Inland Utopia

Coupons of any type are more of a problem than they are worth at the chain store I work at. Customers naturally do want to use all the coupons they have in their hand, and they get annoyed, disappointed or enraged that I tell them that the limit is 1 coupon of each coupon type.

If I get “Soup Nazi” on the customers and do not let them use more than 1 coupon then I am going to get an enraged customer who will want to talk to the manager or threaten to not come to our store. I do try to be accommodating because I know customers will shop other companies instead of ours and I do want to improve on customer satisfaction so I occasionally let the second coupon in a separate transaction go through. And I do not want to hold up the lines just because of an enraged customer then get more enraged customers because the line is held up.

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A letter to the Inland Valley Daily Bulletin about local bus service is going to be published in the next few days.

Our local transit agencies are suffering due to the economy where sales tax revenue and general revenue from local and state government is becoming non-existent. Reading the Daily Bulletin about how Foothill Transit and Omnitrans are going to cut service does strike fear in the individuals dependent on the services these organizations provide to help people get to work, shop or do other activities important to them.

I thought our eco-friendly Governor and state legislature care deeply about the environment where they do not want riders to end up giving up the bus system and clogging our local streets and highways with their cars and trucks.

If you want to help keep your routes alive, the general public will need to be encouraged to patronize their favorite routes so they can be kept for another day. If you do not ride it, they will not provide it.

When it is officially published I will provide a link to the letter.

The Inland Valley Humane Society is not a governmental owned organization, but they are a subcontractor of services from many cities throughout the region. Getting a dog license for my sister who moved from Nevada is becoming more laborious than having a root canal done on your mouth.
Recently my neighbor got robbed and a suspicious man parked near the front of my home for three straight days. My neighbor across the street questioned the man and we found out he was a license investigator. Then I asked my sister was her dog licensed, she said no so I decided to start out the paperwork towards getting her corgi legal.
I fed my credit card into their website and sent the related documents, then a week later they said, you owe the license fee and a penalty. I did pay the license fee, but upon calling their department they said the dog was not licensed in Las Vegas and that was their rationale why she got the penalty.

However she did not live in Las Vegas proper, she lived in the unincorporated part of the city which is governed by Clark County. According to the Clark County website all her corgi needs is either a microchip, a rabies license tag or an identification tag to be current in the city and her dog has two out of the three. It is unfortunate that the staff at the Inland Valley Humane Society seems oblivious to the facts even though when me and my sister call the licensing department they seem oblivious to the facts that could be easily found at Google to make sure we are telling the truth.
It feels like they are out for ways to fleece more money from the newcomers. If they wanted prior proof of licensing they should of said so on their documentation.

Even when you tell them the obvious they are still hungry for the money. I know that the organization is tired of dealing with this case right now, but when you are under the threat of a future penalty penalties it gets you more anxious to clear the books and get things situated so all this energy would not be needed. Then around March 26^th we mailed a check to pay the penalty since they will not likely budge about the penalty, they send a receipt saying we still have not paid them when the check is still sitting in their office not cashed for the last week and a half. If the organization has a hold policy on checks, they should at least say check received, will post in ten days or something like that so the drama would unfold.
My advice to the Inland Valley Humane Society is to have better bookkeeping policies so they don’t have to waste the money sending receipts saying you paid them nothing, when you actually did send them a credit card payment and or checks to their office.
Also I would suggest better customer service skills on their phone staff from the main receptionists to the people in the licensing departments. If I treated my customers at the store I worked at like how they treated me and my family I would be fired by now. Just because you work for a quasi-government agency does not mean you have the power of God on your side.

I understand that our public university system is suffering due to the collapsing economy and lack of support from Sacramento. Unfortunately I am not in the condition to donate money at this time and would love to be taken off the solicitation list from the school until I am able to donate. Not all of us are scientists, attorneys or other professionals that could afford to give a few hundreds to help pay it forwards. I would love to help out, but when the student callers call over and over on the same day when they are told that I have no spare money it does not help the cause.

If the school wants to help make it possible for the next generation of students to get a quality education maybe for the students who are lost after graduation provide them guidance so they would be able to donate back and feel that their education was a worthwhile investment, not a debt.

Matthew Munson ’03

When a neighbor gets robbed you become more suspicious about strange cars parked near your home. The strange car ended up being an investigator at the local animal control agency.

The irony is the individual is parked at the same corner for three straight days which raised the suspicion from me and my neighbor across the street.  Talking to animal control dispatcher did not really do anything to mediate the situation. The individual is there to do his job and that is understandable and he has the right to park where he needs to park.

However if you were a loss prevention investigator/detective or a license inspector like the guy from animal control would you do your best to make sure you are inconspicuous? You would not wear a uniform saying you are from the ABC Department Store. Would you park in the same corner on day 1, day 2 and day 3?. I would not.

At least by knowing this individual was in the vicinity my sister got her dog license taken care of online.

I decided to upgrade my phone from a Curve 8900 to a Bold 9700. The only benefits for me was 3G data, Visual Voicemail and an optical trackpad.

