By News 10
A lumber truck crashed down an embankment near Twin Bridges Road on Highway 50 early Monday morning.
The driver was taken out the truck and transported to a nearby hospital, California Highway Patrol said. His injuries are unknown.
Jill
Jill has been overlooked among the playful kittens and more glamorous orange cats at the shelter. She has beautiful dark gray fur, but she is rather shy and hangs back a bit with new visitors. She does like to be held once she has a few minutes to get used to visitors, and would probably like a calm, quieter home. Jill is 4 years old.
Cat adoption fees are discounted at the shelter for the rest of January, just $40.
Jill is spayed, microchipped, tested for FIV, and vaccinated.
She is at the El Dorado County Animal Services shelter in Meyers, along with many other dogs and cats who are waiting for their new homes. Go to the Tahoe animal shelter’s Facebook page to see photos and descriptions of all pets at the shelter.
Call 530.573.7925 for directions, hours, and other information on adopting a pet.
For spay-neuter assistance for South Tahoe residents, go online.
— Karen Kuentz
Updated Jan. 27 3:25pm: Barton received the trauma designation from the Board of Supervisors.
By Kathryn Reed
In a matter of hours Barton Memorial Hospital is likely to become the only trauma center in the Lake Tahoe Basin. The final hurdle is for approval from the El Dorado County Board of Supervisors.
The electeds on Jan. 27 are expected to sign the paperwork to make this a reality. The board is being asked to certify the designation.
“Barton’s goal is to provide high quality and appropriate care for our patients around the clock with compassion and expertise. Trauma III designation means we can help patients receive the best care and treatment available,” surgeon Kim Evans told Lake Tahoe News.
Barton originally had hoped to be a trauma hospital two years ago. The amount of paperwork and hoops to jump through forced the delay. The American College of Surgeons’ Committee on Trauma has 160 items a level three center must meet. Barton has done so and passed the verification visit on the first try.
“We have a very active population and a high volume of visitors year-round, which means our potential needs for trauma patients is greater than our population indicates. This also shows in our patient data – approximately 30 percent of our emergency visits are trauma-related,” Evans said.
There are 51 trauma centers in California, with Barton being one of four level three facilities verified by ACS.
“Trauma III designation recognizes Barton Hospital as a critical access point for patients seeking trauma care. Unlike other hospital facilities, trauma centers guarantee the resources for in-depth emergency care and the immediate availability of emergency medicine physicians, surgeons, nurses, lab and X-ray technicians, and life support equipment 24-hours a day,” Evans explained.
Renown Medical Center in Reno is a level two facility, while UC Davis Medical Center in Sacramento is a level one. These levels are usually found in urban centers.
Barton has been operating as though it’s a trauma center. So it is not like there will be immediate, dramatic changes. The additional staff required for a level three has been hired, including a trauma program coordinator.
“In the long run, the care may be less expensive for patients. A patient may avoid being transferred to another trauma center and the patient’s treatment plan includes follow-up and injury prevention program,” Cate Neal, registered nurse and trauma program coordinator, told Lake Tahoe News.
However, added costs are possible from Barton.
“An activation fee is only implemented if the patient meets the trauma activation criteria for a full or modified trauma,” Evans said. “This fee covers the additional cost of care including staff and equipment implemented to help someone with a life-threatening injury.”
A major difference with being a trauma center would be the coordinated care approach. The team concept starts when a person is admitted and then all the way through rehab. Patients are also likely to see more in-depth care and have it administered faster.
“Injury prevention programs will be incorporated into a patient’s treatment plan, depending on the injury. Examples of programs include concussion awareness, alcohol prevention outreach, and physical therapy,” Neal said.
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Notes:
• The Board of Supervisors meeting is Jan. 27 starting at 9am in Placerville.
By Larry Weitzman
Like Capt. Edwin Smith of the Titanic, our Board of Supervisors didn’t heed the warnings of an impending debacle (in EDC’s case, huge deficits). Smith was advised several times of icebergs and he neither chose to slow down the speeding Titanic nor change to a more southerly course. As with the Titanic, the warning signs of impending disaster were ever present.
