while members of that committee aren't allowed to hear complaints against them and other members are substituted in their place, the political dynamic is such that any city council member who's ever heard a complaint (and believe it or not of the complaints filed only one made it past the city attorney's office) is going to automatically side with the council member it's against, just as Councilwoman Nancy Hart did when hearing a complaint filed against former Councilman Dom Betro several years ago. The council members at least of that time were too politically dependent on each other for votes that they couldn't really challenge each other in any meaningful way.

The most interesting part of the complaint process which adds to the conflict of interest is that the city attorney's role was only meant to be in an advisory capacity yet the Mayor and Nomination Committee turned the entire process of judge and jury to City Attorney Gregory Priamos and he deftly through one weakly crafted excuse or another kept several complaints against Betro and Councilman Steve Adams from even making it to that committee. The Governmental Affairs Committee then chaired by Former City Councilman Frank Schiavone even had an impromptu meeting one July with Betro on board to change the rules midstream about when city officials could be subjected to complaints even though there was an active complaint against Betro in the pipeline. Self-serving quests and conflict of interest issues didn't get much more blatant than that.

Schiavone later last year tried to do the annual review of the ethics process without contacting board and commission chairs and the mayor as required by the ordinance. When the mayor found out about that, he insisted on redoing the entire process so they had ethics process take two, a week later. But then Schiavone was so confused by the language of the whole thing that when threatening Community Police Review Commission members, Chani Beeman and John Brandriff (with Brandriff remanded by Schiavone to three hours of "ethics" training with Priamos who among other things suggested he run for political office) essentially with opening their mouths in disagreement with the City Hall Agenda involving the CPRC, he said that ethics complaints filed against them would go directly to the Mayor's Nomination and Screening Committee when in actuality, they first go through a process with the CPRC and go to the latter committee (via the city clerk's office) only if they are not resolved. Well, maybe it wasn't ignorance as much as making (or changing) the rules as you go along which has definitely served to water down the ethics complaint process in Riverside much as it has done to the CPRC. And they have the assistance of Priamos as their legal representation because after all, the man wants to keep his job.

But the sordid history of Riverside's own flirtation with the ethics complaint process makes you more fully appreciate what the editorial board is asking for, and that's an independent commission to hear and decide all complaints. Exactly what Riverside needs but short of another charter initiative vote, will never, ever see. Our city will continue to serve as a proud model of how maintaining a checks and balance on ethics is not done.

But there's a silver lining in this cloud. Both Betro and Schiavone were sent packing by voters in part because of their attitudes involving how they handled the issue of ethics and the ethics complaint process. Something that the elected officials who would praise the virtue of the current nonaccountable ethics process to the ends of the city, should keep in mind. There are ethics complaint mechanisms outside the control of elected officials.



The recession may be heading towards its end towards the end of this year but not in the Inland Empire.




Twitter comes to Redlands!

Labor unrest at City Hall and what's the fate of Chinatown?

This notice states an invitation to the Riverside City Council meeting on July 14, at 6:30p.m. to speak out against what it says is the threats of supervisors in their departments to not accept raises or they get laid off. Their complaints won't likely be heard by certain elected officials on the dais (probably the ones beholden to City Manager Brad Hudson that are still left) unless they pack the chambers filled with people spilling out the doors but hopefully, if this is what is going on, someone will pay attention.

Members of the SEIU General Unit, the city's largest union, for example are up for the final 2% salary increase of their most recent MOU they had negotiated and entered into with the city and then there are the 80 or so police officers who haven't yet received their bonus or step up pay. If it's true that threats are being made, does it involve these employees or others? Isn't it interesting how this happens in our city all the time and yet, the city officials and their direct employees say in public certainly during election times how much they value and support their city employees? But you have to watch what happens behind the increasingly closed doors of City Hall often times to know the real story.

This comes in the wake of a recently circulated list of employees who had their maximum salary range that they can receive raised by up to 16% (for the police chief) in December 2008. The city claims that no one has received any of those raises but it's interesting that when the emphasis is on budget cuts and salary and employee freezes that anyone in the city actually had the inkling to want to raise these maximum salary levels of mostly management employees and department heads. The creation of these higher levels does mean that the door has been open for these raises to be given out and it would be easy enough to do that without many people even knowing it was being done. Ironic indeed if it does turn out that when no one is looking, department heads and management employees in the city manager's office do get raises and everyone else is told to take a salary cut or else.

Let's see. How many employees are being offered to have their maximum salary raises raised to being 15% higher so when they get raises in the future, that's what they might receive? And when the police chief received another five-year contract last December and the new fire chief got a contract recently, did their salaries stay the same as in being frozen, were they cut in light of the budget constraints or were they increased? What do you think?

And that's interesting considering that some say, the police department has many chiefs at its helm, not just one. One of them Hudson, put himself at the 9% increase level.

And speaking of such, has a single department head, management employee, the city manager, the city attorney or elected official for that matter even offered to take salary cuts that they appear to be imposing on other employees?

So far, that hasn't happened. After all, this is the same city that claims it's only laying off a minuscule number of city employees and some city departments have lost up or over 1/3 of their staff. But then again, if you're part-time, non-benefited and non-union, you're not a city employee unless you work in Corona and get laid off there.

But you never know, perhaps this Tuesday will be the day that Hudson and his subordinate employees and a department head or two stand up and offer to take the same pay cuts they want their employees to take just to keep their jobs. Miracles happen every once in a while, even in River City.






Speaking of money spent, the city has declared that 70% of Riverside Renaissance has been completed. But at least one city official and probably only one has concerns about the expenditures. The others should but in the past three or four years, they've pretty much turned the keys to most or all mechanisms of financial accountability from merging the finance department with the city manager's office to pretty much mothballing the finance committee, to City Manager Brad Hudson.



(excerpt, Press Enterprise)



As of May, finished work represented $216.7 million of the plan, projects under construction were projected at $271.9 million, and work either in design or out for bid was expected to cost $603 million, according to the most recent city figures available.

Hudson said bids have been coming in between 20 and 40 percent lower than expected on some projects. The city is using a combination of county, state, federal and private money, and its own dollars from bonds, electric, water and sewer funds, development fees and the proceeds from the sale of land and bonds.

"There's very little general fund debt associated with this program," Hudson said. "This program will not threaten the provision of public safety of other services in the future."

The costs of the Riverside Renaissance remain a concern to Councilman Paul Davis, who said right after his election last month that he wanted to take a closer look at city spending.

Davis said Thursday that he supports the city upgrade overall, but that the city needs to do more to anticipate costs and plan projects on the front end.

On some projects, he said, officials have decided part way through to alter the plans, which results in expensive change orders.

"Unfortunately the cost of those can be very devastating," Davis said.

He said he would rather see the savings from unexpectedly low bids spent on new projects rather than added costs for existing ones.





Both sides of the Chinatown debate were left scratching their heads over a judge's tentative ruling on a lawsuit filed involving the historical land site.



(excerpt, Press Enterprise)




In a move that encouraged preservationists, Judge Sharon Waters said she intended to rule that the Riverside County Office of Education did not follow state law governing sales of surplus public land when it agreed two years ago to sell the 2.3 acres to developer Doug Jacobs.

But on another issue, the tentative finding apparently favored the developer. Waters said it appears the city of Riverside did not violate state environmental laws when it approved the office building last year.
Story continues below

Waters did not say when she would issue final, written rulings. She kept in place a preliminary injunction that prevents construction of the medical building from moving forward.

A group called Save Our Chinatown Committee sued the city of Riverside and the Riverside County Office of Education to protect remnants of the historic Chinese settlement. Among other points, the group challenged the Office of Education's sale of the property and contended the city had not adequately considered alternatives that would better preserve artifacts buried on the land.

After the arguments in Riverside County Superior Court, some observers were unsure what will happen.

"It is disappointing that protecting an important historical place has to hang on the technicalities of surplus land laws," said Margie Akin, a member of the Chinatown committee.



San Bernardino County's Board of Supervisors are calling for the formation of an ethics board.


(excerpt, Press Enterprise)



Derry provided more details about the proposed ethics commission and the new proposal for a "sunshine ordinance" in a meeting with The Press-Enterprise editorial board Thursday. He also said he may take the latter idea to voters in a ballot measure if his colleagues on the Board of Supervisors reject it.

Last week's county grand jury report, which included a section on governmental reform that backed the establishment of an ethics commission, has provided fresh momentum to the proposal, Derry said.

