By Lester Snow and Ruth Coleman

An article advocated the need to protect the natural habitat and environmentally sensitive lands regarding the Upper Truckee River Restoration and Golf Course Reconfiguration Project. The commentary suggested creating more wetlands, meadow and wildlife habitat to restore the Upper Truckee. We agree with those points, which are clearly spelled out in the proposed project’s goals and objectives. However, given the statements expressed by the author, it would appear that he was unfamiliar with the proposed project.

Contrary to the suggestion that this is a politically motivated golf course expansion, there is no proposal to expand the golf course. There are five alternatives under consideration. Among them are proposals to eliminate the course, reduce the size to nine holes, or keep it at 18 holes and relocate nine holes farther from the banks of the river to less sensitive areas of the existing state park land.

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Lester Snow is secretary of the California Natural Resources Agency. Ruth Coleman is director of California State Parks.

Tangled Roots Writing of Truckee offers Monday Night Creative Writing Workshops to explore creative writing of any genre in a fun supportive environment for any level of writer.

Read, write, discuss, and generate new material each week, receiving feedback from the group and instructor Karen Terrey.

The next sessions are Sept 13, Oct. 11 and Nov. 8 from 6:30– 8pm in Truckee.

For more information, call (530) 386.3901 or email tangledrootswriting@gmail.com.

Equine enthusiasts are headed west to attend Nevada’s first United States Hunter Derby and the 24th Annual Draft Horse Classic in California. Both events will showcase some of the west’s finest equine artistry and have hand-selected June Towill Brown’s bronze and Lucite sculptures as the highlight of their art displays and juried shows.

The $25,000 Franktown Meadows Hunter Derby in Carson City will make its inaugural debut on Sept. 19 as a standalone high performance competition in affiliation with the United States Hunter Jumper Association. Paralleling this event is the Promenade which will display the art work of Brown of J.T. Brown Sculptures of Incline Village; other elite commodities will also be on site.

J.T. Brown

During the event, Brown will present a variety of her most recent Series of Three Gypsy Vanner Horses and also her Friesian and Arabian horses in the bronze and Lucite medium.

For more information about the Derby, click here.

The Draft Horse Classic and Harvest Fair is set for Sept. 23-26 at the Nevada County Fairgrounds in Grass Valley.

• September is California Wine Month – go pop that cork.

• Need a new ski app? Click here.

• The weekly summer flea market at the corner of Highway 50 and Elks Club Road on the South Shore will not be back in 2011. The California Tahoe Conservancy, the land owner, will proceed with restoration at the site along the Upper Truckee River.

• Click here for a list of community flu shots in El Dorado County.

• The El Dorado County Board of Supervisors is seeking qualified candidates for one vacancy on the El Dorado County Assessment Appeals Board. Applications and questionnaires may be obtained by calling (530) 621.5390

• Cyclelicious, a blog about cycling, has a couple interesting posts related to Tahoe. This one is about how cycling clubs may lose their nonprofit status. And this one is how the Amgen Tour de California – the event the South Shore wants to be the starting site for in 2011 – loses money and some cities want nothing to do with it.

By Bill Simons, Inside Tennis

It’s easy to dismiss New Jersey as some kind of Turnpike ride gone wrong (with too many Sopranos, oil refineries and Jersey Shore types). But before you do, remember this place is some kind of magnet for whizzes. Think Thomas Edison — the greatest inventor ever; a beloved frizzy-haired fellow named Einstein; and then there’s a lesser-known bald guy named Howard Head, who transformed the sport of tennis as much as anyone.

In 1976, Head, an inspired innovator who said that sports equipment always had to feel right, had already invented the laminated ski, which rendered the clumsy, old hickory skis obsolete and revolutionized the sport. But the visionary — wealthy and retired — wanted to rev up his tennis game. So he got himself a ball machine and started to blast away. Unfortunately, many of his forehands landed in the next county. Something was wrong. Something had to be done.

For starters, he bought Prince Manufacturing, which made his semi-primitive ball machine. An inspired entrepreneur, he would morph Prince into one of the iconic names in international sports. He began by tweaking the motor on a household vacuum to produce the first commercially successful tennis ball machine. That was mere prologue. Almost immediately, Head grasped that little user-resistant wood rackets were far too frustrating. They twisted too much. And then came his Eureka moment. In a hot flash, he awoke one night, realizing that rackets needed to be bigger and have a far bigger sweet spot that wasn’t exactly in the middle of the frame. Wow!

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By David A. Sanchez

California voters have an opportunity in this election to send a clear message about the future of our state. Passing Proposition 24, the Tax Fairness Act, will help prevent more than a half-billion dollars from being cut from our public schools and colleges and will help ensure that everyone in the state is paying their fair share.

