Corona Mayor Investigated for Possible Conflict-of-Interest Violation

Mayor William Miller may have violated the state’s conflict-of-interest law when he voted on fees the city charges residential developers to finance school construction, Riverside County Dist. Atty. Grover Trask said Friday.

The district attorney’s office assisted the state Fair Political Practices Commission in investigating the allegation by the president of the local school board that Miller should not have voted on the school fees because he held an interest in an 88-unit apartment complex planned for northwestern Corona.

Trask said that Deputy Dist. Atty. Randy Driggs, who coordinated the investigation for the district attorney’s office, concluded “that there was at least a technical violation” of the Political Reform Act of 1974.

“My reaction is that I’m not overly concerned at this point,” Miller said Friday. His votes on the school-fee issue would have raised, rather than lowered, the fees his project would face, he added.

Complaint Filed in May

Lynn Montgomery, media director for the Fair Political Practices Commission, would not release any details of its investigation, but confirmed that the commission is continuing to look into Miller’s school-fee votes.

“We had a complaint filed in May of this year,” Montgomery said. “ . . . The person who filed it was (school board President) Sally Hoover, and as I understand it, it was on behalf of the Corona-Norco Unified School District.”

Hoover refused to comment on the conflict-of-interest charge, on the advice of the school district’s attorneys, she said.

The complaint stems from City Council votes on March 20, when the council rejected the school district’s request for fees ranging from $2,079 to $5,389 per unit to build schools for the students that new homes will bring.

The council voted instead to instruct city attorneys to draft an ordinance increasing the fixed fee charged to developers from $1,973 to $2,610 per unit to mitigate the impact that the developers’ projects have on local schools, said Dee Lingenfelter, Corona’s city clerk.

Option on Apartment Complex

Miller, who voted with a 3-2 majority, was a part-owner of an option to buy four acres of land designated for an 88-unit apartment complex on River Road.

“The result of my vote actually resulted in a detriment to my project, not a benefit,” Miller said.

Miller said he voted to set a fee that would raise the cost of his own development by $46,728.

The council passed a resolution increasing the development fee to $2,610 per unit on May 1, by a 3-1 vote, with Miller abstaining, Lingenfelter said.

“Once I was advised by the city attorney to abstain, I began abstaining on all those votes,” he said.

Miller has since sold his interest in the planned apartment project, he said.

If the Fair Political Practices Commission finds evidence of wrongdoing, Montgomery said, Miller could face administrative fines of $2,000 per violation.