By Kathryn Reed

Paperwork and meetings seem to be synonymous with government. No wonder people tune out and get discouraged. Action and accomplishments seldom seem to be part of the equation.

Finding an answer for the need for 15 community plans throughout the Lake Tahoe Basin is easy — it’s a requirement of the Tahoe Regional Planning Agency. The bi-state agency has it as a must do in its myriad requirements.

“It is a guiding principle,” TRPA spokeswoman Julie Regan said of community plans.

Chapter 14 — Community Plans in the TRPA’s Code of Ordinances is 18 pages. The first page says, “The goal of the TRPA is to have all community plans completed by Dec. 1, 1989.”

The Tahoe Valley Plan, aka Y Community Plan, has had several hiccups. The latest incarnation will be before the South Lake Tahoe City Council Sept. 15. Homewood kind of has a plan. It is tied to Placer County’s General Plan.

As TRPA finalizes its regional, changes affecting community plans will be made. The 20-year regional plan is expected to be before the Governing Board in late 2010.

During a series of placed based planning meetings in 2006, input was sought from locals about what they want their community to look like and how this would meld with the entire basin. Pathways is supposed to reflect those opinions.

“(Community plans) are a tool to revitalize these different areas without them turning out to be all the same,” said Teri Jamin before retiring this summer as South Lake Tahoe’s community development director. “The process is not one size fits all.”

Height, coverage and density restrictions placed on development by TRPA’s current set of rules prove to be stumbling blocks for some looking to improve their property, according to Jamin.

TRPA’s desire to blend living and working components of a municipality, where the bottom level could be shops and the top housing, is an indication of change.

“You want to make sure you are using the best available science and technology and information to achieve your goals,” Regan said. “The current regional plan has not proved to be very flexible. Right now the current zoning is not really conducive to the density standards of mixed use.”

Even though most of the community plans have been completed, not all have been implemented. Part of this has to do with a substantial number of property owners living outside the basin. Community plans are visions, not mandates — so nothing has to get done except for the paperwork.

The community plans around the lake include:

Stateline-Ski Run

Bijou-Al Tahoe

Tahoe Valley-Y

Y Industrial

Meyers

Kingsbury Grade

Round Hill

Stateline

Incline Village has three plans

Tahoe City

Carnelian Bay

Kings Beach

Kings Beach Industrial

Tahoe Vista

Homewood

By Lake Tahoe Bicycle Coalition

A Class II Bike Lane in Homewood has been neglected by Caltrans for years. The pavement is seriously deteriorated and unsafe for bicycle and pedestrian use. Local residents are seeking the support of others in signing the petition in an effort to show community solidarity and concern for the safety of human-powered road users. You can sign the petition at the following locations:

Westshore Pizzeria (Tahoma), in Tahoe City – New Moon Market, Alpenglow Sports, Olympic Bike Shop, Grind and Gear Cafe, and in Incline at Village Ski Loft, Truckee at Paco’s and Cyclepaths.

If you want your voice represented, then sign the petition no later than Sept. 30 – at which time the petition will be delivered to Caltrans.

Sod will fill the round area in front of the terraced seating. Photos/Kathryn Reed

By Kathryn Reed

Through a $150,000 donation from the Ledbetter family, the Lake Tahoe Community College demonstration garden has evolved into a community destination.

On Sept. 20 the Ledbetter Outdoor Terrace will be formally dedicated as part of the annual Autumn Fest.

Landscape architect Brett Long and his crew have been feverishly moving dirt, laying sod, planting trees and creating a terraced seating area on a half acre of the nearly 3-acre garden.

“This venue a lot of people can use,” Long said as the sprinkler system was being put in.

He envisions with some creative seating that graduation could be staged at the mini-amphitheater. Between 120-150 could fit in the area.

The site is wired so movies could be shown at night. It’s ideal for lectures, an outdoor classroom or

John Roos works on the Ledbetter Outdoor Terrace at LTCC.

community events venue.

Grass encompasses a circular, stage-like area, while the seating is on terraced rock walls.

Jessica Ledbetter wrote the check on behalf of her parents Bill and Beverlee Ledbetter. Beverlee is the daughter of Harvey and Llewellyn Gross — the founders of Harveys hotel-casino. Bill worked for Harvey Gross.

The original demonstration garden is still there. Part of it helps Lake Tahoe Basin residents with ideas for best management practices — a Tahoe Regional Planning Agency requirement.