He said he hopes the supervisors can begin discussions of the ethics commission within the next few months.

"We want to push it back to the front seat and get it moving," said Derry, who made forming an ethics commission part of his election platform last year.

The commission would be an independent panel of five members empowered to review the conduct of elected county officials and their staff and fine them for any campaign finance violations. Members would be randomly selected from applicants who meet a list of criteria and serve two- to four-year terms, Derry said.

He said the commission would have an annual budget of $500,000 and three staff members.




It almost appears as if Derry and the county are almost serious about tackling ethics issues in San Bernardino County government rather than playing at doing so like Riverside's city government has been by taking the will of the city's voters for an ethics code and complaint process and tailoring it to actually protect city officials from city residents filing complaints rather than having an accountable process for doing so.





The human resources director in Redlands has a lot to say about labor negotiations and concessions in that city.



(excerpt, Press Enterprise)



The offer by the Redlands Professional Firefighters Association to defer -- not give up -- previously negotiated pay raises due this year comes with an expectation that the current contract will be extended beyond its current expiration date, including the extension of a number of expensive benefits the council believes should be subject to negotiation.

The firefighters association offer as it currently stands provides minimal real savings to the city over the course of the contract extension. In addition, the deferral of pay raises in one fiscal year does not address the city's ability to fund those negotiated raises as they come due in subsequent years, especially if the current national economic crisis continues, as expected, for several more years.

Revealing or openly discussing negotiating strategies in public, as MacDuff apparently wants the council to do, can put one side or another at a disadvantage.

It is the reason labor negotiations are one of the areas (along with litigation, personnel matters and real estate negotiations) that the state's Ralph M. Brown Open Meeting Act specifies may be conducted by city councils in closed session, outside of the public eye.

While MacDuff forms erroneous conclusions based on necessarily limited information, residents should be assured that the City Council is actively engaged with the process of employee contract negotiations and is well aware of the offers on the table, their full current and future implications and their impact on the city's budget this year and in years to follow.



More clamping down by Western Municipal Water District on its customer's use of water during the latest drought.



(excerpt, Press Enterprise)



No watering is allowed on Fridays for the district's 24,200 retail customers in Murrieta, western Riverside County and the communities of Orangecrest, Woodcrest, Lake Mathews, El Sobrante and Eagle Valley. Violators will get two written warnings; the third violation brings a fine of $100 per day; the fourth violation is $400 per day; and a fifth violation means service shut-off.

"We're just now getting more aggressive," said Tom Evans, president of Western's board of directors. "We believe this will get us the reductions we're looking for, which is 10 to 15 percent. If it doesn't happen, we'll have to be more restrictive."

Riverside resident Shari Barnes worries that her landscaping will suffer with three days of watering in summer's heat. Though she and her husband have grass only in the front, the backyard has trees, bushes and groundcover planted four years ago when their Orangecrest area house was new.

"There are a lot of houses that have brown yards already because of foreclosures. This could make it worse," said Barnes, adding that she makes an effort to conserve water.

"I know it is something we're going to have to deal with in the future. Everyone."




Temecula giving a little more love to its developer friends.

Why the CPRC hardly ever meets and why it's violating the city charter...this time

People in Riverside like the new grade separation underpass on Jurupa, the first to be completed.


(excerpt, Press Enterprise)



Now it's a lot safer for our kids," said Chris Hubbell as he and his wife unloaded groceries outside their home on William Street.

Kathleen Hubbell said she gets more sleep now that locomotives no longer blow horns in the middle of the night to warn motorists.

City Councilman William "Rusty" Bailey said the $28.2 million project also eliminated a railroad crossing at Mountain View, a block from Jurupa. Now, motorists and pedestrians can no longer use the street to get across the tracks, making the area safer for children walking to school, he said.

The Jurupa Avenue underpass is the first Riverside railroad crossing project to be completed in about a decade.

Three more are expected to be finished by early 2012, and another three are in early planning and environmental review stages, said Farshid Mohammadi, the city's railroad projects manager.

The next to open will be a Columbia Avenue overpass under construction at the BNSF Railway tracks near Hunter Park.





Some people have asked me why the Community Police Review Commission hardly meets anymore. Actually since they just cut down their meetings from two to one each month and skipped a couple months altogether, it just seems that way. Chair Sheri Corral's reasons for cutting meetings back is because the commission takes too long to do its business and it's caught up with its workload. Not surprising considering the dismal attendance records that she and Vice-Chair Peter Hubbard had for months just up until several meetings before the elections, where their platform got in by one teleconference vote cast from somewhere in Florida.

Even as its review of complaints is backlogged, much like the situation with the police department's internal affairs division. But never fear, one internal affairs sergeant said that they've never had any problems with complaints running over their statutory limits since he first started working there which was at least six months ago. In the meantime, the average time it took complaints to reach the CPRC in March was 470 days for category one and 336 days for category two. Several months later, they averaged over 300 days to reach the CPRC.

If nobody's complaining about it in the department, perhaps it's like the case with incustody death investigations meaning that it's all adjudicated and done with by the department and perhaps the city manager's office before the complaints even reach the CPRC. But lieutenant turnover aside, the internal affairs division has grappled with its own issues including an abrupt relocation from its cushy offices in the Riverside Plaza to the more under-luxurious digs in the downtown bus terminal, right next to a field patrol substation. A decision brought to you courtesy of the city manager's office. Not to mention a tremendous backlog in its own investigations that's been going on for a while now.

Not that it matters much because if you read this year's biennial report, you will find that the police department, CPRC and city manager's office agree on their respective findings on allegations over 99% of the time. In fact, in some categories, it's 100% agreement, which smells a little bit like collusion between the three bodies behind closed doors to me. It's not unlikely there would be a majority agreement, even a strong majority agreement between them, but 99-100%? Yeah right.

Especially since the percentage of disagreement has been declining over the past several years to reach this point at the same time the appointments to the CPRC have become much more politicized. Remember too, all allegation findings are done by majority vote, minority votes don't count unless they write a minority report which no doubt winds up in the circular file of sorts when it's received (or received, reviewed and filed as the city calls it) and some crazy rumor has it, even when the officer did it, often times he or she will be exonerated because they didn't lie about it to investigators. If one more person asks me about this, it's been floating around out there for quite a while.

It's hard to believe this rumor given the virtually 100% agreement beween the three bodies on allegations against officers, because given that, if the CPRC was engaging in this practice, that would mean that the other two entities would be as well. And that would be a hard sell for the police department because the last thing it would want is to get in trouble with an outside agency again over its practices so it's probably more mindful now of keeping on the straight and narrow particularly involving its complaint process, which was heavily scrutinized and checked by the State Attorney's General's office earlier this decade.


But veracity aside, it makes you wonder, is telling the truth something that commissioners feel officers need to be rewarded for doing? Do they not think it happens often enough? Sounds like a fairly cynical view of law enforcement to me. Truth telling should just be accepted as a matter of course and as a requirement for doing the job, not something to reward an officer for as you would a child with a cookie for being good. And most officers probably do tell the truth to the investigators but if it's true that the commissioners reward truth tellers by essentially exonerating their misconduct, then it seems like the commissioners who engage in this believe otherwise?


No word on when the Ward Two vacancy created by Jim Ward's retirement will be filled or even at this point, whether it will be filled. Which means that at least there aren't as many tie votes as there were when Ward Four commissioner, Linda Soubirous resigned and the city council rushed t fill her spot with Robert Slawsby, who endorsed Councilman Frank Schiavone a short time later and is rumored to be tight with Schiavone campaign consultant, Brian Floyd. Ward Two Councilman Andrew Melendrez said that when he's approached people about putting in applications to serve on it, they say, no way because of the dynamic of the commission and a prospective applicant attended the meeting, watched their antics and decided he wasn't a glutton for punishment. He found the commission highly dysfunctional and seemingly answering only to City Hall.

Maybe they're just waiting for the term to expire next March before allowing Ward Two to have a representative and this my friends, is a violation of the city charter which mandates that each board and commission have a representative from each ward.

Sometimes you have to ask yourself, is the city's charter just a piece of paper with writing on it?






Moreno Valley's city manager is being investigated in Upland in connection with allegedly using a computer in harassment of an ex-girlfriend.


(excerpt, Press Enterprise)



Upland police are investigating whether Moreno Valley City Manager Robert Gutierrez illegally accessed computer records to make harassing phone calls to an ex-girlfriend, according to a search warrant affidavit.

