To the community,
When I visit small towns with active libraries in a white suit as Mark Twain, they hail me as “Mr. Twain,” or “Samuel Clemens.” When I visit small towns without active libraries they customarily ask if I’m there to fry them up some chicken.
Please vote yes on Measure L.
McAvoy Layne, Incline Village
Publisher’s note: This editorial is from the April 27, 2014, New York Times.
More than 90 percent of American adults own a mobile phone, and more than half of the devices are smar tphones. But “smartphone” is a misnomer. They are personal computers that happen to include a phone function, and like any computer they can store or wirelessly retrieve enormous amounts of personal information: emails, photos and videos; document files; financial and medical records; and virtually everywhere a person has been.
On Tuesday, the Supreme Court will consider whether law enforcement officers during an arrest may search the contents of a person’s mobile phone without a warrant. The court should recognize that new technologies do not alter basic Fourth Amendment principles, and should require a judicial warrant in such circumstances.
The court is considering the issue in two separate cases. In one, Boston police officers arrested a man on drug charges and seized his flip phone. After seeing an incoming call on the phone’s outer screen, they opened the phone and checked the call log, which led them to an apartment where they found drugs, money and firearms.
• There is still time to register to vote for the June 3 primary in California. Nevada’s primary is June 10.
• Here is the El Dorado-Tahoe roadwork schedule from Caltrans for this week.
• The owners of Tahoe Keys Marina are opening a deli in May next to the Fresh Ketch. It will sell beer and wine, too.
• North Tahoe Public Utility District has given California State Parks its 30 days’ notice for operating Kings Beach State Recreation Area and boat launch facility. Starting May 15 it’s up to the state to operate the facility. The two public agencies have been bickering for some time.
• Carson City Fire Department is presenting the Nevada Wildfire Awareness Month Kickoff on May 3 from 10am-2pm at Mills Park. The event will promote this year’s wildfire awareness message, Prepare Your Home For Wildfire, encouraging residents to better prepare their homes and properties now to survive future wildfires.
By John Brennan, New Jersey Record
On any given Sunday, Mike Azzaro — or mikeycasino, as he’s known online — will travel from his home in Yonkers, N.Y., to a Ramsey hotel room for the night.
The reason is not glamorous, but it is profitable: Azzaro, 27, is a professional poker player.
Of the online players who have signed up to play in New Jersey at PartyPoker.com, 15 percent don’t live in the state. You must be within New Jersey’s borders to play, but residency isn’t required. That so many out-of-state players are traveling to New Jersey — call it “poker tourism” — is an encouraging sign for the fledgling industry, which so far has been generating less than $2 million per month in tax revenue for the state budget.
Mike Azzaro, sitting by the window, and other out-of-towners playing online at the Borgata in Atlantic City on Friday.
That figure is less than a tenth of the projections made last year by the Christie administration, but it is far closer to the amount anticipated by most industry analysts in the first year of play.
By crossing into New Jersey, Azzaro can engage in unlimited hours of legal online poker. New Jersey is one of three states that permit such play. The state’s rollout of a variety of online games in November followed a similar move by Delaware a month earlier. Last spring Nevada — the state best known for gambling — became the first to offer online poker.
New Jersey benefits when Azzaro and friends cross the Hudson and pay for hotel rooms and room service. And Azzaro admits he has “splurged” on purchases in the state to celebrate wins, such as after he won more than $15,000 in PartyPoker’s first two tournaments in December.
Start Smart is aimed at helping newly licensed and future licensed teenage drivers become aware of the responsibilities of being a licensed California driver.
The next class is May 6 at 6pm in the South Tahoe High School student union. Students and parents are invited.
All classes are free and last approximately two hours. To reserve a space, contact the California Highway Patrol at 530.577.1001.
The program was created to reduce the the number of teen injuries and deaths resulting from motor vehicle collisions.
Two Truckee teenagers have been arrested in connection with firing a BB gun at a man who had to be hospitalized for his injuries.