The irony is the demonstration garden was created years ago by the college as a mitigation measure from a TRPA infraction, Long said. That obligation recently expired so the college had more leeway in what to do with the property.

Volunteers are needed Sept. 16 from 8am-7pm to wrap-up the work. If interested, contact Long at (530) 541.0255.

Sunday’s Autumn Fest schedule:

11:15am — Ledbetter Outdoor Terrace dedication

11:30am — Speaker: Lesley Higgins, maintaining native shrubs and trees

12:30pm — Speaker: Anna McLean, attracting birds to your garden

1pm — Garden tour and puppet show

1:30pm — Speaker: Lorilyn Haubrich, medicinal plants

2pm — Garden tour and puppet show

2:45pm — Door prize drawing

Ongoing activities include live music, horse drawn carriage rides, pumpkin patch, silent auction, bake sale, and kids’ activities. The event is free.

Tahoe Regional Planning Agency has added two key figures to the agency.

Harmon Zuckerman, formerly the principal planner for Douglas County and member of TRPA’s Advisory Planning Commission, is director of TRPA’s Regional Plan update. Casey Beyer of Manhattan Beach has been appointed to the Governing Board by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.

Zuckerman brings more than 14 years of professional planning experience to the newly created position. He will oversee completion of the Regional Plan update, a 20-year blueprint for revitalization of existing communities and continued environmental improvement for the Tahoe Basin.

From May 2006 to February 2009, Zuckerman was principal planner for Douglas County, Nev., and one of his first tasks there was to help complete the 20-year update of the county’s master plan. While at Douglas County, Zuckerman served as the county representative on TRPA’s Advisory Planning Commission

Beyer replaces Tim Leslie as California’s representative on the board. Since 2008, he has been an independent energy consultant and, from 2006 to 2008, was the director of community development for John Laing Homes. He was the chief assistant to Secretary of State Bruce McPherson from 2005 to 2006, director of government relations for the Los Angeles County Children and Families Commission from 2002 to 2005 and director of government and industry relations for Exodus Communications from 2000 to 2001. Beyer worked for Rep. Tom Campbell as chief of staff and California director from 1995 to 2000, district director from 1990 to 1992 and deputy district director from 1989 to 1990. This position does not require state Senate confirmation. Beyer is a Republican.

Harmon Zuckerman

By Ed Fletcher, Sacramento Bee

Placer County officials are inching forward with plans to build a power plant in the environmentally sensitive Lake Tahoe basin.

Officials expect plenty of tough questions and likely some vocal opposition, but they’re convinced the proposed, one- to three-megawatt biomass plant would be good for the local environment.

Read whole story

By Cathy Locke, Sacramento Bee

El Dorado County residents and visitors who suffer serious injuries may be able to avoid a trip outside the county for emergency medical care.

Placerville’s Marshall Medical Center recently was designated a Level III trauma center by the El Dorado County Emergency Medical Services Agency, following an audit of the hospital’s trauma program.

Read whole story

By Associated Press

NEW HAVEN, Conn. — Police on Sunday said they found what they believe is the body of a Yale University graduate student and bride-to-be hidden inside the wall of a university building where she was last seen five days before.

New Haven Assistant Police Chief Peter Reichard said officials are presuming the body was that of doctoral student Annie Le of Placerville, who has been the focus of a massive police search since Tuesday.

“It hasn’t been positively identified as of this time,” Reichard told reporters Sunday night. “However, we are assuming it is her … so we are treating it as a homicide.”

Read the rest of the story

Lakeside Inn and Casino at Stateline is creating a five-course meal to pair with Chile’s award-winning Montes Alpha winery.

The meal begins with a conch salad accentuated by Brazilian xuxu slaw. Montes Alpha’s stainless steel-fermented Sauvignon Blanc will accompany this course and the next.

Next up: Puerto Rican prawns sauteed in achiote oil with a Caribbean sofrito sauce and plantain banana mofongo.

For the third course, pork with pip¡n sauce. This dish consists of steamed leg of pork with a handcrafted sauce of tomatillos, roasted peanuts, almonds, sesame and pumpkin seeds; served with romaine leaves, black beans, steamed rice and pickled onion. Montes Alpha’s Chardonnay will complement this dish.

Intermezzo follows, cleansing diner’s palates with a cucumber-mint lemonade granita, laced with chia seed and spiked with Gran Fuedo Rose. This pause in the meal prepares for the transition from white to red wines.

A corn crepe with duck confit and chocolate-orange sauce is served next.

