If you are unable to join the Zoom meeting by computer or cell phone, you may still submit issues to be discussed to Denise Davis (ivcbcommunityforum@gmail.com).
Denise Davis – Moderator, Citizen Advisory Board Member, IVGID Ordinance 7 Committee Member, Citizen Emergency Response Team (CERT) Member
John Crockett and Amanda McPhaill – Washoe County Library Zoom-masters
Ronda Tycer – Recap Editor
Denise Davis – Forum Moderator
Good morning, Forum. How’s everybody doing? I’m Denise Davis your moderator. Ronda Tycer is our Forum recap editor. And John Crockett is our tech guru. As a reminder, our meeting is being recorded. Before you begin speaking, please state your name. While speaking, please be respectful. Personal attacks will not be tolerated. For those online, if you’d like to share URLs, post them in the Chat Box and they’ll be included at the end of the meeting recap. We partner with IVCB Community 1s.t.org and IVCBA.org to get information out. So, be sure to visit their websites and sign up for their newsletters. To sign up for our Forum meeting notices and recaps, send an email to us at ivcbcommunityforum@gmail.com.
Ryan Sommers – North Lake Tahoe Fire Protection District Chief
Good morning, everybody. I want to take a few minutes and read an email that was forwarded to me and try to clear up a few items. Last Tuesday I received the email. I’ll just read it so I don’t go off script.
Dear Ryan, A friend sent me this report. You mentioned you were going to send out a list of potential landscapers to help remove pine needles from roofs…. What is the policy for discarding those needles? Should they just be dumped on the ground? Or should they be taken to the dump? Perhaps it would be a good idea to make this clear/public. Thanks.
The email goes on to quote the incident that happened.
Last week I am taking my morning walk. There is a landscaping/maintenance crew clearing pine needles from the roof of a house. The landscaper takes the garbage can, walks across the street and dumps it in the vacant lot. (The truck is blank – I have no idea which company it was.)
I go down to the Fire Dept. The two nice ladies in the front office inform me there is really nothing that can be done because (a) “everyone’s bandwidth is pretty full right now,” and (b) there is no way to catch them in the act. I tell them “I have pictures.” They then tell me to call Ryan Dominguez because that would be in his area. I did. I am still waiting for a return call.
A couple of days later, the homeowner’s son is out front meeting with the Fire Dept. inspector (not Ryan Dominguez). I tell the son that if charged a dumping fee, not to pay it because it didn’t go to the dump. “They told me it did.” I informed him that I had watched the guy dump it across the street. (By the way, he was very savvy about this dumping business. He made sure to spread the pine needles around so it looked like they had been there all along.) This finishes with the son saying, “I’ll talk to them.” and the Fire Dept inspector clipboard in hand, saying “So, shall we get this done.” Both went back to the conversation I interrupted with a “teenage eye roll.”
Nobody cared. Nobody even blinked. I told the ladies in the front office, “You can bet if someone reported me doing this, as a homeowner, y’all would be on my doorstep in a New York minute.” So much for “certified contractors” and “defensible space,” Capt Sommers.
PS: You can do what you want with this email including tut-tutting and hitting delete. If you pass this along, please don’t use my name publicly. I am happy to give my name to any interested party, but not the world.
I’d like to address a few things in this email. Number 1, I’d like to meet with this person or have the person contact me. There are quite a few unacceptable actions that occurred at this site with the pine needle removal.
Getting back to the original email of contractors, that was emailed out last Friday at 9:21 am to Ronda. If that’s not the best way to send it, you can give me a different email address and forward it on. I then forwarded it a second time, the copy, on last Tuesday 28th to the forum email address. If there’s a better way for us to disseminate that information, please let us know so we can get that done.
I have talked to my front office. They are very well aware that we will not handle things like this in the future. We will take these complaints and people’s names and follow up with that. And I’ll follow up by saying this because, if they are on our list of contractors, and they’re performing something like this—dropping pine needles in somebody else’s lot is illegal dumping. I wish the captain were here so I could talk to him about it. That is illegal dumping and we can call Washoe County’s nonemergency line to report dumping, to the best of my knowledge, but I’ll clear that up with the Captain.
