Shutdown delays work on Upper Truckee River
One of the casualties of the federal government shutdown is work by the U.S. Forest Service to reroute the Upper Truckee River had to come to an abrupt halt.
Without being able to talk to anyone in the Lake Tahoe office, it is not known how this setback will impact the project or the environment.
Oct. 15 is the date set by the Tahoe Regional Planning Agency for when dirt can no longer be moved in the basin without special permission. The Lahontan Regional Water Quality Control Board also has a say in what is going on with projects affecting waterways.
Both agencies have been watching to make sure the staging are at Sunset Stables has been secured.
“The large stockpile at the staging area was graded and compacted, then covered with a hydraulically-applied bonded fiber matrix. Weighted fiber rolls surround the downslope sides of the pile. In addition the entire staging area has runoff collection ditches along the downslope side that lead to infiltration basins,” Laurie Scribe, environmental scientist with Lahontan, told Lake Tahoe News.
Jeff Cowen with TRPA told Lake Tahoe News, “The shutdown has affected the project, but the USFS was able to get an exemption to keep a couple of people on for one extra week. They are on call for emergencies.”
— Lake Tahoe News staff report
I thought the CTC was funding this project and the forest service was doing the work. If funded by the Conservancy, why did they stop work?
One of the biggest jobs in agencies like the CTC is grant writing. Most of the money they spend comes from grants. From the Federal government. They don’t actually pay for much out of their own pockets. They don’t have any money. It’s all tax dollars. YOUR tax dollars.
Right on Dogula… If the federal government only spent money on Federal items, our Federal taxes would decrease dramatically. Then State related items would have to be funded through your State taxes and you’d have a more direct say in what should or shouldn’t be done with your money.
Instead, the Federal Government money is used by our Federal representatives to trade for votes. Some other State’s representative gets money to support a California initiative so it ends up costing more in the long run.
Shut ‘er Down!
We should just eliminate all this dang gubmint innervention in liberty and let some real ‘merican bidnessmen build the “Upper Truckee River Keys” freedumb timeshare project. That’s jobs, jobs, jobs and sales, sales, sales. Wake up treehuggers.
Instead of worrying about a stream course correction or restoration being delayed, people should be concerned about the state of the country that needs a course correction starting with a reversal of liberal DC policies of the last five years that is destroying a country right before our eyes.
I believe those are California and Nevada tax dollars, not Federal.
I feel compelled to respond to several misconceptions as I am one of the furloughed Forest Service employees working on this project. First, this project is Federally funded through the Southern Nevada Land Management Act. The project area is located on both National Forest Land and California Tahoe Conservancy land with all work being done by Forest Service employees.
Second, the furlough did not affect the construction of the new channel. We completed channel construction on September 30th in order to have ample time to winterize the project area and staging area before the Oct 15th grading deadline. At the onset of the furlough we were granted an exception to complete the winterization of the project. We were able to complete the majority of our winterization by October 8th. After our crews were done a bridge contractor came in and raised the temporary bridge for the winter. So while the furlough has not been ideal, I believe that we were able to adequately respond to it.