S. Tahoe officials strategize about the future
By Kathryn Reed
Recreation is going to be the economic driver for South Lake Tahoe. One way to do this is to stop letting county and state lines be a roadblock. Another is to invest in facilities so they become moneymakers that could provide dollars for other city needs.
But more opportunities besides or in addition to being a recreation mecca are possible based on the ideas that were elicited Feb. 21.
Councilmembers, department heads and other key staff spent 3½ hours Saturday talking about what the city could be. Barely touched on was how to turn the ideas into reality, but that will be flushed out at another meeting as well as when the midyear budget review is presented in April.
“Until we know who we are, we won’t know why we are doing it,” City Manager Nancy Kerry said. “There is no shared agreement of who we are.”
But she added, “One South Shore is starting to take hold.” This is the philosophy of realizing what happens throughout the South Shore impacts everyone and that working together instead of against each other is better for everyone.
And while the city is accountable to the residents within its boundaries, the decisions it makes have impacts beyond its borders.
Ted Gaebler, author of “Reinventing Government” and a retired city manager who spent 50 years in local government, facilitated the meeting at Lakeland Village. He asked them all to express their vision for the city – regardless of money, current policy, how long it would take to achieve or the realistic ability to achieve the goal.
The purpose was to stimulate these city leaders and to get them thinking beyond the norms, beyond what is expected and beyond the ordinary.
South Lake Tahoe city staff explain to the council the projects that are in the works. Photo/LTN
Here are some of the ideas:
• Erase the state line. Or go even further and create an entity whereby the Lake Tahoe Basin governs itself – almost like it is a state unto itself, or have the area be one bi-state county.
• Turn the casinos into condos.
• Have Caltrans turn Highway 50 over to the city so it becomes a city street, which would give the city more opportunities.
• Redevelop Barton Ranch – possibly convert it into a farm for locally sourced food.
• Light rail on Highway 50.
• Tear down dilapidated hotels in town and build quality affordable housing.
• Build a quality recreation center.
• Create an events center for concerts.
• Public art.
• More special events.
• Focus on quality of life.
• Ensure the community is engaged in order to make changes.
• A safe community – in terms of lighted walkways, low crime, and fire safe.
• Build a children’s or discovery museum.
• Better transportation.
• Better connectivity with the trail system.
• Tear down one-third of the hotels. (“We need families here instead of tourists.”)
• Purchase private beaches and turn them into public beaches.
• Remove private residences from the shoreline and create more public access via commercial enterprises like lakeside dining.
• Get rid of Campground by the Lake and make it city offices.
• Revise commercial floor area so it is only needed for one level; this would create more development opportunities.
• Turn the airport into a heliport and then have special events there.
• Take over South Tahoe Public Utility District; this would reduce redundancies and allow for improvements to be made faster.
• Collaborate with private entities and public agencies.
Gaebler reminded the City Council that their responsibility is to the steer the boat, not to actually be doing the rowing.
“We can’t do any of the stuff we would like to do without new revenue,” Councilman Austin Sass said.
He wanted his colleagues to embrace getting a tax hike of some kind on the ballot in November 2016. But they collectively said “slow down” so there would be time to evaluate what exactly any new income would be spent on. Then there will be the discussion about how the money would be raised.
The electeds do seem to agree money should be spent on recreation – but that is a broad topic. The idea, though, is to improve recreation – which will bring money to city coffers – and use revenue from those recreation endeavors to fund road improvements and other needs within the city.
I would suggest you read Kae’s piece on S. tahoe officials strategize about our future. LOTS of good ideas there! Things this town have been talkin’ about for a very long time. Read thru the list of things that are being talked about. Some very good stuff!
We’ll see what actually gets done and what doesn’t. OLS
Thank you Nancy and other South Lake Tahoe Govermental leaders for continuing to pursue ideas to make South Lake Tahoe a better place to live.
Proper economic and recreational growth will help the lot of all of the citizens.
Look forward to the implementation phase.
