Barbara Cooper’s interest in a timeshare was to have access to indoor tennis. Photo/Kathryn Reed

By Susan Wood

Barbara Cooper batted around the idea of buying into a timeshare unit at the Ridge Tahoe in 2002. She did so for one big reason – to play tennis at the indoor courts, the only place in the Lake Tahoe Basin to play inside.

“It’s something my business partner and I got into specifically for playing tennis,” she said. “I entered into this the cheapest way.”

She paid $2,583 for the resale unit – not counting fees. Her portion amounts to $577 every other year.

Cooper got what she wanted out of the experience, which included an agreement with the exchange company Interval International. She went on ski vacations in Vail. Her friend used the exchange for golf excursions.

But now she’s discovered it’s just as easy to drive down to the Carson Valley to play tennis when the weather is nice. In the drought years, there wasn’t an issue to get court time at the Ridge.

“But lately reserving a court can be tricky,” Cooper said.

The Ridge Tahoe has some of the less expensive timeshares on the South Shore. Photo/LTN

Now she’s ready to sell and has placed her unit through the Ridge Tahoe’s resale program, in which they release for purchase one unit at a time. She expects to gain $339 in capital appreciation when the rotation has her selling in 2019. And that’s OK to her.

“It’s worth it to sell to have someone assume the responsibility of the fees,” Cooper told Lake Tahoe News. They’ve gone up 11.3 percent in the last 15 years.

Cooper is not alone in trying to unload her asset or liability – depending on how one looks at it.

Many timeshare units in the region are on the market, prompted by a bit of a glut in availability like other resort towns.

The list of timeshare options on the South Shore is staggering. Beyond the Ridge, there’s the Wyndham, Lake Tahoe Vacation Resort, Beachcomber, Tahoe Beach & Ski Club as well as the two Marriott properties at Heavenly Village – the Grand Residence and Timber Lodge. Some operate under the points-based system, while others use fractions of time. All timeshare units are subject to annual fees and homeowners’ association dues.

“Business is good,” George DeLaurentis of Century 21 said. The broker is busy with a high demand of people coming and going into units. “There’s more inventory now.”

The Marriott Timber Lodge has been open in South Lake Tahoe since 2002. Photo/LTN file

For some people, the option of having a timeshare works wonders if you’re using it in a certain way.

“If you can work the system, it’s fantastic,” DeLaurentis told Lake Tahoe News.

The opportunity appears to work well for those who consistently take trips; and these vacations mean having more spending money while on vacation because the lodging is already paid. Plus, there’s not a bill stacked with fees staring travelers in the face when they leave the properties like some hotel stays.

More than 57 million weeks are available at the 9,000-plus timeshares around the globe. Most complexes average about 125 units each.

Sales revenue by timeshare developers and operators rose 32 percent – equating to $8.6 billion a year – in the five years ending in 2015, according to the most recent estimate by the American Resort Development Association.

But secondary market sales by private owners show a different story.

“Branded resorts are doing very well,” Bob Schmidt, an analyst for Sharket.com., told Lake Tahoe News.

So essentially, people are eager to get in and to get out of timeshares – for reasons as varied as stages in their lives.

Those who watch the industry point to simple life changes like the children of baby boomers growing up and leaving to raise families of their own and might not to be skiing with mom and dad anymore.

“Vacation habits change,” Schmidt said.

The system works great for those wanting to take a nice vacation every year.

But once the status of the family or lifestyle changes, reselling the unit may seem to be easier than it is if you’re seeking a windfall of a return. It’s the opposite of the housing market in which the inventory is low, so buyers and interested parties are willing to shell out more. In the timeshare market, there’s an abundance to pick and choose from if you’re interested in the lifestyle.

Between the top 20 Lake Tahoe timeshare properties (including David Walley’s Resort in Genoa), the average number of units available for resale in 2014 and 2015 was 551, according to Sharket.com.

For example, the two Marriott properties alone have had 90 resales listed for the two-year period. The typical price goes for $5,600 at Timber Cove and $34,000 at the Grand Residence. The properties rate higher than most on the sale-ability score. Whereas, the typical price for a unit at the Ridge comes in at about $500, and it rates in ranking much lower on the score.

