In the News

Freed from the burden of about $22 million owed to Riverside County by a one-time infusion of state funds, Jurupa Valley officials are ready to declare they won’t dissolve the city and aren’t “going anywhere.”

City council members on Thursday, Oct. 1, are set to vote to repeal a 2014 resolution that stated their intent to start disincorporation. They would have been the first city in the county –and the state – to do so since Cabazon in 1972.

It’s the same story with a twist for four relatively new Riverside County cities that were hit hard by a state budget maneuver four years ago.

Gov. Jerry Brown on Tuesday, Sept. 22, announced his veto of SB 25, a Senate bill that would have restored vehicle license fee revenue to Eastvale, Jurupa Valley, Wildomar and Menifee. The governor vetoed similar bills in 2012 and 2014.

However, Brown signed into law a bill, SB 107, that reduces what Riverside County owes Sacramento for Cal Fire services with the aim of helping the four cities. That provision was part of a larger bill tied to the 2011 dissolution of redevelopment agencies, and related legislation signed by Brown sets up an alternative to redevelopment.

State Sen. Jeff Stone, R-Temecula was so outraged when state lawmakers stripped vehicle license fee revenue from cities in 2011, he called for California to be split in two.

But as the state legislative session wound down last week, Stone voted against a bill that would have provided relief to four cities – Eastvale, Jurupa Valley, Wildomar and Menifee – that were especially hard hit by the fees’ diversion. His opposition put him at odds with another Inland senator, Democrat Richard Roth of Riverside.

Two options to help Riverside County’s newest cities -- Eastvale, Jurupa Valley, Menifee and Wildomar -- are still alive and on the governor’s desk.

The first, SB 25, would restore vehicle license fee revenue to the four cities, all of which incorporated after 2007. State lawmakers diverted that money in 2011, a move that hit the cities especially hard, since newer cities relied on vehicle license fees to a greater degree than more established municipalities.