The Ontario City Council appointed a new mayor pro tem and reassigned a slate of regional board seats Tuesday after Councilman Alan Wapner stepped down from those roles, as Mayor Paul Leon called for new campaign finance rules and term-limits.
Mayor Paul Leon said he wanted “to explain plainly” the reason for the shakeup — Councilman Alan Watner stepped down as mayor pro tem as well as from regional and local boards and commissions last week after the FBI raided his home in late July. Federal agents also searched San Bernardino County Supervisor Curt Hagman’s home along with the home and office of a West Covina-based media executive James Su, who owns Chinese-language websites and radio stations including a newspaper that required him to register as an agent of the People’s Republic of China.
“That’s what we’re doing — to name a mayor pro tem and to appoint representatives to those regional boards and commissions so that Ontario’s voice on them continues without interruption,” Leon said, adding that “public office is a public trust, not a career and not a payday” and the council should “reconsider contribution limits” and “take up the question of term limits” in Ontario…