By Jim Sloan, Sacramento Bee

Few businesses feel as threatened by global warming as the ski industry.

And few resorts are poised to go to the same lengths — and expense — to combat it as Kirkwood and the hardy folks who make their homes in the snowy, windswept Kirkwood Meadows.

Although only a few hundred people live year-round in Kirkwood, the community is ready to spend up to $30 million to overhaul its aging, dirty and expensive power system and reduce its contributions to global warming.

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By Ed Vogel, Las Vegas Review-Journal

RENO — A California company might become the first from another state to practice “telemedicine” in Nevada.

The Board of Medical Examiners was told Friday by its lawyers that it cannot prevent the Clinician Medical Group of Bakersfield from using television technology to treat Nevadans.

Board lawyers Edward Cousineau and Lyn Beggs said state laws allow the company to do so.

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Nearly 250 students from the South Tahoe middle and high schools bands,orchestras, choirs and NJROTC will perform a Veterans Musical Tribute on Nov. 9 at South Tahoe Middle School’s multipurpose room.

The free concert is from 7-8pm.

By Kathryn Reed

A valuable piece of real estate in South Lake Tahoe sits idle — used only by people taking a shortcut from Ski Run Boulevard to Highway 50.

City staff hopes to have development ideas in place so the City Council can vote on them in January.

South Lake Tahoe is trying to figure out what to do with this parcel. Photo/Kathryn Reed

“A large restaurant on the corner keeps coming up (as an idea),” Gene Palazzo, city redevelopment manager said this week. “People are all over the board.”

Because the value of the swath of dirt is much less than it was a few years ago, the city isn’t interested in selling it at this point. It wants to control the use on that highly visible acreage.

With the land developed, then the city can also garner tax increment because it is in a redevelopment area, as well as sales tax once a business is operating.

These 2 acres were originally owned by Embassy Suites, which built the lodging property on the lake side of the street years ago. Even though that property changed hands a few times and is now a Diamond Resorts entity, the deal was this vacant parcel had to be developed in a certain time period or it would revert back to city ownership.

Development didn’t occur, so the city has the deed.

The parking garage that belongs to Diamond Resorts that is adjacent to the city’s lot has 125 spaces in it deeded to the empty parcel.

Depending on how things shake out, underground parking could become a component of the development.

Palazzo said he would be engaging Diamond Resorts and the Ski Run Business Improvement District in conversations before a plan of action is brought to the council.

The parcel comes with 24 tourism units, but Palazzo doubts they will be used. Zoning also allows for 13,000-square-feet of commercial floor area.

A request for proposal would be sent out after the council chooses the type of development it wants. With the short building season in Lake Tahoe, it’s likely construction would begin in 2011.

Learn about Slow Food Lake Tahoe on Nov. 11 at 4pm at the Dragonfly restaurant in Truckee.

Slow Food Lake Tahoe is a nonprofit organization started in 2007 whose mission is to reconnect people to the enjoyment of good, clean and fair food, as well as clean and fair goods, and to educate the community about its role as co-producers.

Monthly meetings are the second Wednesday of the month.

Contact Susan Diane at (530) 582.7498 or sdbrumm@sbcglobal.net for more information.

Publisher’s note: This is an excerpt from a longer story about fireplaces in Western ski towns.

At California’s North Lake Tahoe is a historic fireplace handcrafted in the 1940s by Wayne Poulsen, who founded the Squaw Valley USA ski resort after World War II.

“Wayne and his wife built the European-style fireplace by hand for what originally was their house. They did it with individual rocks they collected from the hills around the valley. Now it’s a major floor-to-ceiling attraction in the lobby of my Graham’s Restaurant,” said owner Graham Rock (www.dinewine.com).

“The restaurant is only a half-mile from Squaw Valley’s base lifts and site of the 1960 Winter Olympic Games,” he adds. “Our main dining room has an even bigger wood-burning fireplace where diners strive to reserve a table that faces the hearth.”