Police in Upland, where the ex-girlfriend lives, searched Gutierrez's office at Moreno Valley City Hall as well as his home and vehicles on May 27 for evidence in the investigation, according to a copy of the search warrant return filed last week in San Bernardino County Superior Court. They took computers, cell phones, computer files, thumb drives and disks.

Gutierrez declined to comment Wednesday.

He has worked for Moreno Valley for 3 ½ years. He lives with his wife in La Verne, west of Rancho Cucamonga.

Investigators are expected to submit the case this week to the San Bernardino County district attorney's office for review and possible filing of charges, police spokesman Sgt. Cliff Mathews said by phone Wednesday.




The Press Enterprise Editorial Board is highly critical of Riverside County's decision to dip into its reserve funds.




(excerpt)



The construction boom that powered local revenues through most of this decade vanished along with real estate equity and easy credit. The total assessed value of property in Riverside County has plunged by nearly 11 percent from 2008 levels, a loss to the county of about $54 million in revenue. Property taxes contribute 45 percent of the county's discretionary revenue, and it may be years before property values return to previous levels.

Riverside County cannot keep using reserves to plug budget holes without quickly draining its savings account. The county budget proposal initially envisioned using only $20 million in reserves and making cuts in every county department. But supervisors padded that amount, primarily to ease cutbacks in the sheriff's department, district attorney's office and fire department.

Supervisors cannot continue that strategy for very long without risking catastrophe. The board will have to make hard decisions next year about spending priorities -- and then stick with them, instead of draining reserves to avoid painful choices.






The Riverside County Grand Jury has released its report about the Riverside County Fire Department.



(excerpt, Press Enterprise)



Riverside County should consider forming its own fire department in the future instead of contracting with the state, which plans to hike administrative fees this year, a new county grand jury report says.

Fire officials should also do more to discipline career firefighters who create a hostile work environment for their volunteer colleagues and to address conflict between the two groups, the grand jury said.

The report, released last week, makes 10 recommendations for cutting costs and reducing strife in the Riverside County Fire Department. The department relies on about 1,000 Cal Fire firefighters and personnel to protect the county and 18 contract cities. Cal Fire employees help train and work side-by-side with about 700 volunteer firefighters.

County Fire Chief John Hawkins, a state employee, declined to comment on the report Wednesday. He said his department is following standard procedure and formulating an official response to the grand jury. The response will be reviewed by the county executive office and Board of Supervisors and issued by Sept. 28.

At a May supervisors meeting, Hawkins said an anticipated increase in this year's administrative fees is not Cal Fire's fault. The higher cost reflects an increase in the fees that the state Department of Finance charges Cal Fire, he said.










Redlands is rethinking its budget plans in recent days.


(excerpt, Press Enterprise)




The vote to draft alternative cost-saving plans came as a result of a supplement to the agenda submitted by Councilman Jerry Bean, outlining his ideas for shaving $2.5 million from the budget. Bean has been critical of the idea of the joint powers authority between the city and the Redevelopment Agency to use lease payments for general fund expenses.

Bean has called the move illegal at worst and unfair to water and sewer customers at best. Residents approved the increases in water and sewer rates with the belief that the money was needed for pipeline repairs and improvements, he said.

Bean's suggestions for cuts included instituting employee furloughs on holidays, scratching a plan to hire five additional police officers and not filling the positions of most employees who took early retirement.

When told that the furloughs would have to be negotiated, Bean said that shouldn't be a deterrent to asking employees to take unpaid holidays.

"It was to prove that even though some might disagree with the cuts, it is possible to balance the budget by whittling away at various departments," Bean said.

At times, exchanges between Bean and Aguilar grew testy. Bean said he came up with the plan after Aguilar prodded him for alternatives.





After the city council in Atlanta subpoened its police department to release records on several o of its cases including the fatal shooting of Kathryn Johnston, the police union sued them.


The police department said that the records in question were not subjected to the public records acts.



(excerpt, Sunday Paper)




The APD released the following statement at 6:11 p.m. today:

"The Atlanta Police Department has released information relating to the Kathryn Johnston case to Council Member Felicia Moore pursuant to the June 15, 2009 subpoena on today July 7, 2009. Council Member Felecia Moore will forward all received documents to the Citizens Review Board accordingly. The Department has released this information pursuant to a subpoena which was applied for by the Citizen Review Board pursuant to City Ordinance and was issued by the Atlanta City Council's Committee on Council accordingly.

Despite the release of this information to the Committee on Council and to the Citizen Review Board (which are both entities within City of Atlanta Government) pursuant to subpoena, the documents remain part of an open internal investigation of the Atlanta Police Department, and thus are not subject to disclosure under the Open Records Act."




A judge who heard the case the police union brought against the city decided to allow for the release of the records to the Citizen Review Board.



(excerpt, Atlanta Journal-Constitution)




The union’s lawyer, David Beall, said the judge should order the return of the documents, which he said should not be turned over until after the APD completes its internal investigation of the officers.

“The release of these documents could jeopardize the integrity of the investigation and the officers’ rights,” Beall said. “The DA’s office is still investigating this and there may be criminal charges brought.”

Shoob was unpersuaded and questioned why the police department had not conducted its internal investigation in cases that were as old as three years.








Meetings:




Tuesday, July 14 afternoon and 6:30 p.m. Riverside City Council and Redevelopment Agency meeting (and the meetings begin their bimonthly schedule)





Wednesday, July 22 at 5:30 p.m. Community Police Review Commission, fifth floor large conference room at City Hall









Upcoming political fund raisers:




Tuesday, July 14 at 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. Mayor Ron Loveridge at the Mission Inn Hotel. $500 per person.




Tuesday, July 21, at 6-10 p.m. Paul Davis Debt Retirement fundraiser Contact PaulDavisward4@aol.com







Thursday, July 30, at 5:30-7:30 p.m. Art Gage for Mayor at Victoria Country Club, Fax to (951) 686-5070, $99 a person

July, an interim or a time of shifting dynamics?

July has gotten off to a quiet start for Riverside's City Hall as the city council meetings switched to their lighter summer schedule, which provide fewer opportunities to watch for the emerging dynamics to reveal themselves involving the current city council. There will be two opportunities to study the elected officials of Riverside in July.

Will there be attempts at majority rule bloc building as we saw in the earlier part of the decade with both the GASS and BASS quartets? Or will one city council member pull a Frank Schiavone and try to push himself as the new alpha dog? Or will city residents see something new?

It's said that incumbents are tough to defeat in elections but the last two election cycles saw three of them go down and a fourth incumbent, Steve Adams, squeak into office with barely a dozen votes while running against a candidate he greatly outspent. Currently, Nancy Hart sits as the city council's most senior member being a two-term finisher and right behind her is Adams, who is half-way through his second term but the last two elections added four new council members to the dais.

The results of the very controversial and contentious Election 2007 surprised people who followed them and no doubt campaign workers associated with some of the winning and losing candidates. At least one election result in 2009, that involving the Ward Four contest also surprised some watchers.

But Councilmen Dom Betro, Art Gage and Frank Schiavone who between them comprised two very-short lived majority quartets, all lost their elections for the same reasons. They didn't appear to remember their voting pools in their respective wards until it was time to file papers at City Hall and start running again. The losses were shocking to some people when they took place including the dual downfalls of Betro and Gage in Election 2007 but in retrospect especially as the loss of these incumbents piles up, it's not really that surprising. They became closer identified with city issues forgetting that it's members of their wards who can issue them pink slips.




Betro and Gage were both postering for a mayoral run, at least in a noteworthy issue of Inland Empire Magazine not long before voters handed them their defeats at the polls. They and their supporters apparently believed that city council was a stepping stone to being mayor of Riverside (as it worked for at least the last two) but they were first-termers who had already cast their lot with the out-of-town developers like Mark Rubin and Doug Jacobs rather than their voters. And in Betro's case, he focused most of his attention to one section of his ward, the downtown, which didn't help him when the votes were tallied and he was short by about six.

Both Betro and Gage resurfaced at the recent swearing in of the winners of Election 2009 at the city council chambers last month. And Gage is already flirting a run against perennial mayor, Ron Loveridge this November.

Councilman Rusty Bailey will have to come to terms with the loss of his mentor, Schiavone. In fact, especially at Governmental Affairs Committee, he seemed to shadown the senior councilman who helped get him into office. Will Bailey be his own independent elected with only two years until he faces reelection or will he gravitate to another council leader like Councilman Chris MacArthur who some say, might try to put himself in Schiavone's shoes as leader of the city council.

