·       MontBleu casino now has a William Hill sportsbook.

·       The Genoa Cowboy Festival is April 28-May 1. For more info, go online.

·       Tahoe Regional Young Professionals’ networking mixers are Feb. 10 from 5:30-8:30pm at The Loft in the Heavenly Village and Feb. 16 from 5:30-8pm at Moe’s BBQ in Tahoe City. They are free for members, $10 for others.

·       Homewood Mountain Resort is offering snowcat-accessed backcountry skiing and snowboarding to advanced skiers and snowboarders from the top of Ellis Peak.

·       The Tahoe Douglas Rotary St. Patrick’s dinner is March 11 from 6-10pm at Harrah’s Lake Tahoe. For tickets and more information, go online.

Upon finding more historic photos of trains at Lake Tahoe, I contacted my friend Jeff Browne who is quite the railroad historian.

The lumber train operated in the 1800s in Lake Tahoe. Photo/Lake Tahoe Historical Society

“The Carson and Tahoe Lumber and Fluming Company (aka Lake Tahoe narrow gauge RR) went from Glenbrook on the Tahoe East Shore and ended at Spooner Summit where a giant log flume sent the lumber down to a mill south of Carson City. You can’t hike it from Glenbrook due to the gated golfing community, but you can access the right-of-way by hiking down toward Skunk Harbor,” Browne said.

I did this in 1977 and found bits and pieces of the old railroad, including some interesting old square nails.

The track was removed in 1899.

Trains common over mountain passes used to be common in this area. Photo/Lake Tahoe Historical Society

The steam engine Glenbrook is on display at the Nevada State Railroad Museum in Carson City. More about its colorful history is available online.

Flumes were used as one form of transport of logs harvested in Tahoe. Photo/Lake Tahoe Historical Society

The flume went from Spooner Summit down toward about where Costco stands today.

Remnants of trestles and other railroad parts were found decades after they were dismantled. Photo/Lake Tahoe Historical Society

Milled lumber was hauled by train from Carson City to Virginia City.

Sierra Nevada Wood & Lumber Co. headquartered in Overton was also known as Hobart Mills. Photo/Lake Tahoe Historical Society

That rail bed now is the popular bike path from Tahoe City. Photo/Lake Tahoe Historical Society

“The railroad was a bridge line between Truckee (the SP) and Tahoe City, and roughly paralleled the Truckee River,” Browne said.

— Bill Kingman

The Super Bowl is America’s most watched national sporting event. That’s why the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, the California Office of Traffic Safety and law enforcement officials statewide are urging football fans to call the play now: drinking or driving.

The Avoid the 6-El Dorado County DUI Task Force will be deploying roving DUI saturations patrols during and following Sunday’s Super Bowl matchup.

NHTSA’s Fans Don’t Let Fans Drive Drunk campaign encourages people to make plans ahead of time that will prevent them from getting behind the wheel of a vehicle after drinking. Driving impaired could result in injury or death for you or others on the road.

According to 2014 data, 9,967 people were killed in alcohol-impaired-driving crashes in the United States
– 31 percent of all vehicle crash fatalities in the nation, with crashes spiking on the weekends. California’s
2014 data reveals that 882 individuals were killed in DUI crashes.

 • Marjorie Springmeyer’s memorial service will be Feb. 27 at 11am at the CVIC Hall, 1602 Esmeralda Ave., Minden.

• • Here is the Sierra roadwork schedule from Caltrans for the upcoming week.
• • The Society of Professional Journalists awarded Jason Paladino, Sierra Nevada College grad and Truckee native, the NorCal 2016 James Madison Freedom of Information Student Award for his investigation into the Navy’s Sea Dragon program
• Tahoe Institute for Natural Science recorded 24 eagles during the count in January.
• The El Dorado County annual business survey is available online.

Tahoe Regional Young Professionals is hosting a civic engagement workshop on Feb. 17 from 6-7pm at the Lake Tahoe Community College board room.

Topics include getting involved in the community and making your voice heard. This workshop will cover the basics of civic engagement, political landscape at Lake Tahoe, local elections, upcoming projects in the community, and how individuals may be heard.

For those who can’t make the workshop, it will be streamed live by Tahoe Production House.

This workshop is free for TRYP members and $5 for non-members.

South Lake Tahoe is accepting applications for the spring Citizens Academy.

The academy will be on consecutive Thursdays from 5:30-7:30pm beginning April 7 and running through May 19.

The free, seven-session interactive course is designed to provide residents with an in-depth look into municipal government, as well as information about the services and programs of the city.

This course is open to all community members.

Applications are being accepted through March 25 at 5pm. Applications and the course outline are online.

There is still time for Nevadans to register to vote in order to participate in the caucuses this month.

Any registered Democrat or Republican is eligible to participate and vote. The deadline to register is Feb. 13 for Republicans and Feb. 20 for Democrats.

Democrats caucus Feb. 20 beginning at 11am. The Republicans caucus Feb. 23 starting at 5pm.

South Lake Tahoe firefighters recognized several people at the annual awards ceremony last month.

Awards include:

Firefighter of the year – Mike Mileski

Paramedic of the year – Sophie Tetlow

Dispatcher of the year – Linda Clark

STAT volunteer of the year – Leonard Smith.

Fire Chief Jeff Meston presented meritorious awards to Marty Creel, Kim George, Jody Benavidez, and Brenen Davis for their work on special projects.

The Eldorado National Forest is developing preliminary applications to the Off Highway Motor Vehicle Recreation Division, which includes a strong emphasis on trail maintenance and repair, law enforcement across the four ranger districts, printing and distribution of the motor vehicle use maps, restoration of impacted areas, planning, and education.

The agency will be hosting an open house on Feb. 10 from 4-7pm to discuss the proposed preliminary grant applications. It will be at the Eldorado National Forest Supervisor’s Office, 100 Forni Road, Placerville.

Previous grants have helped address trail repair and clearing of downed trees on more than 300 miles of OHV routes, law enforcement patrol on an additional 900 miles of native surface roads on the forest, provided for the printing of free maps, as well as other planning, development, and restoration activities.

Comments maybe emailed to Cindy Oswald at coswald@fs.fed.us.

Washoe County Sheriff’s Office has been receiving numerous reports about a phone scam in which people pose as sheriff’s office personnel to fraudulently obtain money.

Scammers are using names of  sheriff’s office employees and are able to manipulate the phone technology so the caller ID shows an actual sheriff’s office phone number.

The scammer tells the person there is a warrant out for their arrest for a certain amount of fine. The potential victim is told to either surrender themselves to the sheriff’s office for arrest, or that they may pay a reduced payment of the fine to adjudicate the warrant.

The scammer provides instruction on how the payment should be submitted, usually through an “eGift” cash card or similar payment to a specified account or name given by the caller.

Although the Washoe County Sheriff’s Office will sometimes make calls to inform someone about a warrant, the office will not ask for payment over the phone or negotiate for payment in lieu of arrest.

Anyone who has suffered a loss as a result of this scam is encouraged to take down as much information as possible, such as a name and call back number, without giving any information away. Thencontact the Washoe County Sheriff’s Office at 775.328.3001, ext. 7.