News Archive (6192)
Amador County – Amador County is facing potential large court-appointed fees as officials prepare for two murder cases with six defendants, all of which may qualify as special circumstance cases.
General Services Director John Hopkins said “talk about a perfect storm.” He loosely estimated it could cost $2.5 million to appoint special circumstance defenders, and “there is cause for concern.” Estimates are $275,000 to $550,000 each, adding that “when I say projections, they’re guess-timates” but he was “fully confident it’s going to exhaust the public defender’s budget;” then contingencies; and when it affects the General Fund, he will need a four-fifths Supervisors’ vote to spend those funds.
Hopkins on Tuesday said County Auditor Joe Lowe told him to exhaust the two funds then go to the county. The funds are reimbursable from the state. Supervisor Ted Novelli said the state could push out the reimbursement 36 months. Hopkins said May is the cutoff for the next funding cycle.
Supervisor Louis Boitano said the county could figure to try to make a capital case set-aside fund, and there is always the possibility for problems at Mule Creek. Hopkins said it’s been 26 years since the last homicide case with special circumstances, and they are still looking for ways to fund the new cases.
Novelli asked “what if someone had millions in the bank.” Hopkins said rules do not preclude him from having property assessed, and being pubic funds, it would be appropriate to look at defendants’ ability to pay their own defense.
Novelli said he should use extreme caution in paying the bills,” if that means making phone calls, “because once it’s gone, it’s gone.”
Supervisor Chairman John Plasse said they are talking about the cost to prosecute and also the cost to defend the two cases. Hopkins said estimate totals of $2 million to $2.5 million are only until the end of the year, not the end of the trials.
Boitano said in one case, “there were two vehicles and one vehicle got away,” so they could end up with more defendants.
Forster agreed with Lowe that he should exhaust the funds, and then come back to the board. Hopkins said he could give regular reports on the spending, and it will take a lot of time and be a big drain on his department.
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Supporters say plymouth annexation would boost town
Written by Tom
Amador County – Supporters of an annexation bid by the city of Plymouth last week said the town needs the boost that the Zinfandel and Shenandoah Ridge residential developments could bring.
During public comment at the Amador Local Agency Formation Commission meeting last week, (Thursday, Dec. 15), several people spoke in support, including Rick Sanders of Fiddletown, who said he is involved in community service and Plymouth economic development.
Sanders said one past city planner of Plymouth told him that one time, she drove into town and her 7-year-old said: “Mom. What happened?” Sanders said Plymouth needs a shot in the arm, and it basically hasn’t changed since the mines closed.” He said the city should promote and retain its facilities, and there is a “lot of deferred maintenance in town,” because a majority of residents are single, elderly women.
Sanders said the town could grow by 600 people in the next 15 years, and urged LAFCO’s board to approve the annexation and Sphere of Influence amendment. “We’ve got dense growth,” Sanders said. “It would be nice to have some spacious growth,” and approval was the “single best thing you can do for Plymouth.”
Jim Conklin, executive director of the Amador County Business Council said “we strongly support the annexation and sphere of influence amendment,” and “we hope you do it tonight” so the developer can get started on engineering and other work.
Joseph Merten, a Calaveras County resident and Amador County property owner, said his family has been living in the area since before Amador was a county. He said he used to hunt deer with the Greiliches on the Begovich Ranch property that makes up part of Reeder Sutherland project. Merten said he is involved in the projects because he sees it as good for himself, good for Bob Reeder, and good for the city. He said Plymouth will gain financial benefits from the taxable assets created when homes are built.
Reeder said two Community Facilities Districts for the development include fees of $500 a year for public safety and another CFD to fund water and sewer, which is expected to be in place in six months. He said they will set the CFDs, set the tax amount and start collecting taxes.
LAFCO approved the sphere of influence amendment, and continued the meeting to its next regularly scheduled meeting of Jan. 19, to consider the annexation and reorganization application by Plymouth, which includes Reeder’s project areas.
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Amador County – Amador County Supervisors on Tuesday voted to send a letter of support for Assemblywoman Alyson Huber’s bill to try to revise state law to help Amador County and its cities regarding “Basic Aid” funding.