And what remains as how the most junior council member Paul Davis will fit in with some of his ambitious platform of ideas.


The changing of composition on the dais from the days of GASS and BASS to what is currently an unknown direction now should provide plenty of informative entertainment in the months ahead.




No Community Police Review Commission meeting this week but rumor is, there will still be one held later this month. Even though it's backlogged in hearing cases going back a long ways, there's still nothing to do. Or so claims its current chair. The most interesting part of any CPRC meeting isn't the meeting, it's the discussions afterward about who its participants are really working for, City Hall or the community and whether the manager is working for the commissioners or City Hall. Sit through a meeting or two, the answers are pretty obvious. And one of them, Ken Rotker once said, he answered only to the city council. That caused then-Chair Brian Pearcy to do a double take and comment on it by saying he couldn't really know what to say about that, but didn't really get much of a reaction out of most of the others.




The Riverside Transit Agency has raised bus fares to $1.50 per ride but has added two new routes.










The Riverside County Sheriff's Department's liaison program with nearby Indian tribes is still in its trial stages.


(excerpt, Press Enterprise)



The internal presentations are planned for each of the sheriff's patrol stations and special bureaus, even if, as was the case in Lake Elsinore, employees have no daily contact with tribes.

"We're bridging the gap from both sides," said sheriff's Lt. Ray Wood, the Tribal Liaison Unit commander. "There had been some tension, and there was a need for improvement on both sides."

As far back as 2002, Tortes said he was in touch with Stanley Sniff, then a commander within the Riverside County Sheriff's Department, about such a venture. At that time, Tortes was a city of Riverside police lieutenant.

They discussed using Tortes' background as both a member of the Torres-Martinez tribe and as a supervisor of a police program that had frequent interaction with community leaders. But it wasn't until Tortes retired and Sniff was appointed sheriff that those conversations were revived.

That was August 2008, amid the aftermath of the two high-profile fatal shootings by sheriff's deputies on the Soboba Band of Luiseño Indians Reservation.

The tribe and the sheriff initially disagreed on the interpretation of Public Law 280, which allows law enforcement officers unobstructed access to sovereign reservations for criminal investigations. SWAT teams were requested for some calls.

But a series of meetings and the creation of the Tribal Liaison Unit have helped smooth relations, said Rose Salgado, Soboba's tribal secretary.

"There's been a lot of progress by the grace of God," she said.




Even in this recession, Inland Empire Counties are heaping out millions of dollars for public relations services.



(excerpt, Press Enterprise)




"They bring to the table perspective and experience (gained) by working for other agencies," Wert said.

The largest chunk of spending for outside public relations work went to O'Reilly Public Relations, based in downtown Riverside.

Riverside and San Bernardino counties together have paid the firm about $1.6 million since 2006, according to purchasing records. Most of that, about $1.2 million, was in Riverside County, where the firm has done a wide range of work, such as helping public agencies with crisis management, employee contract negotiations and speech writing.

One of the other top three firms was San Diego-based Cook & Schmid, which earned about $1.1 million, mostly in San Bernardino County, where it developed a fire prevention campaign and voter outreach campaigns and guides to county services.

The other firm, Long Beach-based S. Groner Associates, worked in both counties, educating people about how to properly use and dispose of paint, solvents, pesticides and common hazardous material and also promoting recycling and composting. The counties paid the firm about $600,000 in total.

Patrick O'Reilly said his firm helps officials meet an obligation to the public.

"It would be irresponsible for policymakers and top-level managers to ignore their responsibility to effectively communicate with the public," O'Reilly said. "While they may be very good at tax collection, good at finance, or good at real estate or economic development, that doesn't necessarily make them expert communicators."




But the counties aren't the only ones. The University of California is shelling out some big bucks to buy public relations for its proposed medical school.



(excerpt, Press Enterprise)




Although the university has in-house staff who perform many of the same functions, UCR contracted Riverside-based O'Reilly Public Relations in April last year to help win Board of Regents approval for the creation of the medical school.

Regents approved the school last July, but UCR continued to pay the O'Reilly firm $20,000 a month through June, the end of the $280,000 contract.

"The stakes are so high. This seemed well worth it," said Marcia McQuern, assistant vice chancellor who oversees the school's office of strategic communications.

The contract was structured so O'Reilly's firm could be called up at any time over the 14 months, McQuern said. Monthly payments made it easier for the university to absorb the cost, she said. McQuern is former editor and publisher of The Press-Enterprise.

UCR did not seek other firms for the contract. That's because the school had hired the firm in 2007 to help deal with a bomb scare incident and "we knew of no other firm that had his particular expertise," McQuern said.





Apparently, it's a great year for O'Reilly Public Relations.






The Atlanta Police Department prepares to release its records on the murder case of Kathryn Johnston, who was killed by three of its narcotic officers during an illegal raid to the civilian review board.

But standing in its path is a lawsuit filed by the department's police union.


(excerpt, Sunday Papers)


According to the IBPO's motion for a restraining order, divulgence of such records would result in “irreparable harm” to those under investigation.

"The CRB has requested documents pertinent to a pending investigation simultaneously with investigations being conducted by internal affairs and the district attorney’s office," says IBPO attorney David Beall. "What we don't want is partial evidence in the middle of investigation to be made public which could then be used against the subject of the investigation."

Beall says doing so is analogous to allowing jury members to make information public before a trial has decided the guilt or innocence of the accused.

Cristina Beamud, executive director of the CRB, says the board is presently determining whether it will be represented by its own attorney or the city law department.

“This is all brand new and we are still working some things out,” says Beamud.






Postings by an Indiana State Trooper on his facebook page cost him his job.




(excerpt, The Indy Channel)




Christopher Pestow resigned Wednesday before Superintendent Paul Whitesell could enter a final finding and order, state police said in a news release.

Police began an investigation after discovering questionable entries on Pestow's Facebook.com page. They also were investigating whether he had posted any of the material while he was on duty.

Some of the entries showed Pestow with a .357 Magnum pointed at his head and drinking beer with friends. He also posted pictures of a crash involving his police cruiser and wrote that a person who resists arrest and threatens police officers would "probably end up shot."




The major investigation into a steroid scandal in Boston's Police Department led to the discipline of 11 officers.



(excerpt, The Boston Globe)



The disciplined officers, seven of whom admitted to using steroids at some point in their careers, received punishments ranging from a written reprimand to a 45-day suspension without pay. But none of the officers were fired and none will face criminal charges, Boston Police Commissioner Edward F. Davis said today.

"I am disappointed with the actions of the officers disciplined in this matter," he said during a news conference at police headquarters. "We remain steadfast in our dedication to preserving the integrity of our department by taking every measure to prevent and when necessary uncover officer misconduct."

The punishments were the culmination of an investigation that began in August 2006 soon after the FBI arrested Officer Roberto "Kiko" Pulido for trying to traffic cocaine. Pulido, a steroid user, would guard parties hosted by a convicted drug dealer at an after-hours club in Hyde Park called the "Boom Boom Room."






A Los Angeles Police Department detective committed suicide.



(excerpt, Los Angeles Times)



Susan J. Clemmer, a 19-year veteran of the LAPD assigned to the department’s Gang and Narcotics Division, entered the Santa Clarita station about 9:15 p.m. and spoke to a female deputy. The detective then placed a box of personal items on the counter and asked to speak to a different deputy, said a law enforcement source who had knowledge of the shooting but was not authorized to speak publicly. When the female deputy stepped away to find another deputy, sheriff’s staffers heard a single shot, sources said.

An official familiar with the investigation said the detective suffered a single, self-inflicted gunshot wound. No one else was injured in the incident.

It was not immediately clear what may have prompted Clemmer, 41, to kill herself. The investigation is ongoing, sheriff’s officials said.

Clemmer was a crucial witness for the defense in the infamous 1991 Rodney King beating trials.






The FBI has decided to investigate an officer-involved shooting by Inglewood Police Department.



(excerpt, Los Angeles Times)




The criminal probe, which was announced by the city in late June, is at least the third ongoing investigation into the department's use of deadly force. The FBI confirmed that it had opened the investigation, but would not discuss it.


The civil rights division of the U.S. Department of Justice in Washington is already looking into the department's patterns and practices. The Los Angeles County Office of Independent Review, which monitors the L.A. County Sheriff's Department, is also looking at the Inglewood department's training, supervision, policies and protocol at the city's request.