North Lake Tahoe Fire is not the contractor for these, so if they are doing this, tell us who they are, and we’ll remove them from our list, and we’ll educate them on how to properly dispose of those pine needles. That’s not helping the situation. They’re just moving the situation. That’s not helping at all.
And the last thing, because this really kind of torqued me, if you’re going to take a statement and use it against me, or be derogatory toward my name, it’s Chief Sommers, not captain. That’s all I’ve got to say.
Denise Davis
I do appreciate you forwarding that list because we did talk about it at our previous forum, and how to get pine needles off of our roofs for those of us who have no business on our roofs. I appreciate you sending that information. We did not email it out to everyone on our email list. But if it’s okay, those two PDFs we can send out with our recap.
Ryan Sommers
That’s why we sent it, that’s what we were hoping would happen. It’s also accessible on our website.
Denise Davis
We appreciate that you have that information for us. And again, if somebody sees something going on—”if you see something, say something.” I assume since they said there was no name on the truck or anything, if they took a photo of the truck or the license plate, or whatever, that would be acceptable?
Ryan Sommers
I’ve also talked to Ryan Dominguez because he hasn’t received the voice mail. But it could be lost in the shuffle. They have a chipping line. He has his own line. DNC inspectors have their own voice mailbox. We are going to track that down and see if we can find this [inaudible]. Again, I think I’m pretty approachable. If you see issues going on, especially if it includes my [inaudible], please talk to me directly [inaudible].
Denise Davis
Sorry but what is Mr. Dominguez’s role?
Ryan Sommers
He is our fulltime defensible space inspector. We have two seasonal defensible space inspectors that we utilize a grant for their wages. They are seasonal. They’ve been laid off for the season. But I did talk to both my Division Chief and Fields Office Division Chief, and the Fire Marshal to start making public-contact logs, so we can review. And then we don’t have this [inaudible]. That’s unacceptable. [inaudible] We’re going to do our best. [inaudible]
Kathie Julian
This didn’t happen to be off 1st Green did it?
Ryan Sommers
I don’t know. The time, date, location and all was not included in the email. It was more just the interaction and what happened. No matter where it happened, it’s wrong and we need to address it.
Kathie Julian
Okay, because I also saw somebody with pine needles in a disposal bin walking across the street. And I thought, well, I wonder where he’s taking those. Anyway, thank you. I’ll keep an eye out too.
Ryan Sommers
Yes. Get those pictures, that’s vital. And if we can get these pictures, that would be great.
Aaron Vanderpool – Incline Village Resident, HOA President
Good morning, Chief Ryan. I have a question when it comes to tree removal. Does the Fire Department do tree removal, or is it similar to the pine needles where you just give out a list of contractors? I was told the other day that the Fire Department does remove trees. I just want to clear that up.
Ryan Sommers
The Fire Department has the authority to mark trees to be removed, but the Fire Department will not remove the trees unless it’s endangering life and safety right then and there.
Aaron Vanderpool
That’s what I thought. Thank you.
Denise Davis
Chief Ryan is taking time out of his training to be here today. I talked to him about perhaps talking some more in a future meeting about defensible space and those kinds of issues. We’ll schedule that for a future meeting. If you have any other issues about things that Chief Ryan would be in charge of, forward those to me at ivcbcommunityforum@gmail.com, and I’ll let him know what people are interested in learning more about. Tia did you have anything more to add?
Tia Rancourt – North Lake Tahoe Fire Protection District, Public Information Officer
I’m going to be pushing out a press release today about our Adopt a Fire Hydrant program. With all the recent snow we’ve had and more on the way… our crew will be out shoveling out hydrants. We asked folks to adopt their hydrants near their homes or businesses. That will be going out today just as a friendly reminder.
Denise Davis
Thanks Tia. Well Chief we’ll let you get back to your training. Let everybody know we appreciate all of their efforts. We’ll see you at the next forum.
