Three people are wanted in connection with using seven counterfeit $100 bills at the CVS Pharmacy in Stateline on Sept. 30.

The three incidents occurred at 12:07am, 4:17am and 6:24am. The different suspects entered CVS, purchased Visa gift cards in varying amounts and received cash back in change.

The suspect in the first transaction is described as a male, possible Hispanic, in his mid-30s, wearing a black hat, black sweat shirt.

In the second encounter, the suspect is described as a male, possible Hispanic, in his 30s, wearing a black hat, gray sweat shirt, and gray sweat pants.

The last suspect is described as a male Caucasian, in his 30s, wearing a black San Francisco Giants hat and gray Giants sweat shirt, and jeans.

A reward is being offered to anyone with information leading to the arrest and/or conviction of the suspects. Anyone with information is urged to call DCSO dispatch at 775.782.5126 or Douglas County Secret Witness at 775.782.7463.

— Lake Tahoe News staff report

Owners of PlumpJack Squaw Valley Inn want to demolish the existing on-site structures to build a new multilevel hotel, two residential condominium buildings and an underground parking garage.

The project would include landscaping, bicycle and pedestrians paths connecting the proposed buildings and on-site recreational amenities. Water, sewer and drainage improvements would also be included to support the operation of the new facilities in Olympic Valley.

Comments on the draft environmental impact report will be taken until Nov. 4. The Placer County Planning Commission will have a public hearing on the project Oct. 27 at 10am at the North Tahoe Event Center in Kings Beach. The project does not require approval from the Placer County Board of Supervisors.

The draft EIR is available online.

By Garrett M. Graff, Politico

Nearly every American above a certain age remembers precisely where they were on Sept. 11, 2001. But for a tiny handful of people, those memories touch American presidential history. Shortly after the attacks began, the most powerful man in the world, who had been informed of the World Trade Center explosions in a Florida classroom, was escorted to a runway and sent to the safest place his handlers could think of: the open sky.

For the next eight hours, with American airspace completely cleared of jets, a single blue-and-white Boeing 747, tail number 29000—filled with about 65 passengers, crew and press, and the 43rd president, George W. Bush, as well as 70 box lunches and 25 pounds of bananas—traversed the eastern United States. On board, Bush and his aides argued about two competing interests—the need to return to Washington and reassure a nation and the competing need to protect the commander in chief. All the while, he and his staff grappled with the aftermath of the worst attack on American soil in their lifetimes, making crucial decisions with only flickering information about the attacks unfolding below. Bush struggled even to contact his family and to reach Vice President Dick Cheney in the White House bunker.

The story of those remarkable hours—and the thoughts and emotions of those aboard—isolated eight miles above America, escorted by three F-16 fighters, flying just below the speed of sound, has never been comprehensively told.

Read the whole story

A wildland fire burning south of Gardnerville has destroyed one house and one outbuilding.

The voluntary evacuation for the Ruhenstroth area of Douglas County has been lifted. Highway 395 is also now open in both directions.

The fire was reported Oct. 2 at 1:10pm. About 75 acres have burned.

“The conditions are improving due the light rain, decrease in the winds and cooler temperatures,” East Fork Fire Protection District Deputy Chief Dave Fogerson said in a statement.

The cause is under investigation; however no lightening had occurred in the area.

— Lake Tahoe News staff report

Highway 50 over Echo Summit is expected to be open by 8:15pm after being closed since just after 6:30pm Sunday.

Two vehicles collided on Oct. 2, with at least one person transported to Barton Memorial Hospital.

While snow has been falling intermittently in the Lake Tahoe Basin since this afternoon, the California Highway Patrol would not say if weather was a factor in this crash.

No names or hometowns of the people involved have been release.

No citations were issued.

— Lake Tahoe News staff report

By Colton Lochhead, Las Vegas Review-Journal

A Nevada Supreme Court commission on Thursday called for sweeping reforms of the state’s guardianship system in hopes of better protecting the state’s growing elderly and infirm population.

The 236-page report comes as a culmination of 15 months’ worth of commission meetings dating back to June 2015 and includes dozens of recommendations for changes in guardianship law, policy and court rules.

Most notably, the report calls for all people under guardianship to have the right to an attorney, which is not currently granted in Nevada.

Read the whole story

Comments are being sought on the draft environmental impact report for the Palisades at Squaw residential housing project in Olympic Valley.

Currently zoned for high-density residential development, the proposed undeveloped 19.9-acre project site could include up to 63 residential lots consisting of 33 lots for single-family homes and 30 lots for half-plex units, a 100-foot-wide open space easement along the site’s northeastern boundary, a private park, a multipurpose trail easement and right-of-way for utilities and roadways.

