Caldor fire marches closer to South Lake Tahoe as city evacuates, small towns threatened
HAYLEY SMITH, CHRIS MEGERIAN, ALEX WIGGLESWORTH and GREGORY YEE, LA Times: "Flames from the Caldor fire moved closer to South Lake Tahoe on Monday night as the entire area was placed under a mandatory evacuation order and firefighters battled to save small mountain hamlets.
Intense winds pushed the fire toward the Lake Tahoe Basin, as firefighters fought to protect ski resorts, small towns and landmarks in its path. Officials had hoped to keep the flames out of the region, but conditions deteriorated as the day wore on.
In an evening update, officials confirmed that the fire moved into Christmas Valley and Meyers, a town about 7 miles south of South Lake Tahoe. Reports also emerged that the fire was sweeping through a Tahoe-area ski resort, the Sierra-at-Tahoe, off U.S. 50 in Twin Bridges. It’s unclear how many structures were destroyed."
As Caldor Fire closes in on Lake Tahoe, crews scramble to prevent worst-case scenario
LA Times. HAYLEY SMITH and ALEX WIGGLESWORTH: "It was a moment officials hoped would never come: The mass evacuation of South Lake Tahoe in the face of a rapidly approaching wildfire.
Even though the Caldor fire had been creeping ever closer to the famed resort town for days, few residents thought it would actually arrive. Most spoke reverently of a towering granite ridge a few miles away that they believed would prevent flames from dropping down into the Lake Tahoe Basin.
By Monday morning however, the wind-whipped fire had made alarming progress, raising the specter of an uncontrolled urban fire and sending residents fleeing under mandatory evacuation orders."
All national forests in California closed to visitors. No Labor Day camping, hiking, biking
Sacramento Bee, RYAN SABALOW: "With fires raging across the state, the USDA Forest Service is closing all 20 million acres of California’s national forests to public access for two weeks beginning Tuesday.
In an announcement Monday, the Forest Service said the closure will extend through at least Sept. 17.
“I have made the difficult decision to temporarily close all (California) National Forests in order to better provide public and firefighter safety due to extreme fire conditions throughout the state, and strained firefighting resources throughout the country,” California’s regional forester, Jennifer M. Eberlien, said in an email to employees obtained by The Sacramento Bee."
SEE MORE WILDFIRE NEWS --- See photos of evacuations and damage as Caldor Fire burns toward SLT -- Sacramento Bee, PAUL KITAGAKI/SARA NEVIS/NATHANIEL LEVINE; The fires are different this year - bigger and faster. What's fueling the change? -- JULIE JOHNSON, Chronicle
Rural California counties tighten mask rules as COVID patients flood hospitals
Sacramento Bee, MICHAEL MCGOUGH: "Rural parts of Northern California are watching a hospital crisis play out in front of them — and all around them.
Several sparsely populated counties northSac of Sacramento and the Bay Area are in the midst of their worst COVID-19 surges of the entire 18-month pandemic, with new cases, hospitalizations and deaths accumulating at their fastest rates yet in some areas.
And with infections still spiking and more counties’ hospitals hitting capacity, rural Californians are increasingly finding themselves without alternative options for emergency care."
READ MORE VACCINE NEWS --- Should California expand its COVID vaccine mandates? Here are 3 industries that could be next -- Sacramento Bee, JEONG PARK
California Democrats drop plan to require COVID vaccines to work, go to most public places
Sacramento Bee, HANNAH WILEY: "California Democrats are postponing a plan to require people to prove they’re fully vaccinated against COVID-19 to enter indoor businesses and require workers to either get the shots or be regularly tested.
Assemblywoman Buffy Wicks, D-Oakland, confirmed to The Sacramento Bee on Monday that the idea is dead for 2021. She was among the lawmakers who floated language for the concept last week, but did not formally introduce legislation to carry it out.
Lawmakers had less than two weeks to consider the bill in committee hearings and approve it by a two-thirds majority during floor votes before an end-of-session Sept. 10 deadline."
Former neuroscientist pleads guilty to San Diego-area bank robbery spree
CITY NEWS SERVICE, via Union-Tribune: "A former Marine sergeant and postdoctoral neuroscience researcher at UC San Diego pleaded guilty Monday to carrying out a series of robberies at San Diego-area credit unions.
Karl William Doron, 45, pleaded guilty to nearly a dozen robbery and attempted robbery counts stemming from a string of bank heists he committed between Dec. 28, 2018 and March 5, 2019 in various parts of San Diego and Chula Vista.
Doron’s sentencing is scheduled for Oct. 27 in San Diego Superior Court."
Kevin Faulconer has the resume. But can a 'vanilla' Republican win the California recall race?
LA Times, LAURA J NELSON: "
For a guy known for his collegiality, Kevin Faulconer came out swinging at the last California recall debate.
\Faulconer said conservative talk radio show host Larry Elder does not have “the character, the judgment, the skill set or the experience to be governor.”
Democrat Kevin Paffrath, a 29-year-old YouTuber who has never held elected office, said Faulconer, would need “on-the-job training,” Faulconer said."