Linda Offerdahl – Incline Village Crystal Bay Business and Community Association Executive Director
I want to give you a heads up on the Candy Cane Village and other events scheduled for tomorrow. We are waiting for UNR Lake Tahoe to make the call on whether the weather’s going to be too bad tomorrow. We’re formulating a back-up plan to move to the Sip and Snack at Country Club Center. We’ve reached out to other entities who helped us put this together—I see John James is on here from the Fire Department—including Denise Davis who is with CERT. Stay tuned. We’ll have an announcement on social media to let everybody know what’s happening. The restaurants at Country Club are not likely to close because of the forecasted snow. That’s why we think it’s a good backup plan. Thank you.
Denise Davis
I believe IVCBA has a calendar of events for the whole month of December, correct?
Linda Offerdahl
Yes, thank you, Denise. It’s at northernlightstahoe.com, or just go to our website, ivcba.org.
Denise Davis,
Great. Are you planning to put out any type of community announcement if there’s a location change, or how are you planning to let folks know?
Linda Offerdahl
We’ll do it through social media and our mail chimp. We have about 1100 subscribers. What else do you recommend?
Denise Davis
Nextdoor?
Linda Offerdahl
Yes, social media, and we’ll have signs up at UNR-Tahoe directing people to Country Club if that’s the call.
Denise Davis
Great. I just want people to know where to check in to find out. Fingers crossed. And hopefully we’ll see lots of you tomorrow at the Candy Cane Village.
Kari Ferguson – Incline Village General Improvement District Communication Coordinator
Sorry, I’m driving. There was a 2-hour delay at school. I want to let everyone know that the Rec Center is still closed. We’re hoping to open at some point today. We are awaiting an inspection and reservice process from Southwest Gas. The repairs to the gas line went well yesterday, however, we can’t reopen without the inspection and restoral of the gas service. As soon as we get info, I’ll post it to our website and get it out through all the channels we’ve been using the past couple of days. It’s unusual to have the Rec Center closed.
The exciting news is that Diamond Peak opens tomorrow, which is a week earlier than expected. So hopefully everyone has their skis checked, their equipment checked for safety making sure nothing broke during the summer—check your bindings, check your boots, make sure everything is good—so you can have an amazing first day on the mountain tomorrow at Diamond Peak. We are so looking forward to it. Today is a powder day. We are more than excited to be able to open early for everyone in the community.
We have a lot of fun stuff happening—things in the works for winter programming. Our new IVGID Quarterly is at print currently. I’ll get that information to you as soon as it’s available on our website. We have meetings next week.
Denise Davis
Kari you’ve dropped off so I’ll finish your announcement for you. The Audit Committee meets via Zoom-only on Monday December 5 at 4pm. The agenda is posted. We have a Trustees Board meeting on Wednesday the 14th. I’ll put a link in the Chat where the agenda will be posted. The current IVGID Quarterly has end-of-the-year reports if you’re interested in what happened at the various venues. They have year-end wrap-ups.
Kathie Julian
Kari can you fill us in on what happened with the water quality test done up in the Apollo area?
Kari Ferguson
From what I understand, it was a regulatory test that happens all the time and there was some E-coli detected in there. Normal protocol is they have to have two clean tests within a certain timeframe for the “boil order” to be rescinded. I can get you more information from Brad. I posted everything on the website Wednesday afternoon. Once a test shows E-coli in the sample, they give me the information to post on there. I think I posted the “boil rescind” possibly on Monday.
Denise Davis
The actual notice is dated November 30th. The original notice went out November 23rd. And the “rescind” notice was signed November 30th.
Kari Ferguson
Yes, Wednesday. Sorry about that. I’ve been out sick this whole week. I was not able to report to the office. My brain’s a bit fuzzy. I apologize. But I’m still working as usual. Things like that can be done online. I’m trying to get information out. I’ll leave that up until they tell me to take it down. So that’s still up on our website. So is the Rec Center closure.
Kathie Julian
I was curious as to how it happened or why it happened. Was there a source of the problem that was tracked down?
Kari Ferguson
I did not receive that information. I have not heard why it was in the water. I can ask Brad to see if there’s more information. All I have is what I posted.
