IE business stories recap

The Colonies Crossroads trial, the closing of Carousel Mall and the revival of Ontario International Airport were among the top Inland Empire business stories of 2017.

Twenty seventeen was the year the largest and most publicized corruption trial in the history of the Inland Empire, if not all of California, played out in San Bernardino County Superior Court.

When it was finished, it turned out there wasn’t any corruption.

Rancho Cucamonga developer Jeff Burum, former County Supervisor Paul Biane and Mark Kirk, former chief of staff to then-Supervisor Gary Ovitt, all faced multiple charges in connection with an alleged scheme to get a $102 million settlement from the board of supervisors.

Prosecutors alleged that the settlement was brought about by donations to political action committees, donations that helped speed up the development of Colonies Crossroads, the 434-acre development next to the Foothill Freeway in Fontana.

Burum’s investment group, Colonies Partners LP, developed that retail and residential project, the first phase of which opened in 2005.

But following nearly eight months of trial, jurors rejected all nine of the perjury and corruption charges against the three defendants.

This was after Judge Michael A. Smith had already thrown out much of the case including, at the beginning of the trial, a conspiracy charge that was crucial to the prosecution’s case. After when testimony needed in September, defense attorneys declined to present closing arguments, a clear sign they didn’t believe the prosecution had proven its case.

That hunch turned out to be correct.

The jury didn’t believe the prosecution’s contention that the PAC donations were bribes even though they were made after the board agreed to the settlement.

“I am grateful to all of the jurors,” Burum said after the verdicts were read. “Those people gave up eight months of their lives, and their careers, to make sure that justice was done.”

The fourth defendant in the trial, James Erwin, was tried separately. After his jury was unable to reach a verdict, prosecutor Lewis Cope asked Smith to dismiss all charges against Irwin, which he did.

Twenty seventeen was the year the Carousel Mall in San Bernardino finally closed its doors.

Long one of the most beleaguered retail properties in the Inland Empire, the mall that opened as Central City Mall in 1972, shut down in July.

For at least 20 years, Carousel Mall struggled to stay afloat, as its crosstown rival, Inland Center Mall, became the city’s preferred shopping destination.

As it began to lose tenants in the early to mid-2000’s, and went through a series of owners, Carousel Mall began signing office tenants, including several local government agencies. That approach was supposed to generate more foot traffic, and thus more shopping, but the mall remained a virtual ghost town.

By 2003, city-owned Carousel Mall had lost all four of its anchor tenants: Gottschalks, Montgomery Ward, JCPenney and The Harris Co.

When it closed, Carousel Mall was down to 14 tenants. San Bernardino currently owns most of the mall property, which it hopes to redevelop.

Ontario International Airport had a good year in 2017. It was the airport’s first year under local control after more than 30 years of ownership by Los Angeles World Airports the agency that owns Los Angeles International Airport.

Passenger traffic during the first 10 months of 2017 was up 6.6 percent year-over-year. Much of the credit for that increase was due to Frontier Airlines, which began offering flights to Austin, San Antonio and Denver in October.

The Gold Line in 2017 broke ground on an extension that will eventually extend that service into the west end of the Inland Empire.

The extension will continue the light-rail line from Azusa, where it stops now, through Glendora, San Dimas, La Verne, Pomona, Claremont and Montclair.

Stations will be built in each of those cities except Montclair, which will get one only if it can secure funding from San Bernardino County. Construction on the $1.5 billion project is expected to take about 10 years.

In early December, San Bernardino officials oversaw the completion of the city’s downtown passenger rail system, which extended Metrolink from San Bernardino’s transportation hub to the Santa Fe Depot about one mile away.

Besides letting commuters in east San Bernardino Valley access Metrolink, Omnitrans buses and the city’s rapid transit line, the $123 million project will make it easier for local residents to reach Los Angeles and other parts of Southern California.

The Inland Empire continued to benefit from the e-commerce explosion in 2017, as Amazon announced in February that it would open fulfillment centers in Eastvale and Redlands.

Combined, both projects are expected to create approximately 2,000 full-time jobs.

The Eastvale facility will cover one million square feet and handle smaller items like books and electronics. The Redlands structure will cover 750,000 square feet and pack and ship larger goods

Amazon already operates six fulfillment centers in the Inland Empire: two in San Bernardino, and one each in Rialto, Moreno Valley, Eastvale and Redlands.

The second facilities in Eastvale and Redlands are under construction.

Ontario-based Cardenas Markets and Mi Pueblo, a San Jose based supermarket chain, merged this year.

The transaction, announced in July, created one of the largest Hispanic supermarket chains in the United States. The new company operates as Cardenas Markets LLC and is planning to expand into more Hispanic markets in the United States, according to officials with both companies.

Two trade unions came out strongly in 2017 against proposed electricity rate hikes by Southern California Edison, and they took their battle to the Inland Empire while doing so.

The possible increases – a total of 12.9 percent during the next three years – would leave California’s electricity rates about 40 percent above the national average, according to members of the Laborers’ International Union of North America and the International Union of Operating Engineers.

If approved, Edison’s electricity rates would go up $3.75 a month next year, an increase of $45 for the year, according to the Southern California District Council of Laborers.

After that, rates would go up $5.65 a month in 2019 – $67.80 for the year – and $7.29 a month in 2020, or $87.48 for the year.

Union members, who took their protest to a May meeting in Fontana of the California Public Utilities Commission, maintain those hikes are unfair to working families.

The five-member commission, which determines California’s utility rates, is considering the proposal.

The California Air Resources Board broke ground in February on a headquarters and vehicle- testing laboratory near UC Riverside.

Construction on the $419 million development, which will be located on the west side of Iowa Avenue between University Avenue and Martin Luther King Boulevard, is expected to start early next year. The project will cover about 380,000 square feet and create roughly 460 high-paying jobs, according to officials.