The incident occurred April 24 in downtown Truckee. The victim transported himself to Tahoe Forest Hospital and was later transferred to Renown Medical Center in Reno because a pellet that entered his chest had lodged near his heart.
A day later officer arrested Kyle Mello, 18, and a 17-year-old male on charges of assault causing great bodily injury, burglary and possession of stolen property.
Officers said during the investigation they discovered Mello and the juvenile allegedly broke into three houses in Tahoe Donner prior to the pellet incident. They stole alcohol and the pellet gun used in the assault from these houses, officers said.
Anyone with further information is asked to call 530.550.2335 or 530.550.2336.
— Lake Tahoe News staff report
By Kyle B. Hansen, Las Vegas Sun
A third of Nevadans say their state is the best or one of the best states in which to live, according to a survey.
That puts the Silver State as the 12th-worst state to live in, as judged by its own residents, according to a Gallup poll.
On average, 46 percent of Americans said their state was the best or among the best, and in the top two states — Montana and Alaska — 77 percent of residents said their state was in that category.
When Ironman and Ironman 70.3 race on the same day in Lake Tahoe it will be the first time this has happened in the U.S.
The Ironman 70.3 Lake Tahoe is the 25th race in the U.S. Series. Ironman Lake Tahoe returns for the second time after selling out registration last year. The two races will be Sept. 21.
Ironman 70.3 Lake Tahoe leads athletes through a 1.2-mile swim, 56-mile bike and 13.1-mile run on the same terrain as Ironman Lake Tahoe. The race will start with a single loop 1.2-mile swim at King’s Beach. Athletes will transition lakeside before starting a one-loop 56-mile bike course that will travel through Tahoe City before following the Truckee River past Squaw Valley and into Truckee. From there, the course turns south past Northstar and climbs to Brockway Summit. Athletes will complete the bike course at Squaw Valley. Runners will proceed back up the Truckee River bike path on a relatively flat course before finishing at the Village at Squaw Valley.
More info is available online.
By Edward Ortiz, Sacramento Bee
California’s drought is imperiling tricolored blackbirds, large trees and native fish, with some of the affected species already on the state’s endangered list and others likely headed there because of rapidly declining numbers, scientists say.
“The problems created by the drought are just a harbinger of things to come,” said Peter Moyle, a professor at the UC Davis Center for Watershed Sciences, which hosted a daylong Capitol summit Friday on economic and environmental costs of the drought.
“Native fishes and the ecosystems that support them are incredibly vulnerable to drought,” Moyle said. “There are currently 37 species of fish on the endangered species list in California – and there is every sign that that number will increase,” he said.
Eighty percent of those species face extinction by the year 2100 if present trends continue, Moyle said.
Sten Seemann of South Lake Tahoe has two VIP tickets to Brian Howe at Boomtown because he is one of Lake Tahoe News’ paid subscribers.
On occasion paid subscribers receive special benefits. He happened to win the contest Friday. The reward was two tickets to the May concert.
It’s fast and easy to fill out a paid subscriber form.
Here are reasons to do so:
“LTN is an excellent source for local news and issues that is timely, relevant and convenient. I do not have TV service, so I rely on LTN. I like the email brief because it is easy to quickly scan to see if there is an article I would like to read.” — Sten Seemann
The email Seemann refers to is the Daily Digest. This is free. Just put your email address in at the bottom right of the home page. Then you will receive an email each morning listing what has been posted in the last 24 hours. Clicking on a particular headline gets you to the full story.
Lake Tahoe News needs paid subscribers for two reasons — 1. It’s required by law to keep our adjudication so we may publish legal notices. You may have noticed earlier this year we added a category at the top of the home page called Legals. El Dorado County Superior Court in November deemed Lake Tahoe News an adjudicated publication; 2. Cash flow keeps us in business. It’s as simple as that. We have advertisers who we are thankful for, but we rely on readers as well.
– Lake Tahoe News staff