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LAKE COUNTY, Calif. — Forecasters said that Lake County could receive several more inches of rain in coming days as the last atmospheric river storms in a series move over the region.
The National Weather Service’s six-day forecast released on Friday and continuing until Thursday, Jan. 19, called for up to 7 inches of rain.
That’s a concern for areas of Lake County including Upper Lake, where residents on Main Street near Maddocks Court were seeing full culverts and water covering portions of the roadway late this week, leading to them placing sandbags and using fire hose to try to move water away from homes.
State Climatologist Dr. Michael Anderson said the storm on Friday was the end of the seventh atmospheric river storm in a series that began hitting California at Christmas.
He said the eighth storm will take place from Saturday through Tuesday, Jan. 17, to be followed by the ninth storm on Wednesday, Jan. 18.
Anderson said high pressure is building in the eastern Pacific, and rather than storms coming ashore from the southwest or the west, storms will start dropping in from the Gulf of Alaska. Those storms will be colder, with not as much moisture.
Early Saturday, Clear Lake’s level was at 2.54 feet Rumsey, the special measure for the lake, up nearly 5 feet since Christmas.
Due to the atmospheric river storm event’s continued impacts on Lake County, on Thursday, Sheriff Rob Howe declared a local emergency.
The Lake County Office of Emergency Services said Friday on its Facebook page that Sheriff Howe sent his thanks and appreciation to the California Highway Patrol’s Northern California Division for conducting aerial reconnaissance of remote areas of Lake County to assess the potential impacts of the atmospheric river event.
“The Lake County Office of Emergency Services and Sheriff’s Office continue to monitor the condition of our county during this storm event,” the agency said.
During a special Friday afternoon meeting of the Board of Supervisors, Lt. Gavin Wells, the deputy director of Lake County OES, presented Howe’s emergency proclamation to the board for ratification, which needed to take place within seven days of its issuance.
Wells said the state has declared an emergency due to the storms and Lake County was included in a federal declaration for disaster assistance for counties issued on Jan. 9.
The board voted unanimously to ratify the proclamation.
Email Elizabeth Larson at
LAKE COUNTY, Calif. — On Friday, the California Attorney General’s Office announced a settlement with the developers of the Guenoc Valley Project that will allow a smaller version of the luxury resort and residential development to go forward.
Attorney General Rob Bonta’s office said Friday’s settlement requires a revised version of the project that has a smaller, higher-density footprint to reduce wildfire risk in an area that has had wildland fires in every decade since the 1950s, along with additional measures to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
“Every year, devastating wildfires burn through California, forcing evacuations, destroying homes, and threatening lives,” said Attorney General Bonta. “Developers have a responsibility to build in a way that recognizes this reality and to make smart decisions at the front end so people's lives are not endangered down the line. Today's settlement is an example of responsible development, demonstrating how developers can reduce both wildfire ignition risks and greenhouse gas impacts at new developments.”
“In the years since the Guenoc Valley Project was originally designed and approved, the science and best practices for fire-safe development have advanced. We are pleased to have reached an agreement with the attorney general that reflects those advances and builds on our shared goal to protect communities and the environment,” said Chris Meredith, a partner in the Guenoc Valley Project.
While the Attorney General’s Office’s action indicates the project can move forward, the two other petitioners, the Center for Biological Diversity and the California Native Plant Society, were not party to the settlement and continue to challenge the project on appeal.
The settlement announced Friday, meant to create a new standard for fire-safe development, comes a year to the month since Lake County Superior Court Judge J. David Markham handed down a ruling setting aside the July 2020 approval by the Board of Supervisors due to errors in environmental review and violation of the California Environmental Quality Act, or CEQA.
The resort and residential community is planned to be built on a 1,415-acre portion of the 16,000-acre Guenoc Ranch property near Middletown, which Lotusland Investment Holdings Inc. acquired in 2016.
In July 2020, the Board of Supervisors approved the project’s first phase, which included 385 residential villas in five subdivisions; five boutique hotels with 127 hotel units and 141 resort residential cottages; 20 campsites; up to 100 workforce housing cohousing units; an outdoor entertainment area, spa and wellness amenities, sports fields, equestrian areas, a new golf course and practice facility, camping area and commercial and retail facilities; agricultural production and support facilities; essential accessory facilities, including back of house facilities; 50 temporary workforce hotel units; emergency response and fire center; a float plane dock; and helipads.