185 dollars was blown, but I feel I will have more peace of mind. I was frustrated with my blown trackball and I wanted something better after finding out my refurbished 8900 was going to be delayed.

This phone is going to have to last me for 18 months at least. I can not afford to change smart phones like clothes. If the iphone is released on t-mobile I might never end my contract and remain married to T-Mobile. So I stay in the Crackberry Nation for good times and bad.

The company I work for decided to have a system to make it where if you show up to work late or stay beyond your shift you get an infraction. However in the last six months people have been dismissed due to this new system and many of my co-workers are worried that it is basically a silent purge that is meant to clear out the employees for newer and low paid ones.

I do have some severe concerns where what happens if you have the flu, should you simply just show up because you do not want to get the infraction point where if you call out sick you get 1 point out of 6 towards unemployment?

The 1 point should be waived if you honestly went to a doctor and got a note saying yes, this employee has the flu and has an excuse to miss work. Would it be fun to see your store have no employees because all of them got the flu because the employee is having the living fear that if he or she missed work they would get dismissed and they all have the flu now?

Presenteeism is not good either. If you are honestly sick you should stay home. There should be a state law to protect employees from dismissal if they are honestly sick to do their job.

Yes, I know I should be looking for a new job, but right now there is nothing good for my industry or skill set and I am stuck where I am at.

Also, what happens if on your normal commute to work there is a car accident and you can not exit the highway or road due to congestion due to the accident, you are screwed with the 1 point penalty for being late. If you have a legitimate alibi such as the local police or highway patrol you should be excused from the late  penalty. Acts of god should not give you unemployment.

Anyways, to remain on the job we had to sign the document acknowledging the change in policy. It was like having a gun to your head saying if you did not sign the document you would be basically fired. However policies should be modified and employees should have an easier way of knowing how many infraction points they have accumulated so they would know to be on time and to come to work sick with the flu.

Ontario residents deserve better. We do deserve representatives that do not have the perception of being bought by outside interests such as Councilman Wapner, just because we do not have the thousands of dollars to stuff in their campaign accounts does not mean that we should be ignored.

Our city does deserve growth and opportunity, but at what price should this growth and opportunity provide for our city? It is not about NIMBYism, it is about being pragmatic to business and our residents which make our city work. Since the advent of Proposition 13 we are reliant on sales tax revenue to fund our local government, we should learn to work with the concerns of the residents so businesses would be able to navigate the hoops of public relations.

It has been almost a decade since Target, Toys R’Us and Food 4 Less left the parcel on Fifth and Mountain and if Wal-Mart wants to stop being an absentee landlord they need to negotiate with the residents and clean the blight they purchased.

Unlike the Chino Spectrum, this planned Super Center is near a residential district. Wal-Mart needs to make concessions in order for their project to happen. If concessions such as forgoing the 24/7 nature of the operation can not happen, then Wal-Mart needs to sell off the property so we can find a tenant that would fit well with the neighborhood.

For the last decade the former parcel on Fifth and Mountain in Ontario has been an eyesore since their former tenants left. Ontario residents have been fighting Wal-Mart who bought the property and the city government to prevent a Super Wal-Mart from being built in their neighborhood.

I could understand that the city of Ontario would like to have more sales tax revenue and more jobs flowing thru, but it seems the city only listens to big money flowing thru its leader’s campaign accounts. There should be an amicable compromise between the residents and the property owner to make things happen.

I would suggest solutions on restricting the hours of operation where it would only be 24/7 during the winter season as a start to make an olive branch to the residents who surround the parcel. A regular sized wal-mart with a micro-market such as their Marketside concept or a Wal-Mart neighborhood market a few blocks a way would  have more public support.

I think honestly there should be a referendum with people who live in a 1.5 mile radius in Ontario to decide if the project should be there. If not, Wal-Mart should be refunded the purchase of their land plus 15% and find a new business or residential complex that would be least offensive.

Face it the economy is in trouble and public universities are struggling hard. Alumni associations are trying their best to help support their schools with scholarships and supplemental funding.

My sister has over 20 thousand in school debt with a good amount of personal debt and she is still trying to find a decent job to pay off her debts from school and the alumni association is asking her for a 100.00 donation.

Just because someone graduates from a school means that they produced someone who is raking in the bank. There are case examples such as the part time retail worker with a BA in social sciences or a BA in art, the MA in education struggling to find a job as an educator due to the cut backs.

Maybe if the schools want to improve the donations from their alumni they need to offer better career guidance services even if the students do not actively seek it out. Maybe require a 1 unit course to be completed by the end of the student’s junior year to explore how will the student find a career that is related to their field of study.

I do not believe in being a miser even though I am not making much money. I carry my alumni’s association affinity debit card. At least I know a buck or two is given to the school and I am at least doing something.

Maybe if my sister’s school joined up with Bank of America for their debit cards, she could at least do her part despite the tough times many of us are facing right now.

I do not envy the students who get hired to do cold calls to boost the funding of the schools we have attended, but the administrators should figure out how to boost funds without having to harass the underemployed who are suffering just as bad.