SAME OLD FAILED IDEAS, REPACKAGED TO SOUND SOMEHOW RELEVANT
If all of these proposed projects were actually approved, funded and successfully launched, it would still pale compared to the jobs, income and local taxes generated by simply removing the ban on medical marijuana dispensaries in SLT. Also, as much as I like Austin, his efforts to raise taxes are misguided and totally unacceptable. The City Council will have to learn to live on a smaller budget, just like most of the families in this town.
SAME OLD FAILED IDEAS, REPACKAGED TO SOUND SOMEHOW RELEVANT.
If all of these proposed projects were actually approved, funded and successfully launched, it would still pale compared to the jobs, income and local taxes generated by simply removing the ban on medical marijuana dispensaries in SLT. Frankly, the notion that this town, which built itself on gambling and booze, cannot allow weed is absurd. Also, as much as I like Austin, his efforts to raise taxes are misguided and totally unacceptable. The City Council will have to learn to live on a smaller budget, just like most of the families in this town. Or, this town could grow up and follow the success of Colorado. The choice is ours.
Almost all those things involve stealing property from private entities and using taxpayer money to do it.
How will you pay for it? Federal grants???
Hahahahahahahahahahaha!
You commies have no clue how real prosperity happens.
You are going to need a lot of MONEY, most of this stuff is a great Idea but that’s all. This will never happen, a lot of talk and there will be no action, you must have MONEY, Where will it come from, this town has lived on the tourist and will fail if you don’t have them. wake up.
Remove campgrounds for city offices? Sounds a little selfish. Also, kinda silly to put that in a article that starts off by saying recreation is going to be the economic driver…yet they want to remove a campground for buildings. “They paved paradise and put up a parking lot”
Dog, please explain,in your own words, to us “commies” how real prosperity happens.
While S.Tahoe officials talking about improvements is encouraging it remains to be seen what gets accomplished. Some of the ideas I’ve been on board with for years, others I think are unworkable.
I know talk is cheap but you have to start somewhere.
I hope some of these ideas see the light of day with proper funding.OLS
Notice the use of South Lake Tahoe and One South Shore. Glad to see that instead of a dyslexic Tahoe South. I hope Austin will keep the recreation theme going
It’s a start, people!
Some good ideas, some throwaways….
I enjoy seeing the progress regardless. Onwards and upwards, I say.
some of these ideas are just silly or could never ever be done no matter how much money you have. turn casinos into condos?, take private beaches and homes, heliport really? are there really that many helicopters around?
Doesn’t El Dorado County own the property that the ‘Campground By The Lake’ sits on? Of course, the city would like to have offices there. Think of the View!
Some good ideas and some not so good. Some old hotels do need to go. But to raze the hotels and put up section 8 housing to get rid of the tourist is not just shooting yourself in the foot but it’s cutting off your legs. How is improving recreation going to increase revenue without the tourist? How is using eminent domain to take land from lakefront property owners and putting in restaurants going to appeal to anyone other than the tourists that you’re try to get rid of? I visit friends in town at the campground a lot.
Some good ideas and some not so good. Some old hotels do need to go. But to raze the hotels and put up section 8 housing to get rid of the tourist is not just shooting yourself in the foot but it’s cutting off your legs. How is improving recreation going to increase revenue without the tourist? How is using eminent domain to take land from lakefront property owners and putting in restaurants going to appeal to anyone other than the tourists that you’re try to get rid of? The city offices don’t need to be on the lake. I visit friends in town at the campground a lot. Many would prefer to stay there than a casino and have been doing it for years. I agree a lot needs to be done for the quality of life for the full timers here but they aren’t the ones willing to spend a lot to recreate. We need an area that is appealing for tourism while at the same time locals can also share in the benefits.
Haddi, there’s no way I can explain how free market capitalism is THE driver for economic prosperity in this tiny forum.
If you ACTUALLY care to know, I suggest you read “Economics in One Lesson” by Henry Hazlitt. Shouldn’t be too difficult to find.
Turn the casinos into condos? Tear down a third of the hotels? Take over STPUD, what so the City can then hire an expensive consultant to tell them how to run a water company and sewer plant? Were they serious?