In September 2020, the Center for Biological Diversity and the California Native Plant Society, with the California Attorney General’s Office intervening in support of them, sued the county over the project.
The suit cited myriad issues, including greenhouse gas emissions and building the low-density, luxury resort and housing development in a very high-risk fire hazard severity zone that has burned in 1952, 1953, 1963, 1976, 1980, 1996, 2006, 2014, 2015, 2018 and 2020.
They also raised concerns with the impact of expanding the boundary of existing development into thousands of acres of existing open space and bringing 4,000 new residents to a wildfire-prone area with an existing population of approximately 10,000.
The case was heard in Lake County Superior Court in November 2021, with Judge Markham handing down his decision two months later, at the start of January 2022.
Bonta’s office said the settlement is designed to minimize the risk to current and future Lake County residents and the environment.
The settlement allows the developer to move forward with a smaller, denser version of the project that includes measures to reduce wildfire ignition, evacuation risk, and greenhouse gas emissions generated by the project, contingent on the resolution of other pending litigation challenging the development.
Specifically, the Attorney General’s Office said the settlement requires that the revised project include measures to reduce wildfire ignition risk, including the removal of three development clusters outside the core of the proposed development; various additional road connections to reduce the number of dead-end roads; improved hardscape; and retention of a wildfire expert.
It also requires measures to address greenhouse gas impacts, such as the installation of solar panels and electric vehicle charging equipment at all residential and commercial buildings and the annual purchase of greenhouse gas offset credits, Bonta’s office said.
In addition, under the writ issued by the Lake County Superior Court, the county of Lake also will take additional steps to analyze and address evacuation of the project.
“From the beginning, we have placed the highest importance on safety and sustainability and have worked closely with Lake County and the local community to ensure it is built in a responsible way. Today’s agreement will help this landmark project move forward in delivering increased wildfire safety and greater economic opportunity throughout the region,” Meredith said Friday.
As a result of the settlement, Bonta has filed a request to dismiss the Department of Justice’s appeal against the developers.
A copy of the settlement is published here.
Email Elizabeth Larson atThis email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. . Follow her on Twitter, @ERLarson, or Lake County News, @LakeCoNews.
Attorney General Rob Bonta’s office said Friday’s settlement requires a revised version of the project that has a smaller, higher-density footprint to reduce wildfire risk in an area that has had wildland fires in every decade since the 1950s, along with additional measures to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
“Every year, devastating wildfires burn through California, forcing evacuations, destroying homes, and threatening lives,” said Attorney General Bonta. “Developers have a responsibility to build in a way that recognizes this reality and to make smart decisions at the front end so people's lives are not endangered down the line. Today's settlement is an example of responsible development, demonstrating how developers can reduce both wildfire ignition risks and greenhouse gas impacts at new developments.”
“In the years since the Guenoc Valley Project was originally designed and approved, the science and best practices for fire-safe development have advanced. We are pleased to have reached an agreement with the attorney general that reflects those advances and builds on our shared goal to protect communities and the environment,” said Chris Meredith, a partner in the Guenoc Valley Project.
While the Attorney General’s Office’s action indicates the project can move forward, the two other petitioners, the Center for Biological Diversity and the California Native Plant Society, were not party to the settlement and continue to challenge the project on appeal.
The settlement announced Friday, meant to create a new standard for fire-safe development, comes a year to the month since Lake County Superior Court Judge J. David Markham handed down a ruling setting aside the July 2020 approval by the Board of Supervisors due to errors in environmental review and violation of the California Environmental Quality Act, or CEQA.
The resort and residential community is planned to be built on a 1,415-acre portion of the 16,000-acre Guenoc Ranch property near Middletown, which Lotusland Investment Holdings Inc. acquired in 2016.
In July 2020, the Board of Supervisors approved the project’s first phase, which included 385 residential villas in five subdivisions; five boutique hotels with 127 hotel units and 141 resort residential cottages; 20 campsites; up to 100 workforce housing cohousing units; an outdoor entertainment area, spa and wellness amenities, sports fields, equestrian areas, a new golf course and practice facility, camping area and commercial and retail facilities; agricultural production and support facilities; essential accessory facilities, including back of house facilities; 50 temporary workforce hotel units; emergency response and fire center; a float plane dock; and helipads.
In September 2020, the Center for Biological Diversity and the California Native Plant Society, with the California Attorney General’s Office intervening in support of them, sued the county over the project.
