January 2011 Archives
By Neil Nisperos
Staff WriterMore than 300 seniors from Chino Valley Unified's four main high schools cost the district thousands of dollars when they participated in a spontaneous ditch day.
District officials, already reeling from layoffs of employees and cuts to services because of a predicted $31.5 million budget shortfall, said 353 of the 757 seniors absent on Jan. 11 were unverified or unexcused.
Cost of those ditch day absences, compounded with those excused absences, totaled about $21,340 in lost state funding. In contrast, the 112 senior absences on the day before, most of which were excused, cost the district $3,157.
The lost of funding is crucial for the district whose Board of Education met Thursday night to consider $26 million of cuts, which includes paycuts and layoffs.
"It's important for parents and students to understand that the school and the district's budgets are negatively impacted when students are not in school," said district spokeswoman Julie Gobin. "This impact has an adverse affect on the programs and resource we are able to provide to students."
Student chatter on Facebook indicated the ditch day was related to the unusual occurrence of the date being 1/11/11, officials said. Usually, ditch days take place closer to the end of the school year in June, and students from multiple high schools usually don't coordinate to ditch school on the same day.
"With a declining enrollment trend, naturally our budget goes down, so certainly the senior ditch day that happened didn't help our situation," said Sandra Chen, assistant superintendent of business services at a recent budget meeting. "Every time students don't show up, we're hurting."
The district has also begun a communication campaign to parents and students in order to prevent another mass senior ditch day, which Gobin said may happen regionally, with students at other districts, on April 7 -- or 4/7/11 -- according to Facebook chatter.
"2004 is the year they promoted from elementary to junior high, 2007 is the year they promoted to high school, and 2011 is the year they graduate," Gobin said.
Student leaders from the four high schools attended a regular student advisory committee meeting last Thursday in which district officials discussed the consequences of the ditch day.
Gobin said four Don Lugo High leadership students, Tori Kerber, Brandon DiTommaso, Brett Walker, and Bianca Pezo, were able to relay the message back to their fellow classmates about another ditch day planned Friday.
Only 24 students from Don Lugo ditched school on last Friday, Gobin said.
"What they took back was the message that the senior ditch day significantly impacts education," said Colleen Alton, child welfare and attendance coordinator. "There's a bigger picture here than just having fun. So they got the word out and the kids heeded and paid attention."
Gobin added the district is proud of the students who decided to resist the temptation. Of the 2,250 seniors at Don Lugo, Ayala, Chino and Chino Hills high schools, two thirds, or about 1,440, did attend classes last Tuesday, she said.
"We certainly want to acknowledge they did the right thing and we're hopeful by getting the message out to parents and students we can mitigate the possibility of having a big turnout like this again in April."
neil . nisperos @inlandnewspapers.com, 909-483-9356
By Neil Nisperos
Staff WriterDespite outcry and legal objections from Chino Hills over a high-voltage energy project, Southern California Edison's work on the project through the city begins this year.
Residents can expect to see brush clearing work along the five-mile easement through the city, and tower and pole erection work and conductor line stringing through the coming year.
When completed by 2015, the $1.8 billion Tehachapi project will bring wind-generated electricity from Kern County to the Los Angeles Basin - part of a state mandate to use more sustainable energy.
Edison spokesman Les Starck said the project will enable the company to tap into additional supplies of clean wind energy to help improve the environment and reduce dependence on foreign sources of energy.
A number of residents expressed fears the larger new high-voltage power lines and towers, slated to cut through city neighborhoods, will impact safety, health, city views and property values.
Residents and local officials raised concern that the towers, which would be twice the size of the existing ones, could fall on or near homes during windy weather or an earthquake.
Starck said the concerns are legitimate, though he said the state Public Utilities Commission reviewed environmental issues prior to coming to a conclusion in December 2009 that Edison could move forward with the project.
"We understand the concerns of the residents, but we believe we can build this line safely, operate it very safely, and do so in a very responsible manner," Starck said.
The state PUC sided with Edison's proposed routes using its existing powerline routes through the city, compared to the city's alternate route, which would have cut through the Chino Hills State Park.
