Final Approval from Ione City Council, Wildflower Subdivision Construction Moves Forward

The Wildflower development was first approved by the city in 2007, but only now is final approval and construction moving forward. The subdivision, located on the eastern edge of town, near Foothill Drive and Highway 104, will be the site of hundreds of homes when fully built. Current approval allows just 14 homes to be built for now. Read story here at (http://www.ledger.news/news/final-approval-from-ione-city-council-wildflower-subdivision-construction-moves/article_e64e87d8-1b9d-11e7-b4aa-53c1a665ab3c.html)  Read More

Taking rivers for granted, then seeing water from a different angle

There is a lot of history behind water policy and there are very heated debates about how to balance the need to protect and preserve riparian habitats with humanity’s increasing need. Read more here: http://www.sacbee.com/opinion/california-forum/article142944059.html#storylink=cpy  Read More

Weekly ReCAP of Calaveras Planning and Land Use Issues

Weekly ReCAP for April 14  Read More

Special Board Session re Cannabis Policy 10am Tues

From mymotherlode.com San Andreas, CA — A special session dealing with Calaveras County’s cannabis policy calendared for tomorrow has been bumped back an hour. According to the board agenda made available today, the meeting, which the supervisors at their regular meeting scheduled to begin Tuesday at 9 a.m., will instead commence at 10 in the supervisors chambers (891 Mountain Ranch Road). The lone agenda item will address adopting a resolution... Read More

A story about our water woes – Cadillac Desert

Drought and climate change have forced the West to rethink water management, with some politicians pressing for new dams or major projects like Democratic California Gov. Jerry Brown’s $15 billion proposal to build two 40-foot-wide tunnels to carry water from the state’s wet north to its arid south. But now, as most of those dams and projects hit the half-century mark, many are returning to “Cadillac Desert” and Marc Reisner,... Read More

How Water Gets From the Sierra Nevada Mountains to the Rest of California

So how does all the water from the Sierra Nevada actually travel hundreds of miles through the Bay Area and Central Valley to Southern California? NBC News, April 6  Read More

ATCAA receives $720,000 water-energy grant

The Amador-Tuolumne Community Action Agency (ATCAA) has received a $720,700 grant to install high efficiency dishwashers, washing machines, low flow faucets and shower heads. Read this at Motherlode.com  Read More

California’s huge tree die-off expected to slow after wet winte

“California’s extraordinarily wet winter didn’t just end the drought. It’s likely to mean a turnaround for the state’s dying forests.  After five years of dry weather unleashed unparalleled havoc on trees from Yosemite to the Central Coast — leaving vast stands of pine too parched to fight pests and reducing entire mountainsides to browning wastelands — a forecast by the U.S. Forest Service suggests the die-off will slow this year. ... Read More

California governor: Drought over, conservation must go on

“California Gov. Jerry Brown declared an end to the state’s drought emergency on Friday after powerful storms quenched the state following four extraordinarily dry years that drained reservoirs and wells, devastated forests and farmland and forced millions of people to slash their water use.  The turnaround has been stark. After years of brown fields and cracked earth, monster storms blanketed California’s Sierra Nevada Mountains this winter... Read More

The best use of California’s dead trees: Leave them in the mountains

Science refutes virtually every claim in Jacques Leslie’s ode to logging. Dead trees, which Leslie would have removed from the Sierra Nevada and used for energy, don’t make wildfires worse; in fact, they can slow hot fires moving through the forest canopy. High-severity fire isn’t “catastrophic”; it’s natural and critical to forest regeneration. (“A beneficial way to dispose of the Sierra’s lost trees: Use them for energy,” Opinion,... Read More