The suit cited myriad issues, including greenhouse gas emissions and building the low-density, luxury resort and housing development in a very high-risk fire hazard severity zone that has burned in 1952, 1953, 1963, 1976, 1980, 1996, 2006, 2014, 2015, 2018 and 2020.
They also raised concerns with the impact of expanding the boundary of existing development into thousands of acres of existing open space and bringing 4,000 new residents to a wildfire-prone area with an existing population of approximately 10,000.
The case was heard in Lake County Superior Court in November 2021, with Judge Markham handing down his decision two months later, at the start of January 2022.
Bonta’s office said the settlement is designed to minimize the risk to current and future Lake County residents and the environment.
The settlement allows the developer to move forward with a smaller, denser version of the project that includes measures to reduce wildfire ignition, evacuation risk, and greenhouse gas emissions generated by the project, contingent on the resolution of other pending litigation challenging the development.
Specifically, the Attorney General’s Office said the settlement requires that the revised project include measures to reduce wildfire ignition risk, including the removal of three development clusters outside the core of the proposed development; various additional road connections to reduce the number of dead-end roads; improved hardscape; and retention of a wildfire expert.
It also requires measures to address greenhouse gas impacts, such as the installation of solar panels and electric vehicle charging equipment at all residential and commercial buildings and the annual purchase of greenhouse gas offset credits, Bonta’s office said.
In addition, under the writ issued by the Lake County Superior Court, the county of Lake also will take additional steps to analyze and address evacuation of the project.
“From the beginning, we have placed the highest importance on safety and sustainability and have worked closely with Lake County and the local community to ensure it is built in a responsible way. Today’s agreement will help this landmark project move forward in delivering increased wildfire safety and greater economic opportunity throughout the region,” Meredith said Friday.
As a result of the settlement, Bonta has filed a request to dismiss the Department of Justice’s appeal against the developers.
A copy of the settlement is published here.
Email Elizabeth Larson at
CLEARLAKE, Calif. — Clearlake Animal Control has dogs waiting to be adopted into new homes.
The City of Clearlake Animal Association also is seeking fosters for the animals waiting to be adopted.
Call the Clearlake Animal Control shelter at 707-273-9440, or emailThis email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. to inquire about adoptions and schedule a visit to the shelter.
Visit Clearlake Animal Control on Facebook or on the city’s website.
The City of Clearlake Animal Association also is seeking fosters for the animals waiting to be adopted.
Call the Clearlake Animal Control shelter at 707-273-9440, or email
Visit Clearlake Animal Control on Facebook or on the city’s website.
Using data from NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite, scientists have identified an Earth-size world, called TOI 700 e, orbiting within the habitable zone of its star – the range of distances where liquid water could occur on a planet’s surface. The world is 95% Earth’s size and likely rocky.
Astronomers previously discovered three planets in this system, called TOI 700 b, c, and d. Planet d also orbits in the habitable zone. But scientists needed an additional year of TESS observations to discover TOI 700 e.
“This is one of only a few systems with multiple, small, habitable-zone planets that we know of,” said Emily Gilbert, a postdoctoral fellow at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California who led the work. “That makes the TOI 700 system an exciting prospect for additional follow up. Planet e is about 10% smaller than planet d, so the system also shows how additional TESS observations help us find smaller and smaller worlds.”
Gilbert presented the result on behalf of her team at the 241st meeting of the American Astronomical Society in Seattle. A paper about the newly discovered planet was accepted by The Astrophysical Journal Letters.
TOI 700 is a small, cool M dwarf star located around 100 light-years away in the southern constellation Dorado. In 2020, Gilbert and others announced the discovery of the Earth-size, habitable-zone planet d, which is on a 37-day orbit, along with two other worlds.
The innermost planet, TOI 700 b, is about 90% Earth’s size and orbits the star every 10 days. TOI 700 c is over 2.5 times bigger than Earth and completes an orbit every 16 days. The planets are probably tidally locked, which means they spin only once per orbit such that one side always faces the star, just as one side of the Moon is always turned toward Earth.
TESS monitors large swaths of the sky, called sectors, for approximately 27 days at a time. These long stares allow the satellite to track changes in stellar brightness caused by a planet crossing in front of its star from our perspective, an event called a transit. The mission used this strategy to observe the southern sky starting in 2018, before turning to the northern sky. In 2020, it returned to the southern sky for additional observations. The extra year of data allowed the team to refine the original planet sizes, which are about 10% smaller than initial calculations.