In early 2009, the city filed a complaint in San Bernardino County Superior Court against SCE, claiming that the project would "overburden the easement over City property."
Last April, Judge Keith D. Davis ruled that the California Public Utilities Commission has exclusive jurisdiction regarding the route used by Edison and has rejected the city's lawsuit.
In June, the city appealed the judge's ruling. The request for injunction was aimed at halting the construction until the appeal is resolved.
The 4th District Court of Appeal in September denied the city's request for an injunction to stop the construction.
Chino Hills Mayor Ed Graham said the concern still remains over the possibility of a tower or pole falling near residents.
"You hope it never happens, but if it happens, we did everything we could do to try to stop this," Graham said. "All the responsibility falls on them."
By Neil Nisperos
Staff Writer
The Ayala High School Theater Group, fresh off a fall production of "The Crucible," is tackling another play with a hard-hitting theme.
The students are presenting "The Family Nobody Wanted," which centers around the Doss family, which came to public attention in the pages of Reader's Digest and Life in the late 1940s and early 1950s. At one time, the family spent some time living in rural Cucamonga.
Helen Doss and her minister-in-training husband Carl were a young California couple who wanted a family, though Helen was infertile.
After adopting one infant who matched them perfectly, they wanted more children, but were frustrated by the lengthy waiting periods for white babies. The Dosses, whose only desire was to expand their family, ended up with 12 children from Filipino, Hawaiian, Balinese, Malayan, Indian, Mexican and Native American backgrounds at a time of racial inequality and prejudice.
Donny, who is of European background, becomes engaged to a young woman whose parents are prejudiced against non-whites, and the play deals with how the Doss family deals with the issue.
"Donny is adopted into this family, which basically adopted all the children nobody would adopt, so they took in however many children they could afford to keep," said Ayala senior Kurt Boehmke, who plays Donny.
"Part of the problem is Donny's girlfriend Nan and her parents are prejudiced and he doesn't think it should matter. She's insecure about it and she doesn't think her parents should know, but he doesn't care about prejudice and he knows it shouldn't matter, regardless of who you are."
Ayala student Taylor Stark plays Donny's younger sister Laura Doss.
"Laura is very smart and she's one of the younger ones," Stark said. "She's very sweet, and for most of the kids in the family, they don't understand prejudice. When the conflict happens in the play, they find out about it, but they were taught they were all beautiful."
Chelsea Wilcox is a co-director on the production, which marks her first time directing.
"I would describe directing is a really difficult task, trying to work around people's schedules, but it's going to be an uplifting experience to see the final product and to see that I was a part of that," Wilcox said. "It will be nice when it's all done."
Wilcox was helped by fellow first-time co-director Rebecca Gomez.
"I hope the audience gets to see the moral of the story," Gomez said.
"This family was just an ordinary family, but to everyone else, they were a freak show. So this deals with how much prejudice there was back then. I hope the audience gets to see how silly those kinds of prejudices were and how much we've changed over time."
Gomez said working on the play has been stressful and fun at the same time.
"Seeing actors at their best and having fun in the process has been a crazy and fun experience," she said. "It's something I really learned from."
neil . nisperos @inlandnewspapers.com
909-483-9356
By Neil Nisperos
Staff Writer
CHINO--Chino Valley firefighters were busy Wednesday at the same Chino dairy waste pile that saw a similar conflagration a month ago.
A 10-foot tall pile of green waste, consisting of branches, palm fronds, and other waste, was burning at the Van Der Eyk Dairy Farm, located at 17650 Hellman Avenue.
Firefighters first arrived to the scene at 4:15 a.m.
Investigators are still looking into the cause of the fire. Two fire engine crews were on scene Wednesday. Officials expected the fire to burn anywhere between 24 to 48 hours.
"Fire crews are continually wetting down the burn area and are waiting for heavy equipment to arrive on scene to start breaking up the piles and spreading them out for extinguishment," said Massiel Ladron De Guevara, spokeswoman for the Chino Valley Independent Fire District.
Fire officials said green waste fires typically burn for long periods of time, because the material is densely packed. In order for the fire to be extinguished, firefighters use tools and machinery to break apart the pile.