Comments will be taken until Nov. 4. The Placer County Planning Commission will have a public hearing on the project Oct. 27 at 10am at the North Tahoe Event Center in Kings Beach. More info about the project is online.

The project does not require approval from the Placer County Board of Supervisors.

A house near the state line in South Lake Tahoe goes up in flames Oct. 2. Photo/SLTFD

A vacant house in South Lake Tahoe was destroyed by fire early this morning.

Investigators are still trying to determine to the cause of the 2am Oct. 2 blaze on Chonokis Road.

Estimated damage is $150,000.

— Lake Tahoe News staff report

By Associated Press

Nevada has officially recovered as many jobs as it lost during the Great Recession and hit a new record for employment.

Gov. Brian Sandoval announced Friday at the Governor’s Conference at Business that as of August, more jobs were created in Nevada in the past six years than the 186,400 that were shed in the downturn.

The state’s previous record employment was in May 2007, when Nevada had just under 1.3 million jobs. But Nevada’s economy was battered by the recession and the state bottomed out at 1.1 million jobs in September 2010.

The biggest losses came in construction and hospitality. The state still has 70,000 fewer construction jobs than it did pre-recession, but growth in other sectors compensated for the shortfall.

It now has just over 1.3 million jobs.

The U.S. Forest Service is pleased with the restoration of the Upper Truckee River. Photo/Kathryn Reed

By Kathryn Reed

Rerouting the Upper Truckee River behind Lake Tahoe Airport is costing 50 percent more than planned and there is no way to know if less sediment will actually get carried into Lake Tahoe.

“It’s hard to make conclusions about the overall sediment reduction,” Theresa Cody, a hydrologist with the U.S. Forest Service, said while on a tour of the project site last week.

All along the USFS has said this is more of an ecosystem project than a water quality project. The California Tahoe Conservancy is a partner with the USFS.

In 2013, the feds said it would cost $4 million. The price tag is at $7 million now. The money is coming from the Southern Nevada Public Lands Management Act.

CTC Executive Director Patrick Wright was quick to say the added dollars aren’t because of cost overruns. Additional dollars were needed because it took longer than anticipated to reroute the 6,000-foot channel, then relocating the thousands of Western pearlshell mussels was not in the original budget, and a temporary construction bridge was erected and dismantled each season.

Dirt is excavated to subgrade, before the banks area revegetated, and riffle gravels are added to bring the river’s floor to the desired elevation. Photo/Kathryn Reed

The 14,000 native mussels were relocated this season.

“There is no scientific evidence or theory that we are aware of to suggest that changes in mussel populations have a measurable impact one way or the other on fisheries or benthic macroinvertebrates,” Cody said.

They do, however, filter out plankton, algae and small organic matter.

The overall fish habitat is expected to increase, especially with the riffle depth going from 9 feet to 3½ feet.

It will take years before the Forest Service can say this is a successful project. Monitoring will be extensive to begin with and then scaled back.

“We need large floods to see how the channel behaves and how the floodplain behaves,” Cody said. It’s designed to overflow its banks, which will then help restore the meadow to a vibrant organism.

Water is being pumped into the new channel. Photo/Kathryn Reed

But already positive results are coming in along sections of the 1.2-mile river project. Vegetation is taking hold on the banks, including the willows that love a wet environment. And next year the sage is apt to be gone because the water table will have increased and that plant doesn’t like a ton of water.

“There is no question that the existing condition of this reach was in a degraded and vulnerable condition, as evidenced by channel incision, bank erosion, ground water elevation, and riparian vegetation condition,” Cody told Lake Tahoe News. “The effects of long-term climate change, including prolonged periods of drought, is causing increased stress to the flora and fauna in these degraded systems. As evidenced by monitoring data we have documented in our monitoring reports on similar projects, the restoration of aquatic and riparian habitat is expected to be evident very quickly once the project is completed. The ecosystem benefits of the project are expected to last for generations, will increase resiliency of UTR habitat to climate change impacts, and require virtually no maintenance.”

The old channel saw the water rushing at 700 to 1,000 cubic feet per second. The new channel is designed to have a flow of 375 cfs.

Normally the Forest Service would leave the old channel to pond and become more habitat. But the FAA said no way, it must be filled in with dirt. This is because the project was not allowed to create more areas for waterfowl to congregate; after all birds and planes don’t mix well.

This area is popular for hikers, dog walkers and mountain bikers. Before the snow really flies, all of the construction equipment will be gone and the fences will come down. Next spring non-motorized water enthusiasts may find a more challenging river because it will be narrower. The season may last longer, too, because the water will be deeper – assuming there is at least a normal snowfall.

“Within two years you will not be able to see this area was disturbed,” Cody said.