The peloton whizzes through Stateline on May 11. Photo Copyright 2017 Carolyn E. Wright

By Kathryn Reed

Those who were betting against Megan Guarnier lost in a big way on Thursday. The defending Amgen Tour of California women’s champion collected three jerseys in the opening stage.

The 31-year-old’s voice cracked on May 11 when she spoke to the crowd at Heavenly Mountain Resort about what the day meant to her.

“It’s been a tough year,” Guarnier, the U.S. cyclist who races for Boels-Dolmans, said.

In February she sustained a concussion at Omloop Het van Hageland in Belgium, and then in March had to withdraw from Strade Bianche in Italy with concussion symptoms.

The pros don’t take the time to replace a tube; they change the whole wheel. Photo Copyright 2017 Carolyn E. Wright

Now she would like a do-over, hoping this 72-mile ride around the lake will launch her quest to be the overall Women’s WorldTour winner this year like she was in 2016.

“I think (Friday) will be telling. There will be a hard 12K climb right near the finish,” Guarnier said.

On May 12 the race starts at Heavenly’s Cal Lodge, goes over Luther Pass, through the Carson Valley, up Kingsbury Grade and back to Heavenly.

Amber Pierce, left, of the U.S. who rides for Colavita-Bianchi, said Kingsbury Grade on Friday will be a challenge. Photo Copyright 2017 Carolyn E. Wright

On Thursday, 94 racers set off around the lake, with 87 finishing.

With the sun out, weather-wise this was the best start of any Amgen race in Tahoe. The wind picked up just before the 10:40am start. The National Weather Service in Reno had issued an advisory for the basin, saying winds would be out of the southwest at 15 to 20 mph, with gusts up to 35 mph.

Mount Tallac looms large as the women start stage one from Heavenly on May 11. Photo Copyright 2017 Carolyn E. Wright

“It was more pleasant being a part of the Donner Party than what is going on here,” the announcer said as the women were making their final push to the end.

It was a sprint to the finish, with Guarnier crossing the line at 3 hours, 3 minutes and 48 seconds. Teammate Anna van der Breggen was four-hundredths of a second behind her. Arlenis Sierra, who rides for Astana Women’s Team, came in third at 3:03.55. Sierra earned the best young rider jersey.

The women on Thursday take over Highway 50 on the South Shore. Photo Copyright 2017 Carolyn E. Wright

In addition to the race leader jersey, Guarnier earned the Queen of the Mountain jersey for being the fastest climber and the jersey for faster sprinter.

This is the third year in a row the women have raced in Tahoe. There are four stages for the women, with two being in Tahoe.

Jack and Jen Powless of Roseville are in town supporting their daughter, Shayna, and her team. Photo Copyright 2017 Carolyn E. Wright

While there were not many people at the start, two people who have a vested interest are Jack and Jen Powless of Roseville. Their daughter, Shayna, races for team Twenty20. She finished 48th on Thursday. Their son, Neilson, finished the 2016 Amgen race in ninth place and was named the Tour of California’s best young rider. He’s not competing this year because his team was not chosen to participate.

The Powless children have athletic pedigree – a mother who was an Olympic runner in 1992 and father who was a top triathlete. Both kids started riding bikes when they were toddlers. A healthy lifestyle is what their parents wanted to provide them. They did that and then some.

Traffic on Highway 50 near Logan Creek remains one lane in each direction because of fallen boulders. Photo Copyright 2017 Carolyn E. Wright

It’s been a costly winter for the Nevada Department of Transportation because of all the damage to roads, and the work isn’t even done.

The emergency work for Kingsbury Grade totaled $750,000. That was for the sinkhole that formed in December.

More work is being done on that stretch from the top of Daggett Summit to Foothill Road to prevent more slides.

In all, NDOT has awarded almost $15 million in emergency contracts in 2017 through mid-April for highways in Northern Nevada.

Another $205,000 was spent in Douglas County for highways 50 and 28. Highway 50 in the Logan Shoals area is still a mess, with one eastbound lane still covered with rocks.

NDOT has applied for funds from the Federal Highway Administration, of which to date it has qualified for more than $3 million.

— Lake Tahoe News staff report

The Nevada Division of Forestry Washoe State Tree Nursery in Washoe Valley is open now through mid-October.

The Nevada Nursery Program’s mission is to assist landowners by providing plant material suitable for conservation uses such as, but not limited to, windbreaks, soil erosion control, water conservation and wildlife habitat. Plants purchased at the Washoe State Tree Nursery must be used for conservation purposes.

Trees, shrubs, grasses and perennials are available. The plants are grown and maintained at the nursery and conditioned to survive Northern Nevada’s cold winters and hot summers.

Plants will be available on a first come, first served basis. Prices vary according to container size, from $2.50 to $20.

The nursery will be open to the public from 9:30am-3pm, Thursday through Saturday.

By Katy Murphy, Bay Area News Group

SACRAMENTO — Gov. Jerry Brown on Thursday unveiled a revised $124 billion general fund budget proposal that restored funding to child care subsidies and other social services, but does not include new money for key legislative priorities such as the Middle Class Scholarship or affordable housing.

The governor did not adjust the budget to reflect major uncertainties about federal health-care funding — a week after the U.S. House of Representatives heightened anxiety in California with its vote to repeal the Affordable Care Act and slash health care spending.

If the Affordable Care Act were repealed, Brown said, “What we’d have to do is ugly, and no one wants to take that up yet. So what we’re doing is we’re going to fight it as hard as we can so that doesn’t happen.”

Read the whole story

Truckee native Travis Ganong is now director of snow sports for Squaw Valley Academy.