County Administrative Officer Chuck Iley said the Regional Council of Rural Counties (RCRC) was going to ask Sen. Ted Gaines to co-sign the bill, and Mono County’s Assembly member was also going to co-sign the bill, AB-1191, which would return funds that Basic Aid school districts drain from vehicle license fee and gas taxes that go to cities, and which are not replenished by the state.
Supervisor Vice Chairman Louis Boitano reported on the California State Association of Counties convention, saying that CSAC (SEE-SACK) would be backing a constitutional amendment to fund public safety and other programs. He said doing so would cause an increase in the fees that counties must pay, because public funds can’t be used to finance a public measure to promote the constitutional amendment.
Boitano said CSAC gets $3 million annually from the Finance Corporation and that money is used to pay part of counties’ membership fees. He said that money would be used on the constitutional campaign, which they think is going to take about $3 million. He said Amador County’s CSAC fees will go up from $14,000 to $19,000 a year.
Iley said some big counties are getting hundreds of thousands of dollars in dues increases. Boitano said Los Angeles County now pays $327,000 in dues, and will pay $122,000 more.
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Amador County – A Stockton man was charged with burglary and fraudulent use of a bank card after several incidents earlier this month at the Jackson Rancheria Casino.
Amador County Undersheriff Jim Wegner released details of the arrest, saying that Manual Orozco Avalos, 32, of Stockton was arrested on Dec. 10 by Amador County Sheriff’s Deputies on charges of burglary, possession of stolen property and fraudulent use of a fiduciary access card.
On Dec. 6, at about 6:45 p.m., a Sheriff’s Deputy responded to the Jackson Rancheria Casino parking structure to a reported theft. The deputy contacted a Fountain Hills, Arizona resident who “reported that while he was within the casino, someone had stolen nearly $800 worth of miscellaneous power and hand tools from the bed of his pickup truck.”
After reviewing video surveillance, Casino Security “identified the suspect in the theft as a Hispanic male. They also identified the suspect vehicle as a green Ford Focus station wagon. Unfortunately, the suspect and suspect vehicle fled the area before it could be detained.”
Wegner said on Dec. 9, at about 2:05 p.m., a Sheriff’s Deputy responded to the Casino parking structure to another reported theft. A Pine Grove resident “reported that someone had entered her unlocked vehicle and stole a stereo speaker,” and fuel from her vehicle had been stolen.
Casino Security surveillance video “identified that the same Hispanic male suspect and the same green Ford Focus station wagon were involved in this theft.”
At about 9 p.m., Jackson Rancheria Security “reported that the Hispanic male suspect and the green Ford Focus station wagon had returned.” Deputies “contacted the suspect as he was attempting to use an ATM machine within the casino.”
Manual Orozco Avalos admitted to the theft of the speaker and fuel earlier that day, Wegner said. He also admitted to the theft of the tools three days prior. A search of the suspect revealed that he was in possession of a stolen Visa check card belonging to a Sutter Creek resident, and investigation showed he had tried to fraudulently utilize the stolen credit card to withdraw cash. A search of the green Ford Focus revealed the stolen stereo speaker and numerous items of mail stolen from a residence on Ridge Road.
On Dec. 10, Sheriff’s Detectives interviewed Avalos regarding his crimes and stolen property. Based upon that interview, detectives responded to a residence on Acacia Street in Stockton where they recovered the stolen tools.
Amador County Sheriff’s Detectives subsequently returned the stolen property to the owners.
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Sutter Creek girl faces felony DUI charges for injuring passengers in a crash
Written by Tom
Amador County – California Highway Patrol arrested a 17-year-old Sutter Creek girl early Saturday, Dec. 17, who now faces charges of felony “Driving Under the Influence” of alcohol and marijuana after the car she was driving crashed and two of her passengers were hospitalized.
CHP released details of the crash, but withheld the name of the minor driver. At about 6:45 a.m. Saturday, the girl was driving on Ridge Road west of New York Ranch Road, traveling west in a 1997 Honda Civic, with a 19-year-old adult and a 17-year-old juvenile as passengers in the vehicle.
CHP said the driver “claimed to have swerved to miss a deer and lost control of her car and ended up going over an embankment.” The driver suffered minor injuries and complained of pain. The driver and her “passengers were transported to the hospital for injuries.”