They left one off the list, simply dissolve the City to reduce redundancies, higher taxes and fees, duplicity, and poor decisions. If Incline Village and Tahoe City can do it so well without an added layer of costly bureaucracy, so can South Lake Tahoe.
“Now Mr. and Ms. politician and government manager, what would you do if you were “given” free unlimited money?”
A Conservative would return it to the people who it was taken from. A Liberal would start building gold plated statutes of themselves and new offices and say strange things like we are a “one world basin.” Did someone check what was in the decanters and was there an open bar near?
Didn’t think you could. Stop name calling. Try and have an original thought now and then. You are the poster child for engaging the keyboard before the brain. Just because someone posts something on the internet it does not always make it true. Using a reference to a 1946 publication on economics seems right in line with your forward thinking process.
Get rid of tourism, raise taxes and spend the increased revenue on recreation. Sounds like 1st grade recess economics to me.
A successful economy built of privately owned businesses which give non-locals what they want will accomplish many of the ideas above and create a vibrant place families want to live.
I agree with Dog that too many of the ideas are based on a philosophy of communism which aims to replace private property and a profit-based economy with public ownership and communal control. They are taking away someone’s rights and should be put aside as they only demean the list of good ideas for the City to consider. It’s actually scary to me that those ideas came from our councilmembers, department heads and other key staff who are our employees or elected representatives. I won’t call them communists but they really need to think about what they said.
If you want older hotel properties to look better, that will happen on it’s own (and someone else’s money) when there are people desiring to come to our city and wanting to stay in nicer hotels. You don’t have to take their property, the marketplace will reach your goal for you.
Other ideas are good goals which need to be vetted to find out why the government should take your money (taxes) to do them. If they are good for the community (supporting education which then supports economic development through private investment by developing an educated group of workers and entrepreneurs, improving transportation, safety and quality of life, etc.) then they should be considered for affordability and importance to the community.
Many of these brainstorming sessions develop great ideas but the goal of leadership is to thin them out to only the best.
Good luck Nancy.
seems to me that the folks at this meeting are not in touch with outdoor recreation.
I would assume that they are good at 12oz curls.
most of the ideas presented are from the Marvelous Makeover.
The problem Dogula is free market capitalism works really well,on paper. Though I generally subscribe to the basic tenets and I have read all the great ones from Adam Smith, von Hayek, Friedman etc. The reality is the short run greed overcomes long run investment good sense. If we go back in time here in Lake Tahoe before the market had much of any regulation the short term greed just about destroyed the asset. Fishing, timber cutting, development etc. were all decisions based on a much more free market. Where did it get us?
On the other hand 30 years of over regulation froze our ability to “fix the mess”. So I think the solution lies somewhere in the middle, but I am not optimistic we will ever find the right balance.
Great dialogue here !! Obviously something needs to be done here in SLT.
But. It all comes down to MONEY !
I mentioned in a prior thread expanding the city boundary to encompass Heavenly and hopefully generate income for the cash strapped city.
I read recently that Heavenly wants to expand its operations into summertime with all kinds of activities.I think that’s great ! More tourists more $.But they still are not in the city ! The largest employer and business on the California side (I think) and still in their own little world.
Kenny thanks for your input on the prior thread.
So nothing is cast in bronze, who were the signers of this lucrative agreement with heavenly?
I notice not one of the council members mentioned this topic !
What say you locals ?
Kiwi.
Joining hands and singing “We are the world” or the basin, will have about the same results. The idea of taking things away from private property owners for subjective “better uses” like new offices, is not a great idea unless it is an abatement issue of abandoned property, they should encourage small businesses with every incentive they can, concentrate on recreation for tourists who arrive drop their cash and leave, and what has always worked before that will keep working.
A suggestion for recreation planning is to set aside a small part of each trail system (High Meadows, Tahoe Mountain, Angora Ridges, Hawley Grade) for hikers only. These areas are thick with trails and not to set a small percentage aside for hikers is missing the boat in a big way. There are probably more locals and tourists who hike than mountain bike and to not serve them is a big mistake. Hikers grow tired of watching for a fast moving rider to approach from around a curve or from behind. It spoils the relaxation people seek from nature.