It’s all in what people are seeking.

The timeshare concept was born out of the 1960s, allowing multiple owners to share one property and gain access to resorts around the world by cashing in points or selecting allotted times.

By Peter Hotez

It once was stated that, “man’s weakness is not achieving victories, but in taking advantage of them.” Indeed, this is the case for global infection control. Throughout history we have so far eradicated only a single major infectious disease threat, a feat accomplished through the leadership of physician D.A. Henderson, who passed away in 2016 at the age of 87. 

Beginning in 1966, Henderson led a global effort based at the World Health Organization (WHO) to accelerate smallpox vaccinations. In an extraordinary campaign that required vaccinating people in the poorest and most remote areas of the world (and detailed in his book “Smallpox: The Death of a Disease”), the disease vanished, with the last known naturally transmitted case of smallpox occurring in 1977. 

Ever since, we have made great strides in the global control of infectious diseases, and even progress towards disease eradication, but frequently the endgame has been disrupted by an unexpected turn of events. In a recent book, I estimated that most of the world’s poverty-related neglected diseases are paradoxically found in the G20 nations. There are at least a half-dozen diseases for which disease elimination or eradication would be feasible were it not for war or national turmoil, political malaise, or a growing anti-vaccine movement.

Some of the most dramatic examples of game-changing disruptions in disease control have been noted for human parasitic and tropical infections. During much of the 20th century, tremendous strides were made in the elimination of the highly lethal Gambian form of African sleeping sickness (human African trypanosomiasis or “HAT”) through a combination of case detection, treatment and tsetse fly control. Many of the methods used to wipe out sleeping sickness were developed by Eugene Jamot, a French physician working in Cameroon who pioneered the use of portable and movable treatment teams during the early 20th century.

By the 1960s, Gambian HAT was near elimination in many African nations. But when hostilities, and civil and international conflicts broke out in Angola, Democratic Republic of Congo, Sudan and elsewhere, public health control was interrupted, so that by the 1990s the incidence of HAT had returned to pre-Jamot era levels. More recently, as tensions have eased and mass treatment and tsetse control efforts have been reinstated, we have seen a 73 percent reduction in deaths from HAT between 1990 and 2010. With only about 10,000 cases of HAT remaining, we may still yet see the global elimination of this deadly disease. 

War, conflict and political instability also have halted or interrupted other global efforts to eliminate or eradicate parasitic diseases. Breakdowns in health systems in Venezuela are resulting in resurgences of malaria and Chagas disease. Public health disruptions from the ISIS occupation of Syria and Iraq have allowed the number of cases of cutaneous leishmaniasis, a disease transmitted by sandflies and often associated with a disfiguring ulcer on the face[RJ1] , to skyrocket and spread into neighboring countries. The only good news is that although wars in the Sudan almost derailed global guinea worm eradication efforts led by the Carter Center, the Centers for Disease Control and WHO, through the perseverance of these organizations, this disease may soon become only the second disease ever eradicated[HPJ2]  .  

Next to war and political instability, probably the next most corrosive factor thwarting public health gains against infectious disease is simple absence of political will. During the 1950s and ’60s, under the auspices of the Pan American Health Organization, an ambitious effort to control yellow fever and dengue resulted in the eradication of the Aedes aegypti mosquito in more than a dozen Latin American and Caribbean countries. But lapses in mosquito control efforts and other factors allowed Aedes aegypti to re-establish, resulting in the reintroduction of dengue into the region during the 1980s. Now yellow fever has returned to Brazil, where it could gain access to Aedes mosquito populations and threaten urban centers.

Perhaps the most disheartening examples of infectious disease control going off the rails are instances in which there are deliberate attempts to block vaccination efforts. Today, the transmission of polio has been halted everywhere except in Afghanistan and Pakistan (and before that northern Nigeria) due in part to concerted efforts by religious extremist groups to kidnap or assassinate vaccine workers. 

And now in the United States and Europe we have anti-vaccine groups who allege links between vaccines and autism, despite massive scientific data showing conclusively there are no links or even any plausibility for vaccines causing autism.