The waste pile had earlier caught fire Dec. 12 at Vander Eyk Dairy at the corner of Hellman Avenue and Chino Corona Road. It took a few days for firefighters to extinguish the fire last month.
No injuries or property damage was reported.
neil.nispeors@inlandnewspapers.com, 909-483-9356
By Neil Nisperos
Staff Writer
CHINO--The regional authority responsible for desalinizing Chino Basin water has appointed a new top administrator as it continues with a major expansion project and faces structural reorganization.
Curtis Paxton, currently the assistant general manager and chief operating officer of the Palmdale Water District, will take the reigns as the first general manager of the Chino Basin Desalter Authority on Jan. 24.
"I'm really looking forward to becoming part of the Chino Basin Desalter Authority family and strengthening the relationships between the agencies," Paxton said. "I believe that the founders of CDA had great vision and I'm excited with partnering with the board to continue to move forward as an organization."
The authority is responsible for cleaning and desalinizing Chino Basin water for Chino, Chino Hills, Ontario, Jurupa, Norco and western Riverside County. The cities and agencies that contract with the authority receive about 20 percent of their water from it.
The authority's two treatment plants, Desalter I and Desalter II, will be expanded to increase water production from 24,600 acre-feet per year to 35,200 acre-feet per year. Officials expect the expansion work to be completed around 2014.
The $116 million expansion cost will be shared equally between the city of Ontario, Western Municipal Water District and the Jurupa Community Services District.
The agency produces 20 million to 25 million gallons of clean water daily. A completed project would produce about 35 million, officials said. Since desalination efforts began 10 years ago, about 60 percent of infrastructure for the authority has been completed.
Staffing for the authority has been comprised of part-time employees from the various cities and water agencies that comprise the desalter joint powers authority.
The changes over the new year transitions the agency into a stand-alone organization, with its own full-time employees, said Ontario engineer Tim Mim Mack, who serves in the authority's current managerial role of CDA coordinator.
"The reason we have a new general manager is to increase organizational efficiency," Mim Mack said. "Having only part-time staff from every supporting agency is not very efficient."
Paxton said he will work with the board to develop the new organizational structure. Until then, the desalter authority will contract staffing from the various members agencies.
neil.nisperos@inlandnewspapers.com, 909-483-9356
By Neil Nisperos
Staff Writer
The Los Angeles County District Attorney's Office has charged the city attorney of Chino and Rialto with two misdemeanor counts of driving under the influence of alcohol.
Jimmy Gutierrez is expected to be arraigned at 8:30 a.m. Thursday in the Los Angeles Superior Court in West Covina.
Gutierrez may elect to have an attorney appear for him in court since the charges are misdemeanors.
A vehicle driven by Gutierrez was driving Oct. 23 on the 60 Freeway in Industry when California Highway Patrol officers from the Santa Fe Springs station stopped it for swerving. The officers asked Gutierrez to take a sobriety test, but he elected to provide a blood sample at a hospital.
Gutierrez said he had consumed a few glasses of wine with dinner.
He was booked at 3:30 a.m. at the sheriff's substation in Industry. He was released from custody at 1 p.m. Oct. 24, according to the county Sheriff's Department and the California Highway Patrol.
Gutierrez said he regretted his actions and took "full responsibility for my actions on that evening."
"I blame no one but myself, and I will accept the consequences given to me by the justice system," he said this past fall. "I would like it to serve as a reminder that as adults we must be mindful of our public activities that involve the consumption of wine or alcoholic beverages."
After his arrest, Gutierrez said he contacted Chino Mayor Dennis Yates and Rialto Mayor Grace Vargas to inform them of the incident.
Yates said his council will await the outcome of the arraignment, before considering further action.
"We're still in limbo and we're looking to see whether indeed he was over the limit," Yates said. "The council will look at just exactly what the consequences he will suffer, if he was indeed found over the limit and we'll look at whatever they make him do, whether it's going to alcohol school or applying a fine. It's a little premature for us to comment until we learn what happens."
Rialto Mayor Pro Tem Ed Scott said the incident did not affect Gutierrez's performance.