The driver “was found to be under the influence of alcohol and marijuana.” Due to her injuries, the driver was released to the hospital for treatment. Also due to the injuries to her passengers, she faces felony DUI charges.
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Sacramento – U.S. Attorney Benjamin B. Wagner announced recently that Sutter Health Association has paid $1.4 million and Catholic Healthcare West paid $875,000 to settle allegations that certain of their affiliate hospitals overcharged the government for infusion therapy and lithotripsy services.
Public information officer Lauren Horwood said the “settlements resolve findings by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Office of Audit Services indicating that the two entities overcharged the federal Medicare program.”
Overcharges came through “duplicate charging for the administration of infusion therapy” and “unbundling packaged infusion therapy services when the individual procedures should have been billed as a group.” Overcharges also occurred through duplicate billing under separate revenue codes.
Horwood said: “Lithotripsy is a medical procedure that uses shock waves to break up stones in the kidney, bladder, or ureter.”
Wagner said Catholic Healthcare West, the fifth largest hospital provider in the country and largest hospital system in California, had 36 affiliate hospitals involved in the matter, in California, Nevada, and Arizona.
Sutter Health Association, an integrated health care delivery system, operating in Hawaii and California, had 25 affiliate hospitals involved in the matter, all in Northern California.
Wagner said his “office will actively pursue recovery of Medicare dollars. This settlement not only recoups overpayments made by Medicare, it helps ensure more accurate billing practices by these hospital systems in the future.”
Horwood said “both healthcare providers cooperated fully with the investigations.”
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Impacts and benefits the topic of Plymouth LAFCO hearing
Written by Tom
Amador County – Developer Bob Reeder of Reeder Sutherland talked about his projects and efforts to diminish impacts on agricultural land last week as Amador County Local Agency Formation Commission discussed his land, subject to a Sphere of Influence Amendment application for the city of Plymouth.
The sphere was amended to include Reeder’s Zinfandel and Shenandoah Ridge residential development projects, and Reeder answered Commissioners’ questions on his agreements, still pending with three landowners.
Jennifer Mason said her parents’ property is 198 acres, and they were worried about traffic ingress and egress on Old Sacramento Road, due to the development. She also worried that a 15-year estimated build-out to 250 homes – about half the project – could cause fire risk to the Mason property if Reeder’s land was not managed in that time.
A representative for the Mason family asked that the decision be delayed until an agreement was reached. The Commission declined. Reeder said the Masons were worried about a right they own to access a spring via Reeder’s property, which was granted by the former property owner. Reeder said the Masons were worried that when a road is built, it might affect the flow of water into the spring, because the road would cross its underground source. He said when the road is built, soils will be tested. He also noted that the “grant deed recorded in 1969” had a provision that if the natural springs are affected by the property owner, then the owner will have to mitigate the impacts by constructing a well for the Masons, for agricultural purposes.
Reeder said he wants to work with the Masons, and “I don’t believe it’s fair to hold up this process.” He had tried to get with them, and first contacted them a year ago.
Amador Water Agency estimated that a water and sewer Community Facilities District will take about six months to put in place, said LAFCO Executive Officer Roseanne Chamberlain, and a fire and police CFD will also be established.
Reeder said regarding his intentions on the project, we are still hopeful that we can start construction in 2013. To do that, they need complete engineering for master plans, improvement plans and a Caltrans permit, all by 2012.
Financially, he said Reeder Sutherland was in a good position. He said: “We have no debt, zero debt on our property in Plymouth,” and “a lot of people in this business went out of business.” He said they did not take out any loans on the properties, and “we’re in a position to wait out this bad economy.”
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Amador County – The Amador County Transportation Commission was awarded nearly $200,000 in highway funding, including $141,000 for the Kennedy Mine Tailing Wheel building project.
ACTC received two allocations from the California Transportation Commission last week, which announced $401 million were being allocated state wide for 39 different projects. ACTC’s two project funding allocations included $57,000 for planning, programming and monitoring, through the State Transportation Improvement Project, with the funds to be used on the Highway 88 Corridor Improvement project.
ACTC also received the allocation of $141,000 for the Kennedy Gold Mine Tailing Wheel build project, which will erect a building similar in shape and size to the original building that housed one of several Kennedy Mine tailing wheels.