A particular concern is the resurgence of measles, because it is one of the most contagious of all the vaccine-preventable diseases and often is the first to re-emerge following a decline in vaccine rates. But really any one of the major childhood illness targeted for vaccination could re-appear. Measles was eradicated in the United States in 2000. However, it returned to California in 2015, and now the state of Texas is especially vulnerable because tens of thousands of children are not being vaccinated for non-medical exemptions. Globally, between 1990 and 2010 there has been an 80 percent decline in measles deaths and for the first time the number of young children who die of measles globally has dropped below 100,000. However, there are concerns that an American-led anti-vaccine movement could now derail this achievement and possibly even lead to a reversal of sustainable and global goals for health and poverty reduction.

We need a concerted effort by global leaders to close current gaps and explore final steps to eliminate our great plagues. To do so will require international cooperation by the WHO member states, especially the 20 wealthiest economies comprising the G20 nations. Taking on the considerable political and social hurdles will become one of the great international challenges in freeing populations from the tyranny of epidemics or pandemics. 

Peter Hotez  is dean of the National School of Tropical Medicine at Baylor College of Medicine, where he is also director of the Texas Children’s Hospital Center for Vaccine Development. He is the author of “Blue Marble Health: An Innovative Plan to Fight Diseases of the Poor Amid Wealth” (Johns Hopkins University Press).

By Associated Press

How often do students miss school? Are they ready for college? Are they physically fit? Is their school a welcoming place?

States are beginning to outline new ways to evaluate their schools, rather than relying just on traditional measures such as test scores.

The plans are required under a federal education law, the Every Student Succeeds Act, which was signed by former President Barack Obama in 2015 and takes effect in the coming school year.

Read the whole story

By Bill Swindell, Santa Rosa Press Democrat
 
Authorities resumed their search Sunday morning for a Santa Rosa couple whose Petaluma-bound plane went missing on April 17 after taking off from Truckee.

Two Civil Air Patrol planes took off around 10 a.m. to search for Mark and Brenda Richard’s white-and-blue Socata TB-20 Trinidad, said Maj. Kathy Johnson, spokeswoman for the Civil Air Patrol. A third plane left in the afternoon to assist.

The patrol suspended its search Saturday afternoon because of strong winds above an area of the Sierra Nevada mountain range where the plane had last been tracked by radar and cellphone information.

Read the whole story

By Amelia Pak-Harvey, Las Vegas Review-Journal

 A few years after Colorado legalized recreational marijuana in 2012, Denver Public Schools produced a public service video with a straightforward message: The education system wasn’t getting that much money from pot tax revenue.

It was a misconception that the district was trying to clear up. The first $40 million in excise taxes on the retail drug went to a school construction fund for the entire state; the rest landed in the state’s public school fund. Retail and medical sales taxes have also funded a few grants.

Will Colorado serve as a cautionary tale for Nevada as it grapples with how to tax recreational marijuana? Will that revenue even make a dent on education funding?

Read the whole story

The future of the commercial strip housing the Tahoe Wellness Cooperative in South Lake Tahoe as well as the tenants remains in limbo.

This is because property owner Patty Olson has filed chapter 13 bankruptcy. Prior to that filing the property was in foreclosure.

Cody Bass, founder and executive director of the medical marijuana collective, has been trying to buy the property for a year. He is suing Olson for breach of contract. Attorney Bruce Grego had been representing Olson, but is no longer involved.

The city is going after Bass because he doesn’t have a valid permit to operate his business.

“I am not certain what will happen, but it does not change the city’s requirement that the owner consent to the continued operation of a marijuana dispensary and TWC has not provided that consent,” City Attorney Tom Watson told Lake Tahoe News.

The city and Bass issue is slated to go to trial in late June.

— Lake Tahoe News staff report

By Lake Tahoe News

Proponents of Measure T, the initiative that would give South Lake Tahoe voters a say in the loop road, want back in the game.

Attorney Bruce Grego last week filed the civil case questionnaire with the Third Appellate Court in Sacramento. He is representing himself and Laurel Ames.

The loop road would reroute Highway 50 behind Harrah’s and MontBleu, with the current highway becoming a city-county road. The environmental documents are being released Monday.

