Squaw Valley will again offer discounted season passes for next season.
Squaw is offering reloadable passes in keeping with its sustainability goals and to offer greater customer convenience. Current Squaw season passholders wishing to purchase a 2010-11 pass online can reload their 2009-10 pass with zero hassle. Those purchasing a Silver pass or higher prior to May 9 will also receive free Cable Car access for summer 2010.
For pricing details, click here.
By Reno Gazette-Journal
Defending their respective 2009 Silver Belt Banzai titles, brother and sister combo Daron and Shannon Rahlves provided repeat performances last weekend at Sugar Bowls’ 2010 Silver Belt Banzai, taking the top podium spots for a second year in a row.
Meyers Community Roundtable meets tonight at 6 in the California Conservancy Corp cafeteria at the corner of Highway 50 and Apache Avenue.
Meeting agenda includes:
• Celio mural
• Proposed boat inspection in Meyers
• County supervisor report
• Government reports
• Public forum
For more information, call Sue Novasel at (530) 577.4857.
It’s spring skiing on the slopes of Lake Tahoe. Here is the ski report from Curtis Fong, the Guy from Tahoe.
By Kathryn Reed
Paperwork is expected to be signed today to change the ownership, name and look of Chase’s Restaurant at Lake Tahoe Airport.
The matter is before the South Lake Tahoe City Council, which meets starting at 9am at the airport.
Sam Sonki Ahn has been operating the eatery for about five years. He has reached an agreement with Diane and Tom Miller for them to buy the restaurant. The city and the Millers have reached an agreement for a five-year lease.
The Millers, who Monday declined to be interviewed, plan to rename the restaurant Flight Deck. Views from the bar, as it is laid out today, look out to the runway and tarmac.
If everything is signed today, the lease would take affect April 1, with improvements set to be completed so the first plate of food could be served on or before July 1. What all will be changed is not known.
The Millers are not new to the restaurant industry. They operated Steamers from 1996-2002.
Breakfast, lunch and dinner will be served seven days a week. The deal says the establishment must be open 10 hours a day. The idea is the Millers will market the facility to city workers, locals, tourists and service clubs for the latter to have their regular lunches there instead of at the Stateline casinos.
The proposed menu uses cutesy names like Runway Chicken and Tarmac Turkey for sandwiches. Lunch fare is pretty standard — burgers, sandwiches, soups and salads. Ribs, steak, chicken and fish of the day are listed on the dinner menu.
One thing the city wants out of the deal is to make more money. Ahn had been paying $552/month in rent, plus 5 percent of gross sales. According to city documents, gross sales have ranged from $1,500 to $3,000 month.
The Millers will pay $600/month, 5 percent of gross sales up to $15,000 per month, and topping out at 7 percent for sales of more than $30,000 month, plus a percentage of the entire building’s utilities.
By Kathryn Reed
After being in the business of chronicling the lives of those on the South Shore since the 1960s, Laine Photolabs is about to close shop.
“It provided me, for 20 years, the lifestyle I needed. I needed complete control of my time,” Brooke Laine said. It meant being able to raise her kids without interference from a boss and serve the community as a member of the South Lake Tahoe City Council.
But it was also a business she inherited from her parents and not one she would have necessarily picked.
“Running a business I’m quite good at. Photography was never my cup of tea,” Laine said.
The 1982 South Tahoe High grad returned to town in 1990 to take over the business.
For the last three years she has been working at Bank of the West. This is something she will continue to do. What else the future holds for the 46-year-old remains to be seen.
The contract with Lake Tahoe Unified School District ends this school year. Laine will shoot America’s Most Beautiful Bike Ride in June.
She said the decision to close was not difficult.
“I’ve been looking forward to it,” Laine said. “I’m totally excited about moving on.”
She said it’s not a coincidence the contract with LTUSD expires the same year her youngest son graduates from high school.
The retail end was shuttered in 2007. The agreement between she and her parents was the family name would not be sold, thus the reason for closing the business and not selling it.
