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LOWER LAKE – With its wells running low, the Lower Lake County Water Works board held a public hearing Monday night to discuss an urgency ordinance to impose emergency conservation restrictions.
The meeting, which lasted more than two hours in Lower Lake's Brick Hall, was at times contentious, as district customers voiced their frustration over issues ranging from what they perceived as the district's failure to plan for the future to wondering why they hadn't heard about the issue sooner.
More than 30 district customers attended, along with Supervisor Ed Robey and County Counsel Anita Grant, who also acts as counsel for the district.
District Board Chair Frank Haas explained that the meeting was held to discuss the four-page conservation ordinance.
In the form handed out Monday, the ordinance suggests prohibiting all landscape and outdoor water usage, putting fines in place for overuse, cutting off service in cases where overuse continues, preventing new service connections and cutting off customers from outside of the district.
Haas, however, conceded that the ordinance was a “boiler plate,” and would be changed before the board accepts it, likely at a yet-to-be-scheduled meeting in early August.
District General Manager Al Tubbs explained that due to less rain this past year, the wells are down. The district's pumps are going 24 hours a day, but still can't fill the district's pumps, he said.
Tubbs said if the district's customers can't start conserving by 15 to 20 percent of the 560,000 gallons the district pumps each day, he's concerned that the district will be in desperate straights.
The situation became critical in early June. At that time Tubbs went to the board to notify them that the district's pumps were having to run much longer because of lower water levels, as Lake County News previously reported.
The board decided to shut down a standpipe on Morgan Valley Road that 12 Morgan Valley families – who are outside of the district's bounds – use to supply potable water to their homes because of their own low or dry wells.
After the families appealed to the district, the board held a special meeting where it decided to compromise. It cut off commercial trucks using the potable water to spray down construction sites and allowed the Morgan Valley families to continue using the pipe through July 31.
Tubbs admitted Monday, “The standpipe is a very, very minuscule amount of water.”
The consensus from district customers Monday was that the families who use the standpipe, despite being technically outside of the district, are customers, and should not be cut off. But Grant said that the district's ability to sell water to out-of-district customers is defined by California water law.
“State law speaks particularly to the idea of users outside the district,” she said.
The district must define its water needs and then, if there is a surplus, the standpipe use for outside district users can continue.
But Tubbs did not have any hard numbers of what would amount to a surplus. The board did say, however, that the standpipe users would continue to be supplied for at least another month.
Grant said the board couldn't discuss the out-of-district users formally because the item wasn't on the meeting's agenda.
She also surprised some audience members by saying that, in an emergency, the district could cut off water to certain customers if it deemed it necessary. “The ramifications for these things can be quite dire.”
Tubbs handed out information about the level of water use over the last four years.
On a daily basis in July 2003, the district pumped 393,335 gallons of water, Tubbs reported. This past month, it pumped 584,912 gallons on a daily basis, an increase of nearly 50 percent. Overall the district serves close to 900 households.
Tubbs neither explained the reason for the increase in usage nor provided data on new hookups to account for the increase.
When questioned about plans for the future, Tubbs said the district is in the process of creating a rate structure to penalize overuse, and that he's going to meet with the Konocti water district in August to ask for an emergency system tie-in.
He said he also would like to put in a $500,000 surface water treatment system so they could purchase surface water from Cache Creek from Yolo County, but that he has thus far been unsuccessful in obtaining grant funding. Robey said he would try to help Tubbs find the money.
Several audience members suggested they would be willing to pay more money now against a loan for the treatment system in order to address the district's water shortage.
Robey told the district board that he believed the ordinance stipulations against outdoor water use and accompanying penalties would be hard to enforce. He did suggest adding surcharges for overuse and putting a temporary stop to hookups to the system, which would demonstrate to the Konocti water district that they were serious about finding solutions.
He added that water conservation doesn't need to be painful. “It's possible to conserve water without suffering very much.”
C.J. LeBrun said she was upset that the district was only now telling customers about its water problems. Haas said the board itself only found out in June about the problems, when Tubbs notified board members.
By the end of the meeting, frustration and tempers had subsided, with customers asking for guidance on conservation.
Carl Cunningham, one of the Morgan Valley out-of-district customers, summed up the district's situation this way: “It's not an emergency, it's a matter of growth.”
He said he and other customers want to help the district improve, and are looking for ways to help in ways that include conservation and finding agencies to support system upgrades and expansion.
Another Morgan Valley resident, Roger Lipman, added “The reality is, the whole district has to conserve.”
The district board moved to hold over approval of the ordinance until it has time to update it with input from the meeting.
E-mail Elizabeth Larson at
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LUCERNE – A travel trailer that caught fire Monday afternoon caused an outage of Mediacom Internet and television services along much of the Northshore and parts of Lakeport.
Northshore Fire Protection District Battalion Chief Lou Dukes said firefighters were dispatched to the fire at 11:23 a.m.
