A power outage in Nevada is affecting lift operations at Heavenly Mountain Resort.

NV Energy said an issue on Kingsbury Grade has 389 customers without power. There is no estimate of when the power will be restored.

“The guys are working on the line right now. I’m sure it was weather related, but I’m not sure what happened,” Faye Anderson with NV Energy told Lake Tahoe News.

The tram and Gunbarrel chairlift at the California base area are the only ways to access Heavenly this morning.

“We have a power challenge right now on the Nevada side,” Coop Cooper with Heavenly told Lake Tahoe News. The gondola is also affected by the outage.

All California lifts are operational Jan. 30 except Sky, which is on wind hold.

— Lake Tahoe News staff report

Marjorie Springmeyer

By Kathryn Reed

Marjorie Johnson Springmeyer, pioneer, activist, environmentalist and vocal advocate for justice, died Jan. 28, 2016. She was 93.

Mrs. Springmeyer had been ill for a number of years.

She was born July 23, 1922, in Gardnerville.

Her mother, Stella Van Dyke, moved to the Carson Valley from Ohio to teach at Douglas High School. Her father, Knox Johnson, came to the United States from Denmark.

Mrs. Springmeyer spent her summers in Tahoe during the era when the basin had more cattle than people.

“We ran around all the time with our shoes off,” Springmeyer told this reporter.

The family owned a large swath of land in the basin – and still does. When her dad died Mrs. Springmeyer’s mother retained the land in the Bijou area of South Lake Tahoe. The family had already sold the land where the Truckee River goes under Highway 50 for $1,000 so the main thoroughfare through town could be built. The land where Safeway is has been owned for years by Mrs. Springmeyer and her brothers. Her estate also owns the property on Al Tahoe Boulevard where Lake Tahoe Wildlife Care is being built.

After World War II, she married Buzz Springmeyer on the family’s ranch in the Carson Valley. He had a garage in South Lake Tahoe where Auto Zone now exists.

Mrs. Springmeyer was the godmother to South Lake Tahoe City Councilman Hal Cole’s daughter. Cole wrote this article about Mrs. Springmeyer in 2012.

One of Mrs. Springmeyer’s biggest issues was having never seen the realization a city hall in South Lake Tahoe even though her family gave the land for this to be a reality.

She was a wealth of information about the history of the South Shore. She had volumes of documents; often which she kept in her vehicle when she would travel to City Council meetings.

The death of her daughter is how Happy Homestead Cemetery was created. Mrs. Springmeyer’s mother, Stella Johnson, provided the land for the cemetery. Since then the family has donated more acreage and some has been bought for the cemetery’s expansion.

She is preceded in death by her husband, Buzz Springmeyer; daughter Connie; and sons Jon Springmeyer and Fred Springmeyer.

Mrs. Springmeyer is survived by her brothers, Knox and Bill Johnson, and several grandchildren.

Services are expected to be in February.

Publisher’s note: This editorial is from the Jan. 24, 2016, Reno Gazette-Journal.

In a bit of bipartisan teamwork, a Senate committee last week passed a bill to help Lake Tahoe that would also have big benefits for Reno-Sparks.

The Lake Tahoe Restoration Act, sponsored by Nevada Republican Sen. Dean Heller, is far from a sure thing. But this was a big step. Only about 1 in 7 bills even make it out of committee.

With Nevada in the national spotlight as the caucuses approach, now is the right time to press the presidential candidates — especially those who are senators — on whether they will support this bill and help it get a hearing by the full Congress.

Read the whole story

Maddie Bowman of Meyers won her fourth consecutive X Games gold medal in ski superpipe on Jan. 29.

She is the first woman to land a switch 900 in the superpipe during competition.

The 22-year-old said she learned how to take off backward with 900 degrees of rotation on Wednesday. Judges gave the Sierra-at-Tahoe skier a score of 87.33. This is her sixth X Games medal.

Taking second was Ayana Onozuka of Japan, with a score of 85; Annalisa Drew of Andover, Mass., took the bronze with 83 points.

— Lake Tahoe News staff report

By Jonathan Thompson, High Country News

On Jan. 22, as “Snowzilla” was about to hit Washington, D.C., and much of the East Coast, Secretary of Interior Sally Jewell announced much-anticipated rules on emissions from oil and gas production on Bureau of Land Management-administered leases. While the rules resemble those proposed by the Environmental Protection Agency last year, these are likely to have a bigger impact in the oil and gas fields of the West.

The EPA rules only affect new and modified facilities, while the BLM regulations also apply to the tens of thousands of existing oil and gas production facilities.

It may seem odd that a land management agency is regulating pollution. Technically, though, the rules are not aimed at reducing emissions, but at stopping the waste of natural gas, which clearly falls under the BLM’s mandate. Since natural gas is mostly methane, a particularly potent greenhouse gas, with health-damaging and ozone-producing volatile organic compounds mixed in, conserving the commodity also reduces pollution.

Read the whole story

By Dave Philipps, New York Times

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — In 2014, after 10 years of rapid growth, the Wounded Warrior Project flew its roughly 500 employees to Colorado Springs for an “all hands” meeting at the five-star Broadmoor hotel.

