From the San Bernardino County Sentinel..

News of Note from Around the Largest County in the Lower 48 States
Friday, July 31, 2009
A Fortunado Publication in conjunction with Countywide News Service
10808 Foothill Blvd. Suite 160-446 Rancho Cucamonga, CA 91730

Berry’s Tenure Draws to an End

Acting city manager Steve Berry’s tenure with the city of Grand Terrace came to an ig­nominious conclusion Tuesday night when he was escorted from City Hall by a member of the sheriff’s department while the city council in closed session resolved to terminate him.

That decision was made without the par­ticipation of councilman Jim Miller, who in recent weeks was identified as the subject of a complaint advanced by Berry per­taining to votes Miller had made on agendized consent calendar items that ratified check regis­ters which included pay­ments made to the Grand Terrace City News.

The City News is owned by Miller’s wife, Margaret. It was revealed in court documents re­leased earlier this month that Berry’s statements to the district attorney’s office were instrumental in the district attorney’s office’s filing of criminal conflict of interest charg­es against Jim Miller.

Scores of Grand Ter­race residents, many of whom expressed outrage at the district attorney’s action, flooded the coun­cil chambers in anticipation of an adver­tised hearing with regard to the termination of the assistant city manager on that evening’s city council agenda.

Berry, though he had been serving in the ca­pacity of acting city man­ager for 13 months in the aftermath of former city manager Tom Schwab’s medical leave, was never hired to fill the role of city manager. Rather, he remained, until earlier this week, in the capac­ity of assistant city man­ager, albeit one who had been elevated to the role of acting as the city’s top administrator. The city council earlier this year had declared its intention to undertake a statewide recruitment drive to fill the city manager’s slot, and invited both Berry and Schwab to apply after a controversy had broken out about which of the two was best suited to lead city staff. Schwab withdrew as a candidate in late May. Last month, however, af­ter a series of press expo­sés regarding Berry and his comportment as as­sistant city manager - in­cluding his implication in an alleged embezzlement and his moonlighting for a developer in neighbor­ing Loma Linda - the city council announced that it would no longer consider Berry as a candidate for the post of permanent city manager.

It was in the immediate aftermath of that action that Miller was arrested and charged by the dis­trict attorney’s office. In conjunction with that ar­rest, the district attorney’s office released materials relating to the investiga­tion of Miller, including statements by Berry that he had considered the city’s purchase of ads that ran in the City News to be a conflict of interest impli­cating Miller and his wife from the first time those ads had been purchased, roughly six months af­ter Margaret Miller had purchased the newspaper in 2006. Moreover, those documents demonstrated that Berry had worked in tandem with city attorney John Harper in raising the issue last year. The documents suggested that Berry was instrumental in kindling the district attorney’s office’s interest in the matter, which was brought to the district at­torney’s office’s attention by an “anonymous” and “confidential” informant. That complaint, however, was augmented with sup­porting materials that originated from Berry’s office.

Subsequent to the fil­ing of the criminal charg­es against Miller and in reaction to the release of those documents, other information surfaced that suggested the portrait of Miller’s action provided to the district attorney’s office’s investigators was, if not inaccurate, incom­plete.

Specifically, it turned out some of those ads which Berry had so ve­hemently insisted repre­sented a conflict of inter­est had been purchased on the city’s behalf by Berry himself.

Furthermore, in close-knit Grand Terrace, it was universally recognized that Margaret Miller had purchased the newspaper in 2006 and that her hus­band was a member of the city council, beginning in 2004. This cast doubt on the veracity of the sug­gestion contained in the investigative report that city attorney Harper did not know of the circum­stance relating to the ads and their relationship to the Millers until August 2008. And in another blow to the case put to­gether against Jim Miller, former city manager Tom Schwab went on record as saying that the city at­torney had examined the circumstance early on - in 2006 - and concluded that the city’s purchase of the ads from the City News was kosher.

