By Jenny Kane, Reno Gazette-Journal

Surprise, surprise… Burning Man sold out quicker than the last air conditioner on a 114-degree summer day.

The rush for 30,000 tickets available during the main sale ended after about 35 minutes, before most people could say “Sparkle Pony.” People waiting in the queue started seeing “unavailable” notices for both tickets and vehicle passes about 12:40pm March 29.

Burning Man, a giant pop-up art campout in the middle of Northern Nevada’s Black Rock Desert, this year is scheduled for Aug. 27-Sept. 4. The theme this year is “Radical Ritual,” one of the most common rituals during spring being the global frenzy over tickets.

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It wasn’t that long ago that there was no water under the Tahoe Keys pier. Photo/Kathryn Reed

By Kathryn Reed

The snow — it won’t stop. For people living in the Sierra it’s becoming the winter that won’t end. For water users downstream, it means the spigot won’t be turned off during the dry summer months.

Under snowy grey skies on Thursday the snow survey near Sierra-at-Tahoe revealed water content of 46.1 inches. This is 183 percent of the average of 25.2 inches for the Phillips Station location.

This was a dramatically different scenario compared to two years ago when Gov. Jerry Brown attended the reading and there was barren ground.

“This is an extremely good year from the snowpack standpoint,” Frank Gehrke, who does the snow surveys near Echo Summit for the state Department of Water Resources, said March 30. He said this year’s snowpack ranks in the upper quarter of historic snowpacks.

Even so, the governor’s emergency drought declaration is still in effect. There are parts of California that still have not fully recovered from the drought.

Statewide, the water equivalent is 45.8 inches or 164 percent of average for this date. This is the highest level since 2011.

Water content is what the depth of water would be if the entire snowpack melted instantaneously.  

It’s normal for this final measurement of the season to be the deepest of the four that are taken throughout the winter. This was true this year – increasing from 6 inches to 28 to 43.5.

But that escalation was not found during the drought years, which severely impacted the municipalities and farms that depend on the runoff.

As the snow begins to melt, flooding may be the next problem — locally and downstream.

Joshua Ingraham, 45, of South Lake Tahoe faces attempted murder charges in the stabbing that occurred March 24 at the South Y Transit Center.

Joshua Ingraham

The altercation started with a fist fight between Ingraham and a 26-year-old male South Lake Tahoe resident, according to police officers. A 48-year-old South Lake Tahoe man tried to intervene.

Ingraham allegedly pulled out a large hunting knife and stabbed the 48-year-old in the shoulder area. The victim was transported to Barton Memorial Hospital with life threatening injuries. He was in stable condition as of March 29.

A fourth person, a 46-year-old South Lake Tahoe man, helped the younger man prevent the suspect from fleeing.

The two men who stopped Ingraham were treated and released from Barton with non-life threatening injuries.

Anyone with information related to this case is asked to call SLTPD at 530.542.6100.

— Lake Tahoe News staff report

Updated 1:53pm:

A 43-year-old South Lake Tahoe man was found tied up, gagged and beaten in his residence on Spruce Street. A significant amount of blood was inside the apartment.

A co-worker found him the night of March 29. The colleague had gone to the dwelling because the man had not been at work since Monday.

According to officers, the victim had been tied up for at least 20 hours.

“There is no evidence that there is any threat to the citizens of South Lake Tahoe and it is believed that the victim knows who committed this crime,” police said in a statement.

The man’s 2000 Subaru Legacy Outback station wagon is missing. It is blue and grey, California license plate 7WFM387. 

No arrests have been made and further details have not been released.

The victim as of Thursday morning was in stable condition at Renown Medical Center in Reno.

— Lake Tahoe News staff report

By Lake Tahoe News

El Dorado County Superior Court is officially down a judge with the resignation of Nelson Brooks.

Nelson Brooks

In February the Brooks family issued this statement to Lake Tahoe News, “Judge Brooks suffered a cardiovascular event last summer. He has not been medically cleared to work at this time and the family greatly appreciates all the caring concern that has been expressed by the public regarding this unfortunate event.”

The resignation was announced March 29.

Brooks was first appointed to the bench by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger in 2009, and was elected a year later to a six-year term with more than 75 percent of the vote. He was re-elected in a bitter battle in June 2016. He had 58.53 percent of the votes, while his opponent Roland Thiemann had 41.16 percent. The race garnered statewide scrutiny because it is almost unheard of for a sitting judge’s colleagues to support a challenger.

Brooks’ leave from the bench started in August. He had been collecting his full paycheck — $189,041 — until this week.

He presided over the family law, civil, and juvenile divisions. Most recently he was in Placerville’s criminal pretrial department.

Gov. Jerry Brown could appoint someone to fill out the remainder of Brooks’ term or it could remain vacant until the next election.

