Downieville — With spring weather abounding, only Supervisor Leblanc missed the Sierra County Board of Supervisors this past Tuesday, May 2nd. The Department Manager’s portion of the meeting began with Sheriff Fisher updating the Board on an eventful two weeks for the Sheriff’s Office. At the beginning of the period, an eastside deputy needed to deploy his taser while subduing a highly intoxicated individual who was taken into custody and booked at the Plumas County jail. Then, this past Friday, the pursuit of a suspect wanted for domestic violence, starting in Reno and progressing through Truckee, Sierraville, Sattley, and Sierra City, ended with the suspect’s arrest late Friday afternoon in Downieville by the Sierra County Sheriff’s Office (SCSO). The next day, the SCSO, after receiving an alert from the Reno Police Dept. about a vehicle traveling north on US-395 with a kidnap victim aboard, immediately headed to assist in the pursuit. While the kidnapper was fueling up his vehicle at the Shell station in Hallelujah Junction, with his victim having escaped the vehicle and barricading herself inside the gas station there, Reno arrived at the scene and surrounded the vehicle until Sierra County deputies arrived to arrest him for false imprisonment and criminal threat. Then, on Monday night, the SCSO was called in to assist the California Highway Patrol (CHP) and the Plumas County Sheriff’s Office with apprehending a vehicle traveling at high speeds on US- 395 before heading west on CA-70. Eventually, on the west side of Graeagle, the CHP successfully stopped the vehicle using a spike strip. The 19-year-old driver was booked for felony eluding and reportedly ran from the cops “because it was fun.” Meanwhile, preparation for the upcoming summer season was the main topic of discussion for the day. After so much snow this winter, Bryan Davey, Director of Transportation, reported there is a lot of pressure to get Gold Lake Road open, but since there is currently up to 12 feet of snow on the Plumas side of Gold Lake Road and Plumas County doesn’t anticipate being able to remove the snow until possibly mid to late June. So, Davey stated, “it doesn’t do us any good to get our side completely open until they are ready.” Davey also spoke about the snow’s impact upon the bridge construction projects slated for the Lakes Basin. With a snowpack still between six to eight feet in the area, some delay in the start of construction work is certain. However, the road from Packer Lake to Packer Saddle will be a longer-term since the road is not in the County’s jurisdiction for plowing. As a final note, Davey said the county is looking to take a unique approach - hiring a contractor as a temporary employee - to get the work going on the renovation of the Downieville Community Hall. The county is also redesigning some aspects of the building plans to get the budget down a bit and, while it appears a solution is close, the renegotiated contract still needs approval from the USDA. District Rangers Andrew Mischler and Rachel Hutchinson updated the Board on their progress preparing for the summer season. They are onboarding recreation staff and preparing to open campgrounds for the summer. Campgrounds at higher elevations like Jackson Meadows may not open until after the 4th of July, but progress is being made in other campgrounds to open by May 25th. On the timber operations front, Alaska Peak Timber has completed about 50% of the tree removals slated for the Ramshorn campground. Rhonda Grandi from Public Health announced the Community Assessment Projects were completed last week and are now moving towards an implementation plan. Grandi also discussed possible directions regarding the California Department of Public Health California Home Visiting Program expansion funding of $400K for the county. They had declined the funding last year but were allowed to take it this year with the caveat that if the county turned it down again, they would not get this opportunity again. She is carefully evaluating this as it is a large sum of money for this small county and plans to report back to the Board on further action. Next, the Board discussed Supervisor Dryden's draft of a letter to the Friends of Plumas Wilderness (FPW) about their plans for a Feather River Canyons National Monument. After some discussion, concerning the vagueness of the FPW proposal, the Board agreed to coordinate revision the draft for action at the next meeting. Finally, Supervisor Roen
gave an update that the Roadside
Fuels agreement has
been executed as we need to
get contractors aware of potential
contracts that need to
get executed this summer to
take care of the shovel-ready
projects on Yuba 49 as well
as Green Acres.