Steve Dolan – Incline Village Resident, Friends of 3rd Creek Director
I have some information that may be pertinent. I was told by a close source that since our water source is a single source, the probability is that the sample that had the E-coli or giardia was probably tainted from the start, possibly by the person who was doing the testing; or possibly somewhere along the road. Having it show up in only one location is atypical of the system itself. If the system were infected, it would have shown up in more places than the Apollo area. So immediately the “boil” order was rescinded. And then there were some issues dealing with testing of the water from the State, because it was a weekend—believe it or not. Basically, it’s cleared up and the overall concept is that it was a tainted sample from an external source and not our water system.
Denise Davis
I believe I heard those same kinds of statements on my tours of the water facility when Joe Pomeroy used to do those tours. Basically, if a sample comes back positive for some something, it’s likely from where the sample was taken and not in the water system.
Kari Ferguson
Yes, getting the samples and transferring them is sometimes an issue. I’ve heard that.
Jack Dalton – Incline Village Resident
I have some comments about what happened. I have some problems. I appreciate what Steve said. My first question is whether the email went out to everybody or just to the affected persons. I don’t think I got an email. I found out about it because a friend had a doorhanger that was put out and sent out the notice on an email chain. Did everybody get it or just the group who got doorhangers?
Denise Davis
From what I read on Nextdoor from a person who was in the affected area, they got the notice on their door. I don’t remember hearing that they got an email.
Jack Dalton
There was a comment that there was an email on the 23rd. I don’t think I got that. I knew about the doorhangers because I was part of an email chain. I think that’s potentially a problem. What Steve said is reassuring. But that’s not the message that people got. There was a “water boil” notice in place. I don’t think that “the weekend” is a satisfactory answer for water safety. If there’s E-coli in the water that’s a danger to everybody but particularly the young and the elderly. That could be fatal. I don’t think the weekend is enough for 7 days before the “boil” order is rescinded. You can go to Raley’s and get free water. I don’t think that’s an answer. I think we should have a better answer.
Steve Dolan
Jack, the weekend excuse was from the State because all of this works through the State with regards to recertifying and getting things back out to the public in a timely manner. The State itself said they didn’t have the manpower to do the testing for Incline. Incline itself has a system to test, however, that’s in the process of recertifying. But in particular the State is the one that delayed the retesting of the samples.
Jack Dalton
Well that’s obviously news. But I think that’s totally inexcusable. I don’t care if it was the State. But I bet if this were down in Reno, they would have it tested right away. I don’t think a weekend, a holiday, or any other excuse should put people at risk.
My next question is that someone was telling me that there was the ability a few years ago for Incline to do the testing. So now the question is why are they doing recertification? That doesn’t make any sense.
Denise Davis
I believe you have to do that periodically.
Jack Dalton
If it’s periodically, that’s on a schedule. It’s the same thing with the gas line. If you can schedule the gas line inspection for a week or a month in advance, what happens to that month? Are we at risk? I don’t have any problem with the Rec Center being closed for a day, but that sign was up on paper at the Rec Center for a month. I just don’t think that is acceptable for public health.
Denise Davis
I’ll see what I can find out, Jack.
Jack Dalton
Well I hope so because IVGID is remiss in some of the information that we have. So, don’t get me going. The next thing is the effluent pipeline. I think it’s a tragedy for the people of this village that we find out from the trustees—And the head of the trustees says he was shocked. It sounds like you “round up the usual suspects” in Casablanca—He was shocked that it’s now going to be $65 million plus for the effluent pipeline. This is the head of the Trustee Board. I don’t understand this lack of information that’s putting us at risk.
Kari Ferguson
Jack, I’ll bring your concerns to Indra and Susan. If I had information, I’d give it to you, but I don’t. I can only give you the information I have.
Jack Dalton
That’s a problem. You’re here. You should have that information. Most of the information we got was from Steve. I’m glad to have the information, but IVGID has the responsibility to tell us what’s going on.
Steve Dolan
Jack, I don’t speak for IVGID at all.
Jack Dalton
I understand that. This is not a thank you for telling us that we have some sense. So, somebody just didn’t wash their hands is what I gather.
