CIVIC | NOTES for Wednesday, Feb. 5

IN THIS BULLETIN – Animal removal deadline extended for Garland Rescue Ranch | Adelanto Jail is $25 million over budget | Littlerock and Sun Village town councils still waiting on revised CSD | LA County concerned with $640 million welfare tab for illegal immigrants | Hesperia to offer free CERT training | Congressman Cook takes on Obamacare | Health care enrollment half way to projected estimates for Inland Empire | CoolCalifornia wants to engage communities to use less energy | Newly-elected city officials participate in ethics and responsibility course in Sacramento |

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| ANIMAL RESCUE CLOSURE DELAYED |

According to a story posted on the Facebook group page of the Garland Rescue Network, a deadline for vacating about 30 dogs and 40 cats at the Garland Rescue Ranch in Palmdale was delayed on Monday.

The Palmdale animal rescue operation was ordered last week by Los Angeles County Animal Care and Control officials to move out all of its animals by Monday, but the deadline was extended another week. The animals were ordered removed because the rescue operation has no kennel license and too many animals under county regulations, according to Mercedes Atwood, manager of the facility.

Animal Control Chief Deputy Director Betsey Webster said Garlands Rescue was given more time because of the progress made in finding new homes for the animals. About 50 dogs and 30 cats were adopted out Saturday, according to Atwood. Rescue workers were told the animals would be taken to the Lancaster shelter if they were not moved out. What remains at the facility on 16th Street West, just outside Palmdale city limits, are about 30 cats. All are feral – or wild – animals that aren’t suitable for adoption to homes, Atwood said.

Read more from the Garland Rescue Network’s group page at facebook.com/groups.

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|ADELANTO JAIL $25M OVER BUDGET|

The tab for the expansion of the High Desert Detention Center here has come in at $25.4 million more than the amount San Bernardino County officials projected in late 2010, reports Joe Nelson of the San Bernardino Sun.

When it awarded a construction contract to Washington-based Lydig Construction Inc. in December 2010, the county projected a total cost of $120 million. With construction now complete and a grand opening scheduled for Thursday, the final cost for the project has come in at $145.4 million, which includes $22.1 million in additional costs including design, administration, inspection, utilities and permits.

That is more than what the county initially budgeted for the project in 2008 – $144 million – when it applied for, and subsequently received, $100 million in state funding for the project. Read the full story at redlandsdailyfacts.com.

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| WAITING ON A REVISED CSD |

Annamarie Dyemartin, secretary for the Littlerock Town Council, told the Bee that members of the community attended a meeting on Saturday in Sun Village to review the area’s current Community Standards District, which was approved in 2007. However, the town councils for both Littlerock and Sun Village have been waiting for nearly three years for the modified CSD to be approved, which includes commercial truck parking, storage containers, and rural artifacts, according to Dyemartin.

“We were told that the area plan (Town & Country) has to be completed first,” said Dyemartin in an email to the Bee. The (town council) asked them to incorporate the CSD into the area plan and they won’t or can’t.”

Dyemartin said that community leaders plan to hold another meeting to inform more residents of the modified CSD. They are also attempting to schedule a meeting with Los Angeles County Planner Robert Ettleman, but “he is waiting to hear back from his boss for the approval,” she said.

For a bit more insight into the area’s struggle with amending the CSD, check out this article from 2010 at littlerock-ca.us/news.

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| WELFARE COST CONCERNS |

Los Angeles County Supervisor Michael D. Antonovich announced that a report by the Department of Public Social Services reveals that almost $640 million in welfare and food stamp benefits were issued to illegal alien parents for their native-born children in 2013.

According to a news release from Antonovich’s office, the $640 million consisted of $227 million in CalWORKs (welfare) and $412 million in CalFresh (food stamps), which amounts to a $3 million increase over the previous year. More than 20 percent of the County’s public welfare funds are spent on illegal immigrants, the release stated.