A Swiss-born family owns Tahoe House Bakery just south of Tahoe City, where skiers gather morning and afternoon to feast on European-style pastries such as apple strudel. On cold days, they move closer to the bakery’s 40-year-old, double-sided rock fireplace to get warm while also consuming gourmet delights and brewed-to-order coffee.

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The United States Amateur Snowboarding Association puts on a series of grassroots snowboarding competitions all over the nation and Sierra Resort is once again be the home base for the South Shore Series.

Events include a Giant Slalom, Slalom, GS, Boardercross, Superpipe, and Slopestyle.

Locals Al and Donna Vano, together with the core of USASA volunteers and the Sierra Resort Competitions Department, host the South Shore Series beginning in January and continuing through March.

The competitions are open to snowboarders of all ages as well as skiers in the Superpipe and Slopestyle competitions. Registration for each event is $30 per competitor in addition to USASA membership dues.

South Tahoe Series riders have won the most gold medals at the USASA National Competition for the past eight consecutive years. This year the Nationals will take place April 4-9 at Copper Mountain.

Open class Superpipe and Slopestyle competitions at Nationals are now ranked as 3-Star events on the Swatch Ticket To Ride World Snowboard Tour. So all competitors in these two events will also be competing on the TTR tour.

Here is the complete schedule of events for Sierra Resort:

Jan. 9: Giant Slalom

Jan. 10: Slalom

Jan. 16: Slalom & GS

Feb. 6: Boardercross

Feb. 27: Superpipe

Feb. 28: Superpipe

March 6: Slopestyle

An altercation at Red Hawk casino near Shingles Springs last month culminated in the arrests of five people Friday, seizure of several guns, ecstasy, marijuana and cash.

Search warrants were executed simultaneously at four locations by El Dorado County sheriff’s SWAT, Folsom Police SWAT, Sacramento County sheriff’s SWAT and Stanislaus County sheriff’s SWAT. One was served in Orangevale, two in Folsom and one in Riverbank.

Arrested were Jesse Madrigal, Steven Santiago, Ricky Mora, Stephen Lizotte and Ernie Lizotte.

The arrests stem from an Oct. 14 incident when several Hispanic males and females confronted tow Caucasian males and a Caucasian female while at the Red Hawk Casino.

Several of the Hispanic males confronted the Caucasian males asking them if they were “Placerville Peckerwoods.” The Caucasian males denied any gang affiliation and our investigation did not reveal they had any gang ties, according to officers.

At the same time one of the Hispanic males also made threats to sexually assault the

Caucasian female. The Caucasian female became enraged and attacked the Hispanic male that made the comment. One of the Caucasian males attempted to separate the female from the Hispanic males when he was punched and hit with a beer bottle, authorities said.

Red Hawk security responded to the area and the groups separated.

One of the groups went to an elevator where they confronted a female victim that had not been involved in the original incident. The group told the victim she was going to get them out of the casino using her vehicle and they would let her go once they were at the freeway, officers said.

The victim was forced to move with them through the casino floors to the parking garage. Once in the garage, the victim was able to get away from the group and contacted Red Hawk Casino security and ultimately El Dorado County sheriff’s deputies.

Using security video from the casino, detectives were able to identify the suspects who were involved in the kidnapping of the victim.

Maggie O’Neill, Reno Gazette-Journal

When Paralympian Mark Wellman, 49, answers his phone in Truckee, he picks it up with two short words: “No Limits.”

That’s the name of the motivational business he started in 1991, but also a brief summation on his attitude on living.

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Does having an eco broker represent you in a real estate transaction make a difference? It all depends on what your beliefs are about the house you want to buy as well as having an agent who knows what she is selling. Listen to Realtor Cheryl Murakami on K-Tahoe FM 96.1/AM 590 (www.kthoradio.com) on Saturday at 10am or Monday at 6pm as LTN Publisher Kathryn Reed interviews her.