Denise Davis,
We’ll follow up on some things and report back. Moving on, I just want to remind everyone if you need to know if it’s a red day or a green day, that information can be found at phone number 775 833-5555. Also, Washoe County has a website called “Where’s My Plow?” The URL for that will be in our meeting recap. You can also go to the Washoecounty.gov page and in the search bar, just type in “Where’s my plow?” and it will take you to that page. I see that Judy Simon is on and I see that the TRPA Advisory Planning Commission meeting December 7th has been cancelled. Judy do you have any information you want to share about any of that?
Judy Simon – Crystal Bay Resident, TRPA Advisory Planning Commission Member
I don’t have any information as to why it was cancelled. The one concern I have is the development in Crystal Bay, which I understand was supposed to go to the APC, but it has not been agendized. I think it would be good for the APC to look at that since many of the people on the APC are professional planners.
Denise Davis
Okay. Thanks for that information. The next scheduled meeting on the TRPA website is the Governing Board meeting December 14th. Those meetings are all-day kinds of meetings. The agenda has not been posted yet, so check back on the TRPA website for that. Amanda, do you want to tell us what’s going on at the Library?
Amanda McPhaill – Incline Washoe County Library Librarian
Coming up in December we’ll have our holiday party with Santa. That’s a really big holiday event for us. If you have little ones around, it’s on December 14th. There will be crafts, [inaudible]. We also have our holiday wrapping station. If you have gifts you need to wrap up in a secret place so you don’t have anyone peeking, bring your gift to the library and we’ll supply all the wrapping paper, ribbons, bows, tape, and scissors so you’re not fumbling around finding all that. Another event for little ones is our gingerbread house creation. We’ll have all the candies, graham crackers, and icing for them to build their very own gingerbread houses.
Our newest program at the library is Bingo Night. The first Tuesday of every month at 6pm we’ll be hosting Bingo with prizes to win.
Denise Davis
And a big round of applause for Amanda for making it up the hill this morning early so we could have our meeting today. Thanks Amanda. [clapping]. I also want to let everyone know about the current issue of the IVCBA magazine Live Work Play, in case you have not seen it or seen it around town be sure to pick one up.
The Board of County Commissioner meetings are scheduled this month for December 13th and December 20th. Those agendas are not posted yet. Check the County website if you’re interested in that information.
Our friends at the TTD have a Finance and Personnel Committee meeting scheduled for December 7th at 1:30. Then a TTDC Board meeting will follow that on December 7th at 3pm. An item of interest on the Board meeting agenda is “Review and accept the Highway 28 corridor monitoring report related to the East Shore Trailhead operations and paid-parking pilot for 2021.” Their report is dated December 1st and they are reporting on the 2021 experience, so I would guess 2022’s experience won’t be reported on for another year. If you have any comments to make about parking observations, I would urge you to submit comments and/or attend via Zoom or in person on December 7th.
Our IVCB Citizen Advisory Board (CAB) will have a meeting on Monday December 5th at 5:30pm. This will be our last Zoom-only meeting. In January we will start having hybrid meetings here at the library. On the agenda for the December 5th meeting is the Washoe County Transportation Plan, presented by Amy Cummings. She is working on Incline’s mobility issues, not the mobility hub. Recently there was a meeting at the Parasol building with Amy Cummings and several of the transportation partners. Also on the CAB agenda for December 5th is the “IVGID Land Coverage Report” discussion. There is a December 21st, 2022 report from the NV Division of State Lands on the sale of coverage by IVGID. If you’re interested in this, it will be discussed at the CAB meeting.
I also want to remind everyone that the Tahoe Film Fest started yesterday. They have a booklet if you’re interested in catching any of those films. And that’s all I have for government and community announcements.
Helen Neff – Incline Village Resident
There is also a Washoe County Planning meeting on December 6 at 6pm in the chambers and also on Zoom. It is on the IVCB Community 1st calendar. Agenda Item 9 is for possible action concerning cannabis-consumption lounges. The proposal is going forward to the commissioners for their approval. if anyone has comments to submit, I’ve found it works really well to submit through Washoe 311, and ask them to send it out to all the Planning Commission members. You may also want to send it to Alexis Hill and others on the Board of Commissioners.