Sutter and its medical foundations to pay out $90 million to settle Medicare fraud suit
Sacramento Bee, CATHIE ANDERSON: "Sacramento-based Sutter Health will pay out $90 million to settle allegations that its staff and affiliated doctors lied to Medicare about the severity of patient conditions to jack up their payments, the U.S. Department of Justice announced Monday.
“Today’s settlement exemplifies our commitment to fighting fraud in the Medicare program,” said Acting U.S. Attorney Stephanie M. Hinds for the Northern District of California. “Health care providers who flout the law need to know that my office will hold accountable those who pad their bottom line at taxpayer expense.”
In a statement issued Monday, Sutter leaders said: “Today’s agreements bring closure to a long-running dispute, allowing Sutter to avoid the uncertainty and further expense of protracted litigation, and enabling a constructive relationship with the government.”"
Sacramento school district confirms 24 students are still stranded in Afghanistan
Sacramento Bee, SAWSAN MORRAR/JASON POHL: "At least 24 Sacramento-area students are confirmed to be stranded in Afghanistan as turmoil continues in Kabul, according to school officials.
San Juan Unified school district staff said 24 students, down from from the initial estimate of 150 students, had not returned to campuses since the start of the 2021-2022 school year.
After reading The Sacramento Bee’s story about two students stranded overseas, Sacramento Congressman Ami Bera’s office contacted San Juan Unified and is working with the district to bring students back safely."
Will Gavin Newsom release Robert Kennedy’s killer?
DAN WALTERS, CalMatters: "Gavin Newsom was just a toddler in 1968 when Robert Kennedy won California’s June 5 presidential primary, addressed his cheering supporters in Los Angeles’ Ambassador Hotel and then was murdered as he walked through the hotel’s kitchen en route to a private celebration.
Fifty-three years later and now California’s governor, Newsom may decide whether Kennedy’s murderer, Sirhan Sirhan, will be released from prison on parole. A two-member state parole board panel last week recommended Sirhan’s release, but ultimately the governor has the power to allow or block parole.
It would be both a personal decision and a political one. Newsom counts Kennedy as a personal hero and has his portrait on the wall of his office. However, he also considers himself to be a criminal justice reformer who has declared a moratorium on executions and has sanctioned parole for some vicious killers."
Bills to increase housing density in California head to Newsom
The Chronicle, ALEXEI KOSEFF: "Gov. Gavin Newsom will decide whether to loosen zoning rules in California to allow duplexes and lot splitting in residential neighborhoods across the state.
The California Legislature sent the “light density” proposal to Newsom on Monday, a year after a similar measure was tripped up at the last minute by political infighting, along with another measure that could clear the way for more small apartment buildings in urban areas.
The governor now has about a month to either sign or veto the bills, part of a housing package shepherded by the state Senate leader that has generated sustained opposition from local governments and neighborhood associations, which object to losing some degree of control over how their communities develop."
OLGA GRIGORYANTS, LA Daily News: "Environmental justice groups gathered Monday, Aug. 30, in front of the California EPA building in Sacramento, demanding cleanup of contaminated sites around the state, including the Santa Susana Field Lab tucked away in the hills above the San Fernando and Simi valleys.
Organizers of the demonstration said the California Environmental Protection Agency and Department of Toxic Substances Control, the regulatory agency overseeing the investigation and cleanup of contaminated soil and groundwater at the SSFL, failed to hold polluters accountable, allowing them to walk away from cleaning contaminated sites often located in low-income and working-class communities.
Rally goers held signs that read “Six decades later still waiting for 100%% cleanup of SSFL” and “We demand complete cleanup of toxic and radioactive waste” while chanting “No more!”
ROBERT SALONGA and NATE GARTRELL, Mercury News: "In another blow to the case built on a landmark Santa Clara County concealed-gun permit corruption indictment, California prosecutors dropped charges Monday against a political fundraiser who had been accused of bribery and participation in a criminal conspiracy.
A prosecutor for the state Attorney General’s office told a Superior Court judge Monday morning he didn’t believe there was enough evidence to successfully prosecute Christopher Schumb, who was accused of helping broker a pay-to-play scheme that curried donations from people hoping to be issued concealed-carry permits from the sheriff’s office.
Schumb’s attorney reiterated the same sentiment he has voiced since his client was indicted last summer."
AP's ROBERT BURNS and LOLITA C BALDOR: "The United States has completed its withdrawal from Afghanistan, ending America’s longest war and closing a chapter in military history likely to be remembered for colossal failures, unfulfilled promises and a frantic final exit that cost the lives of more than 180 Afghans and 13 U.S. service members, some barely older than the war.
Hours before President Joe Biden's Tuesday deadline for shutting down a final airlift, and thus ending the U.S. war, Air Force transport planes carried a remaining contingent of troops from Kabul airport late Monday. Thousands of troops had spent a harrowing two weeks protecting the airlift of tens of thousands of Afghans, Americans and others seeking to escape a country once again ruled by Taliban militants.
In announcing the completion of the evacuation and war effort. Gen. Frank McKenzie, head of U.S. Central Command, said the last planes took off from Kabul airport at 3:29 p.m. Washington time, or one minute before midnight in Kabul. He said some American citizens, likely numbering in “the very low hundreds,” were left behind, and that he believes they will still be able to leave the country."