The department was the subject of several community protests last year after a spate of officer-involved shootings resulted in four fatalities between May and September. A Times investigation last year found that since 2003, five of 11 people shot and killed by Inglewood police were unarmed.

In a statement released June 25, Inglewood Police Chief Jacqueline Seabrooks said the May 17 shooting was being investigated by the L.A. County district attorney's office as well as separate internal criminal and administrative investigations. She said her department will cooperate with all aspects of the FBI's investigation.


"We are confident the FBI review will validate facts already made public about the incident, including our initial findings that Mr. Smith was armed and pointed his handgun at officers, resulting in the fatal shooting," Seabrooks said.

Human Resources uses its powers; The CPRC thumbs its nose at its own

The Human Resources Board meets today at City Hall and one of the items it will be discussing is its decision to convene a public hearing to discuss some of its policy recommendations. This is an interesting development in the process that this board has undergone in the past year to become more engaged in the process of advising on labor policy issues in the city's workforce as well to exercise its powers. Including the power of investigation, which it doesn't have according to the city's manager's office and the power of public hearings, which the city manager's office hasn't commented on it.

Through Human Resources Director Rhonda Strout, there have been some directives by City Manager Brad Hudson and City Attorney Gregory Priamos (who both seem to need a conduit to speak for them) to deny the Human Resources Board statistical information including that on lawsuits filed by city employees. Now mind you, lawsuits when filed are in the public record so to say that the statistical information is not to be available to the Human Resources Board or is outside of its purview is just ridiculous. But if you've been to recent meetings of the barely-there Community Police Review Commission, common tactics have been used to shut down public comment on issues at this body's meetings in a much more aggressive fashion than has been seen so far with the Human Resources Board in terms of narrowing its parameters.

The power of investigation was in the text of the ordinance that lays out the roles, powers and responsibilities of the Human Resources Board until about 2006 when the city council voted to change the ordinance language but technically it still exists under the ordinance language involving "other" powers that this board can exercise. Still, the city manager's office while not viewing the Human Resources Board as quite the threat (or at least as much of a plaything) as the beleaguered Community Police Review Commission have taken some more mild steps of micromanagement which have led the board drafting letters to ask for "clarification" from the city council on several issues mirroring the situation faced by the CPRC last autumn.

But contrast this with the CPRC which refuses to abide by its charter-mandated power to investigate officer-involved deaths and whose members don't seem to want to do anything except hand off all their work for Manager Kevin Rogan to do and put his own spin on, most likely as he is directed by his own bosses in the city manager's office. At least the Human Resources has teeth and isn't afraid to use them, whereas the majority of the CPRC seem content to be a do-nothing body which is there solely to either serve as a "shiny public relations tool" as Commission Robert Slawsby said in his interview or to elevate the individual ambitions of those serving on it.

The Human Resources Board did get stymied by the Riverside Police Department in its attempts to receive a presentation on the issue of the retention of female police officers. The department refused to give a presentation first citing confidentiality reasons and then saying that it couldn't afford to pay one of its employees to go and give a 15-20 minute presentation. Never mind that it doesn't have to pay higher ranking employees (who earn flat salaries in the six-figure range) to work over time. It just sounds like once again the department is getting cagey when it comes to discussing in public its issues surrounding the department's very poor record of retaining female officers.

One departmental management representative said that the department could send a representative to talk to community organizations about this issue but couldn't do so as easily with the Human Resources Board because they had to go through the city council because the board served to advise the city council. What it translates to is that the Riverside Police Department most likely turned down an invitation to discuss this issue because it doesn't want to do so and can't just come out and say that. Hence, the litany of excuses which change with each person that you ask about it. I did receive an interesting email last year which if the allegations in it are true about female officers would 1) explain why the department doesn't want to address this issue and 2) explain a possible reason why former Officer Kelsy Metzer was fired on her first day reporting for work and then had her lawsuit protesting it quietly settled by the city within several months of it being filed.



On a related issue, one instructor from Riverside Community College said that they had recommended many students from their classes to try out for the Riverside Police Department. She was dismayed to discover that while most of the White male applicants made it through, not a single Black male candidate or a female of any race were accepted by the department.



The city of Riverside plans to give community organizations 18 days each year to use the Fox theater at half-price. That means they'll pay $1,500.

(excerpt, Press Enterprise)

Top booking priority for the 1,642-seat theater will go to professional, touring acts, according to the policy. That would include the first scheduled shows -- the Broadway-style musicals "Annie," "Jesus Christ Superstar" and "Hairspray."

The operators of the theater, scheduled to open in January, also hope to book concerts by nationally known musicians on concerts tours, said Riverside City Councilman Mike Gardner, who represents the downtown area.

Setting aside days for nonprofit arts groups means the theater also will showcase local talent, Gardner said. That could include the Riverside County Philharmonic, the California Riverside Ballet, and the best theater talent from UC Riverside and other Inland colleges and universities, he said.

"It won't be used for weddings," Gardner said.

The theater's professional operator, William P. Malone, will have the authority to decide which groups or performances get access to the stage, he said. The proposed policy does not specify which days local groups could use the theater at a discount, but it would give groups at least 60 days notice if a performance date had to be changed.

Steve Kester, director of the Riverside-based Raincross Chorale, said 18 days isn't enough for a vibrant Inland arts community. He said the city of San Jose has publicly owned theater that makes community acts the top priority.

Former Councilman Dom Betro, whom Gardner defeated in 2007, said that at least 50 days a year should be reserved for local acts. That would bring together the city's arts community, he said.

Gardner countered that the draft policy was developed after he and other city officials met with arts groups at least three times in the past year. The number of days set aside for local shows can be changed, he said. "This is just a start."

One Inland Empire mayor praises another. That would be San Bernardino Mayor Patrick Morris about Riverside's mayor Ron Loveridge. It's nice prose but it reads a bit like a campaign speech even though the second phase of Election 2009 is still a ways off.


(excerpt, Press Enterprise)

Loveridge's 40 years as a UC Riverside political science professor have provided him with an informed perspective on the American city. He clearly understands our critical transportation, environmental and infrastructure needs. He also possesses real vision for our region's future and will work to develop a new generation of leadership in our increasingly diverse and urbanized communities.

We are fortunate to have a leader of Loveridge's quality and integrity to head one of our nation's most influential organizations.

The Press Enterprise actually takes a critical look at some of the nasty comments left by anonymous people at its Web site. Like people celebrating the tragic deaths of individuals. Gee, that sounds familiar.






Speaking of internet comments there's some interesting ones on the latest update on the aftermath of the destruction of Kawa Market.



(excerpt, Press Enterprise)




That is just so special. The City of Riverside spend over $650,000 to put someone out of business and ponys up another $400,00 to set a used house and rehab it, then sells it for a whopping $210,000. Does anyone else see a problem with the above equation? I guess they can up the charge per hour on their new high tech parking meters to make up the difference.



Looks nice. It's sad to loose the Kawa market because it is so old, and I do have sympathy for the owners, but it really was in a bad place, and was affecting the neighborhood in a bad way. In certain respects, it probably wasn't the best idea to build the Kawa Market there in the first place, but I'm sure it wasn't expected to attract such a ghetto crowd over time. Restoring the and relocating the historic bungalow to the site was a good move, and makes more sense for the neighborhood.



I agree with you "whooz", for Betro to claim that there was no intent to "break even", I is an outright lie. Somewhere, somehow, there is a motive behind it....and it is not for the public.



Dan Bernstein of the Press Enterprise gave the project higher marks but had this to say.



(excerpt)



In 2008, a Riverside real estate expert told me the city could probably get $300K for the bungalow. Early this year, she revised her estimate to $230K. Councilman Mike Gardner says the asking price for the home is $210,000. Not bad for a qualified affordable-home buyer. Not a great return on a $1 million taxpayer investment.

Gardner says the Erase 'N" Replace was never intended to be a moneymaker. To that I say: Mission Accomplished!


Then again Riverside's hardly the first city where keeping poor Black folks out of a mostly White middle-class neighborhood to go to the closest food market has been a much greater priority than "breaking even". Losing money is even preferable.



Riverside vs Corona. At stake, a stop on the high-speed train set to run from Los Angeles to San Francisco in several decades.






A Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department sergeant has been charged in connection with sexually assaulting three women. And guess what? Before his arrest, he had a prior history of being investigated in connection with other sexual assautl allegations.


(excerpt, Los Angeles Times)



According to interviews and law enforcement records, these are not the first accusations of sexual misconduct against Fitzpatrick during his 19 years with the Sheriff's Department.