For now, the court will continue to use the Assigned Judges Program through the Judicial Council. These are visiting retired judges.

By Marcella Corona, Reno Gazette-Journal

Nevada lawmakers want to abolish the death penalty because of concerns over costs, sparking opposition from prosecutors and some victims’ families.

Nevada is among 32 states that allow death as a sentencing option. But no inmate has been executed since 2006 and none likely will be any time soon as the state struggles to replenish its supply of execution drugs.

Assemblyman James Ohrenschall and state Sen. Tick Segerblom, both Democrats, proposed Assembly Bill 237 in late February. The bill would end capital punishment and leave life without the possibility of parole as the state’s strongest punishment.

Currently, there are 82 death row inmates, according to the Nevada Department of Corrections. But the state has only executed 12 prisoners since the death penalty was reinstated in 1977.

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Some ski towns like Vail have mega houses that are seldom used. Photo/LTN

By Megan Michelson, Powder
 
Take a drive through any ski town, and chances are you’ll find a lot of dark houses. Fancy homes where nobody lives, million dollar crash pads where the lights shine just a few times a year.

In Mammoth, it’s not just ski bums and twentysomethings who can’t find places to live. Cops, teachers, and nurses are struggling, too. According to a recent Mammoth housing study, 52 percent of homes are empty most of the year—used intermittently by vacationers. Of properties in the full-time rental pool, less than 2 percent are vacant, meaning if you want to score an apartment, you better call within minutes of the ad being posted and be prepared to compete.

The same thing is happening in ski towns across the country: Not only is housing overpriced, but it’s practically impossible to find. In Tahoe, 76 percent of locals fork over more than the nationally recommended 30 percent of their income on housing and the wait time for affordable units can take up to two years.

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By Carlos Tejada, New York Times

The corporate owner of Sears and Kmart said there was “substantial doubt” that it could continue operating as brick-and-mortar stores continue to face challenges in an e-commerce world.

In a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, the corporate owner, Sears Holdings Corporation, cited its efforts to cut costs, sell property, tap new funding sources and make other moves to stanch the flow of red ink. Still, it reported a $2.2 billion loss for last year and said it had to use money from its investments and financing activities to fund operations.
 
The disclosure is a setback for the company and for Edward S. Lampert, the hedge fund manager who engineered the combination of the two legends of American retail 13 years ago. Lampert has shut down stores, reshuffled the company’s organization and pushed to have a greater online presence. Still, Sears Holdings has lost more than $5 billion over the last three years as sales have declined.

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Federal money is on its way to help Douglas County and the Washoe tribe recover from the Feb. 5-22 storms.

President Trump this week approved the funding via the major disaster declaration for Nevada.

This is the second round of funding for Northern Nevada. Money has also been allocated for the storms that hit Jan. 5-14.

Douglas County’s roads, mostly in the Carson Valley, have been hard hit by the deluge of water, which including significant flooding.

— Lake Tahoe News staff report

By Kathryn Reed

“The problem with the status is something we are taking very seriously.”

Those are the words of Bob Grant about accreditation at South Tahoe High School. Grant is essentially second in charge of Lake Tahoe Unified School District,

The district office and staff at STHS are focusing much of their attention on getting the school off probationary status and to be accredited without any blemishes.

The board received an update on accreditation on March 28, nearly two months after the district found out the appeal had been denied.

Only one parent was in the audience. He sat there for hours, then was told because he didn’t fill out a form to talk he would not be allowed to do so.

Officials from the Western Association of Schools and Colleges will be back next school year to make another report. They could remove the probation, add another year to the two-year probation or withhold accreditation.

It was about a year ago that STHS learned it received the two-year probationary accreditation. The district believes there were procedural flaws involving the visiting committee. That is what the appeal was based on.

It was stressed that the probationary status has no impact on colleges at this point because STHS is still fully accredited.

It will not be a full assessment this next go-round. Instead the review team will analyze whether the district has made strides to improve upon the weaknesses that were identified by the WASC group as well as what the school said needed addressing.

Grant said it is important to figure out why something wasn’t being done or wasn’t working and then work on how to fix the problem.

To monitor things locally, a task force has been put together of staff, administrators, parents and students.

“They said we didn’t have enough data,” Grant said. “We need to create tests to gather data.”

With Common Core being the rule of the land these days, students are only tested by the state as juniors.

Teachers at STHS are working collaboratively to design tests so all students in Common Core classes are judged in the same way.

When it comes to accountability, live pacing guides are going to become the norm. This is to ensure teachers of the same subject are at the same place throughout the semester so it’s easy to tell the standards have been taught.

Board member Angela Swanson asked if the probationary status would limit the pool of principal candidates. The answer was no. Chad Houck has the job until the end of the school year. The thinking is that the pieces will be in place for the start of the next school year so a new principal can step in and take over the leadership and see the accreditation process to a better outcome.