The early years
Ed and Del Laine arrived here through different routes. He in 1957 with his first wife. After divorcing he stayed at the lake. Del started coming here as a toddler each summer with her family. She still spends her summers at the cabin off South Upper Truckee Road.
They met through a children’s theater project Del was spearheading. Ed volunteered to do carpentry work on the set. They got engaged, married and raised three daughters and a son here.
For a spell Ed was advertising director at the Tahoe Daily Tribune. Del wrote columns for the paper about skiing, hiking, bowling, fishing, gossip and other activities. In 1967 the couple left the Tribune to open Laine Associates.
“We did primarily advertising. Photography was a component of that. It evolved and Ed became more interested in photography,” said Del, who turns 80 Saturday. “The difficulty was the seasonality.”
In the early days the Laines made their money in seven months and ran up the bills the other five. Del often worked at home doing the books as she tended to their offspring. Ed supplemented their income by teaching photography for nine years at Lake Tahoe Community College.
“In the beginning I think it was rough. For some reason or another we made it. We were able to grow into wedding work and portrait work,” Ed, 78, said. “We put a studio together. The wedding business was our main stay.
“I never liked a lot of my work. I was never satisfied with it,” Ed said. “Maybe I was wrong in being overly judgmental. A lot of artists are like that.”
Changing direction
The one-hour photo business became a reality when they moved from South Lake to Round Hill in 1989. They incorporated and created Laine Photolabs Inc.
“Our lawyer made (Photolabs) one word, which was a mistake,” Brooke said.
They sold film, camera bags and batteries — but never cameras. In the late 1990s they began transitioning into digital photography.
The wedding business began to change as digital cameras cropped up. Everyone began to think they could take a picture as well as a professional and the business became diluted with wannabe professionals.
Brooke was more than ready to stop taking wedding photos. Cranky people and having to dress for the occasion are some of the reasons she was glad to move out of that genre.
“We decided we would transition from wedding to sports photography. That was my decision,” Brooke said. “I was a mother with kids. I wanted to be where they were. They were in sports.”
Her computer background made the digital work an easy leap. They bought a processing machine in 2000. Though the upfront costs were expensive, it didn’t take long to see a savings.
For a time father and daughter ran the business as equal partners. Then Ed worked a few days a week before calling it quits for good.
Brooke’s children have worked at the lab during the summer, but neither has a desire to carry on the family business.
“Brooke was the mainstay. She did one tremendous job in terms of public relations and fairness,” Ed said. “She is such a fair person. The business was respected from that standpoint.”
A collection of photos
It’s not just memories of vacations that came through the lab. Law enforcement had Laine Photolabs develop pictures.
Nothing was put in the trash. It was either destroyed or given back to the agency. This way no one could dig through garbage cans for evidence.
Confidentiality was a huge part of the business. Most of the crime work was done at night so a customer couldn’t walk in.
Brooke said she would try to inspect the photo for quality and ignore the image as best she could.
Easier photographs to deal with are from schools. Brooke approached LTUSD in 2003 about doing school shots. She bid on the project, got a one-year contract that turned into a multi-year contract.
Community events, lawsuits, weddings, the development of Tahoe Keys — it’s all part of Laine Photolabs’ history.
“We have a huge legacy of photographs which chronicle that era,” Del said of the city’s early years.
The family isn’t sure where the photos will go, but possibly one day to the local historical society.
For many youth growing up in South Lake Tahoe, being able to go snowboarding is only an item on their wish list. For five weeks, that wish came true for 24 sixth- through 12th-graders because of the collaborative efforts and generosity of SOS Outreach program, Heavenly Mountain Resort, Heavenly Ski and Snowboard Foundation, Boys & Girls Club of Lake Tahoe, Vail Corporation, Matt Grodzik, Heavenly Ski and Snowboard School and Red Hut Cafe.