County prosecutors reviewed a similar on-duty sexual assault complaint against him 10 years ago but declined to file criminal charges because of insufficient evidence, according to records of the district attorney's office.

And Sheriff's Department officials had investigated charges that he exposed himself to women twice while off duty, law enforcement sources said.

"The pattern here makes it a most troublesome case," said Michael Gennaco, head of the county's Office of Independent Review, a county watchdog agency.

"It is unfortunate that more wasn't done in 1999 to identify additional victims," he said.

District attorney spokeswoman Jane Robison said prosecutors were aware of other accusations, "but we aren't going to comment on the exact number yet, or the circumstances."

Happy Fourth and some IOUS for you

The Riverside County Superior Court has stabbed the public's right to access documents right in the heart with this recent move to charge people who visit its on-line site to view or print online documents. Many people who have relied on court documents, say in exposing the recent Bradley Estates mess surrounding former City Councilman Frank Schiavone and City Attorney Gregory Priamos see this as a step being taken by the county to not earn money to put back into the court's operational budget but as a means of discouraging or even preventing people from being able to find out what Riverside County and its cities are really doing, often times with tax payer money.

Just to look at a document that's 10 pages or less, you have to agree to pay $7.50 with $0.07 a page from that point on. Shameful, shameful, shameful. Yes, the county's broke but charging people just to view public court documents online is not going to clear up the county's fiscal picture very much if at all.

Legally, you can be charged for copies of public records but not for looking at them which means that lines will grow longer at the courthouse to get free access to those documents and not a whole lot of money will be made for viewing them and copying them online. And that's just what our overly congested court system needs is more people to make it more jam packed, crowded and backlogged. And this time without any help from Riverside County District Attorney Rod Pacheco.




Fewer fall classes at Riverside Community College this autumn and more IOUs being issued by a state with no settled budget.






On what used to be the Kawa Market stands a historic house ready to be moved into by its new owners.



(excerpt, Press Enterprise)



If all goes as planned, the hardwood floors will echo with the patter of children's feet by the end this month. The city is selling the three-bedroom, 1,410-square-foot home to a couple with two children, ages 5 and 3.

The family meets the low-to-moderate-income requirement to qualify for the house, priced at the appraised value of $210,000, said Eva Yakutis, the city's housing and neighborhoods manager.

The city invested more than $1 million moving and renovating the house.

The intent never was to break even, said former Councilman Dom Betro, who initiated the transformation about two years ago.

The ideas was to provide an affordable home, preserve a piece of Riverside history and improve a neighborhood, he said.










What's interesting too is reading Press Enterprise Columnist Dan Bernstein's latest analysis on the Fox Plaza or what he calls the Pipe Dream.

He also discusses the city's decision to buy four buildings in close proximity to the Fox Plaza project which it claims will be used to secure future parking. Yeah right. Bernstein appeared to agree.


(excerpt)



About four years ago, the city cut a deal to buy the buildings' parking lot so that patrons of Fox Plaza -- a phantom hodge-podge o' shops, condos, etc. -- would have a place (much of it underground) to park.

But the deal had an expiration date: 5 years. If the Fox Pipedream wasn't completed, the parking lot would revert to the owners. Time's a-flyin' and there's not much in the pipeline for the pipedream. The city doesn't like its monolithic design, it now totally hates the idea of condos and it has no idea when or if the developer will ever get financing. Tick tock.

With the parking-lot deal soon to expire, the city finally admitted it has zero confidence that this project, whatever it is, will make deadline. (It might be flat lined.) Rather than allow the parking lot to revert to the building owners, city officials hit on a brilliant idea: just buy the buildings. Then the parking lot will revert to them!

The city will end up owning almost an entire square block when you throw in the abandoned (via City Hall eviction) buildings (Stalder, etc.) it wants to demolish to make way for the pipedream.

Despite the city's deeply touching generosity toward a private developer, the Fox Plaza may never amount to anything more than vapor. But the city will be heavily invested in prime real estate and ideally positioned to toss out the owners of Simple Simon's, Flowerloft, etc. if a bigger, slicker pipedream ever comes along.

We call that innovation.



If I were the owners of some of those businesses, I wouldn't get too cozy in those spots considering who their new landlord is.





Former Riverside Police Department Officer Robert Forman lost his defense motion to have all the cases against him tried separately or what is called bifurcated. Forman was arrested last October on felony charges of sexual battery and oral copulation under the threat of authority, stemming from alleged incidents with three different women. He plead not guilty and then had his preliminary hearing moved at the last moment out to Corona of all places where the judge decided that there was enough evidence for him to stand trial on the charges.


(excerpt, Press Enterprise)

Forman, 39, was not in court for Wednesday's hearing. He was represented by attorney Mark Johnson. Forman has pleaded not guilty to two felony counts of using his authority as a police officer to force women to perform sex acts on him and a felony count of sexual battery.

Forman, who was arrested on Oct. 15, 2008, had worked for the Riverside Police Department since 1996. Riverside police Capt. Mike Blakely said Forman is no longer employed by the department.

Johnson said after the hearing that he wanted the charges -- based on accusations made by three women -- prosecuted separately because it offered his client a stronger chance of prevailing.

"The cases are weak," Johnson said.

But Fields said during the hearing that it was appropriate to prosecute the charges as one case because of the similarity of the alleged offenses and because it showed "a propensity to commit these type of offenses."

The trial is tentatively scheduled for later this summer. But most likely, it will probably be delayed. Then he'll probably get acquitted by a jury worried about a guilty verdict scaring people from wanting to become police officers and be back to the Riverside Police Department within a year.



Speaking of who won't be coming back, former Officer Jose Nazario won't be rehired by the police department any time soon. But perhaps not for all the listed reasons people including this blogger have provided. The real reason might be back in New York State where Nazario is from. That might also be the reason that a lot of the fanfare about bringing him back to the fold of the police department has died down.






Here's one local view about what needs to be done with the Riverside National Cemetery Support Committee.







The San Bernardino County Grand Jury in its report urged that some reforms be implemented to address serious ethical problems in the county's government.


(excerpt, Press Enterprise)




The 2008-09 grand jury final report -- a nonbinding annual review of county government by a panel of private citizens -- focuses on the operations of county departments, agencies and officers.

It includes a section devoted to governmental reform, a major concern of the grand jury because of an ongoing investigation into the assessor's office that has led to the resignation and arrests of former Assessor Bill Postmus and three former aides.

"This attitude of 'anything goes' by a few needs to be changed," foreman Burrell Woodring wrote in his introductory letter.

The report commends a proposal by Supervisor Neil Derry to establish an ethics commission, stating that an "independent and unbiased" panel should be formed.

In his letter, Woodring notes that the proposal could be delayed by budgetary issues but suggests that it may be better in to spend the money now.

Derry estimated the cost at $500,000 a year.

"Unfortunately, for the past five years, the board has expended several million dollars to various lawyers to investigate several ethics violations and accomplish the very thing that a well-financed Ethics Commission would do," Woodring wrote.





The San Jacinto City Council considers extending its contract with the Riverside County Sheriff's Department another five years.



(excerpt, Press Enterprise)




The 2009-10 contract will cost the city $7,437,000, the report states. The council meets at 7 p.m. in the San Jacinto Unified School District board room, 2045 S. San Jacinto Ave.

The city will have about 88 hours of daily patrol coverage, equivalent to 18 deputies, and six sergeants. Additional services include a traffic enforcement officer, school resource officers and specialized teams, including regional gang and narcotics task forces.

City Councilman Jim Potts said a recent survey and comments from residents indicate people are "absolutely happy" with the service.

"We got a very good deal for the first five years," said Potts, a police volunteer.








Wi-Fi Report:



Some interesting news out of this front. AT&T purchased a company which will oversee the future operation of the Wi-Fi networks installed by Riverside replacing the current contracted company assigned to that duty.

Here are some stats taken on performance issues at different access points.

Century near Alessandro:

Distance from AP: 10 ft

Signal: Excellent

Connects: Yes

Internet: Yes

Speed: poor loading speed, attempted to load Yahoo.com, but internet drop off. **

Crashed browser pages*: Yes, before drop off

Email sent: No, email couldn't be sent




*browser pages crashing while loading due to problems with ad placement or redirect page on the ATTMETROFREE network by one of its advertising firms during the past several weeks.


