Publisher’s note: Occupy South Lake Tahoe canceled the Dec. 1 event at the Y because of the weather. Organizers will congregate Dec. 8 from noon-4pm at Heavenly Village.

By Kevin Yamamura, Sacramento Bee

Nearly three-fifths of California voters agree with the sentiment driving the Occupy movement, though voters split when asked whether they identify with protesters, according to a Field Poll released Monday.

The statewide survey found that 58 percent agree with the reason behind Occupy demonstrations in cities and on college campuses.

But 49 percent said they don’t identify much with Occupy protesters, compared with 46 percent who said they identify some or a lot.

“The second question is much more of a personal one, as in, ‘Would you go out into the streets if things got bad, if push came to shove?’ ” said Field Poll Director Mark DiCamillo. “The first question is broader: ‘Where are your heartstrings?’ ”

Nearly nine in 10 “strongly liberal” voters said they agree with the Occupy sentiment, compared to 66 percent of “strongly conservative” voters who said they disagree.

While the Occupy movement tilts left, nearly one-third of Republicans said they agree with the reason behind it, as did 62 percent of nonpartisan voters.

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By Richard N. Velotta, Las Vegas Sun

Tourism is a complex machine and its numerous cogs — federal policymakers, state government leaders, convention and visitors bureaus, industry strategists and the airport — came together Wednesday to map out how they can team to lead Nevada out of its economic doldrums.

Several shareholders hold key individual pieces and shared their plans in presentations to about 300 people attending the 1 1/2-day Governor’s Conference on Tourism that ended Wednesday at the Rio.

Among the plans:

• A definitive effort to attract the 2022 Winter Olympic Games to Northern Nevada. The state will team with California in 2013 to convince the U.S. Olympic Committee that the Lake Tahoe area would be the best place to host the games.

• The June 28 opening of a new 14-gate terminal at McCarran International Airport that will provide a new home for international flight arrivals and long-haul domestic flights.

• A new call to set aside regional rivalries and political differences to unite behind a strategy to use tourism to help diversify the state’s economy.

• An effort to refurbish the Las Vegas Convention Center to bolster the city’s grip on its place as the top convention and meetings destination in the country. Next year, the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority will resurrect a makeover plan that was shelved when the recession hit.

• A single brand strategy to attract tourists to a diverse state that includes wide-open rural landscapes as well as entertainment and casinos, due for delivery in late May.

• Brand USA, the nation’s first international marketing program, which will deliver its first ads to attract foreign tourists to the United States next year.

“The sessions have been super,” said Claudia Vecchio, new director of the state’s Department of Tourism and Cultural Affairs. “It’s great that we can have this much expertise together at one place.”

Experts from near and far offered presentations on their roles to energize the industry.

Lt. Gov. Brian Krolicki told attendees to put Friday, Feb. 11, 2022, at 7pm on their calendars – the lighting of the Olympic torch for the start of the 2022 Winter Olympic Games in Northern Nevada.

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Douglas County, after more than 2.5 years of stakeholder meetings, it is moving forward on the Douglas County Conservation Bill by having public open houses at several locations through mid-December to share information and seek public input.

“The bill is locally developed, comprehensive federal legislation that will improve public lands management and help achieve Douglas County’s long-term master plan goals for growth, conservation, and public recreation,” Steve Mokrohisky, Douglas County manager, said in a press release.

The measure would transfer federally owned cultural lands to the Washoe Tribe, transfer federal lands to Douglas County for water resource infrastructure and flood attenuation projects, improve the management of certain federally owned public recreation parcels, address the proposed Burbank Canyons Wilderness Area, and provide for the sale of excess and difficult to manage federal lands in the Carson Valley, ensuring that the sales proceeds are used locally to acquire conservation easements from willing landowners in Douglas County.

The Douglas County Conservation Bill balances the county’s development and planning needs with the protection of its cultural heritage, historical agricultural operations, floodplain lands, and natural resources. It is designed to improve access to public lands, and strengthen the ability of the U.S. Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management to focus on their respective core responsibilities of forest and rangeland management.