Prop. 24 does not raise taxes. It keeps taxes for large corporations in California at their current level. If Prop. 24 does not pass, about 2 percent of California’s largest corporations will get a $1.3 billion tax cut without any requirement to create jobs in California.

It is unconscionable, in these tough economic times, that a handful of large corporations, which are reaping record profits and handing out bonuses to their executives, would eagerly seek new sweetheart tax breaks.

It’s equally important to understand how Prop. 24 came about. During the state’s budget crisis of 2009, backroom deals were cut that became part of the final budget agreement, providing billions in permanent tax breaks to large corporations.

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David A. Sanchez is president of the California Teachers Association.

Hyatt Regency Lake Tahoe presents the inaugural Beer Dinner at the Cutthroat’s Saloon on Oct. 1.

There will be a five-course menu created by Chefs Chris Moore and Justin Kaufman paired with select beers from Samuel Adams.

The event begins at 6pm with a reception featuring Sam Adams Light to welcome guests to the Western-inspired bar.

Tickets are $59 per person. Reservations may be made by contacting David Hamer at (775) 886.6730 or david.hamer@hyatt.com.

By Frank X. Mullen Jr., Reno Gazette-Journal

Wild horse advocates are asking the federal government to investigate allegations that the Bureau of Land Management sent 172 Nevada mustangs to an auction attended by “slaughter buyers” in July.

The horses were rounded up by the BLM in the Pilot Creek Valley area near Wendover and auctioned off in Fallon on July 10. By law, federally-protected horses can’t be sold for slaughter, but the agency says the horses sent to the auction were abandoned domestic horses or their offspring, not federally-protected mustangs.

Such “estray” or “feral” horses aren’t covered by the 1971 law that protects established herds of free-roaming mustangs. Federally-protected wild horses can’t be legally sold for food, but estrays can be sold for eventual slaughter in Mexico or Canada, where firms provide horse meat for human and animal consumption.

“I’m disgusted the BLM did what it did with these horses,” said Jill Starr, president of Lifesavers Wild Horse Rescue. Starr bought 169 of the horses at the auction. Six have been adopted and the remainder will be offered for adoption or released in a sanctuary, she said.

Read the whole story

By Kathryn Reed

“It’s a stroll in the park.”

That’s how Chris Hawken, No. 2 guy with South Lake Tahoe Park’s and Recreation Department, described Saturday’s annual Bijou Bash. And it’s exactly what it looked like.

Kids learn about recycling at the South Tahoe Refuse table on Sept. 11. Photos/Kathryn Reed

With nearly 3,000 people meandering through Bijou Community Park, which was closed off to vehicle traffic, it was one of those Tahoe Saturday’s to bask in the sun, mingle with friends, watch kids scamper about, munch on food from local restaurants, and visit a variety of informational booths.

Tahoe Mountain Milers started things off with a poker run with 30 participants.

Anthony Davis kept things rolling as he emceed the event and had people grooving to the music in between the various stage acts. Demonstrations from Miss Marcia’s dancers to karate to gymnastics brought out hundreds to watch.

At the other end of the park, near the entrance, kids scampered on the big equipment the city brought out. Lots of kids visited the firefighters based on the number of plastic red fire hats being worn all over.

Kristopher Fisher, 10 was all smiles as he climbed into the cab of the Kodiak snowblower with its 1,000 horsepower engine and 1,470 pounds of torque.

In between the areas gymnasts practiced in the stretch of lawn that was put in by park staff last year. Children played on the permanent equipment installed this year as well as on and in the bouncy house apparatuses brought in for the bash.

Exact attendance numbers are hard to calculate because not everyone walks in the main entrance. And with it being free, no tickets are sold. About 2,700 attended last year and it’s anticipated about 300 more came this year. It helped that there wasn’t a downpour this year.

People even showed up before the 11am start time, clearly redefining Tahoe time.

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Lake Tahoe News congratulates Preston Development general contractors of Tahoe Paradise for winning the advertising give-away at Saturday’s Bijou Bash.

About 3,000 people meandered through Bijou Community Park in South Lake Tahoe during the annual event.

Owner Dan’l Preston entered his card in Lake Tahoe News’ drawing. The general contractor won $900 worth of advertising on Lake Tahoe News. South Lake Tahoe Parks and Recreation Director Gary Moore picked the winning business card at the end of the event Sept. 11.

For those who signed up for a subscription, you should receive a confirmation email soon. That will then start your free subscription that brings you a daily email listing what has been posted in the last 24 hours. If you don’t receive the confirmation email, it’s in your spam folder or we couldn’t read your email address. Just go to the home page of LTN, near the bottom right enter your email address to subscribe.

Thank you everyone for your support of Lake Tahoe News, Tahoe’s daily news source.

It was a pleasure to meet all of you.

Kathryn Reed, LTN publisher