Ontario Councilor Freddy Rodriguez. (Rachel Parsons/The Enterprise) Update Tuesday, June 1: Councilor Freddy Rodriguez indicated in a Facebook message that he doesn’t intend to resign and instead will go to a recall election. He wrote on Tuesday evening: “To everyone begging me to resign and circumvent 10,500 citizens, I have[Read More…]

Ontario Councilor Freddy Rodriguez. (Rachel Parsons/The Enterprise) UPDATE Thursday, May 27: Petitioners announced on Facebook that 433 signatures on the petitions have been verified – leaving the effort 61 signatures to go to force a recall election. Watch the Enterprise for new updates. ONTARIO – The second citizen effort to[Read More…]

Councilor Ken Hart has been one of the key proponents of altering the city charter. (Enterprise file photo) ONTARIO – Recommendations from Ontario’s Charter Review Committee mean the city’s governing document could be in for an overhaul. The city charter guides everything about how Ontario city government functions, including urban[Read More…]

Larry Sullivan, left, city attorney for Ontario, inverted his legal advice from a previous meeting, allowing the council to eject Justus. (The Enterprise) ONTARIO – Acting at the direction of the Ontario City Council, Police Chief Steven Romero ejected former councilor Marty Justus from the council audience Tuesday for silently[Read More…]

Councilor Freddy Rodriguez reads a prepared statement responding to an ongoing protest by former councilor Marty Justus during an Ontario City Council meeting. (The Enterprise/Liliana Frankel) ONTARIO – Ontario City Councilor Freddy Rodriguez on Wednesday apologized for his persistent accusations that former Councilor Marty Justus was a child abuser. “I[Read More…]

Ontario Mayor Riley Hill and Councilor Freddy Rodriguez. (The Enterprise/Rachel Parsons) UPDATE: Freddy Rodriguez finds the tort notice “weird.” ONTARIO – Marty Justus, former Ontario city councilor and recent target of public attacks, is demanding that city officials repudiate criminal allegations against him and “cease and desist from making these[Read More…]

Former Ontario City Councilor Marty Justus holds a petition to recall Council President Freddy Rodriguez. He presented a letter to the city council on Tuesday, March 16, saying Rodriguez should lose his city positions. (Submitted photo) ONTARIO – Two former Ontario mayors and four former councilors Tuesday urged the Ontario[Read More…]

A map of Ontario showing where elected officials have lived during the past decade. (Submitted photo) ONTARIO – A committee of four citizens and three Ontario city councilors is dusting off the city charter this spring, intending to revise the document for the first time in 36 years.  Jackson Fox,[Read More…]

Marijuana from Zion Cannabis Dispensary in Ontario. (Liliana Frankel/The Enterprise) ONTARIO – Ontario will spend its marijuana tax windfall paying city debt owed for employee retirements and one-time spending for city projects, the Ontario City Council decided on Feb. 23. The measure was proposed by Councilor Ken Hart and passed[Read More…]

Freddy Rodriguez examines paperwork during the hearing in Malheur County Circuit Court on March 11, 2020. (The Enterprise – Les Zaitz) VALE – Malheur County Circuit Court Judge Lung Hung on Thursday dismissed a restraining order filed by a local woman against Ontario City Councilor  Freddy Rodriguez, finding that she[Read More…]