Contributed by Tia Rancourt | Public Education/Information Officer

Our annual Summer Water Safety Program was a great success at Sand Harbor – Lake Tahoe Nevada State Park. Thank you to our agency partners, IVIGD Recreation Center – Aquatics, for their support with lifeguard and water safety instruction and thank you to Nevada State Park for allowing us to continue our program by moving it to Sand Harbor Beach. We would also like to extend a special thank you to Raley’s at Incline for donating the food for the barbeque lunch. 

This program has been taught for over 27 years, focusing on water, boating and sun safety topics geared towards our 3^rd – 5^th grade elementary school students. It is taught at the end of the school year in hopes that students will keep this life saving information in mind as they head for the beach and lake to recreate over the summer.

We wish all our students, teachers, and faculty a safe and enjoyable summer!

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North Lake Tahoe Partners with the Parasol Tahoe Community Wildfire Resilience with Defensible Space Software

FIRE ASIDE IS A SOFTWARE PLATFORM THAT SUPPORTS FIRE AGENCIES AND FIRE SAFE COUNCILS IN THEIR MISSION TO HELP COMMUNITIES ADAPT TO WILDFIRE 

Incline Village, NV (June 2023) North Lake Tahoe Fire Protection District has implemented Fire Aside’s Defensible Space Evaluation (DSI) software as part of an expanded commitment to improve residents’ wildfire resilience, funded by Parasol Tahoe Community Foundation. 

Parasol Tahoe Community Foundation is a nonprofit public charity that is dedicated to supporting the Tahoe region, and its Tahoe Fire Safe Initiative was created to fund fire prevention strategies in the Tahoe Basin, focusing on people and property. “Fire prevention and safety remains one of the Community Foundation’s top priorities,” says the Community Foundation’s CEO Claudia Andersen. “The Fire Aside software directly addresses the mission of our Tahoe Fire Safe Initiative and is an important way for us to invest in the safety of our community now and into the future.” 

Fire Aside’s Defensible Space Evaluation (DSI) software replaces a previous manual process of forms and checklists with an interactive and easy to use product. Residents are empowered with clear, actionable information that is specific to their property, including photos of vulnerable items and associated risk levels so they can prioritize costs while getting useful education along the way. Fire Agencies can dramatically increase the velocity of evaluations and efficiency, report on resident actions taken, inform compliance for grants while gathering actual structural and vegetation data at the ground level to target areas of highest risk and allocate resources efficiently and with impact. 

North Lake Tahoe Fire Chief, Ryan Sommers, shared “By using Fire Aside DSI software, we can visit more homes, offer more thorough action items to residents and therefore dramatically increase the number of fire resistant homes in the community. We are so grateful to our partners at Parasol Tahoe Community Foundation for their commitment to build a more wildfire resilient community.” 

North Lake Tahoe Fire Protection District plans to ramp up home hardening evaluations this summer. To sign up for a no-cost consultation on home hardening and defensible space, visit https://www.nltfpd.org/defensible-space. 

More About Fire Aside: Fire Aside is a software platform that supports Fire Agencies and Fire Safe Councils in their mission to help communities adapt to wildfire. Fire Aside’s software is currently supporting millions of high risk properties in California & Nevada. 

I love to catch commencement speeches when I can, for oftentimes they hold as much value as the degrees themselves. I’ve delivered a few clunkers myself that were forgettable, and I regret getting those kids off on the wrong foot. But I happened to catch Secretary of Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin’s recent address at the Navel Academy, and it went into my “Memorable” file as unforgettable. Here are a few of the gems…  

“It is great to be here, even though the first person I met said, ‘Beat Army!’ And it is 

indeed an honor to help welcome the next generation of Sailors and Marines to what is the finest Navy that the world has ever known.Graduates, today belongs to your loved ones too. And let’s give them a round of applause.

You chose to come to this Academy. And despite challenges that nobody imagined, you chose to keep coming back, and to keep pushing, and to keep growing. You know, all those choices add up to character. And all those decisions add up to integrity. And all those deeds add up to leadership. 