Denise Davis
I’ve seen announcements on television for the City of Reno and I believe the City of Sparks also discussing cannabis-consumption lounge regulations. As we know, the city controls everything within the city limits, but the county controls all unincorporated areas. It sounds like it will be a city- and county-wide effort to regulate cannabis consumption lounges.
Aaron Vanderpool – Incline Village Resident, HOA President
I want to make a comment. I’ve been very unhappy with the stoplights in town. I don’t know if it’s just the routes I drive, but the waits are terrible and it seems they are getting worse. You mentioned that on December 5th Amy Cummings will be at the CAB meeting. I’ve actually started a chat with the county. I guess next Wednesday they will look at the timing of the lights. I guess one possible reason I keep having longer waits is because they don’t use the “1st come 1st serve” setup anymore. It’s more like a programmed, timed sequence of how the turn lanes work for turning left. I have been disappointed by the wait-times getting through town. It’s difficult because we have the busy times and slow times. But I think the goal should be smoother traffic through town and not having these ridiculous waits to get north and southbound. I guess that sounds like a big topic next week to be aware of.
Steve Dolan – Incline Village Resident, Friends of 3rd Creek Director
I really feel things are going backasswards and getting the cart before the horse. We have a lot of talk about development and enhancing the business environment and making the entrance to town prettier with the $25,000 Washoe County gave IVCBA. I just want to point out that our
Federal senators have introduced vacation enhancement incentives for Tahoe.
Diamond Peak and the IVGID beaches can’t staff their workforce. The Hyatt is expanding.
Ellison has a permit in right now for work on the housing at the beaches. He’s probably planning a lot more expansion. He’s expanding Cal Neva. Then there’s the Boulder Bay expansion. There’s a new giant Kings Beach proposal last Wednesday—I didn’t go but I heard about it.
Tahoe Regional Planning Agency (TRPA) is expanding and ADUs are being allowed all over the lake. We’ve got Washoe County expanding—basically for hotel tax and gambling taxes. And we know that Cal Neva and Boulder Bay and the Hyatt are based around gambling taxes.
We have this concept that’s basically affordable-housing and achievable-housing. Those two don’t even really apply because typically they’re attached to a bigger development.
I think the backassward part is that we really need to build housing before we build more attractive and license bigger business expansions.
For example—and I’ve mentioned it a few times—the Cal Neva Expansion of 400,000 cubic ft of coverage that our commissioner before Hill authorized.
I feel we need to pay a lot of attention to this with the CAB, which is again run by the commissioner. She’s all in with this business expansion based on senators and community lawyers who are fighting for all the expansions. In fact, enhancing Incline’s core, which is what this $25,000 workforce is supposed to try to assist, is also showing up with the 947 condominiums permit. That went from just that building—in terms of expanding the definition of density—to our entire Incline commercial core.
We’re really under attack by a lot right now. The whole north shore, but in particular Incline Village with STRs and things like that. I thought I’d bring this up and try to scare everyone into fighting harder for this. I’m trying.
And I would say, Doug Flaherty’s Tahoe Clean Air organization is something that everybody should try to support in any way they can. He would be the best person to talk to about that. I really feel that we’re headed intentionally towards Vegas North on the north shore. We all need to pay attention to that. Thanks for listening to my rant.
There’s also another thing when we’re talking about workforce housing. Homewood just did something by buying property for workforce housing. Back before my days in the 1800s, when a company would build or an infrastructure needed to be constructed, the business that was benefiting from the labor force would actually provide them housing for free. When we’re talking about IVGID or the Hyatt or Cal Neva or any of these large employers, it can’t be the newly termed “accessible housing.” That’s just another way of saying it’s more expensive and the builders make more profit. It needs to be housing for the employees of these companies. I think that’s the way our CAB , our commissioners, and our senators and IVGID should be looking at our problem. Because we can’t build… I mean, as a businessman who’s worked here for many years and had businesses here with a lot of employees, I personally wouldn’t try to start up a new business here, because there’s no housing, and therefore there’s no… And it’s not even affordable housing, it’s just housing the workforce can pay for. They’re making $35,000 to $65,000 per year which translates to around $1300 for a 2-bedroom that would be affordable for those people who are making those lower wages. So that discussion also…. What really is low income is not based on the median income. It’s based on the income of the people who are actually working in these places that are paying $15-$25 per hour.