“With $550 million for public safety and nearly $500 million in healthcare – in addition to the hundreds of millions spent on education – the total cost for illegal immigrants to county taxpayers is nearly $2 billion dollars a year,” Antonovich said.

A monthly breakdown of these figures from the Los Angeles County Department of Public Social Services are available at scvbeacon.com.

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| HESPERIA CERT TRAINING |

In his latest newsletter, Assemblyman Tim Donnelly encouraged Hesperia residents to participate in free Community Emergency Response Team training, saying California faces the reality of increased fire dangers because the state has been hit with one of the driest winters in recorded history.

Beginning Feb. 6, this 20-hour CERT course will include disaster preparedness, basic disaster response skills, light search and rescue, team organization, terrorism and disaster medical operations. If interested in attending, contact Brigit Bennington, Emergency Services Coordinator, at 760-947-1245 or at bbennington@cityofhesperia.us.

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| COOK: OBAMACARE CREATES UNCERTAINTY |

Rep. Paul Cook, R-Yucca Valley, said in his newsletter Tuesday that the Congressional Budget Office’s budget & economic report on Obamacare confirms “millions of hardworking Americans will lose their jobs and those who keep them will see their hours and wages reduced” under the new health care law.

“The president’s health care law creates uncertainty for small businesses, reduces take-home pay, and makes it harder to invest in new workers,” said Congressman Cook, who is a cosponsor of H.R. 3121, the American Health Care Reform Act, which is a bill to repeal and replace President Obama’s healthcare law.

According to Cook, H.R. 3121 safeguards individuals with pre-existing conditions by creating high-risk pools. These high-risk pools are capped at 200 percent of the average premium of the state. This plan extends existing health privacy protections and improves insurance portability.

“We need a real market-based solution, not a one-size-fits-all government scheme,” Cook said.

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| HEALTH CARE ENROLLMENT |

Covered California and the California Department of Health Care Services (DHCS) announced that 39,474 consumers in San Bernardino and Riverside counties enrolled in subsidized and non-subsidized Covered California health insurance plans from Oct. 1 to Dec. 31, under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.

The three-month total represents 52 percent of the base projection of 76,069 Covered California estimated for the region during the entire six-month enrollment period, which ends March 31. The Inland Empire counties of San Bernardino and Riverside represent about 8 percent of the statewide enrollment. For the three-month period, which is half of the open-enrollment period for 2014 coverage, 500,108 consumers enrolled in plans statewide.

Tables showing enrollment in these and other regions are available online at coveredca.com/news.

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| LESS ENERGY CHALLENGE |

Cities throughout California are invited to sign up now through March 30 to participate in the statewide CoolCalifornia City Challenge, a community-based competition to cut carbon emissions.

The competition is designed to engage households and community groups in cities across the state to use less energy, reduce their carbon footprints and build more vibrant and sustainable communities. Participants in each city log their actions to reduce greenhouse gases onto an online carbon calculator which determines how much carbon is being cut in each municipality. More info is available on the Air Resources Board website at arb.ca.gov/newsrel.

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| ELECTED OFFICIAL TRAINING |

The League of California Cities hosted its annual New Mayors and Council Members Academy in Sacramento on Jan. 22 for more than 200 newly-elected local officials. The three-day academy included training on a wide range of topics such as ethics, legal obligations, financial responsibilities and communication strategy.

The New Mayors and Council Members Academy is a voluntary educational program offered to newly elected city officials in California to better prepare them for the strenuous demands and requirements of locally elected public office, according to the League’s website. Incumbent city officials also attended the training to continue their own education, stay current on new requirements and learn new skills beneficial to the public they serve.

Most materials from the conference are now posted online and financial responsibilities materials are available as well. Read the full article at cacities.org/top/news.

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CIVIC | NOTES is a bulletin published throughout the week, featuring summary news and issues of public interest for the High Desert communities. | Contact the Civic Bee editor with any news tips or sponsorship interest for the Bee’s CIVIC | NOTES