Argentina’s premium Malbec, the Kaiken Ultra Malbec makes a guest appearance for the final two courses of the meal and stars in the next dish: braised short rib with rosemary, sage and Malbec. Served with roasted calabaza, Cuban white beans with chorizo all drizzled with truffle oil.

An imported and domestic cheese platter is presented for the final course. Goat cheese in baked phyllo, five-year aged white cheddar, gouda and Manchego cheeses deliver mild and savory flavors to the accompanying berry and rhubarb compote, candied pine nuts, pistachios and chocolate wafers.

The $95 cost includes tax and gratuity. Reservations are advised as seating is limited, (775) 586.7707.

By Kathryn Reed

It took expert mechanics at LTUSD to get the Fighting Chance vehicle rolling for the Sept. 6 parade. Photo/Lisa J. Tolda

Because most abductors try to gain the trust of their prey, children are taught in Fighting Chance to keep their distance from strangers.

Emmet Freeman, a junior at South Tahoe High School, went through the training when he was in elementary school. It likely saved him from something terrible when he was a fifth-grader.

A guy about 20 years old approached him, saying he’d lost his wallet. He asked Freeman if he would help find it and even offered him $5.

“My son said no. He got scared, jumped on his bike and pedaled hard,” recalled Angie Keil. “I don’t know what he was intending to do. You don’t know what would have happened.”

Police nabbed the suspect for other offenses, but no charges could be brought against him in the Freeman case because he didn’t do anything to the boy.

One point of Fighting Chance is to educate kids that they should not get close enough to a stranger to be grabbed — don’t take the money, don’t bend down to pet the cute puppy.

Fighting Chance was the brainchild of Brooke Laine when she was a member of Soroptimists International of South Lake Tahoe. It was in the mid-1990s, Laine’s sons were about 4 and 5 years old.

She started thinking about Terry Probyn and wondering how she was going to teach her kids to prevent another kidnapping in Tahoe. She tried to empower them, to explain that they have choices. But then her son, Nick, asked how his friends were going to know what to do.

Laine called Probyn to talk about the idea of putting Fighting Chance together in honor of Jaycee Lee Dugard, her daughter who was snatched from a Meyers bus stop on June 10, 1991, when she was 11.

Probyn is part of the video that is shown to students in Lake Tahoe Unified School District. After Freeman’s experience, he became part of the educational material, too.

On the video Probyn talks about how she is certain Jaycee Lee froze when the kidnappers approached her because she didn’t know what to do.

Seldom are victims randomly chosen. Most perverts stalk their victims, picking the ones they want. This is likely what happened with Jaycee Lee because the suspects’ vehicle was seen in the neighborhood days before the kidnapping.

“I started reading about pedophiles and child abductors. These guys are creepy, disgusting people,” Laine said. “The average child abduction takes less than 5 seconds. These molesters go to church, they sit next to you. They go to the grocery store. They don’t have horns or a big red sign.”

Fighting Chance is taught in grades 3-6. In sixth grade, youths are taught that if the suspect gets out of the vehicle, but they’re locked in, to take a button off a shirt and put it in the ignition.

Kick out a taillight if stuffed in the trunk. Cops in Tahoe know to pull over a vehicle with a busted out taillight just for the reason someone could be in there.

“We did lose a little bit of our innocence, but because of that I think parents keep a better eye on kids and Soroptimist started a Fighting Chance,” said Lt. Les Lovell of the El Dorado County Sheriff’s Department. “The sheriff’s office partnered with them and gave them a car so they can teach escape techniques.”

There is talk of bringing Fighting Chance, which is trademarked by Soroptimist, to younger kids.

Besides the Freeman incident, a couple other local kids were able to escape from some would-be kidnappers at Lakeside Inn at Stateline because they had seen the Fighting Chance video the day before the incident.

A couple years ago two girls walking in the Bijou area were approached by someone in a van who wanted to talk to them. They knew to stay far enough back so they couldn’t be grabbed. They also got a full description of the vehicle when it circled back by them.

Laine said it’s important for parents to not be afraid to talk to their kids about the scary things that are out. The most important thing is to give them the tools to get out of threatening situations.

A multiphase project encompassing approximately 2,391 acres of National Forest aspen stands will be restored by the US Forest Service in the Tahoe Basin. The greatest number of stands is in the West Shore’s watershed.

The degradation stems from grazing and fire suppressions stunting the natural aspen stand regeneration, plus conifers encroaching on the stands.

A full description of the project is at http://www.fs.fed.us/r5/ltbmu/projects/.