Zuleyma Martinez and Joselyn Rodriquez. Photo/Provided
Each week the participants were greeted by Heavenly coaches, SOS coordinator Cara Kauffman, and Boys & Girls Club volunteers to enjoy a day of riding and camaraderie.
The program was facilitated through the Boys & Girls Club and is just one example of the local club providing quality programs and services.
One of 4,200 clubs nationally, the Boys & Girls Club of Lake Tahoe is funded through local efforts including grants, donations and fund raising. All donations made to the local club support our local youth.
For more information contact www.bgclt.org.
By Dale Kasler, Sacramento Bee
More than a year after it opened, Red Hawk Casino remains an underperformer.
The company that manages Red Hawk said Friday the Shingle Springs casino is still operating below expectations. It added, however, that it is starting to see better results from a revamped marketing program and new management.
To the community,
Soroptimist International of South Lake Tahoe wishes to thank the community and the hundreds of donors who made it possible to donate $50,000 to Jaycee Dugard at the end of 2009.
Because of the parade and the publicity it generated, we received donations from as far away as Hong Kong and New York, but the majority of them came from the citizens of our own community in amounts from $1 to $2,000. The parade could not have happened without the help of all of the following:
Lake Tahoe Unified School District
Lake Tahoe Unified School District maintenance crew
BlueGO Transit
El Dorado County Sheriff’s Department
South Lake Tahoe Police Department
South Lake Tahoe Fire Department
Lake Valley Fire Department
California Highway Patrol
STARS (Sheriff Team of Active Retirees)
City of South Lake Tahoe Parks and Recreation
Inn by the Lake Event Center
Praxair Distribution
Edgewood Tahoe Golf Course
Dollar Signs and Graphics
Angie’s Signs
Thran’s Flower Shop
Cakes by Grace
Lake Tahoe Chocolate Factory
Dart Liquor
Lake Tahoe Business Services
Laine Photolabs, Inc
Girl Scouts of America Troops 56, 92, 236, 238, 543, 577
“S” Club of South Lake Tahoe High School
KRLT/KOWL
KTHO
Grapevine Apparel
Bank of the West
Fromarc Insurance Agency
We also thank the organizers of other fundraisers who contributed to the fund, including Kathy Garcia and Horizon Casino with their “Building New Bridges’ event Sept. 20, Terri Poland and Push Fitness, the Slo Rollers and, in a last drive to get to $50,000 the last few days, Paul Middlebrook and KTHO for their radio campaign.
The $50,000 check was delivered to Jaycee’s attorney Dec. 21 in time for Christmas, and was greatly appreciated. The account at Bank of the West has remained open and any donations still coming will be forwarded to her as they accumulate.
Thanks again for all of the support for Jaycee and her family!
Soroptimist International of South Lake Tahoe Foundation
“TAPPED†is currently only available for viewing at theaters or licensed public screenings. There is no admission charge for attending the “TAPPED†screenings; donations will be accepted for the hosting locations.
It will be shown April 30 at 6:30pm for free at Sierra College Tahoe-Truckee Campus, 11001 College Trail Drive, Truckee.
Is access to clean drinking water a basic human right or a commodity that should be bought and sold like any other article of commerce? Stephanie Soechtig’s award winning feature film, “TAPPED†is an unflinching examination of the business of the billion dollar bottled water industry.
From the producers of “Who Killed the Electric Car†and “I.O.U.U.S.A.†this documentary is a behind the scenes look at the unregulated and unseen works of an industry that aims to privatize and sell back one resource that ought never become a commodity, our water.
From the plastic production to the ocean where so many of these bottles end up, this inspiring documentary trails the path of the bottled water industry, and the communities that were unwitting chips on the table. A powerful portrait of the lives affected by the bottled water industry, this revelatory film features those caught in the intersection of big business and the public’s right to water. From the website: www.tappedthemovie.com
For more information, call Madonna Dunbar at (775) 832.1212, email mod@ivgid.org, or go to www.tahoeh2o.org.