“If the star was a little closer or the planet a little bigger, we might have been able to spot TOI 700 e in the first year of TESS data,” said Ben Hord, a doctoral candidate at the University of Maryland, College Park and a graduate researcher at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. “But the signal was so faint that we needed the additional year of transit observations to identify it.”
TOI 700 e, which may also be tidally locked, takes 28 days to orbit its star, placing planet e between planets c and d in the so-called optimistic habitable zone.
Scientists define the optimistic habitable zone as the range of distances from a star where liquid surface water could be present at some point in a planet’s history. This area extends to either side of the conservative habitable zone, the range where researchers hypothesize liquid water could exist over most of the planet’s lifetime. TOI 700 d orbits in this region.
Finding other systems with Earth-size worlds in this region helps planetary scientists learn more about the history of our own solar system.
Follow-up study of the TOI 700 system with space- and ground-based observatories is ongoing, Gilbert said, and may yield further insights into this rare system.
“TESS just completed its second year of northern sky observations,” said Allison Youngblood, a research astrophysicist and the TESS deputy project scientist at Goddard. “We’re looking forward to the other exciting discoveries hidden in the mission’s treasure trove of data.”
TESS is a NASA Astrophysics Explorer mission led and operated by Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and managed by NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center. Additional partners include Northrop Grumman, based in Falls Church, Virginia; NASA’s Ames Research Center in California’s Silicon Valley; the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian in Cambridge, Massachusetts; MIT’s Lincoln Laboratory; and the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore. More than a dozen universities, research institutes, and observatories worldwide are participants in the mission.
Jeanette Kazmierczak works for NASA's Goddard Spaceflight Center, Greenbelt, Md.
LAKE COUNTY, Calif. — The Lakeport Police Department is asking for the community’s help in its effort to locate a woman reported missing in the fall.
The Lakeport Police Department said it is investigating the disappearance of Lien Merry Lloyd, 33. Her first name is pronounced “Lee-Ann.”
Lloyd’s mother contacted Lakeport Police on Oct. 6 to file a missing person report on her, telling police that she was last aware of her daughter being in Lakeport in July.
In August and September, the Lakeport Police Department had enforcement contacts with Lloyd.
At the time of the original report Lloyd was entered into the National Missing and Unidentified Persons System, which will trigger a notification to Lakeport Police should any other law enforcement agency run her in the National Crime Information System, which is a standard practice.
Lloyd is a white female, 5 feet 2 inches tall and 130 pounds, with brown hair and brown eyes.
She is reported to have a tattoo of a bird on either her right arm or right ankle.
“We are currently following some leads but have not located Lloyd,” the police department said.
Anyone who may have information on Lloyd’s whereabouts or who she may have been associated with dating back to July of 2022 is asked to contact Officer Katie Morfin by email at
You can also submit information anonymously by texting the words TIP LAKEPORT followed by your message to 888777.
LAKE COUNTY, Calif. — An important new project in the city of Clearlake has received support courtesy of the annual Wine Auction.
On Thursday, the city of Clearlake received a $10,000 donation from the Lake County Wine Alliance to support the Clearlake Youth Center remodel project.
Since taking over the Clearlake Youth Center in October, city staff have been working on an extensive remodel, including replacing kitchen equipment, and replacing flooring, painting, and all-new activity equipment.
Once the Clearlake Youth Center remodel is completed, the creation of such programs like summer and day camps, youth classes, will be held at this facility.
The Clearlake Youth Center will also be available for youth event rentals.
All proceeds from events such as Breakfast with Santa, Bunny Brunch, comedy show fundraiser, and Movies in the Park goes directly to creating and maintaining the youth programs.
A portion of the building also will be used for a daycare for the children of Konocti Unified School District staff and city employees.
“The city is honored to receive these funds from the Lake County Wine Alliance, and we are extremely grateful for the assistance in getting this building and our youth programs up and running again. Our kids need it. A special thanks to Marie Beery for thinking of us and all her support for community programs,” said City Manager Alan Flora.
The check was delivered to city’s Recreation and Events Coordinator Tina Viramontes at the Saw Shop on Thursday.
Weston Seifert, owner of the Saw Shop, is the Lake County restaurant chairperson, and the Saw Shop catered the dinner for the 2022 Wine Auction.