Let’s examine the Kelly Webb-Terri Daly debacle. Daly became EDC’s chief administrative officer Dec. 18, 2010. In less than four months, EDC terminated the information technology director and the CAO immediately appoints an extremely unqualified (not even one full semester of college) Webb, an overpaid analyst in her office, to the job as interim IT director (now super overpaid). With Webb at the head of IT, Daly now has access to the emails of all employees. Sounds a little like having an NSA spy in our midst, but highly placed sources confirm that was the primary reason. But wait, it gets better.
Larry Weitzman
Webb’s interim appointment was at step 2 of the salary scale. By a BOS unanimous vote on Sept. 4, 2012, and a satisfactory performance review and at Daly’s recommendation, Webb gets a raise from step 2 to step 3 (5-0 vote).
But Webb’s failure as interim IT director is looming in a scathing report from the State Controller’s Office that was to be received by the CAO on July 25, 2013. Daly, instead of seeking Webb’s immediate removal, places at the next BOS meeting (July 23, 2015) an unagendized item in violation of the Brown Act (improper notice) and in violation of the county Charter (no recruitment process) to have Webb appointed as full IT director and another pay raise to step 4. Our completely blind BOS approves this illegal item 5-0.
To add insult to injury, Daly’s evil isn’t finished. Knowing the report from the State Controller’s office isn’t public yet, Daly seeks a retroactive pay raise for Kelly Webb of about $10,000 for the past period from March 10, 2012, to Aug. 7, 2013, which is also illegal and a violation of state law. It causes the county counsel’s office to issue a lengthy legal opinion that Daly’s attempted retroactive pay raise is illegal. Daly doesn’t care about the taxpayers of EDC as she hires an outside law firm to prove her correct and the county counsel wrong. The outside law firm also said Daly was acting outside the law. The county, not Daly, paid that legal bill.
What’s the big deal about the State Controller’s Office report? The following excerpt from the report says most of it: “… it was found that the functional costs in the cost plan cannot be substantiated…. Network and Mainframe costs have been estimated then allocated based on methodologies that are not sufficiently documented, supported or understood by current IT management … I/T Department Management does not understand the purpose of the Countywide Cost Allocation Plan.”
This state controller’s report, which as a direct result of failure of Daly as CAO and Webb as interim IT director, costs El Dorado County $3 million of state reimbursable costs.
After our own county auditor pointed out to the BOS and other county employees of Daly’s attempted illegal actions, does the BOS (on Aug. 6, 2013) place Webb back to the position of interim IT director? No, they gave her yet another pay raise to step 5 by a vote of 5-0.
And I called them three blind mice in my last column. It should have been five.
It took another full year before the BOS to finally removed Webb from being the interim IT director. This whole episode demonstrates the evilness of Daly and the ineptitude of the then BOS. I have all the county documents supporting the above information.
Edwin Smith went down with the ship. Terri Daly is still attacking the county auditor who said the county under Daly was going to deficit spend $150 million over the next five years.
Larry Weitzman is a resident of Rescue.
By Nick Zaccardi, NBC
Both Olympic snowboard slopestyle champions came up short in the Winter X Games in Aspen, Colo., on Sunday.
Jamie Anderson of Meyers finished second to Norway’s Silje Norendal for a second straight year at X Games. Anderson had the lead with a 91.33 in her second run, until Norendal posted 93.66 in the last run of the competition. New Zealand’s Christy Prior won bronze.
Anderson is a four-time X Games gold medalist and has won a medal in all nine of her X Games slopestyle appearances, dating to her debut at age 15 in 2006.
Sage Kotsenburg was fifth in the men’s slopestyle in Aspen.
By Jason Blevins, Denver Post
ASPEN — The future of snowboarding is Chloe Kim.
Mere minutes after a brutal practice crash, the 14-year-old on Saturday toppled Kelly Clark’s dynastic halfpipe dominance. Spinning technical combos with a pair of 900s, a switch method and a switch 720 with floating amplitude, Kim’s final run in the best-of-three contest earned 92 points to beat Clark’s first-run 90.
Last year Kim was the youngest athlete to win an X Games medal with her halfpipe silver. Saturday night she became the youngest Winter X Games gold medalist. She was too young to go to Sochi and she is too young to compete in the World Cup circuit.
Rivals like Hannah Teter of Meyers and Elena Hight of South Lake Tahoe struggled to land clean runs that could thwart the queen of snowboarding’s performance.