AT&T notified: Yes

Date of repair: N/A



** due to 25%-100% packet loss in Gateway pathway through network in that area of the city. Cause of packet loss: Unknown Repair date: N/A

University/Canyon Crest



Distance from AP: 20 ft



connect: Y (excellent)

internet: y

speed: Fast

browser crash: Y



email? Yes, load provider, email sent in two seconds







University near Iowa (Paradise Ultimate Spa)



Distance from AP: 15 ft.



connect: Y

strenght: excellent

internet: Yes

speed: fast

browser crash: Yes

Email: loaded Yahoo, emailed 2 seconds









Chicago near Towngate Center/Market building



Distance from AP: 25 ft.



connect: Y

strenght: good

internet: Yes

speed: fair to poor. spotty

browser crash: Yes

Email: couldn't load yahoo email page



Ping? Y



Yahoo: 25% packet loss

Sitemeter: 25% loss (one timeout)

pe.com 100% (four timeouts)


Network Pathway Pings: (packet loss/timeouts)


10.3.122.75 0%



10.3.96.1: 50% loss (two timeouts)



10.3.96.2: 25% (one timeout)



206.141.192.60: 50% loss (two timeouts)



206.244.0.3: 100% loss (four timeouts)









Chicago near Enterprise

Distance from AP: 15 ft.



connect: Y

strength: good

internet: Yes

speed: good

browser crash: Yes

Email: Y 2 seconds






Chicago near Ransom

Distance from Access Point: 25 ft.



connect: Y

strength: excellent

internet: Yes

speed: fast

browser crash: Yes

Email: Y 2 seconds

Have a Happy and Safe Fourth of July!

March 27, 2007: Epicenter of when micromanagement came to River City

There are several different stories about what led to the events on May 27, 2007 at City Hall and all of them are fascinating. Some say this was the date that the police chief of the Riverside Police Department lost his independence and his power to do his job, a problem that he apparently has faced since in the police department where it appears there are many cooks in the kitchen, all of them shrouded behind a curtain.

March 27, 2007 didn't really get exciting until about 6 p.m. when hundreds of police officers from two different labor associations and members of the public began gathering at City Hall just outside the city council chambers. This massive group was preparing to confront the city council on an agenda item which was no longer on the agenda. A fire storm of sorts which had brewed most of that week caused its removal in such a way that most of those living in the city would be none the wiser.

But the missing agenda item which was the focus of such controversy and crowds had left some tracks that couldn't be brushed away.

The item itself had actually been placed on the "tentative" meeting agenda nearly a week before the meeting by Administrative Analyst Jeremy Hammond upon instruction from the city manager's office. There were copies of this "tentative" meeting agenda circulated which showed that the city manager's office via Hammond was making a move towards changing the status of several high-ranking police management positions to being "at will" rather than contractually bound by the same rights and standards as captains. One of these copies ended up in the hands of this blogger. It was an item that stated that management positions in the police department would be "at will".

Not that assistant chiefs and deputy chiefs aren't in a sense "at will" employees already. They are picked by the chief to serve in those positions and when one chief is replaced by another, the newer chief can pick his own management team. So as a result, an assistant or deputy chief could be reduced back to being a captain. That happened to Mike Blakeley for example who lateraled in as a deputy chief to former Chief Ken Fortier and then when Fortier was run out and replaced by Chief Jerry Carroll, Carroll picked his own deputy chief and Blakely went back to being a captain. The difference is with these "at will" positions was that these management personnel in the police department might not just lose a nonclassified job title, but they could lose their jobs.

If you can recall what happened at that pivotal meeting, the city council fronted by about a half-dozen of its staff members backed down and almost pretended to act like they didn't know what the fuss was all about but rest assured, they did. Phone calls and emails had been sent to these elected representatives for nearly a week to complain about this action that was scheduled to take place.

March 27's meeting is seen by many as the day that the city manager's office tried to launch a coup detat of sorts against the police department's chief. But others say that what happened that day was merely a culmination of a series of actions taken by city management and counter actions taken by the police labor unions that began some time after that date in history.



Lt. Tim Bacon and Lt. Darryl Hurt state in their lawsuit, Hurt, Bacon v the City of Riverside that the ground work for this confrontation was actually laid much earlier in spring of 2006 when the city manager's office tried to change elements of classified positions within the sworn division of the police department. These positions were at its management level. This chain of incidents which led to the first confrontation in public on this issue was documented in their lawsuit.



On or around May 19, 2006, Bacon and Hurt learned that the city had placed an agenda item for a meeting to change the classification of certain RPAA employees without having a "meet and confer" with the RPAA leadership. The mission of the city's endeavor was to create "at will" positions within the RPAA's membership.

On May 23, 2006, Bacon and Hurt met with Chief Russ Leach, and Councilmen Art Gage and Frank Schiavone to discuss these issues that had arisen. A huge crowd of police officers and community leaders showed up at a council meeting to protest this proposed action.


Apparently this earlier protest spurred the city council or enough of its members to pull the reins on its direct employee, City Manager Brad Hudson to stop his attempts to make changes in the police department among its management level that could shape it into one more controllable by his department. But the problem is that once you pull the reins on Hudson to not engage in a questionable action, you have to keep those reins pulled in a firm grip. Because sometimes history repeats itself and this time it did.

And sure enough as already stated, the issue reared its head nearly a year later and hundreds of people appeared at the March 27 city council meeting to confront the city council, Hudson, DeSantis, City Attorney Gregory Priamos (who should have nipped the process in the bud in the beginning for legal reasons) and Chief Russ Leach. Presidents of the Riverside Police Officers' Association and Riverside Police Administrators' Association were there and spoke on the issue.

At that point, the city had pretty much backed down as it often does when greeted with crowds at City Hall. When that happens, someone like a former Councilman Frank Schiavone or a Mayor Ron Loveridge is already looking for an escape plan to turn the meeting around and make it appear that it was all much ado about nothing. Either that or "miscommunication" or "crossed wires" or some other catch phrases that get tossed about by elected officials when these major issues come to a head.

Before the meeting, the item had been removed from consideration and a statement appeared on the final meeting agenda that an unspecified item had been pulled. That of course, matched up numerically with the agenda item that had been included on the earlier tentative agenda describing the intent to reclassify the captain's positions through the nonclassified deputy and assistant chief ranks to being "at will". The day before the contentious meeting, members of the RPOA's leadership had met with former Councilman Frank Schiavone who was alerted to the situation the day before after having just returned from a trip to Mexico to messages on his answering machine. The RPAA had also expressed its grave concern.

According to Schiavone, he contracted Priamos about the situation late that Sunday night and that he had also received a phone call on the issue from Councilman Steve Adams.

I had contacted Hudson about the situation and received an email back from him saying that there was nothing unusual about what was being proposed for those police police positions. He said he offered the same option to other managers working under him in the city's ranks and that most or all of them accepted the offer willingly. Of course, the response to this by people in the city's employee ranks was that most of them feared the "at will" offer like they feared few other things. In fact, of the three police positions which were to be changed, one was a deputy chief position held by Dave Dominguez (who later retired and went to be police chief in Palm Springs). He flat out refused to change his status and he had good reason because allegedly Dominguez was included on a short list of management or supervisory employees, all Black or Latino that the city manager's office was trying to push out.



The List


Of that list, one employee, Tranda Drumwright, was fired and at least three others, Art Alcaraz, Jim Smith and Pedro Payne "resigned". When I first heard about this list from an anonymous source inside City Hall, most of these employees still had their jobs. If I was a bit skeptical at first, that soon went away when one by one these employees left the city during a relatively brief time span of about 18 months or so.

Today only one or two of them does and his or her name will remain anonymous to ensure that he doesn't suddenly "resign".

But anyway, Hudson's email had assured me that there was nothing out of the ordinary or extraordinary about the proposal to turn the assistant and deputy chief positions (which are essentially classified captain positions with a 2.5-5% pay increase) to being "at will". However, when I showed up at the city council chambers the evening of March 27, 2008 which by then was packed with lots of people, he came up to me and told me to ignore what he had written in the email and that Priamos' office had told him that public safety management positions could not be treated in a fashion similar to management positions in other city departments. The one question I had for Hudson was why if there was some legal issue complicating his plan to create "at will" management positions in the police department, why didn't he consult with the city's legal counsel before directing Hammond to put it on the tentative agenda in the first place?

After all it would have been made more sense to do that. Maybe the thought just never occurred to him in his drive to get this proposal passed and implemented. Even with this last-minute change of plans, the meeting still proved to be quite eventful.

