Areas of Alpine County will be without power as Liberty Utilities replaces power poles.
The work will be done on June 24 and July 1, between 9am and 5pm. Outages could last for eight hours each of those days.
Affected areas begin at Turtle Rock Park and include Airport Road, Markleeville, Grover Hot Springs, Shay Creek, Carson River Resort and Markleevillage.
· Jane Freeman has been hired as deputy director of the California Tahoe Conservancy.
· The 5th annual Aviation Roundup at the Minden-Tahoe Airport will be Aug. 22-23. The show will feature the U.S. Air Force Thunderbirds, Team Rocket, Bill Stein, Kyle Franklin, Matt Younkin, Manfred Radius, and Dan Buchanan.
· Truckee is implementing a burn ban effective June 22. This means there will be no more debris burning.
· South Lake Tahoe’s Fourth of July parade starts at 9am at Rufus Allen Boulevard and Highway 50, and will end near the Y.
· Here is the Caltrans El Dorado-Tahoe roadwork schedule for the week.
By Kathryn Reed
Abandon the park; make it bigger and better. Those are the extreme viewpoints of what to do with South Lake Tahoe’s Regan Beach.
About 40 people gathered this week at the city’s recreation department to discuss how to generate revenue to offset operations and maintenance costs, what to do to improve the environment, look at how to distinguish the park from other facilities in the area, and what do about dogs.
South Lake Tahoe is on a quest to develop a plan for this park that has not had much attention in the five decades since it was built. The retaining wall is crumbling, the building where food is prepped has a leaky roof and dogs don’t stay in their designated area.
South Lake Tahoe residents express what they want Regan Beach to look like in the future. Photo/Kathryn Reed
Later this summer a refined proposal is expected to be completed under the guidance of the Parks and Recreation Commission. It is likely to be presented to the City Council in September.
City Manager Nancy Kerry told Lake Tahoe News what she hopes to see is three levels of ideas – things that must get done to address accessibility, safety and maintenance issues; medium level ideas that include wants more than needs; and then possibilities if funding were not an issue.
While the 2015-16 budget will be approved about the same time the council hears what is proposed for Regan Beach, that doesn’t mean the area will miss out on the next fiscal cycle. The budget is often adjusted midyear and work could be incorporated into the 2016 capital improvement plan schedule.
People at the five tables were all over the place when it came to ideas for the park. Some of the ideas were:
· Demolish the food building and start over.
· Have food service available year-round.
· Have a building big enough to be used as a reception for weddings and other meetings.
· Create a designated sledding hill.
· Build a pier.
· Have food trucks.
· Remove much of the grass.
· Decrease the amenities so they are in line with money available for maintenance.
· Balance the facilities at the park to not impact the neighborhood.
· Remove many of the trees; plant shade trees.
· Ban dogs.
· Restrict dogs to a small area.
· Rebuild the bulkhead.
· Remove the bulkhead so there is more beach.
· Have a ramp to launch human powered watercraft.
· Create more access to the water.
· Rent beach chairs and water toys.
· Add bike racks.
· Take out most of the parking to create a bike-in, walk-in park; leaving a few spots for people with disabilities.
· Get rid of chipped tires.
· Install bear boxes.
· Build a staircase from the bulkhead to the water.
· Get rid of non-native vegetation.
· Add recycling stations.
There will be more public meetings this summer for people to give input as the ideas are refined. An online survey is another way to give feedback.
By Jackie Calmes, New York Times
WASHINGTON — Growing numbers of Americans are going cashless, but demands to finally put a woman on paper currency persist. And now theTreasury has announced that a portrait of a woman, to be determined soon, will grace the $10 bill.
The note will continue to have some image, also to be determined, of the current $10 honoree, Alexander Hamilton, a founding father (there were, of course, no mothers) and Treasury secretary to President George Washington (he of the $1 bill). Treasury Secretary Jacob J. Lew, who by law makes the selection of an honoree, will disclose his choice by the end of the year. The new note will appear in 2020 — the 100th anniversary of the 19th Amendment, which gave women the right to vote.
The only criterion under law is that the chosen person must be dead, but the Treasury said Mr. Lew was looking for a woman “who was a champion for our inclusive democracy.” That would include the abolitionist Harriet Tubman, who was the top choice on social media of a campaign to put a woman on the $20 bill.
World renowned pianist Joseph Kalichstein will open the Lake Tahoe SummerFest season on July 31.
The Incline Village event goes through Aug. 16.
