News

A new documentary airing Wednesday, Oct 21 on KVCR-TV profiles the Me2/Orchestra, a musical ensemble made up of people with mental illness and their allies. KVCR interviewed Margie Friedman and Barbara Multer-Wellin, the film’s executive producers/directors, about the documentary called “Orchestrating Change.”

The documentary “Orchestrating Change” will air on KVCR-TV at 10p.m. Pacific, Oct 21. 

Our Wednesday, October 21st Small Business Spotlight shines on Salt Oasis in Rancho Cucamonga!

You can learn more about this business at saltoasis.com

Monday through Thursday at lunchtime, KVCR News has your daily news rundown. Stories highlighted today include:

1. The San Bernardino County Registrar of Voters says early voting numbers are up compared to the 2016 election.
2. Environmental leaders in California are meeting this week to brainstorm how to reach climate goals by the year 2045.

Riverside County officials announced today that the county has gone back to the most-restrictive purple tier of coronavirus restrictions set by the state.

Riverside County had gone into the less-restrictive red tier in September, allowing indoor operations with restrictions.

Now, amid rising coronavirus test rates, the county’s going back to the purple tier.

This means gyms, churches, restaurants, movie theaters, and more have a few days to transition to not being able to hold any indoor operations.

Our Tuesday, October 20 Small Business Spotlight shines on New Color Screen Printing and Embroidery in Rancho Cucamonga!

You can learn more about this business at www.newcolorsp.com.

Election day is just two weeks away and the San Bernardino County Registrar of Voters says early voting numbers are up compared to the weeks leading into the 2016 election. 

San Bernardino County Registrar of Voters Bob Page said at a Monday press conference that on their last count, nearly 12 percent of the more than 1.1 million ballots mailed to voters have been returned so far.  At this point in 2016, there was just over a one percent turnout.

October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month. One in eight women will get breast cancer in their lifetime, yet fewer women are going in to get screened for the disease during the COVID-19 pandemic. KVCR’s Benjamin Purper spoke to Riverside University Health System radiologist Lisa Mahoney about the importance of early screening for breast cancer and some of the precautions RUHS is taking to prevent the spread of the novel coronavirus during screenings. 

Our Monday, October 19th Small Business Spotlight shines on Above the Stem in Redlands. Click the headline above to hear their story!

You can learn more about this business at  https://abovethestem.com/

Today’s is California’s online voter registration deadline. 

CapRadio’s Chris Nichols has some details on what that means. 

You can go to registertovote.ca.gov -- or search for it on the Secretary of State’s website. 

Monday, October 19 is the last day to register to vote, and the latest numbers show that Inland Empire voters have been registering at some of the highest rates in the state.

According to state data, as of September 4, San Bernardino County had the second highest percent increase in voter registrations in the state. Riverside County had the fifth largest. U.C. Riverside political science professor, Francisco Pedraza says this regional rise may be due to decades of work done by community organizations.  

The Bruder fire, a brush fire that began late Wednesday night in south Redlands, has burned 125 acres and is 30% contained as of Thursday morning.

The blaze started around 10p.m. off Live Oak Canyon Road and prompted evacuations of homes nearby.

By 2:30a.m. Thursday, 265 firefighters were on the scene battling the fire.

Mandatory evacuation orders were put into place for homes south of Sunset Drive, from Edgemont Drive to Puesta Del Sol, and homes north of Live Oak Canyon Road from the 10 Freeway to San Timoteo Canyon Road.

Monday through Thursday at lunchtime, KVCR News has your daily news rundown. Stories highlighted today include:

1. California’s annual Great Shakeout earthquake drill is happening today, virtually.
2. DEA announces biggest meth bust in U.S. history in the southland.
3. Meteorologists expect dry, warm, and windy weather in Northern California, which present the perfect conditions for more wildfires.

California’s annual earthquake drill is happening Thursday October 15. This year during distanced learning, teachers and students are being asked to participate virtually. 

