Supervisor’s Achievements a Counterweight to Plea Deal

During his 26 years in public office, San Bernardino County Supervisor Gerald “Jerry” Eaves has held the titles of councilman, mayor and assemblyman. A local hospital dubbed him a “hometown hero” and the city of Rialto named a park after him.

But this month, Eaves will acquire a different kind of status: felon.

Eaves, the highest-ranking official implicated in a series of county corruption scandals, is expected to plead guilty Jan. 21 to one felony count of conspiracy to violate the state’s conflict-of-interest laws. The conviction will force Eaves to resign from the Board of Supervisors, ending a lengthy, volatile political career in which he seesawed from power broker to political outcast.

Eaves says he doesn’t care how history portrays him. His true friends, he insists, will remember him for the good he has done, not for the shameful way he is leaving office.

“I’m not concerned about my image at this point in my life,” he said after announcing his decision to accept a plea agreement.

Eaves, a brash, old-school politician, rose from Fontana steelworker to Rialto mayor. Later, as an assemblyman, he became a member of a dissident alliance that challenged the authority of the Assembly speaker. As a county supervisor, Eaves was called the “King of San Bernardino County” before a criminal indictment prompted calls for his resignation and temporarily stripped him of several prominent posts.

Friends and former foes alike say Eaves will be remembered as a skilled politician who looked after his constituents but didn’t always play by the rules.

“People are going to say Jerry did some good things and some bad things,” said Rep. Joe Baca (D-San Bernardino), who challenged Eaves for an Assembly seat in 1992 and lost.

In 2001, near the height of Eaves’ influence in San Bernardino County, prosecutors charged him with accepting bribes in the form of free Las Vegas vacations and campaign contributions in exchange for his support for a scheme to build seven billboards on county-owned land in Colton. William “Shep” McCook, the Orange County businessman who erected the billboards and allegedly bribed Eaves, is scheduled to go on trial in May.

The billboard deal is one of a succession of scandals that have led to criminal convictions of nearly a dozen officials in the area.

Eaves has maintained his innocence, saying he is the victim of a political vendetta. But in December, a weary Eaves said he will accept a plea agreement to avoid a drawn-out trial. He is expected to plead guilty for failing to report the free vacations, as required by state law. Under the deal, Eaves will pay a $10,000 fine and be sentenced to three years of informal probation.

Once he becomes a convicted felon, he will be prohibited from keeping his post on the Board of Supervisors.

Just before he was charged in 2001, Eaves pleaded no contest to another misconduct charge, failing to disclose three free jaunts to a Canadian fishing lodge, then voting to route public funds to a firm associated with those trips. Under a plea bargain in that case, Eaves agreed to resign from the board when his term expired in 2004, pay a $20,000 fine and spend three years on probation.

Eaves has also been fined twice by the state Fair Political Practices Commission for failing to disclose income and contributions that posed a potential conflict of interest.

Still, Eaves’ supporters throughout the county praise his many years of service.

“In my opinion, I think he will be remembered more for what he has brought to the community than the charges that are brought against him,” said Rialto Chamber of Commerce Chairman Michael Pate.

Eaves was a longtime employee of Fontana’s Kaiser Steel Mill before he was elected to the Rialto City Council in 1977. Three years later, he became mayor of the former citrus farming community. In 1984, he was elected to the first of four two-year terms in the state Assembly.

During his stint in Sacramento, he joined the “Gang of Five,” a group of moderate Democrats who tried to wrest the reins of power from then-Assembly Speaker Willie Brown. Because Democrats held only a narrow majority in the lower house, the dissidents held the balance of power for months.

Brown punished the five by stripping them of their key committee assignments. Eaves, however, won redemption when he was later reappointed to an influential committee post with Brown’s blessing.

While in the Assembly, Eaves secured funding for a park on flood control land in Rialto that was later named after him. After prosecutors filed the corruption charges in 2001, some Rialto residents suggested renaming the park, but no formal proposal has been considered.

Also as an assemblyman, he drafted legislation to redevelop the closed Norton Air Force Base in San Bernardino. He introduced a bill to make battered women’s syndrome admissible in domestic violence court cases. Eaves took some ribbing from his colleagues in 1988 when he drafted a bill to allow nudist colonies to serve alcohol.

After his eight years in the Assembly, Eaves won a seat on the Board of Supervisors, where he served as a strong-willed chairman for four years. He developed close ties with minority and labor groups and won his second term without opposition. Eaves is the only Democrat on the five-member board.

At the height of his influence, Eaves won many accolades.

Steve Peace, a former state senator, once dubbed Eaves “king of San Bernardino County” in a newspaper article. The Loma Linda University Children’s Hospital Foundation named him a “hometown hero” for supporting children’s programs. Eaves and his wife, Jena, have operated a foundation that raised more than $170,000 from 1997 to 2000 for scholarships, dance groups, youth programs and organizations fighting diabetes and leukemia.

John Dudley, a former executive with the Boy Scouts of America, recalls being at Ontario International Airport years ago and seeing a crowd of union supporters descend on Eaves when he returned from a stint in Sacramento.

“I thought it was Mother Teresa coming in,” Dudley joked.

But once prosecutors disclosed Eaves’ role in the billboard scandal, he became a pariah.

Three of his board colleagues asked for his resignation, saying his presence would be a distraction. They also voted to remove him as a representative to the California State Assn. of Counties, the Inland Valley Development Agency, and other regional and state groups.

But less than two years later, the Board of Supervisors reappointed Eaves to many of those same posts, noting his years of experience in Sacramento.

Despite the expected guilty plea, some supporters say Eaves’ only crime was being inattentive to state conflict-of-interest laws. They refuse to believe he deliberately committed a crime.

“No one can ever convince me that Jerry ever took a bribe,” said Midge Zupanic-Scaggs, a former Rialto councilwoman who voted in 1991 to name the city park after Eaves.

Dudley, the former Scouting executive, noted that throughout his career in politics, Eaves has been a devoted volunteer with the Boy Scouts and other youth groups.

“I hope people don’t forget that he did a lot of good too,” he said.