The three weekend series of nine concerts will include masterpieces translated by renowned artists and a nationally acclaimed orchestra led by Joel Revzen, artistic director and conductor. Many of the players have principal positions in prestigious symphonies including the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra, the philharmonics of New York and Los Angeles, and the symphonies of San Francisco, Seattle, Dallas, and Vancouver. Friday and Sunday concerts include the 40 member orchestra, while Saturday performances feature an intimate “Meet the Music – Meet the Musicians” chamber music series, featuring smaller ensembles from the orchestra followed by post-event receptions for attendees and artists to mingle.
The Lake Tahoe SummerFest orchestra performs in a 500-seat acoustical tent pavilion on the campus of Sierra Nevada College in Incline Village.
Tickets are $85 (Fridays and Sundays) and $65 (Saturdays) for adults, $15 for children 15 and under, $20 for students and include reserved seating, free parking, and complimentary desserts following the performance. The first six rows of reserved seats are $100. For more info or to buy tickets, call 775.298.0245.
Vail Resorts is increasing its minimum wage to $10 an hour effective Sept. 26. This is when annual salary increases are to take place.
This is for employees companywide, including the three Tahoe area resorts.
“This is a wage above current minimum wages in all states where we operate and will impact thousands of employees across our resorts and lines of business,” the resort said in a FAQ for employees.
The Colorado-based company said the reason to do this was, “For Vail Resorts to be successful as a company we need to deliver an experience of a lifetime to our guests and we do that by creating an experience of a lifetime for our more than 25,000 employees. As such, our company needs to remain competitive on wages, particularly as the economic environment continues to strengthen.”
The federal minimum wage is $7.25 an hour; it’s $9/hour in California and $8.25 in Nevada.
The company said it intends to increase the minimum wage with inflation each year.
The company did not release specifically how many employees this affects companywide or at individual resorts.
— Lake Tahoe News staff report
By Van Tieu, KRNV-TV
There are new allegations in the officer involved shooting at the Tahoe Hacienda Inn in South Lake Tahoe earlier this week that left a 22-year-old man dead.
Kris Jackson
An attorney for Kris Jackson’s family is pursuing wrongful death and violation of civil rights actions against the officer who shot him.
Alan Laskin, says the officer should be criminally charged for acting out of protocol and killing Jackson. He says, according to Jackson’s girlfriend, who was there, she never heard any type of warning from the officers to stop, like “put your hands up” before Jackson was shot.
By Larry Weitzman
It’s been about three months since the CAO Pamela Knorr, obligated the taxpayers to a contract for legal services, except it appears the contract was for investigatory services. The contract, executed by Knorr and County Counsel Robyn Drivon had a spending limit of $50,000. A bill for services has already been received by the CAO for $15,627. It’s not her money that Knorr is spending, but your money. While you may not pay property tax, almost everyone who lives in the county contributes to the approximately $40 million in annual sales tax revenue.
It’s appears to be a simple contract. To understand its purpose, structure, need, who is involved and what’s being done is shrouded in mystery. County government has turned into a wall of opaqueness. Everyone connected to this contract has circled the wagons to prevent any information as to how it came about, its purpose, need, billing, and real parties in interest. This is like a private deal paid for by public money, but the public is to butt out.
Larry Weitzman
On June 12 a Mountain Democrat reporter, the capable Dawn Hodson, attempted to inquire as to the nature of the contract and got stonewalled by everyone she talked to or attempted to talk to. Even when the questions had obvious answers, they were spun like a top. And remember, these people work for us, the taxpayers and get paid nearly $200,000 a year in base pay alone.
According to the story, the CAO wouldn’t discuss anything about the contract when asked about allegations regarding a contract for investigative services to be rendered or have been rendered by the law firm of Prentice, Long and Epperson, LLC. Instead, Knorr wouldn’t talk and referred Hodson to the county counsel.
In reading Hudson’s story it doesn’t look like Drivon was talking all that much and, in fact, was misleading when Drivon said, “The contract was authorized by the Board of Supervisors and the investigation was ongoing.” When asked about the nature of the investigative services, Drivon wouldn’t answer. Drivon later affirmed that the contract was within the $50,000 authority of the CAO, meaning it didn’t have to go to the Board of Supervisors for approval.
Drivon intentionally tried to mislead the Mountain Democrat. Drivon obviously knew this contract was not submitted to the BOS for approval in either a consent calendar matter or regular agenda item and yet said, “It was approved by the BOS.” The BOS knew nothing of this contract. Drivon knew it but tried to imply because CAO Knorr had jurisdiction on her own to sign it that the BOS approved it. That wasn’t just shady; it was plain pettifoggery. News readers are smarter than that.