An examination of the record shows that Miller never made a vote to di­rect the city to purchase the ads from his wife’s newspaper, but rather had cast votes to approve the city’s check warrants af­ter those purchases were made on the authority of city officials below the rank of the city coun­cil. Those votes came on the city council’s vari­ous consent calendars. A consent calendar con­sists of a number of rou­tine housekeeping items pertaining to the city’s operations. All items on the consent calendar are deemed, and certified by city staff and the city at­torney, to be “routine and non-controversial.” Thus, questions have emerged about the accountabil­ity or lack thereof on the part of the city attorney and city management in allowing the items to have been placed on the consent calendar at all or without some notation of the relationship between Miller and his wife.

Questions of this sort appeared to be weighing heavily upon many of the community’s members who turned up at the July 28 city council meeting. Many wore red, white and blue lapel pins that were meant as a sign of support for Miller and his wife.

Those who spoke be­fore the council that eve­ning sounded two basic themes - defense of or at least an understanding or empathy for Jim Miller’s predicament and a scath­ing condemnation of Steve Berry.

Cynthia Bidney said she was “concerned for the reputation” of the community in the wake of Berry’s handling of municipal affairs. “Steve Berry is a liability to this city, yourselves and the citizens of Grand Terrace. He has dug up dirt and thrown mud. My experi­ence in dealing with Steve is he his argumentative and caustic.”

He had threatened her and her family, Bidney said, when she had sought to petition the city for re­dress. And Berry, she said, was capable of political skullduggery that would potentially compromise each member of the city council. “It is obvious Jim Mill­er was set up,” she said. “What more does he have on each one of you?” She said Berry was “calculating and vindic­tive. He is a master at dividing our citizens for selfish gain.”

Bernardo Sandoval likened the regime at Grand Terrace City Hall to an Iron Curtain or Third World dictatorship. In such countries, Sando­val said, “You are not al­lowed to speak freely. The rule of law is used to dic­tate to people what they can or cannot say, to keep those who are in control in power. Steve Berry, this is not Russia.”

Sandoval continued. “I don’t understand the re­ports coming in of people afraid to speak, city coun­cil members intimated to speak against him. You don’t have to be an at­torney to understand the injustice being done here. He is using the rule of law to keep people boxed in to intimidate his foes. Ac­tivists are afraid of get­ting their funding cut off. Our city does not deserve this.”

Patricia Farley told the council, “Whoever asked the DA to prosecute Jim Miller did not have con­cern for protecting the rights of the citizens in this community. It was purely vindictive. That cannot be tolerated. The people in the district at­torney’s office allowed themselves to be part of this.”

Farley continued, chas­tising the council. “Af­ter what you know to be facts, why is Mr. Berry allowed to step into City Hall? You should have had a special meeting to stop him. Decent people will not be willing to serve on the city council when they are framed like this.”

Though the council agenda had indicated the consideration of the as­sistant city manager’s termination would be held in open session, the council adjourned into a closed session that lasted less than an hour. Miller did not participate in that session. Upon return­ing to the council dais, Mayor Maryetta Ferré announced the council had reached a consensus. “This decision is not in­tended to reflect on Steve Berry’s integrity or ser­vice,” she said, but added that “it is impossible for Steve to provide the lead­ership of staff to continue as city manager.”

A vote to that effect was then taken, resulting in a unanimous 4-0 deci­sion that was noteworthy from the standpoint that it included the support of councilwoman Bea Cortes, who hitherto had been an impassioned Ber­ry supporter.

That reversal on Cor­tes’ part was perhaps ex­plicable in the face of the tremendous outpouring of antipathy toward Berry that evening but also as a consequence of a report that the previous day Ber­ry had locked himself and the city information tech­nologies specialist inside City Hall. It was suggest­ed that such a move had been intended as part of an effort to gain inappro­priate access to city files.

The council did not indicate whether that inci­dent had any impact on its decision.

An effort to approach Berry to get his reaction and his version of events was thwarted when, as the city council had yet to announce its decision, Berry was escorted from City Hall by sheriff’s de­partment personnel.

The council also voted, after its vote to termi­nate Berry, to name city finance director Bernie Simon as his replacement as acting city manager.