The San Bernardino County Sun from San Bernardino, California • Page 24

projects By JOE BAKER Sun-Ttltgrm Bvsifttu Editor SAN BERNARDINO Mainly because of the troubled national economy, certain aspects of the Redevelopment Agency's overall Central City plan may be deferred or dropped, Mayor W. R. Holcomb said Friday. "We're looking Into the question of cash flow and whether the whole plan can be funded. 'It's a very complex overall plan in which, if all the positive things would occur, we would have no problems.

"But it would be unrealistic to assume all the positive factors will go, and if they dont, we must do some contin gency planning," Holcomb said. Holcomb said he and the Redevelopment Agency have been evaluating the program, unveiled by former agency Chairman Warner W. Hodgdon last December after more than a year of studies and planning. "If we could assume a good economy nationally, the plan could be Implemented much faster, probably over a 10-year "We're not in a position where we can say how much of the plan we can afford to carry out or how soon it can be done. "No projects have been formally changed or dropped, but it seems almost certain at this time that we won't be able to afford some things, at least for now, such as the Bicentennial amphitheater and the Pioneer Plaza," said Holcomb.

Estimated cost of proposed public improvements for the amphitheater in northwest San Bernardino ranges from $15 million to $3 million, and for Pioneer Plaza on Court Street opposite City Hall about $572,000. Holcomb said resources are available for proposed public parking on downtown sites recently acquired and cleared by the Redevelopment Agency, provided downtown merchants are willing to form a parking district and pay construction, maintenance and other costs of the district If not, he said, the agency probably would either defer or abandon the program and return the properties to the original owners. He said the owners probably would not be asked to return the down payments, mostly about 10 per cent of the full price. In most cases, balances due on the properties are payable in two to four years. Holcomb said the overall Central City plan also calls for extensive street, water, sewer and other public utility construction that could be readily deferred.

Another major item under study for possible deferment is the aerobus system proposed as a link between Central City and Inland Center malls. An upswing in the national economu, he said, could have a positive impact on the agency's timetable. Such an upswing might bring the long-sought 200-room hotel and a fourth department store into the downtown area, and some industrial plants into the city. "Unless we get that hotel, there wouldn't be much sense in building (Continued on B-3, Col. 1) may drop some SJB.

tjVi. San Bernardino news County news w2 I 6 -i San Bernardino, Calif. Section The Sun-Telegram, Saturday, Nov. 22, 1975 Three S.B. highway jobs OKd By CHI CK PALMER Sun-Tlt9rmSH Wrlttr SAN BERNARDINO A 197f77 budget adopted Friday by the California Highway Commission authorizes the spending of $20 million for three projects in San Bernardino County, two of them on Interstate 15 between Fontana and Ontario.

The $436 million statewide construction budget allocates $196 million for rebuilding and upgrading state highways and $240 million for the construction of 77 miles of new freeway and other road work. Overall, the $853 million budget is down nine per cent from 1975 $934 million. Most of the county's money will be spent on an eight lane freeway and toe north portion of an interchange of Interstate 15 and Route fiO, east of Ontario. The project, straddling the San Bernardino Riverside county line, will cost $12.5 million. The construction of the south portion of an interchange of Interstates 10 and 15.

east on Ontario, will cost $72 million. A safety project, construction of a median barrier on 1.3 miles of 110. east of Ontario, will cost $300,000. Sidney McCausland. director of the state Department of Transportation (Caltranst.

said the new budget emphasizes getting full use from existing state highways, because funds are getting scarce. The budget faces he said. lt rails for urgently needed work But the commission challenged some of the "urgently needed' projects, such as installing Jnetered onramps to control the flow of traffic on Route 210 in Los Angeles and Glendale. '1 can't believe that ramp metering "on a freeway that Isn't carrying a high volume of traffic is more Important than some of the road construction projects we have had to leave on the supplemental list for future Commissioner Robert Herdman, of Solvang, said. The commission has the prerogative of amending the budget as we get closer to the beginning of the fiscal year, July McCausland said.

(Continued on B-3, Col. 1) Wills-' w' III I II I I .1: Workers struggle to return accident victim to road after truck accident on Highway 330 Two men killed in mountain truck crash that when the brakes failed, they were unable to downshift to slow its speed. Parker said, "We're not going to make this curve," Baker told officers. The truck careened against a two-foot high guard rail for more than 100 feet before the heavy load toppled the vehicle sideways over the ledge, CHP officer Anderson said. It flipped once, landing upside by braking or downshifting.

Morotists behind the truck also spotted the brake problems and one honked his car's horn to warn those in the truck. Dead at the scene off of Highway 330, four miles north of San Bernardino, were the driver, Donald Frank Parker, 22, who had been pinned in the cab, and Frank Lee Brooks, 25, thrown 50 feet from the truck into a brush covered hillside. By DENNIS KELLY 5un-Ttiegrm stiff Writer SAN BERNARDINO Two Arcadia men were killed and another man injured when their rented truck lost braking power under a heavy cargo of logs and tumbled down a mountain highway ledge Friday afternoon. The survivors said the men knew they were in trouble but were unable to halt the truck's momentum here, asks $5,000 in damages each for Sgt. David Jay Bushnell and Detectives Barry A Bruins, Terry Z.

Harbison and Claude Williams. It names Henry Ramirez Sr. and his wife, Beatrice, of 937 Texas who were convicted in Superior Court Aug. 25 of multiple counts of assault and battery on the officers. Ramirez is serving a 90day sen- Mother meets child; murder case over Four Redlands detectives file suit against couple Staff photo by Sam Spina down facing in the opposite direction from which it had been going.