You seek wisdom. You practice discipline. You treat others with dignity and respect. And you will defend our democracy with honor, courage, and commitment. Graduates, over the years, I’ve learned that leadership is not just what you do, it’s who you are. And your leadership will be at the very heart of America’s work to forge a more open and more peaceful 21st century.

As President Theodore Roosevelt once said, ‘A good Navy is not a provocation to war. It is the surest guaranty of peace.’

Class of 2023: Wherever your career takes you, remind the world of what you stand for, and what America stands for. Honor. Courage. Commitment. Democracy. Liberty. And the rule of law. The lessons of this academy will always steer you true. And when the fog rolls in, let the values that you have learned here be your lighthouse.

Class of 2023: We will all be cheering you on as you make our country stronger, and our democracy deeper, and our world safer. Congratulations. 

May God bless you. May God bless your families. And may God continue to bless the United States of America.”

To my mind, Lloyd Austin is the right man in the right job at the right time. His Z generation graduates are out there on the job right now, and our world is a safer place. I would like to meet the good Secretary and shake his hand. I would also like to ask him why the Marine Corps does not field a football team. I suspect it is because the Marine Corps is all about protecting the country and our allies, and has no time left over for protecting a quarterback. This supposition I hope might elicit a smile from our most capable and good-humored Secretary of Defense, Lloyd Austin.

Audio: https://anchor.fm/mcavoy-layne

Originally published in The Sierra Sun 06/08/2023 

INCLINE VILLAGE, Nev. — Author, retired wildland firefighter and University of Nevada, Reno at Lake Tahoe Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing program graduate, Clare Frank, will read from her book, “Burnt: A Memoir of Fighting Fire” at the University of Nevada, Reno at Lake Tahoe Prim Library this Saturday, June 10, at 1 p.m. 

Following the reading, Frank will engage in conversation with a panel of experts from the Climate and Wildfire Institute to discuss how to better protect and serve the Lake Tahoe region and Sierra Nevada which are increasingly impacted by severe wildfires. Frank will bring her unique perspective as a seasoned firefighter and the first female Chief of Fire Protection for CAL FIRE.

“Now, anyone’s fire is everyone’s fire in the West and beyond,” Frank said. “If we want our future generations to know what a forest is, if we want breathable air and fatality reduction, we need to stop pretending fire is an unpredictable disaster.”

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Originally published in The Tahoe Daily Tribune 06/08/2023, Submitted

INCLINE VILLAGE, Nev. — North Lake Tahoe Fire Protection District has implemented Fire Aside’s Defensible Space Evaluation software as part of an expanded commitment to improve residents’ wildfire resilience, funded by Parasol Tahoe Community Foundation.

Parasol Tahoe Community Foundation is a nonprofit that is dedicated to supporting the Tahoe region, and its Tahoe Fire Safe Initiative was created to fund fire prevention strategies in the Tahoe Basin, focusing on people and property.  

“Fire prevention and safety remains one of the Community Foundation’s top priorities,” said the Community Foundation’s CEO Claudia Andersen. “The Fire Aside software directly addresses the mission of our Tahoe Fire Safe Initiative and is an important way for us to invest in the safety of our community now and into the future.”

READ MORE >

Originally published in The San Francisco Standard 05/30/2023, Written by MaryAnn Jones Thompson 

Sadly, there will be no Truckin’ on the Truckee anytime soon.

The Lake Tahoe summer vacation tradition of floating the Truckee River from Tahoe City to River Ranch will not be happening during June and July—and maybe not even all summer.

The winter snowpack has filled the lake to a point where runoff into rivers and reservoirs would be​ t​​oo great​. Without Tahoe waters being released into the Truckee, there will not be enough water flow​ to allow for safe rafting of the river.

The Truckee River Rafting company announced yesterday that it would not be taking any reservations for June and July bookings but may be able to open by August, depending on water conditions.

READ MORE>