Signs announce arrival to Lake Tahoe Watershed
Drivers now know they are in the Lake Tahoe Watershed. Photo/Provided
Gateway signs along three Nevada highways leading into the Lake Tahoe Basin have been installed to bring awareness to the watershed.
“The signs are meant to help remind the millions of people who visit Lake Tahoe each year that they are entering a special place and have a duty to help protect its famously clear waters and environment,” a Tahoe Regional Planning Agency spokesperson said in a press release.
The signs are near Daggett Summit on Kingsbury Grade, Spooner Summit on Highway 50 and on the Mount Rose Highway. The signs read, “Entering the Lake Tahoe Watershed — Help Protect It!”
Money from the signs came from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the Nevada Division of Environmental Protection as well as funding from the Lake Tahoe license plate program. At the start $12,000 was budgeted for each sign.
“The cost of the three gateway signs was actually about $35,000 each,” Tom Lotshaw, spokesman for TPRA, told Lake Tahoe News.
The goal is to find funding to put signs on the California side, too.
35,000 each. Who ever approved that for those signs should be fired. On the Grounds your a dumb a%& wasting money and getting ripped off…
Nobody wastes money quite as flamboyantly as government does.
What else could that money have been used for? Hmmmmmmmmmmm. . .
Big, ugly, unnecessary and expensive roadside clutter with a weak message and poor English. $35,000 x 3 equals $105,000, or $3 for each South Shore resident. I want my $3 back! No California signs, please.
As soon as I saw that sign my first thought was “How much did THAT cost?” Do they really think a sign is going to change behavior, much less a $35K sign, even further less, three of them? This is a perfect example of wasting other people’s money and we should demand the person who approved this explain to the public why they feel these signs will get any kind of return on OUR investment! Absolutely unbelievable!
Let’s hope California is still in enough of a “budget crisis” that it won’t spend money on an unnecessary boondoggle like this.
Steve, the money will come from a grant. People seem to think that if grant money is used, it’s FREE! I’ve heard actual officials claim that no tax dollars were used for a project because the money was from a Federal grant.
D’oh!!
They forgot one line,
No Motorized Off-Roading
Ahhh yes, FREE. Grant dollars grow on trees
Are entrance signs to national parks a waste of money too?
Although 35 grand each does sound a little crazy. How can it cost as much as a new Mercedes?
Three Nevada signs plus four future signs in California at $35 grand each adds up to $245,000. Include government salaries, etc. and you’re north of $300,000. That’s a lot of text books or acreage of tree thinning. Wonder who did the cost benefit analysis for this boondoggle? Has anyone seen the watershed signs in Mendocino County? Approximately 1 x 2 feet in size, metal, attached to speed sign wooden poles, cheap and just as effective…and they don’t block the scenery. I hope someone investigates this.
And one 15 minute fireworks show costs? ya, go figure
Technically, the fireworks shows aren’t paid for by the taxpayers. Of course, there are a lot of collateral expenses incurred in putting them on that we DO pay for, but we could go on for WEEKS debating the costs of things our government does. And some of us know they shouldn’t be doing 90% of them anyway.
While I approve of raising awareness about protecting the lake, this does seem a bit over the top. More than a bit.
And one tax payer funded study to determine the feasibility of the airport being a commercial facility costs ?
And one self pay parking machine costs…
most stuff has a cost, right or wrong, there are no free lunches…
Sometimes I wonder if the readers here have nothing positive in thier lives ?.. $3 .. Your worried about ?.. Stop driving your car for a mile or two.. Get over it whiners!