By USSA
ASPEN, Colo. — X Games officially wrapped up on Sunday afternoon with ski superpipe. Fittingly, after four days of nonstop action, the final competition of the 2015 X Games lived up to the billing. With it all said and done, Canada’s Simon d’Artois won the superpipe gold in dramatic fashion, Kevin Rolland of France took silver, and hometown hero Alex Ferreira (Aspen) grabbed bronze.
David Wise (Reno) did not win a fourth consecutive X Games gold medal in superpipe, taking fourth in Sunday’s final.
“This is going to be a good year for me. It’s really nice to do a couple of high-level events, enjoy skiing, and spend the rest of the time with my family. The difference between an Olympics year and an X Games year is that X Games is the biggest event of the season. This is the biggest contest of the year for us, which is why we throw it all on the line,” Wise said.
On Friday evening, 16 skiers had three chances to make it to Jan. 25 final. The stacked field was cut in half with Gus Kenworthy (Telluride, Colo.) sitting in the top spot after the elimination round.
The caliber of skiing displayed Sunday night was incredible. The Canadian halfpipe specialist stomped all three of his runs through the superpipe during Sunday’s final, but he needed his final attempt to solidify the gold medal.
A score of 93 for d’Artois edged Rolland’s 92.33 and Ferreira’s 91.66. While the Canadian gold medalist and French silver medalist were deserving of their podium spots, Ferreira put on a show in front of his hometown fans. The 20-year-old Aspenite won his second consecutive X Games superpipe bronze medal with a clutch performance.
“I don’t even know what to think right now; it was a crazy day,” said an elated Ferreira. “I didn’t land my first two runs and had to put it all out on the line for my third one and it ended up working out. I couldn’t be happier. All my friends and family are out here and I’m in front of my hometown.”
By Stephanie Pearson, Outdoor
Nordic skiing began about 8,000 years ago in Russia but it’s taken until now for the sport to start really catching on in the U.S. The proof is everywhere: Citizen races are booking out months in advance, alpine resorts are grooming new classical and skate-skiing trails (an offshoot of Nordic Skiing that developed in the ’70s), and Americans are finally competing with the powerhouse Europeans.
Earlier this month, Liz Stephen placed fifth in Italy’s multi-stage Tour de Ski, the highest result ever for an American. And shortly after that, she came in second in the Cross Country World Cup.
Why is this cardio-intense sport, formerly practiced only by diehard Nordic fanatics, being embraced by the masses? One reason could be that it kills winter depression and improves both mind and body health. According to the soon to be published “Birkie Health Survey,” a study of 24,000 past participants in the American Birkebeiner, the largest cross-country ski marathon in North America, it’s the best sport there is for both physical and mental well-being.
By Carly Ledbetter, Huffington Post
Every time Girl Scout cookie season comes around, we can pretty much count on losing money and gaining a few inches on our waist lines. And even when the season’s over, we can still satisfy our hankering for the delicious cookies by drinking them as milk, ordering them online, and, as of Tuesday, buying them in the form of a candle.
Yankee Candle and Girl Scouts of the USA just announced the Girl Scout Cookies Limited Edition Candle Collection, otherwise known as the tastiest partnership ever and a great way to get the cookie without the calories.
The four fragrances, Thin Mint, Trefoils, Chocolate Peanut Butter and Coconut Caramel Stripes, will be sold on the Yankee Candle website, at over 500 Yankee Candle stores and some special retailers.
By Brad Branan, Sacramento Bee
David Keyes didn’t wear a suit or work in an executive office, but he was the capital region’s highest-paid local government employee in 2013.
As a captain in the Placer County Sheriff’s Office, Keyes received a base salary of $122,000, according to recently released data from the State Controller’s Office. When he retired in November 2013, Keyes also received $150,000 for unused sick time, $19,000 for unused vacation and $64,000 for other incentives, boosting his final-year pay to $355,000.
Keyes, 53, did not return messages from the Sacramento Bee. Since retiring, he has been able to enjoy his longtime hobby of photography, according to a website showcasing his work.
Keyes’ law enforcement sector has more people than any other category on the region’s list of 1,000 highest-paid local government employees, The Bee found in an analysis of the State Controller’s Office 2013 data. In Sacramento, El Dorado, Placer and Yolo counties, 237 sworn employees from sheriff’s departments and 57 sworn officers from police departments were on the list.
Sworn personnel from sheriff’s departments received an average of $106,000, compared to $73,000 for all local government employees in the region, the analysis found.