Truly glad to see these folks getting together to talk and brainstorm, although there certainly has been plenty of that over the years with little tangible success. Gotta keep trying, though. “Slapshot” nailed it, in that it’s obvious the pendulum has swung to halting extreme of over-regulation. The answer is truly somewhere in the middle.
And for what it’s worth, whoever suggested removing private residences from the shoreline and turning the casinos into condos (not sure if it’s the same person) should not be invited to the next meeting.
The one thing that the City should be working real real on is getting the Heavenly Valley Ski Resort in line and work out some way to collect a percentage of the ticket prices for the City. When Heavenly first opened it cost $2.75 for an all day ticket and $1.50 for a half day. Now it is $100 and $65.00. At that rate there will be no more Skiers soon. If you make it affordable, people will come. I lived here when it was affordable and now It is impossible to afford to live in the Tahoe Basin unless you have been here for a long time and own your home with no payments.I did but left because of the politics and the fact that the sewer rates and water rates are way out of line,and the wages are way out of line that are paid to the City and County and S.T.P.U D.
Heavenly Valley should not be allowed to build anything more until they agree to a percentage of their lift tickets, And if Nancy Kerry is as good as you all think then she should be leading the fight.
I’ll 2nd that thought !!
Where do you think heavenly gets the water it uses to make all that snow ?
I wonder if they pay the same rate we all do.? Or do they get it for free ?
Enquiring minds want to know.
I only raise these points because I don’t feel that this multi million $ corporation is playing ball with the city. They have their own profitable ballpark.
Raise the local taxes ??? Ludicrous !
The problem is everyone loves to tax the other guy, not themselves. While I appreciate the argument that heavenly should pay some sort of fee etc. and maybe they should.The other side of that is they probably spend more then anyone or any entity to bring people here which in turn generates taxes. Along time ago the TBID was proposed to collect fees to some degree on every business to help support tourism. Kenny led the charge to oppose that so I find it more than interesting he is leading the charge to tax someone else. “Tax anyone but me” seems to be the mantra.
Steve Buttling – I believe they get water from STUPD, KGID, and East Peak Lake.
With KGID they pay based on the service pipe size
http://kgid.org/pdfs/NEW%20WATER%20METER%20RATES%20Dec%201%202012%20-%20mlr.pdf
Steve Buttling, Oldtimer and others, if you read the agreement that was signed between the city and the then American Ski Corp., you will see that the city has no legal right to make Heavenly pay taxes on lift tickets.( this agreement was just posted by Kenny Curtzwiler last week) A past city council signed that right away. Kiwi, if you have an idea on how to bust the agreement I’m sure council would be all ears and you can come to their meeting and use your three minutes to make your case.
As to water, the city owns no water companies and thus can’t raise their water rights. Heavenly does pay for their water.
Thankyou for the responses to my comments folks and the link to KGID.
By raising the topic of water usage at heavenly I did not mean to imply that they are not paying for the water they use to produce snow, but perhaps that they might be getting the good old boys treatment “???
And yes I am aware that most of the water/snow melts and finds its way back to where it came from.
My veiled point is that this is perhaps the largest corporation in the city(not) yet they have a different set of rules and taxation than the local burger joint trying to make a living.If some legalese gobbly gook agreement was written many years ago giving them a free ride , was it for perpetuity ?? And why can’t it be changed.
new owners perhaps new rules ??
and who signed this agreement Terry Trupp ? A big fan of fresh powder ?
Ok I must have too much free time on my hands !
Well unfortunately I do! Lol
Kiwi.