County Counsel Drivon also would not answer questions as to the first billing statement of $15,627 as to what it was spent on. Drivon said that the money would come from county funds. Drivon needs to be reminded and Pam Knorr too that county funds are not their personal funds but the money belongs to the residents and taxpayers of El Dorado County. But now they won’t even tell us how they are spending OUR money.
Instead they are lying to us as to how they are spending this money as Knorr and Drivon wanted to bill this $15,627 encumbering Facility Accumulated Capital Outlay projects and charge it off to “Fixed Asset: Project Management for the New Courthouse.”
But the investigator, Ken MacHold, who is suppose to be working for the Prentice et al law firm did confirm in his phone interview with Hodson he is interviewing people in the county but he could not comment or disclose any other information regarding the nature of the interviews. According to Hodson, the Prentice et al law firm wouldn’t’ t even return phone calls.
We need a thorough investigation. I know it’s spending more money, but hiding contracts from the public, lying to the public about contracts, lying to the public about how money was spent or identified inappropriately by two of the highest officials in the county cannot be tolerated. This is not their private bank account, it’s our public money for public uses, not secret investigations done with a contractual subterfuge.
Larry Weitzman is a resident of Rescue.
Publisher’s note: The following statement was issued by the Resort at Squaw Creek after the Bear League questioned why a bear trap was set.
Thank you everyone for your feedback regarding the USDA Wildlife Services bear trap. While we appreciate the passionate response, we do want to keep to the facts of this particular situation, rather than the assumptions being posted on social media about what has been going on.
It is a fact that USDA Wildlife Services has set a non-lethal bear trap on our premises. This was done in response to our concern for employee safety, as well as the fact that the bear had been hit by a car in our parking lot and was most likely very injured, judging from the damage to the vehicle and the amount of blood both on the car and on the pavement. Wildlife Services recommended setting the trap and we complied with that recommendation.
Additionally, we are very cognizant of the fact that we, like everyone in the Tahoe basin, live in bear territory. Because of this, we take the appropriate steps to secure our premises. It is false that the bear entered the resort through automatic doors, and it is also false to say we are not taking additional and extra precautions to deter this bear from coming back. Like all of you, we live in this area because we love being so close to the mountains and all that that entails. And, like you, we take responsibility to ensure that we continue to be good citizens of this mountain community.
It is unfortunate that this bear has been injured. We all hope that he can be restored to health and returned to the wild. He has not been around the resort for the past few days, and so far has not gone near the trap. USDA Wildlife Services tells us that it is likely he has moved on due to his injury and will not be back. In any case, the trap is being removed today.
We would appreciate if everyone could stick to the facts, despite the emotions that run high when we come into contact with these beautiful animals.
Sincerely,
Andre Priemer, general manager, Resort at Squaw Creek
The Bear League responded on Facebook saying:
Resort at Squaw Creek Bear Trap Update: (and final report, we hope) The bear trap has been removed (thanks to everyone who called them and commented about it). Apparently as soon as management learned the camouflaged trap had been discovered and that word was out on their plan to have a bear killed they made the unfortunate and badly thought out decisions to: 1) claim the bear would be ‘relocated’—which of course, is Not true—DFW verified this immediately and told us Resort management had to sign the depredation permit stating they knew the bear would die. 2) craft a miss-information statement on BEAR League’s Facebook page in an attempt to encourage our friends to actually believe that USDA Wildlife Services has such a thing as a non-lethal trap (they do not) and that USDA Wildlife Services would give medical attention to a bear who was hit by a car (they do not, they only kill) and that USDA Wildlife Services would relocate the bear (they would not, they only know how to kill bears, not relocate them) And 3)——–and this is the only ‘good’ decision they made so far——-remove the trap since no one was believing their ‘story’. So, thanks again, everyone. Another bear saved.
The South Lake Tahoe Public Utility District board of directors this week unanimously decided to alter how members are elected.
The board passed a resolution that says instead of running for a particular seat, candidates will all run together for the number of seats available. The candidates with the highest number of votes for the number of seats available will be elected. This is the same process used for the South Lake Tahoe City Council.
The board had discussed this at a few meetings this spring. Public sentiment was in favor of the change.
“It was expected to increase interest in running for the board due to the elimination of challengers having to specify their opponent — when the incumbent choses to run for re-election — and it greatly reduced the likelihood that an incumbent would not have to campaign for re-election at the end of each term,” Richard Solbrig, South Tahoe PUD general manager, told Lake Tahoe News.
— Lake Tahoe News staff report