The meetings are:

Minden: Dec. 5, 5:30–7:30pm, Emergency Operations Center, 1694 County Road, Minden

North Douglas County: Dec. 6, 5:30–7:30pm, North Sunridge Fire Station, 3620 N. Sunridge Drive, Carson City

South Douglas County–Topaz Area: Dec. 7, 5:30–7:30pm, Topaz Ranch Estates Community Center, 4001 Carter Way, Wellington

Lake Tahoe: Dec. 12, 5:30–7:30pm, Tahoe Transportation Center, 169 Highway 50, Stateline

Genoa: Dec. 14, 5:30–7:30pm, Genoa Town Hall, 2287 Main St., Genoa.

U.S. Forest Service Lake Tahoe Basin Management Unit fire crews are responding to the rekindling of a weeks-old prescribed fire off Andria Drive on Kingsbury Grade, near Stateline.

Three Forest Service crews and two engines were on the scene Thursday morning.

The fire is 10-12 acres in the middle of the unit. Extremely cold temperatures and high winds are creating difficult conditions for firefighters and interfering with the ability to pump water from engines. Full containment is expected at noon today.

The Forest Service last conducted prescribed fire operations in the unit a few weeks ago, and crews had been routinely monitoring and patrolling the area for fire activity. No smoke had been observed from the unit for the past five to seven days.

Early this morning, the Tahoe Douglas Fire Protection District reported to the Forest Service that the prescribed fire unit was active. Tahoe Douglas firefighters were the first on scene but have since been released.

About 600 Liberty Energy customers are without power this morning in the Sierra Tract of South Lake Tahoe.

High winds toppled a tree, which put wires on the ground and broke three cross arms. The company expects the power to be restored about 10 this morning.

National Weather Service officials say high winds will be blowing through much of Northern California and Northern Nevada today. Persistent gusts in the Lake Tahoe Basin are expected to be between 40 and 55mph, with ridge gusts of 100 to 130mph.

With the wind comes ice cold temps. The basin is not expected to have daytime highs in the 40s until Monday. The coldest overnight lows — single digits — are forecast for Truckee for the next few nights.

— Lake Tahoe News staff report

By Steve Timko, Reno Gazette-Journal

Almost one in five Nevadans were born in another country, while about one in four were born in the Silver State, according to recent U.S. Census Bureau data.

Nevada handily retains its title of having the fewest native-born residents of any state in the latest American Community Survey data from the census bureau.

Nevada’s 24.3 percent estimated native-born population is almost 11 percentage points behind Florida, which has the second lowest native population at 35.2 percent.

Nevada’s native-born population increased from the 2000 census, when 21.3 percent of the state’s population reported being born here.

Former Nevada state historian Guy Rocha said this is pretty much how it’s always been for the Silver State.

“This state has always been about immigration,” Rocha said.

And it’s not just people who move here from other places in the country; they come from all over the world.

From the state’s beginning in 1864 through about the 1920s, it was the boom-and-bust cycle of mining that drove the state’s population growth.

Mining drew an Irish and Cornish population from Great Britain and also Italians and Slavs.

Agriculture drew Portuguese to Lovelock, Fallon and Yerington; Germans and Danes to Carson Valley; and Italians to Dayton and Reno, Rocha said.

The Silver State can’t even mint it’s own governors, Rocha said. Out of 30 governors, only seven were born here. Paul Laxalt, who was in office from 1967 to 1971, was the last native-born governor.

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STATELINE — Tahoe Douglas firefighters are looking for the individual who set fire to the cloth hanging on the scaffolding of the old Bill’s Casino at Stateline.

A security guard from MontBleu casino used a fire extinguisher to put out the blaze that consumed about a 10 foot by 12 foot piece of cloth.

Someone on Nov. 30 set fire to material covering scaffolding in the Stateline casino corridor. Photo/LTN

Eric Guevin, acting fire marshal with Tahoe Douglas, said his department got the call about 3am Nov. 30 from security at the casino.

The only description of the suspect is: middle aged male wearing a ball cap.

The fire didn’t stop renovation of the building from continuing Wednesday.

Anyone with information is asked to call the fire department at (775) 588.3591.