Grego and Ames two along with the late Bill Crawford were the original backers of Measure T. While voters approved it in November, a lawsuit had been filed by Jason Collin, who is now on the City Council, in the summer to stop the measure from being on the ballot. El Dorado County Superior Court Judge Jim Wagoner let the vote go through.

However, in December Wagoner narrowed the suit to be Collin v. South Lake Tahoe. This meant the voters no longer had a voice. In January the judge said the measure was invalid and unconstitutional. 

“My best hope is confirmation that Measure T is constitutional and enforceable. That means the public has the opportunity to vote on that issue and the city would be restrained from supporting a proposal until a proposal is presented to the public and we have a full venting of issues,” Grego told Lake Tahoe News.

Before the court can hear arguments it must decide that Grego and Ames are real parties of interest to the case since they were not parties in the case when the judgment was made.

By Thomas Moore, Las Vegas Sun

Using the wrong Social Security number in a casino can cost you millions of dollars and land you in jail as professional sports bettor David Nakama Oancea, also known as Vegas Dave, is finding out.

According to an indictment issued by a federal grand jury last week, Oancea used Social Security numbers that weren’t his to place nine bets in 2015 and 2016 at the Wynn and Westgate sports books.

Under the Bank Secrecy Act, casinos are considered financial institutions and must report transactions of $10,000 or more by filing a currency transaction report or CTR.

Read the whole story

By Kathryn Reed

A destination – that is what The Crossing wants to be.

What was the Factory Stores at the Y in South Lake Tahoe has been revamped with the hope it helps revitalize this end of town.

Sacramento-based Sutter Capital Group infused more than $1 million into the property. Besides a façade that makes the center look modern and inviting, the remodel has included an open space where the two commercial strips once met.

The 4,000-square-foot plaza can be rented for events and parties. There is an elevated stage, seating and fire pits. This is where bike-pedestrian paths connect to the center.

The brewery has large doors that open directly onto the plaza.

Based on the number of cars in the parking lot it is evident the center is more popular than it had been in recent years.

A brewery spills out onto the common area at The Crossing in South Lake Tahoe. Photo/Kathryn Reed

Sutter Capital bought the property in December 2014. For several years Wells Fargo Bank had owned the center because former owners Shannon Casteel and Nancy Irmer defaulted in 2012. At that time the sisters owed more than $8 million. In 2004, they bought the center from their brother, Gary Casteel. He still runs Heavenly Village.

New tenants that have moved in or will soon include Elevate Wellness, Omni Tahoe, Verde Mexican Rotisserie, Lake Tahoe Aleworx Taproom and Pizzeria, Sierra-at-Tahoe and T-Mobile.

Holdover tenants include Big 5, Bank of America and Styles for Less. Big 5 was closed earlier this year because the roof leaked and damaged the store. The interior has been fixed, and the roof will be replaced this spring.

“There are a number of vacant suites remaining, although we are in various stages of discussions with prospective tenants on the majority of them,” Burke Fathy, general manager of the ownership group, told Lake Tahoe News.

To the community,

This week is National Volunteer Week (April 23-29). Barton Health would like to extend a heartfelt thank you to our incredible team of volunteers for all they do to support our patients and help our physicians, nurses, and staff.

Our volunteers enhance the patient experience at Barton Health. Our biggest group of volunteers, the Barton Auxiliary, greet and guide our patients and their families at the hospital. They assist with special events, host the Comfort Cart, and help with activities behind-the-scenes. Since 1960, the Barton Auxiliary has raised more than $7.6 million for health and wellness services in our community.

The Auxiliary members and other volunteers are also an integral part of Skilled Nursing. They assist on field trips and bring their pets, music, and other talents to energize our Skilled Nursing residents.

In addition, volunteers play a role in making positive changes for the health system. Community members offer their input as Patient and Family Advisors. Others serve on steering committees and boards for Barton Health and the Barton Foundation. Volunteers also support the Barton Foundation’s efforts to raise funds for health and wellness. They participate in fundraising events and many are donors themselves.

We are thankful for the time and energy our volunteers put into making our events and our health system run smoothly. Their efforts do not go unnoticed and are greatly appreciated.

Molly Hucklebridge Coolidge, communications specialist Barton Health