Its load of quartered logs spilled across the dusty brush covered hillside. The fence-like railing was crushed underneath the truck and some portions hung in a tree branch. U.S. Forest Service firemen, seeing the accident while outside their ranger station a half mile south, notified authorities and went to the scene. by the trial judge, Superior Court Judge Thomas M.

Haldorsen, who said that the prosecution had filed to prove any element of its case. Nor had the prosecution disproven the defense that the missing girl had been abandoned in San Francisco and not killed, he said. TheJudge called for more investigation by both sides before the casewent to trial again. Further investigation was conducted, and Friday the district attorney's office moved to dismiss the still-pending murder charges on grounds of insufficient evidence. Judge Don A.

Turner granted the motion and the two were freed. "I can't forget everything that has happened to me," Mrs. Walpole said (Continued on B-3, Col. 5) A Thought for Today In youth the days are short and the years are long; in old age the years are short and the days long. Panin First Federal Savings Loan Association of Sin Bernardino 555 St.

889-0881 Also in Barstow and Loma Linda By PATRICK SHEERAN Sun-Ttlt grm Stiff Writtr REDLANDS Four police detectives filed a civil suit against a Red-lands couple Friday, alleging assault, battery and negligent battery while the officers were trying to arrest the couple's son In a murder investigation April 28. The suit, filed in Municipal Court Michael A. Baker, 22, of San Di-mas, was taken to San Bernardino County Medical Center with minor injuries and authorities expected he would be released Friday night. The men were driving down Highway 330, which leads to Running Springs and Big Bear, in a truck with logs loaded above the bed's four-foot high white fenced railing. They had rented the truck from a Monrovia equipment rental firm.

Deputy County Coroner Ben Rubidoux said they may have been trying to sell logs in the Los Angeles area. Phillip Duke, 28, of Dana Point, who was in a car with his brother and a friend, had detected a burning odor even before he came upon the truck. "I thought, wow, my own brakes were going," Duke said. He came up behind the truck four miles before the accident and spotted smoke coming from the wheel wells. The brake lights of the truck flashed intermittently "but it looked spongy," Duke said.

"The brakes kept getting worse and worse," said Duke's brother, John, 25, of Laguna Beach. "It got to the point where they had to resort to pumping the brakes to slow them down and take the curve." They said they honked, but the men in the truck were aware of the trouble, according to the survivor. Baker told California Highway Patrolman Bill Anderson that the truck had clutch problems when they drove it to the mountains, and FLOWERLAND PLAZA CHRISTMAS OPEN HOUSE Sunday, Nov. 23rd 2-3 P.M. SEE HUNDREDS OF SPECIAL IDEAS FOR CHRISTMAS GIFTS SUN-TELEGRAM NEWSPAPER CARRIERS Call 889-9666, Ext.

254 BY ALAN ASHBY Sun-Tlegram Staff writer SAN BERNARDINO "I always said I had six children. But I had seven and now I have seven again," commented Mrs. Merla Walpole Friday after murder charges against her and her former husband were dismissed in court. Mrs. Walpole, 35, of San Bernardino, and her former husband, Antonio Rivera, 38, of Col-ton, had been accused of killing their daughter Judy In 1965 when she was three years old: Now Mrs.

Walpole is planning to spend Christmas with the teen-ager she is convinced is the daughter she and Rivera were convicted of murdering after a jury trial last March. Their conviction was overturned NEW ROOFS RE-ROOFING REPAIRS FREE ESTIMATES TERMS AVAILABLE MORRISON-HOPE, INC. 205 SO. ARROWHEAD 885-6881 RESTAURANTBAR Proven Locations for Lease Court Arrowhead in Downtown San Bernardino Pptentially the Best Operation in the City Contact 889-3829 or 640-1702 tence at Glen Helen Rehabilitation Center. Mrs.

Ramirez is scheduled to begin a 60day sentence Jaa 2. The detectives' attorney, Carroll M. Lawson of Redlands, said Friday the criminal convictions did not rule out civil action by the officers who, he said, were physically assaulted and beaten in the course of performing their duties and then harassed with accusations of "police brutality." The Redlands Police Officers Association released a statement of support on the suit It said, in part "Police officers, like any other persons, are entitled to approach the bar of justice seeking equal treat Prior criminal proceedings regarding the illegal act on these officers meted out a certain kind of justice. But the true victims of those attacks were not justly recompensed. The request now is that they receive the benefits of the full scope of justice which was begun in the criminal courts." The arrests of Mr.

and Mrs. Ramirez after the attacks in April touched off a demonstration and several community meeting at which police brutality was alleged. A subsequent investigation by the San Bernardino Coun ty District Attorney's Office concluded there was no police brutality Lawson said the four detectives were compelled to wait until the (Continued on B-3, Col. 5) Navaho investigation is requested by Pettis WASHINGTON Rep. Shirley N.

Pettis, has asked Interior Secretary Thomas Kleppe to investigate measures "to relieve the problems of the Navaho Indians" in San Bernardino County. Mrs. Pettis made her request in response to a San Bernardino Sun-Telegram story Nov. 16 that revealed the Indians experience an 80 per cent unemployment rate and exist in poverty. She told will note that 5,000 Indians live in San Bernardino County, most of them in the desert.

They represent 52 different tribes. With the many larger tribes in the western United States, it is easy for us to overlook small groups of Indians like the Navahos living in the hamlet of Ludlow." The 61 Navahos of Ludlow, she said, live in poverty. She acknowledged that the question of federal assistance to Indians not living on reservations is now before the courts, but said "it really doesn't do much to help the Navaho Indians in Ludlow now." 4aaaaim a tMu.tjjAm 4 114 444 4444 4144J4J444J4.