When everyone sat down or stood up in the aisles and in the back of the chambers to the point where they spilled out the doors, the city council began to line up its employees like Hudson, Priamos and Leach to head everyone off at the pass by assuring them that nothing sinister was taking place and that the proposal to turn three of the police department's highest level positions to being "at will" was off the table. No one seemed very impressed by the series of rehabilitative and somewhat revisionist speeches being given them and people went to the podium and spoke on the issue anyway.

They didn't speak against the two management employees who had accepted their appointments into the "at will" positions or the one management employee who refused to go along with it. They didn't feel at that time that the appointments of "Johnny D.", "Pete" or "Diamond Dave" were bad choices or criticize their qualifications, in fact many approved of them. What bothered them was the process and the changing of the status of the management positions filled by these men to being "at will".



The RPOA: No "yes men"


One of those speaking was then RPOA President Ken Tutwiler who had this to say:


"At-will employees fear losing their jobs so they often become 'yes men'. "



And it's nearly impossible for management people in this position of being "at will" to be anything but, especially in Riverside at this point in time. Some of those people who "resigned" on that above list did so precisely because they weren't or didn't want to be "yes people". They wanted to be management employees with the freedom and the room to run their respective divisions or departments, not to be held on leashes and pulled back and/or threatened with termination or punishment if they didn't do or say "yes" quickly enough.

If you want to see what happens to an "at will" employee in a very short period of time, all you have to do is attend meetings of the Community Police Review Commission and sit there for about 30 minutes. The single most asked question by community members who attend these meetings (and there have been more of them lately) is who does the manager of the CPRC work for, the commission or City Hall (i.e. city manager)? And all it takes to answer it is simply sitting in a meeting and observing the chaos that erupts nearly without fail within the first 20 minutes. It's pretty clear that the manager works for DeSantis who on at least one occasion called a CPRC manager into his office complaining that the manager was doing a poor job of controlling the commissioners.

But then these days the second most commonly asked question by many of these same people is who do the commissioners work for.

Still, Tutwiler wasn't the only officer or individual in general to express the concern that if members of the police department management were to become "at will", then they would be "yes men" to someone or else they would no longer be employed.

Because one question remained unanswered in that episode involving the "at will" positions and that was who actually made the promotions into those positions? Was it Leach, the chief who's supposed to be the one who promotes or was it the city manager's office?

One account about this chain of events that was provided stated that Hudson himself made the decision to promote two of the individuals who were to be given the option of being "at will" employees at the time of promotions. In fact, this account alleged that Leach wasn't even in town at the time when Hudson appointed two sworn employees in the police department to fill the positions of assistant and deputy chief and that Leach knew nothing about it until he got back to Riverside. And when he did find out that these pivotal promotions had been made allegedly behind his back, he was very upset but ultimately bowed to the will of the city manager's wishes, being an "at will" employee of sorts himself. Because after all, if you're an "at will" employee in River City what else can you do but what the boss tells you?

Members of the RPOA had allegedly hoped that at the March 27, 2008 Leach would confront his boss about what he had done without him knowing a damn thing about it but of course, as hundreds of people in the audience saw, nothing like that happened. Leach gave the perfect performance of an "at will" employee and said exactly what Hudson wanted him to say. Just as he would several years later when he was used to help his boss change the investigative protocol involving how the CPRC handled its officer-involved deaths.

The person who provided the account stated that this pivotal moment in the city and police department's history was the beginning of the end of Leach's independence as a police chief. After that, it didn't take him long to become the micromanaged employee that he is today given scripts of words that he's required to say at public events including his most recent performance giving accounts of CPRC investigators trampling crime scenes after officer-involved deaths.

And that's fundamentally wrong. The police department is Leach's whether he's a good chief or a bad one. He is the one to be accountable for its accomplishments, mistakes and bad deeds. But it hasn't been his department in a while in the same way that it's been Hudson's or DeSantis' with a bit of Priamos and perhaps even several city officials put in the mix. A bunch of chefs in a kitchen hiding behind a curtain, shielded from accountability.









Riverside's Metropolitan Museum Board is pushing for smaller budget cuts for the museum in the city's annual budget.


(excerpt, Press Enterprise)




The city's museum department is devoted to preserving, arts, culture and history, said Norton Younglove, a former Riverside councilman and a former Riverside County supervisor.

"It just doesn't make sense," Younglove said.

So at Younglove's request, the advisory board voted to ask the City Council to restore some funding so the museum cut would be 17 percent, which would put the cuts near the same levels as those faced by the city library and park systems.

The 27 percent cut to the museum left just more than $1 million for the new fiscal year, which starts today. It was approved by the City Council last week as part of the city's $197.8 million general fund for most basic city services.

In a crowded meeting room in Metropolitan Museum, the museum director, Ennette Morton, quelled rumors that museum staff layoffs are eminent.

She said the museum budget has $844,820 to pay the salaries and benefits of the nine full-time workers and two part-timers. She added, though, she could not guarantee there would not be layoffs during the fiscal year.

Most of the museum budget cuts will be achieved by eliminating funds for at least seven vacant positions, Morton said. The last budget had 18 authorized positions, though actual staffing started drop below that level three years ago.

She added that City Manager Bradley Hudson directed her to keep the same level of programs, public hours and other public services.

"All the things we are doing, we will continue to do," she said.




The San Bernardino city manager said it's okay to borrow money from "special purpose" accounts to reduce its deficit.



(Excerpt, Press Enterprise)




In a memo distributed to city leaders Monday, City Manager Charles McNeely concurs with a finding by the city attorney's office arguing that such loans are permissible as long as they don't violate state restrictions.

That's a sharp departure from the position taken by McNeely's predecessor, former Interim City Manager Mark Weinberg. He argued that such borrowing would be likely to trigger a lawsuit under California's Prop. 218.

The 1996 measure amended the state constitution to prohibit the use of special-purpose assessments to pay for general governmental service.

In February, Councilwoman Wendy McCammack urged officials to consider borrowing from a $20 million reserve in a city refuse fund to plug a $9 million shortfall on San Bernardino's general fund. Weinberg strongly opposed the idea.

Still, in his recent memo McNeely points out that officials have approved such borrowing in the past, including a project to lower City Hall's energy costs with more efficient lighting and one to upgrade computers.

McCammack welcomed the changed perspective.

"There are certain funds that you can borrow from short term in order to get over some hurdles," she said. "If we had investigated that back in February, we wouldn't have lost so many city services."




No Los Angeles Police Department officers will be fired for actions taken in the 2007 May Day incident.


(excerpt, Los Angeles Times)

Bratton refused to criticize the decisions of the panels, which comprise various commanders and a civilian. Each officer is judged by a different panel.

"I never comment on board decisions because it might have a chilling effect on my command staff personnel who sit on those boards," he said.

Bratton cautioned that the board "has the clearest look at all the various sides of the issue. They hear from the officer."

Of the four officers Bratton sent to the boards, one received an official reprimand for being guilty of unauthorized force but was found not guilty of misleading statements.

A second officer charged with seven incidents of unauthorized force was found guilty of two of them and given a 12-day suspension.

A third officer was found guilty of unauthorized force, conduct unbecoming an officer and misleading statements and given a 20-day suspension.

A fourth officer was found guilty of two of seven counts of unauthorized force and received an official reprimand.

A civil rights group in Columbus, Ohio took complaints of police abuse and misconduct from city residents.



(excerpt, WBNS 10 TV)

The Columbus NAACP heard a variety of complaints from the roughly 35 people attending the meeting, 10TV's Glenn McEntyre reported.

The complaints ranged from intimidation to racial profiling. But Columbus NAACP President Noel Williams told 10TV News her group is particularly concerned over officer-involved shootings.

"There are a couple of cases that have come to our attention that we're going to focus on because there's a possibility - we're not sure, because we're not done with our investigation - that there may have been some unjust action by the officers involved," Williams said.

Two cases under scrutiny occurred in June of last year.

In one case, a Columbus police officer shot and killed Edward Hayes, 31, when the officer said Hayes refused to drop a gun he was carrying. Family members dispute the officer's account.

"He had his hands up (saying), 'Please don't shoot,' " Laura Valentine, Hayes' cousin, told the hearing. "And he was shot in the back."

Both a grand jury and an internal police investigation cleared the officer of any wrongdoing.

In another officer-involved shooting, 16-year-old Regina Jennings was injured in both arms after police said she refused to drop a weapon that, according to police, turned out to be an air rifle.

The officers' actions in the Jennings case are still under review.