"As long as he continues to do his job, I will support him in his job," Scott said. "If at some point he continues to exhibit poor judgement, then I might want to take a different look at it. Everyone makes poor judgement. He stepped forward with this. Thank God nobody was injured as a result."
By Neil Nisperos
Staff Writer
CHINO -- Esperanza Herrera is one happy mom after the help of concerned school officials.
Her son, a 15-year-old district high school student, had problems with school attendance when he was in junior high school. Now he's counted among students who have made attendance improvement at Chino Valley Unified.
Attendance at Chino Valley Unified School has increased more than a percentage point from the same period last year, according to district officials.
The improvement of the attendance rate, from about 96 percent in late 2009 to a recent report of about 97 percent, is welcome in a time of decreasing education funding statewide.
Part of the reason for the uptick is proactive work on the part of the district's Student Support Services team, which assesses the reasons students may have attendance problems.
Colleen Alton, a child welfare and attendance coordinator with the district, and Irene Garnica, an outreach advisor Student Support Services, both make regular visits with families in need to find out what they can do to help. They contacted Herrera several years ago.
"Her son wasn't going to school, but his glasses were broken and he had an ear ache," Alton said. "The family had no medical insurance and we helped get him glasses.
We got him over to the district health clinic were they they not only helped, but also helped fill out medical papers for insurance, so that she would have insurance. they facilitated that as well."
Alton said student support services acts as a "hub" for parents and students to get back on track.
"We hook them up with the right resources," she said. "Some kids have no shoes and can't go to school without shoes. We have a closet her where I keep extra pairs of shoes."
Often, the team is able to help families with referrals to community health and social service providers, such as the district's own health center at low or no cost to district parents, credit recovery programs, the district's home-based online virtual school, and free or low cost tutoring, and school supplies.
Herrera, who speaks Spanish, told Garnica at a recent visit, that the team has been a great help to the family.
"She doesn't understand very much English, so with the transplanting service, we've been a great help to her," Garnica said. "She says she wishes she could be little and
young so we could have sent her to school too."
Herrera's son's attendance has been a "100 percent turnaround," Alton said.
"He's gone from not going to going," she said. "He's been at school every day. He started at one of our junior highs and he's progressing to high school now."
By Neil Nisperos
Staff Writer
CHINO -- The Chino Valley school board went against the district superintendent's urging to take immediate action on $12.5 million in budget cuts and instead put off such a decision.
The board Thursday night delayed any action after employees, at risk of paycuts or layoffs, asked officials to look hard in finding other ways to deal with the potential $31.5 million deficit facing the district.
Superintendent Wayne Joseph had identified a $12.5 million list of cuts earlier in the week and urged the Board of Education not to delay in reducing the budget deficit.
The Board of Education has scheduled an additional budget discussion during a 5 p.m. study session Thursday at Woodcrest Junior High, 2725 S. Campus Ave., Ontario. The next board meeting in which action could be taken will be at 7 p.m. on Jan. 20, also at Woodcrest.
Joseph's recommendations had included work year reductions for district directors and coordinators, occupational therapists, pyschologists, program specialists and instructional aides.
Also identified were the possible elimination of a number of clerical positions, bilingual clerks, career and school counselors, advanced placement secretaries, school nurses, the elementary school music program and school transportation.
Some employees have expressed concern that district officials are not making equitable reductions across the board. Particular board scrutiny was placed on use of overtime, management work hours and supervision ratios.
"In some cases we have organizations that are stacked because we have a lot of people to work and as you begin to shrink, sometimes that shrinkage does not go from bottom to top. We miss some steps," board member Fred Youngblood said.
"We need to go back from time to time to look at where we are out of balance in terms of what we thought we have and what we need."
Board member Brandon Blanchard also needed more detailed information about management and requested district administrators look at an equal reduction of work hours for directors and coordinators across the board.
"I'm looking for a shared responsibility of reduction instead of eliminations," Blanchard said.
Joseph voiced some caution however, reasoning that at some point, reductions to district management would result in an impact to the ability of the district to attract quality people.
"We have to be careful that when we're looking at cuts we send out the message that not one group or two groups are carrying the load," he said. "We just have to be careful about that message and that the people (at the district office are) convenient sacrifices."
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