The fire broke out in the 40-foot trailer as a local man who had borrowed it was returning it to Clearlake. As he drove eastbound along Highway 20, Dukes said the man noticed the fire.
“He looked in his rear view mirror and flames were coming out of the trailer,” Dukes explained.
Firefighters arrived minutes later to find the trailer parked in front of the Paradise Cove subdivision east of Lucerne, said Dukes. By that time, the trailer already was fully involved.
Northshore Fire and Cal Fire sent a total of five pieces of equipment and eight firefighters, said Dukes.
Dukes said there was potential for the fire to get into nearby vegetation, but by 11:32 p.m. firefighters had contained it, and completely extinguished it a short time later.
It took another hour to mop up the smoldering trailer, said Dukes. No injuries were reported, and the cause of the fire isn't yet known.
The fire did, however, manage to damage a Mediacom cable line, said Dukes.
The trailer had been pulled off the road, where it was sitting underneath Mediacom's fiberoptic line and power lines, said Dukes. The power lines were OK, but the cable lines were burned enough to knock out service.
A Mediacom service representative reported that the fire took out service in Nice, Upper Lake, Lucerne and the Robin Hill area of Lakeport.
Cable and TV services in the affected areas weren't restored until 7 p.m., two hours after Mediacom originally estimated repairs would be complete.
E-mail Elizabeth Larson at
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This compares to a seasonally unadjusted rate of 5.2 percent for the state and 4.7 percent for the nation for the month, according to Dennis Mullins of the Employment Development Department.
Lake County's unemployment rate ranked it No. 42 among California's 58 counties, according to statistics Mullins provided.
Surrounding county rates included 8.7 percent for Glenn, 10.7 percent for Colusa, 4.3 percent for Sonoma and 5.1 percent for Mendocino, Mullins reported. Marin had the lowest rate in the state with 3.7 percent and Imperial County had the highest at 16.6 percent.
Total industry employment in Lake County grew by 220 jobs (1.4 percent) between June 2006 and June 2007, said Mullins, ending the year-over period with 15,910 jobs.
Year-over job growth occurred in farm; natural resources, mining and construction; trade, transportation and utilities; information; leisure and hospitality; and government, Mullins reported. Year-over job losses occurred in financial activities, and professional and business services.
Industry sectors with no change over the year included manufacturing, private educational and health services, and other services, according to Mullins' report.
The Farm sector again led industry gainers for the year-over period adding 130 jobs, Mullins noted. Government gained 60. Natural resources, mining, and construction added 30 jobs and trade, transportation, and utilities was up 20. Information, and leisure and hospitality were each up 10 jobs. Professional and business services was down 30 and financial activities dropped 10 jobs for the period.
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KELSEYVILLE – After weeks of final preparations, the Ely Stage Stop was moved to its new home on Sunday.
The move was originally scheduled to take place over the next week, with the house being moved in stages across Highway 29 and then through cattle pastures and oak woodland.
However a lot of prep work completed this past week apparently allowed Solares House Moving – the Bay Area firm with the contract to complete the move – to complete the move in one day.
On Thursday the house had been moved from its original location to a staging area down toward S Bar S Ranch where it would cross the highway. A trail also was cleared across the open ground to the site of a new Ely Stage Stop museum along Soda Bay Road, which will be owned by the county but run by the Lake County Historical Society.
The work day began early on Sunday, with Caltrans closing the highway at 6 a.m. and California Highway Patrol standing by.
A Pacific Gas & Electric crew worked to raise power lines to let the house – reportedly built around 1859-1860 – pass underneath.
With the lines raised and the house hooked up to a semi towing truck, the house began to move across Highway 29 and then through the fields just before 8 a.m.
Historical Society President Randy Ridgel and wife Jackie, the group's secretary, along with Board of Directors member Kevin Engle, were on hand to witness the move, recording it with both film and photography.
The house movers stopped to build a bridge over a part of Thurston Creek and continued the move in the afternoon.
Kelly Cox, the county's chief administrative officer, watched the move throughout the day. He said the house finally moved up the hill to the museum site at about 5 p.m. after a few hours of “painstakingly slow” progress. At the final push the movers used a cable to pull the house up, inch by inch, said Cox.
County Deputy Redevelopment Director Eric Seely, who was away this week and unable to be there for the move, was given an update on the progress via cell phone, said Cox.
Seely has spent several years working to make the museum project a reality. Cox said Seely was glad to hear the house had survived the move and safely arrived at its new location.
Cox said next come the foundation, roof and siding, which will be done in stages. Seely said the work will be done in stages, as funding allows.
E-mail Elizabeth Larson at
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BARTLETT SPRINGS – This weekend, two local buildings with important connections to the county's past met very different fates.
On Sunday, the Ely Stage Stop began its move to a new museum location. A day earlier, the reconstructed Bartlett Springs Resort lodge was burned to the ground.