Slap, I did not lead the charge as you put. A group got together and hired Dale Sare to represent us. I attended the meetings as an individual and also collected about $3K from several business’s who were against the set up of the bid tax. Total raised to fight the tax was about 10K from a lot more than just me. I spoke at all the meetings as well as privately with Duane Wallace who worked for the chamber at the time. I never ever said I was totally against the tax but rather we all (lodging at the time) pay a fair share. I also said I know we need to grow this town and the tourist is our life bread and I depend on them just like everyone else. As far as who signed the HV agreement think back to the late 90’s and who was on the council at the time. As far as breaking the “covenant” I do believe a third year law student could break that the way it was written and yes, I have checked it out. The problem lies with the council, if your elected officials would stop recusing themselves on all the issues that affect the residents perhaps the city could move forward. Yes Nancy should be the one leading the fight as she works for the council and not the employees she keeps defending and the council works for the community that elected them.
oldtimer, excellent comment! I’m in total agreement in regards to Heavenly Valley and STPUD. OLS
KC I think you hit it on the head ! Ouch!
THE CITY COUNCIL !! Eeeeelected by the people, FOR the people .
Or is it just a position for them and their personal agendas.Well it shouldn’t be.
Do you think they, yes them , are reading these comments, and if so why no responses !!
to be continued (roll music)
PS real MEN don’t use pseudonyms lol
Right KC .
Why no mention of the fact almost all these ideas were brought up years ago (2005-7) in place based planning and visioning meetings? Despite Nancy not being here then, many of us were and the vision hasn’t changed. We want the old motels gone, mixed use redevelopment with affordable housing, sidewalks, street lights, and bike trails connecting it all. Instead, we have a new BevMo, auto zone and tj maxx… We don’t need to talk, we need to “just do it!”
Oy vey!
All that needs to be done is….. Turn all of Tahoe into the State of Nevada.!!!
The rest will take care of its self..
the old Heav. has a water tank next to the enchanted forest.
they do not pay for that water and its well.
they do buy water from KGID and pump it to East Peak lake.
the also pump water from the base of California to the pond at Maggies then they pump it to East Peak lake.
interstate transportation of water….Hmmm.
when I was a snowmaker in 83-84 we would drain the tank at the bottom of Keller on a cold night with 11 guns spraying World cup and the base area.
They forgot about the people mover to Echo Summit, the gondola from Genoa and closing Stateline for a chili cook off.
HV on the Ca side draws from the David Avenue well. It is located on David Street (imagine that) which is almost at the corner of Pioneer and Ski run. Hv paid to have a new line installed and improvements to the pumps and they pay for every drop they get. When I ran for the STPUD board I promised Blaise that I would make every effort to get them all the water they needed to keep the mountain open. The Face is the biggest billboard in the world and it is ludicrous that we don’t give Hv the water to remain open. The water they do use for snowmaking, on the Ca side, drains right back to the aquifer of the David Avenue well. The first thing everyone sees is The Face and even if it is not open at least the perception is that we have snow. Wouldn’t be the first time we have misled the tourists. In essence STPUD is charging them for the same water they fill it up with. I see no reason why we can’t give them the water to stay open and bring tourist dollars into our economy.
This is some of the funniest crap I have read in a long time. What sort of fantasy world do you folks live in. Get rid of the City and we will be fine. If you want to tax HV then do it it and quit screwing around. If the weather doesn’t change they are going close up sone enough.
Start with a user fee for summer gondola rides or don’t ok the use permit for the new summer activities. Our city likes user fees why not HV?
Well we have yet to see any kind of acknowledgment from city council regarding any of the comments posted here.the old ostrich head in the sand scenario.
If the city is happy to support HV , then HV should reciprocate and help support the city.Sadly I think all of this dialogue , and ideas put forward will just vanish into the air as if it was never brought up.
Does the city have any kind of online suggestion box or thread where these comments would at least be read by the electeds ?
Kiwi.
Mr Buttling, with all due respect, this and any forum like it should not be the place for our elected officials to respond to the ideas or criticisms put forth by those participating here. Feel free to write our council members or even attend council meetings to voice your opinion officially.
Hv anticipates approx. 110,000 summer visitors to the new proposed recreation site. Yes, I actually read the report. I suggest you all read it, very interesting concept and a lot of work went into this. They actually answer a lot of questions about the transportation and parking problems we have here and my take on it is they agree about the problem but like everyone else do not have a solution other than park at Harrahs.
Heavenly does not get any deals on water! It pay`s the same as you and I . Around $2.00 PER CCF.
Yawn