They were celebrating their biggest year yet: $225 million raised and a work force that had nearly doubled. On the opening night, before three days of strategy sessions and team-building field trips, the staff gathered in the hotel courtyard. Suddenly, a spotlight focused on a 10-story bell tower where the chief executive, Steven Nardizzi, stepped off the edge and rappelled toward the cheering crowd.

That evening is emblematic of the polished and well-financed image cultivated by the Wounded Warrior Project, the country’s largest and fastest-growing veterans charity.

Since its inception in 2003 as a basement operation handing out backpacks to wounded veterans, the charity has evolved into a fund-raising giant, taking in more than $372 million in 2015 — largely through small donations from people over 65.

Read the whole story

Douglas County commissioners on Feb. 4 are expected to enter a one-year agreement with Larry Werner for him to be interim county manager.

Werner, former Carson City manager, served as interim county manager in Douglas when Steve Mokrohisky left 2014. The county and Jim Nichols parted ways earlier this month, with Nichols receiving six months pay. Technically his last day is Jan. 29, but he turned in his keys two weeks ago.

Werner’s contract call for him to make $172,008 a year, with a car allowance of $700 per month. He is expected to start March 7.

Until then Mimi Moss, Douglas County’s community development director, is at the helm.

— Lake Tahoe News staff report

By Associated Press

CARSON CITY — State officials say Nevada gambling revenue was up 1 percent in calendar year 2015 compared with 2014.

The Nevada Gaming Control Board said Friday that the state’s casinos won $11.1 billion last calendar year. Slot machines accounted for 63 percent of that.

Las Vegas Strip gambling revenue in 2015 fell less than 1 percent compared with 2014 and totaled about $6.3 billion. Downtown Las Vegas casino revenue was up about 6 percent last year to $542 million.

Reno casinos saw a gain of about 3 percent and won $571 million last year.

Nevada gambling revenue has remained relatively flat since 2009, and hasn’t rebounded to peak levels seen in 2007.

By Kathryn Reed

A lease or outright ownership of the senior center. That’s what South Lake Tahoe and El Dorado County officials are tasked with negotiating.

City Manager Nancy Kerry, all city councilmembers except JoAnn Conner, and Ken Sands from the senior center attended this week’s Board of Supervisors meeting in Placerville. The goal was to explain to the county electeds and staff the importance of changing how the senior center is operated.

The county since 1929 has owned the land in the middle of town that also houses the museum, art building and visitors center. The city leases the land and then handles who the tenants are.

The problem is the county hasn’t been investing any money into the facilities and has basically been an absentee landlord. The seniors feel at a loss because they have money to invest, but can’t get the county’s ear. The city, which has been doing upkeep, wants complete control.

The city has written checks totaling $2.5 million in a 15-year period to maintain the facilities located there. It has taken in revenue of about $300,000 in that time from weddings and other rental fees at the senior center.

Sands spoke Jan. 26 about how the seniors have money to invest. He gave the example of when the group attempted to put windows in, but the county stopped the process. Then there is the well-documented time a few years ago with the county against the seniors’ better judgment put the mental health office in the same building. This was in an area of the building the seniors had paid for in an expansion.

Both sides have been talking for months, which some people, including Supervisor Shiva Frentzen, thought were the formal negotiations. Not the case.

The supervisors in closed session agreed to enter formal negotiations.

Supervisor Sue Novasel told Lake Tahoe News the negotiations will resolve: “How do we get to where we want to go?”

She added, “For the county we want to try to create opportunities where we can go as county, whether it’s transfer or sell or whatever. The details need to be hammered out.”

Kerry told Lake Tahoe News, “We either negotiate a new facility-use agreement for all properties or we negotiate a transfer of the assets to the city so the city can negotiate with the tenants for long-term improvements.”

There is no time line when this will all be settled. The disagreement dates back to the 1990s.

The second annual Carson City International Film Weekend featuring award-winning international and independently made films is Feb. 18-20. All events are free.

The Carson Community Center will host international films each evening, and Western Nevada College will show 10 independent films in the afternoons, Thursday-Saturday.

International films include “Cherry Blossoms” on Feb. 18, followed by “Children of Heaven” on Feb. 19 and “A Royal Affair” on Feb. 20. All three films will be shown at 7pm in Bob Boldrick Theater at the Carson City Community Center, 851 E. William St. Each film will be followed by an optional open forum discussion.

Shorter independent films will show from 2-5pm each day at WNC, located at 2201 West College Parkway, in Cedar Building, Room 100.

Thursday’s films include “Blue Eyed Boy” from an Iranian filmmaker and “Our Father,” a film that portrays a son’s struggle with his father’s dementia and belligerence. “Our Father” includes nudity and mature content.

Friday’s short films, produced by UNR student filmmakers, cover a wide range of topics, including the Truckee River, a bicycle cross event, child abuse, aging, and taxidermy.

To top off the independent films, Saturday features two music themed documentaries and a harmonica jam session. Films include “Virtual Harmony” where a Reno Carmelite nun organizes a worldwide online choir, and “A Pocket Full of Soul:  The Harmonica Documentary” which explores the culture, the players, the politics and the music.

For more information, email internationalfilmweekend@gmail.com.