San Bernardino City Unified School District Emergency Manager, Eric Vetere, says normally the annual Great ShakeOut earthquake drill is done in-person and involves the evacuation of entire school campuses into field areas.

Ontario International Airport’s freight and passenger numbers are growing, reflecting a “gradual recovery” for the airport amid the pandemic. 

Commercial freight volume at the airport increased more than 20% in September while the number of air travelers rose to almost 200,000.

According to a press release, Ontario Airport representatives say these numbers reflect a “gradual recovery” for the airport in recent months.

Passenger volume there reached a low point in April due to the coronavirus pandemic, but it’s grown every month between May and September.

U.C. Riverside’s School of Business gave an optimistic outlook for the Inland Empire’s economic recovery from the pandemic-related recession during its annual conference on October 13. In many sectors, the region fairs better than the state despite a slowed recovery of jobs lost due to the shutdown. 

Dr. Christopher Thornberg, director of U.C.R.’s Center for Economic Forecasting, says record home sales and increased consumer spending in recent months shows that people are learning to live as normally as possible with COVID-19.

San Bernardino County appears to be overtaking San Diego County in coronavirus hospitalizations, now ranking second in the state. 

San Bernardino County is now behind only Los Angeles County in terms of hospitalizations.

San Diego County now ranks third.

The confirmed case count in San Bernardino County since the public health documentation period began in early march is 58,125 cases with 986 deaths.

More than 690,000 people have been tested for the virus in the county.

This Saturday, October 10, actor and comedian Jon Lovitz will be doing stand-up at the Improv Live Comedy Drive-In in Irvine. Drive-in comedy is a new style of stand-up during this pandemic, where guests enjoy the show from their cars, on the top level of a parking garage at the Irvine Spectrum. 

For Live Comedy Drive-In ticket information, visit improv.com/Irvine. 

Both the Riverside and San Bernardino County Registrar of Voters say the U.S. Postal Service received mail-in ballots ready to send to voters on Monday, October 5.

Voters can sign up with the Secretary of State’s “Where’s My Ballot” tracking system to see when their ballots are mailed, received, and counted.

Today on Inland Edition, KVCR’s Benjamin Purper speaks with Este Geraghty, the Chief Medical Officer and Health Solutions Director at ESRI, the Redlands-based geographic information systems company. Dr. Geraghty talks about the logistical and planning challenges involved in distributing a potential vaccine for COVID-19 and the role GIS mapping technology plays in doing so.

For more information about Dr. Geraghty and ESRI, visit https://www.esri.com/about/newsroom/author/estella-geraghty/

San Bernardino County continues to move away from moving into the less-restrictive red tier of coronavirus restrictions amid rising case and positivity rates. 

The county is still in the most-restrictive purple tier of restrictions set by the state, despite hoping to move to the red tier last week.

Under the red tier, counties can open churches, restaurants, gyms and movie theaters indoors, with limited capacity.

According to data released Tuesday, San Bernardino County had 9.6 cases per 100,000 residents, which is up from 7.7 last week.

Riverside County received a warning from the state Tuesday that it is in danger of slipping back into the first phase or purple tier of the re-opening plan. This could cause some recently reopened businesses to close once again. 

On September 22, Riverside County’s COVID-19 numbers were improving and so the county advanced into the state’s second or red tier re-opening phase, allowing some businesses like gyms, restaurants and salons to partially resume indoor services.

Four young tribal leaders from the San Manuel Band of Mission Indians were honored with “30 Under 30” awards for raising awareness about missing and murdered indigenous women and girls.

Assemblymember Eloise Reyes, who represents parts of the Inland Empire in the California State Assembly, presented the awards at a drive-through ceremony at San Bernardino Valley College. KVCR is owned and operated by the San Bernardino Community College District, which includes San Bernardino Valley College.

Representative Mark Takano, a Democrat from Riverside, introduced a bill today aimed at holding law enforcement officers accountable for attacks on journalists. 

The bill would create an electronic system within the Department of Justice for members of the press to report violent interactions with law enforcement.

It would also require law enforcement agencies that are subject to complaints to respond within 60 days.