I just wanted to put that out there for people to think about. Give Doug Flaherty some props because his Tahoe Clean Air seems to really be paying attention to the details, listing laws and actions by our commissioners, and paying attention to this. Thanks for listening.
Denise Davis
Just to circle back to something you said earlier in your comment… Part of the reason I try to make everyone aware of when meetings are is because at these public meetings there are always two opportunities to make public comments about anything you want to say for 3 minutes—both at the beginning and again at the end. I just can’t stress how important it is to write to the people who serve on these boards, but also to give live public comment. You can’t control whether they read what you submit, but you can make comments in person. I know it’s time-consuming, but it’s very important that they hear from us. They hear from agencies and consultants but they don’t hear a lot from the general public. I urge people to attend these meetings. Most you can attend via Zoom and give your comment. I will point out that the Washoe County Commissioners require you to be in person to give live public comment. But the TTD, the TRPA and other organizations are still on Zoom and you’re still allowed to comment via Zoom. I urge everyone to think about doing that.
Aaron Vanderpool
I agree with everything that Steve said and what was just said now about how important it is to show up and submit comment. I’m only talking to 19 people on this call. It is important to get on the record because the people who are writing rules, laws, and policies are getting paid to go to these meetings, to show up and make their voices heard. Most of us are volunteers taking our own time and it’s much more difficult, but we have the numbers, so more people need to show up.
And one quick comment I wanted to add to what Steve said. It really irks me when I hear about affordable housing. That’s something that is really backwards. Our economic system is set up to increase the wealth gap. I don’t think affordable housing will ever exist. The way the economic structure is set up, it basically pushes the poor into worse conditions—the poor into poverty and wealthy people into wealth. I’ll give you an example. Placer County is giving money to people to rent out their empty homes to create more housing for people. But this just incentivizes investors to buy more property they can rent out. We really need to think about our economic structure and set it up so we’re disincentivizing the increase in wealth gap, and create conditions that are fairer to people who don’t make as much money.
Doug Flaherty – Incline Village Resident, Tahoe Clean Air Director
Can you hear me okay? [Yes, we can]. I’m recovering from a 17-day viral infection. I may be speaking slowly and I may cough. Anyway, thanks for your comment Steve. It behooves all of us to stay educated and informed on what’s happening here in the Tahoe Basin with the proposed TRPA high-density coverage requirements. There’s a concerted effort by Placer County, El Dorado County, and Washoe County in conjunction with the TRPA to push through these high- density coverage requirements through their Area Plans.
There is a battle going on in Placer County right now on this issue. I just want to make a few short comments about being aware of data. Many of you may not know that the entire Lake Tahoe Basin water— 84,092 acres—and the Truckee River—which is 37.8 miles long – are classified as “impaired waters” under the EPA’s Clean Air Act (Section 303-D). The “impaired waters” – basically cite three major pollutants of nitrogen, phosphorous, and sediment. We’re overwhelmed in the Basin right now with significant amounts of algae. I encourage everyone—and perhaps Aaron Vanderpool can post the link—to please read the 2022 State of the Lake report. Everyone should read the entire report. It explains that Lake Tahoe is in an environmental “free fall.” This is our drinking water we’re talking about. TRPA and “government partners”—Washoe, Placer, and Eldorado —are all in it to increase dramatically and make some of the biggest changes to our Regional Plans since 2012. They fail to monitor the conditions of Lake Tahoe. They fail to embrace the UC Davis State of the Lake report, and they fail to acknowledge that Lake Tahoe waters are classified as “impaired waters.” We need to get more involved and more educated. Thank you.