“It's completely gone,” said Zane Gray, the resort's caretaker since 1982, of the main lodge building.
The fire was reported Saturday afternoon, said Gray. On Sunday, he went to survey the damage, which included five acres of brush land and the building.
A US Forest Service investigator is working to determine the fire's cause, Gray said. The Mendocino National Forest office in Willows couldn't be reached over the weekend for comment.
However, Gray said he believes it was arson, saying that fire officials told him Sunday that the fire appears to have started in the lodge building.
“It couldn't have started by itself,” he maintained, explaining that the propane tanks were removed several years ago, and the electricity was turned off.
“Somebody had to match it, that's all,” he said.
The lodge building that burned Saturday was located at the site of the resort's original lodge, which burned down in 1934. It was rebuilt, with that incarnation of the lodge blowing down in a windstorm in 1988, said Gray.
“I had the building all totally rebuilt in 1989,” said Gray. “It cost the company $171,000 at that time to do the upgrade on it.”
The nearby gazebo, said Gray, was spared in Saturday's fire. “The fire burned right to it but never touched it.”
Gray said he rebuilt the gazebo in 1985, installing new timbers and lumber in an attempt to put it back the way it was at the turn of the 20th century.
The Bartlett Springs Resort's history stretches back to the 1870s, after a mineral spring was discovered there by Napa resident Greene Bartlett during a camping trip, according to The Bartlett Springs Area: Past & Present, written in 2005 by Upper Lake resident Michelle Wells.
Bartlett, who suffered from rheumatism, believed in the springs' healing abilities, Wells' history reports, so he filed a claim for the 160 acres around the spring.
A resort would later be built there, Wells wrote, that included three hotels, camping areas, two stores, mineral steam baths, a bottling facility, a concert hall, stores, a doctor's office and numerous recreational activities – swimming, golf, croquet, tennis, riding, bowling and more.
A Justice of the Peace and constable even were stationed at the resort, Wells wrote, explaining, “because it was so isolated it became more like its own little town as well.”
Known by friends and neighbors as “the mayor of Bartlett Springs,” Gray, who will be 80 in September, has cared for the 1,990-acre property for the last 25 years.
A self-described “pretty tough old man,” Gray is a World War II veteran who moved to Lake County in 1978 with his wife, Frances.
During the time Gray has acted as caretaker, the resort has changed hands a few times, purchased by the French water bottling company Vittel in 1984, who later sold the property to Nestle in 1993. The Vittel bottling plant was later sold separately, and is today the home of Tulip Hill Winery in Nice.
Gray has worked hard over the years to preserve and improve the remaining resort buildings.
The resort suffered damage in the 1996 Fork Fire, said Gray. The two-week Fork Fire reportedly burned 83,000 acres in the Mendocino National Forest and on private property, destroying 11 structures.
Of those structures destroyed, one was a small second house on Gray's 12-acre property near the resort.
A member of the Northshore Fire Protection District, Gray helped fight the Fork Fire and tried to protect the resort then as well.
“We were able to save the lodge at that time and all of the buildings, except for two of the old cabins that were from the 1890s era, and I had just restored them,” he said.
In recent years, despite his care, Gray has been fighting a losing battle against vandals intent on destroying the resort buildings.
Vandalism has been going on in Bartlett Springs “nearly forever,” he said, adding, “It's picked up in the last two years.”
He's found a lot of people on the property – mostly young people, he added – and despite chasing them off the problems have continued.
A visit this reporter made to the lodge in May – granted access by Gray – revealed windows, walls bashed in, bullet holes, kicked in doors and evidence of parties, including trash and beer bottles.
There have also been bouts of arson in the area, said Gray, with a “firebug” around caught there a few years ago after setting some fires.
Gray said he notified Nestle of the building's destruction, and hasn't received word what the company might do. He said he doesn't think that they will rebuild the lodge.
Editor's note: Zane Gray is the great-uncle of Lake County News Editor Elizabeth Larson.
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NICE – Firefighters continued their work Sunday mopping up at the scene of a 128-acre fire that was contained Saturday night.
Cal Fire reported that the fire broke out behind Robinson Rancheria Saturday afternoon, quickly climbing up the hill and into steep terrain. Firefighters from Cal Fire, and Northshore and Lakeport Fire Protection Districts fought the blaze.
At the scene Sunday, the trail of the fire was clearly visible, making its way from behind Robinson Rancheria Bingo & Casino, traveling over the hill and back toward more steep terrain near Pyle Road.
Firefighters cut trees and dealt with remaining hot spots around the area of the fire, which left a huge blackened footprint.
Rachelle Trimmer of the Cal Fire Incident Command Center reported that 80 firefighters were on duty Sunday, including a five-engine strike team and supervisors, and a water tender.
Trimmer said one engine with four firefighters would remain at the scene overnight.
Northshore Fire District Chief Jim Robbins said the fire was the largest his agency has fought so far this fire season.
E-mail Elizabeth Larson at
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