CTC in announcing the award last week said the Kennedy Tailing Wheel Building project “enhances the opportunity for all who travel along State Route 49/88 to experience the unique grandeur of the remaining tailing wheel, and the lore of hard rock mining and the area’s rich history.”
Acting Caltrans director Malcolm Dougherty said the 39 projects included $327 million in funding through the Proposition 1B of 2006, a voter-approved transportation bond. The $327 million will fund 10 projects, “including $42 million toward the purchase of 42 new passenger rail cars,” which “will be put into service on all three state-supported Amtrak California routes, the Capitol Corridor, San Joaquin and Pacific Surfliner.”
San Joaquin County received $50 million in funding for phase one of a widening project on State Route 99. It will widen the highway from four to six lanes over 8 miles between Arch Road and SR-120.
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Jackson Rancheria gives 6,300 lbs of food and $400 to Interfaith Foodbank
Written by Tom
Amador County – The Jackson Rancheria Casino &
Hotel continued its support of Amador County Interfaith Food Bank with
the recent gift of another truckload of food and cash. Total donation
this time included 6,573 pounds of food – more than three-and-a-half
tons – plus $400 in cash.
Ron Olivero, Director of Entertainment and Events, for the Casino, presented the delivery to Interfaith Food Bank and its Executive Director Kathleen Harmon. Food Bank volunteers Rick Rogers and Dean Bear helped unload the truck.
Harmon said: “This is so totally awesome. And again, thank you so much for the wonderful commercials,” she added, referring to the Rancheria’s television commercials featuring the food collections and the Food Bank truck.
The donations were the result of food collections by both employees and guests of the Casino in November and were delivered in time for holiday distribution.
Jackson Rancheria Casino & Hotel is located at 12222 New York Ranch Road, in Jackson. For more information, call 800-822-WINN or visit JacksonCasino.com.
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Fire Safe Council seeks stakeholders for Pine Grove Fire Plan
Written by Tom
Amador County – A disappointingly light turnout of two members of the public went to the second workshop of the steering committee of the greater Pine Grove Community Conservation Wildfire Protection Plan.
Amador Fire Safe Council Consultant Jim Simmons said “we’ve educated the steering committee,” after going through what the Plan is, and why it is important, to bring funding to the community. He said “hopefully we will do many more of these outreach group meetings,” because “it is a community-driven process.”
He said if each parcel owner cleared their undergrowth, the 55,000-acre Greater Pine Grove planning area it could be the largest land clearing project ever done without an Environmental Impact Report. He said the area is from just above the Jackson Rancheria, to Highway 26.
Simmons said comprehensive, community-based forest planning and prioritization was not new, but it “was given new and unprecedented impetus with the enactment of the Healthy Forests Restoration Act of 2003.” The Act was the “first meaningful statutory incentives for the U.S. Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management to give consideration to the priorities of local communities as they develop and implement forest management and hazardous fuel reduction projects.”
To take full advantage, a community must first prepare a Community Wildfire Protection Plan, without which the Act limits “Wildland/Urban Interface” (encroachment into forests) to within a half-mile of a community boundary or within one-and-a-half miles when mitigating circumstances exist and create a fire break. With the plan, “you can define that Wildland/Urban Interface,” Simmons said, and “it could be 3 miles deep.”
He said 50 percent of the Act’s funds “must be used within the Wildland/Urban Interface as defined by either a Community Wildfire Protection Plan,” or by the limited definition provided in the Healthy Forest Restoration Act. The Act also “gives priority to projects and treatment areas identified” in a plan “by directing federal agencies to give specific consideration to fuel reduction projects that implement those plans.”
All decision-making members were represented at the meeting, held at the Volcano Communications Tech Center on Church Street in Pine Grove. Simmons said the group will work to get more participation from the community stakeholders, that is, the public, who will help the steering committee develop the plan, and say what it wants in the plan.
He said the federal land management agencies will be advisors, and the Amador Fire Safe Council will be consultants and grantees on the project. The decision makers of the Plan’s contents will be Cal-Fire, Amador County, Amador Fire Protection District, and Lockwood Fire Protection District.
Simmons said collaboration means that people who live in the area have a say.
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