Steve Dolan
I’d like to add to that list of agencies to watch, the Lake Tahoe Basin Management Unit (LTBMU) of the US Forest Service. They have a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with TRPA which prevents TRPA from enforcing Best Management Practices (BMPs) on US Forest lands. Therefore, they’ve gone around the lake—and in particular our watershed—I’ve reported on the removal of the dam for old Incline Lake, which started out without any BMPs. At the same time, they were doing that with the Upper Tyrolian bike path. Both Incline Creek and 3rd Creek were dramatically affected by that abuse of the system without any preventative sediment filters or anything like that at all. It killed fish, it ruined spawning areas, and all sorts of things. To add to what Doug said, LTBMU has no one watching over it. The TRPA has told me specifically that they can’t enforce those work sites because of the MOU. I’m currently working on affecting that relationship. We’ll see how that works. It’s two states, and it’s a national law. I think we should try to get TRPA more active in at least speaking with and monitoring the US Forest Service, because they are adding a ton of sediment which is the number 1, 2, or 3 main cause of decreased lake clarity.
Denise Davis
What I’ve observed is that we seem to cycle through managers of the LTBMU very quickly. In talking to people, I’ve been told it’s a pay issue. They can get paid more in other places, so managers cycle in and out quickly.
Did anyone else have any comments to make? I’ll remind everyone we’ll have our final community forum in 2 weeks on December 14th.
Stay safe. There is lots of ice under our snow. Have a great time this month. We have a lot of activities and opportunities to meet up with friends and family we might not have seen for a while. So be careful, be safe, and we’ll see you in 2 weeks.
Links:
our email is:
Washoe County Sheriff Office (WCSO)
non-emergency dispatch 775-785-9276
Incline substation Facebook page
https://www.facebook.com/Washoe-County-Sheriffs-Office-Incline-Village-Substation-143827955640457/
RED Day / GREEN Day parking info 775-833-5555
https://www.washoecounty.gov/csd/operations/roads/Snow%20and%20Ice/Winter%20Parking.php
Washoe County “Where’s My Plow” real time snow equipment operations
https://www.washoecounty.gov/csd/operations/roads/Snow%20and%20Ice/snow_ice_ops_incline.php
North Lake Tahoe Fire Protection District website
Dec 5 – IVGID Audit Committee meeting
https://www.yourtahoeplace.com/ivgid/board-of-trustees/meetings-and-agendas
Dec 5 – IV/CB Citizens Advisory Board (CAB) meeting
https://www.washoecounty.gov/CABS/IVCB_CAB/2022/files/IVCB-Agenda-12-5-22.pdf
Dec 7 – TTD Finance and Personnel Committee meeting
Dec 7 – TTD /C Board meeting
Dec 14 – TRPA Governing Board meeting
https://www.trpa.gov/event/governing-board-meeting-3/
Washoe County Planning – applications in Commission District 1
https://www.washoecounty.gov/csd/planning_and_development/applications/apps_commish_district_one.php
Village League “City of Incline Village” website
https://www.cityofinclinevillage.com/
IV/CB Community 1st meetings and community info
IVCBA (Incline Village Crystal Bay Community and Business Association)
Chat Log:
09:22:47 From Kari Ferguson : Audit committee & BOT Meeting https://www.yourtahoeplace.com/ivgid/board-of-trustees/meetings-and-agendas
09:39:16 From Kari Ferguson : Diamond Peak info: https://www.diamondpeak.com/
09:45:55 From kathie julian : Doug, pls put your organization link into the chat.
09:52:41 From Aaron Vanderpool : https://tahoe.ucdavis.edu/stateofthelake
09:54:21 From kathie julian : Miranda Jacobsen of Tahoe Tribune is on this call. I would hope that local journalism would look into these concerns that the community residents raise.
09:54:31 From Aaron Vanderpool : The link to download the full State of the Lake report is on the right top of the page
LINK FOR TREE SERVICE AND LANDSCAPER LIST:
ttps://www.nltfpd.org/defensible-space
Preview attachment TreeServiceList_2021.pdf
Participants
Aaron Vanderpool
Amanda McPhaill
Aodhan Downey
Beth Davidson
Darlene Velicki
David Simon
Denise Davis
Doug Flaherty
Helen Neff
Jack Dalton
Jon Davidson
J. James
Judy Simon
Kari Ferguson
Kathie Julian
Linda Offerdahl
Miranda Jacobson
Pam Straley
Patricia Moser Morris
Ronda Tycer
Ryan Sommers
Sam Levine
Shirley Appel
Steve Dolan
Svata Trossen
Tia Rancourt
Yolanda Knaak