As the leading American downhill skier on the Audi FIS World Cup tour, Ganong’s eyes are set on representing the country again in South Korea for the 2018 Olympics as well as at Beijing’s 2022 Olympi

Starting in the 2017-18 academic year, Squaw Valley Academy’s new competition ski program will enable alpine ski racers to achieve a college-preparatory education while training full-time with Squaw Valley Ski Team and racing at the U14, U16 and FIS level. Focused on the development of the student-athlete, Ganong will add a unique elite-athlete perspective to the experience through his mentorship role.

As part of this newly-aligned partnership, the Travis Ganong Scholarship program has been created. This scholarship will be awarded annually to two promising student-athletes that embody Ganong’s passion for education and alpine ski racing. This merit-based award provides full or half tuition until graduation and is open to all students entering grades 9 and 10 for the 2017-18 school year.

For more information and to apply for a Travis Ganong Scholarship, so online.

By Francis Xavier, Unofficial Networks

If you live in a mountain town deemed desirable for tourism you may have noticed a revolution in the housing market over the last few years….its called AirBnB. If you’re a second homeowner you love it. If you’re a struggling ski bum– it’s the bane of your existence.

The Denver Post did an excellent bit of reporting on the explosive trajectory of short-term vacation rentals in Colorado ski country and its effects on local communities. The boom in this newish type of rental has generated record amounts of income for homeowners and tax revenue for municipalities.

The negative result is that the same increased demand has driven long term lease rates upwards by an astronomical amount.

Read the whole story

More than five years after Promised Land Express chairlift opened at Northstar the ski resort is now in compliance with conditions put it on by Placer County.

The resort donated a conservation easement on 56 acres to the Truckee Donner Land Trust. The resort first treated the 56 acres for fuels reduction and wildlife enhancement.

This acreage is located in the western portion of the Northstar in an area with high habitat conservation value. This easement complements the 233-acre easement on the east side of Highway 267 and the 37-acre easement near the Village at Northstar already operated by the Land Trust on Northstar land. 

These easements provide access to public recreational lands and are important for water quality protection as they contain diverse riparian waterways. 

This season the Elizabethtown Trail that connects Waddle Ranch Preserve to Northstar will be open.

— Lake Tahoe News staff report

By Kathryn Reed

Suicide. It’s on a lot of people’s minds. And that’s what worries those who want to prevent people from acting on those thoughts.

In a survey of South Tahoe Middle School students, 65 out of 509 youths have thought about suicide, while 45 out of 509 have tried to kill themselves in the last year. Of those, 55 percent were girls and 25 percent boys.

The others didn’t put a gender. It could be they are trans or gender neutral or use some other way to identify. Nationally, for the LGBTQ community, the suicide related numbers are triple those of the mainstream youth population.

These were some of the sobering facts that came out of the annual mental health forum organized by Barton Health. More than 50 people attended the May 9 gathering at South Tahoe High School. There were representatives from health care, law enforcement, businesses, nonprofits, social services, the general public and education.

A 2016 South Tahoe School graduate said it’s great that those in the know gather to talk about the services available and what they are finding in their sphere of influence, but what really needs to happen for this information to get to the people who need it. She has had mental health issues and recently received treatment in the Bay Area. She wishes while she were in school, she had known about many of the services that are available here.

She is now a peer counselor with NAMI – the National Alliance on Mental Health. The local NAMI chapter headed by Jeanne and Alan Nelson continues to expand its offerings.

What Jeanne Nelson shared with the group is that dealing with mental illness can be a lifelong issue – for the person and their loved ones.

Help is available and recovery is possible.

What was stressed is that mental illness comes in a variety of forms, none of which should be brushed aside. Depression is the most common issue and will likely affect everyone at some point.

It’s only been in the last few years that locally a greater emphasis has been placed on mental health. Part of this is the result of a 2012 community needs assessment by Barton Health that revealed the South Shore was lacking in mental health services. Since that time the pendulum has started to swing in the other direction. (Lake Tahoe News did a multi-part series on mental health in 2016, with the stories accessible from the Home Page under Special Projects.)

Being able to openly talk about mental health as easily as one would talk about cancer or a heart attack or any physical ailment is a goal. Erasing the stigma; that’s what needs to happen so people will treat mental health with the same seriousness and reverence accorded physical issues.

A multitude of events is going in May in recognition of this being Mental Health Awareness Month. More information is online.

Publisher’s note: This editorial is from the May 8, 2017, Las Vegas Sun.

During his recent trip to Washington, D.C., Gov. Brian Sandoval showed why the Republican Party should encourage him to come back for an extended stay.

Like six years in the Senate. Or maybe even four years in the White House.

Sandoval went to the nation’s capital in an awkward position, as a moderate and results-oriented governor meeting with Cabinet members of a hard-line extremist presidential administration. On two of the main issues that prompted his visit — supporting last November’s successful ballot question legalizing recreational marijuana and opposing the Yucca Mountain high-level nuclear waste dump — he was completely out of step with the president.

Read the whole story

By Michael Doyle, McClatchy Washington Bureau
 
WASHINGTON — Crucial details about the location and depth of certain California water wells can be kept secret, and out of the hands of an environmental group, a top federal appeals court ruled May 9.

Although targeting a specific request for California information, the ruling by what’s sometimes called the nation’s second-highest court could shape at least a few of the other Freedom of Information Act requests nationwide. More than 700,000 FOIA requests were filed in Fiscal 2014, and the question of what can be denied recurs often.

Tuesday’s unanimous decision lumped water wells with those drilled for oil and gas production. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit said that the water well information fits under a long-standing exemption to FOIA. The decision thwarted AquAlliance, the Chico-based group that sought the information.

Read the whole story