— Lake Tahoe News staff report

By Richard N. Velotta, Las Vegas Sun

With the Nevada Commission on Tourism six months away from unveiling the state’s new tourism branding message, commissioners agreed Tuesday to double their meeting schedule next year to offer more frequent feedback to their new director on the project.

Commissioners got a glimpse of the direction research is steering the brand message at the commission’s quarterly meeting and met new director Claudia Vecchio in the session conducted hours before the opening of the Governor’s Conference on Tourism at the Rio.

Commissioners said early indications show that the development of the brand by Seattle-based GreenRubino is on track and members believe it will provide a message that will attract visitors to the state, especially rural Nevada.

“It all my years with the commission, this is one of the best things I’ve ever seen,” said Commissioner Lorraine Hunt-Bono, who as lieutenant governor headed the commission from 1999 to 2007.

GreenRubino President John Rubino is scheduled to give delegates attending the tourism conference a look at work to date later today.

In Rubino’s review with commissioners, he described how his company researched public sentiment about Nevada to learn what visiting the state meant to people. In interviews with 3,000 people, the common theme Rubino found was that Nevada represented uninhibited freedom, inspiring discoveries, rewarding adventures and that it’s unexpectedly diverse. People used words and phrases like “thrilling,” “uplifting,” “awe-inspired” and “off the grid” to describe their feelings for the state.

Rubino interpreted that into a brand insight – that “Nevada is for do-ers.”

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By Kathryn Reed

“Bring it on!”

That was essentially what the five members of South Lake Tahoe’s City Council said Tuesday night at the conclusion of a one-hour special meeting about the medical marijuana ordinance.

“Let them react to us for a change,” Councilman Tom Davis said after Councilman Bruce Grego led the charge to stick with the status quo.

The reference is to the feds who keep waffling on what their stance is in regards to medical marijuana as well as to the recent Pack vs. Long Beach court decision.

The Nov. 29 meeting was a continuation of the Nov. 15 meeting when attendees spilled into the lobby area where they had to watch the proceedings via a television monitor. The latest meeting, though people nearly filled the room, was much more subdued with only five people speaking.

All the council members agreed much give and take has gone on for the last two years to come up with what all sides affected locally believe is a viable, comprehensive and fair ordinance for regulating the three dispensaries and dealing with growing medical marijuana in residences.

City Attorney Patrick Enright presented five scenarios to the council. They ranged from doing nothing to banning dispensaries completely.

After the meeting, Enright told Lake Tahoe News, “I think they made the right decision.”

While an attorney better versed in the topic was consulted and recommended tweaking the ordinance, Enright believes in what is on the books, as does the council.

It was also pointed out that something new about the topic seems to emerge monthly – whether it’s a court decision, litigation, policy change or something else. Neither the council nor city staff wants to keep hashing out the issue.

As Grego said, the city needs to move on and start addressing other issues besides medical marijuana.

Plus, there is no truly safe decision the council could have made.

“I think we could get sued no matter what we do,” Councilwoman Angela Swanson said. “We can’t act based on the fear of litigation.”

While the ordinance remains in effect without change, all cities in the California with medical marijuana dispensaries are waiting until the state Supreme Court decides if it will hear the Long Beach case. That decision is expected by Jan. 10. If the jurists hear the case, a decision could take more than a year. If they don’t hear it, then the Long Beach case is the law of the land and South Lake Tahoe would have to revisit the issue. Or the top court could depublish the Long Beach decision, making it enforceable only within the limits of the Southern California city.

South Lake Tahoe has asked for the federal government to issue a ruling on the city’s ordinance but as of Nov. 29 had received no response. And while the feds have sent letters to dispensaries in some California cities to cease and desist, the three dispensaries in South Tahoe have received no such letters to date.

Caltrans announced today it has completed a project on Highway 89 in El Dorado County that is designed to safeguard water quality in and around the Lake Tahoe Basin. The $17 million project received $11 million in funding from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009.

The project on Luther Pass will direct roadway water runoff to treatment collection facilities. The project also widened highway shoulders, constructed curbs and gutters, and repaired and constructed drainage facilities between the Alpine County line and Highway 50 in Meyers.