“Officially dead” is the term used to now describe the Municipal Service agreement between the Ione Band of Miwok Indians and the City of Plymouth.  The California Supreme Court has denied an appeal by the Ione Band of Miwok Indians regarding the overturning of the MSA by the Amador County Superior court some time ago. According to Amador County Counsel Martha Shaver this means that the last avenue to resurrect the MSA is now closed.

A controversial bill that would have required mandatory spaying and neutering of most California cats and dogs was shelved last Monday. Assemblyman Lloyd Levine, D-Van Nuys, pulled AB 1634 at a hearing of the state Senate Local Government Committee at the Capitol. "It pains me to have to tell everybody this, but I've been reading the handwriting on the wall and it doesn't look like we have the votes," Levine said as he announced his decision on KCRA.

Fast response by local fire crews set the minds of a residents in the China Graveyard Road area at ease. A vegetation fire was reported at 1:56 pm as spreading on a a hill. The fire was moving from the edge of a residence’s property down the hill towards the Kennedy Mine Apartments. Residents watched to be sure they didn’t need to evacuate as the fire creeped towards the apartments. Crews arrived on scene and went to work immediately and a short time later the fire was out. Fire crews remained on scene mopping up hot spots. It appears as though the fire was started by a tractor being used to clear weeds on a property. 

Last night Amador County residents in the Jackson and Sutter Creek areas lost power for the third day in a row as PG&E announced yesterday that the power would be shut off between 11pm and 3am while they worked on the transformer that blew on Monday due to heat.  PG&E spokesperson Nicole Tam said the planned outage was to allow PG&E crews time perform replacement work to increase electric viability. We will have to approx. 1600 customer in Jackson and sc offline so interruption of service. Tam wanted to be sure to express to local residents that PG&E understands that this poses as an inconvenience for many, “but in order for crews to safely do the work they have to take the customers offline.” She continued by saying that they chose to do the work after normal business hours as to not be more of a hindrance.  Customers calls went out at 3pm and then again at 7pm informing customers that the power would be out and allowing them the option of a morning wake up call since alarm clocks would likely not be reset when the power was turned at 3am. Tam said the service is not a regular one and is used only when there are planned outages. Again Tam said, “We want to express our appreciation for our customers patience.”

On Tuesday the discussion surrounding the Bureau of Land Management’s Sierra Proposed Resource Management Plan seemed to be an item of contention for some of the Supervisors as it was learned that the County had missed the deadline to comment on the plan by a day. The plan provides direction and guidance for more than 230,000 acres of public land located primarily in nine central California counties including Amador, Calaveras, El Dorado, Mariposa, Nevada, Placer, Sacramento, Tuolumne and Yuba counties.

The next item to appear before the board was part history lesson as the board learned about a long time family name that is not very well known in Amador County.  A proposal was received form the United States Board on Geographic Names to name an unnamed Summit in Amador County, Trembath Mountain after the Trembath family who migrated here form England in the 1800’s. The summit is located approximately 5 miles north-northeast of Amador City. Rick Sanders, a descendent of the Trembaths, reported to the board that he is requesting to name the mountain in honor of his ancestors Benedict and Ann Trembath who immigrated to Amador City in the 1870’s.

The Amador Fire Safe Council has announced they are extending the entry deadline for their defensible space contest to close of business July 16, 2007.  The Contest is open to all Amador County residents and will honor those homeowners who are an excellent example of defensible space requirements.  Criteria will be the law, PRC 4291.  See our website at www.amadorfiresafe.org or call the office at 296-6220 for entry details.  Winners of the contest will receive a gift certificate from the Ridge Road Nursery and a yard sign proclaiming them to be "Fire Safe!"

A report released this week from the California State Department of Finance has some interesting details regarding the make up of the population of California, including details on mortality, fertility and migration rates of the ethnic groups that make up the GoldenState. The report projects California's population will reach almost 60 million people by 2050, adding over 25 million since the 2000 decennial census, according to long-range population projections released today by the California Department of Finance. From less than 34 million Californians counted in that census, the new data series shows that the state will pass the 40 million mark in 2012, and exceed 50 million by 2032.

A new petition for signatures to put a new ballot measure on February’s Primary election ballot may be coming to a store front near you. The subject of the proposed initiative- Eminent Domain. California Secretary of State Debra Bowen announced on Friday that the proponents of the new initiative may begin collecting petition signatures for their measure. The Attorney General has prepared the legal title and summary which is required to appear on initiative petitions.

Yesterday’s big news was the electrical power outage that turned the air conditioning off to about 4462 customers. Initially the 4462 customers, both commercial and residential, went dark around 4 pm after a major PG&E transformer exploded. The outages effected local business, homes and meetings with the City of Sutter Creek having to postpone their Planning Commission meeting. The transformer explosion, located in the Martell area just off of Highway 49, is thought to be heat related. As PG&E crews responded the call lines to the utility were swamped with local residents asking about restoration. By about 8 pm 1100 or so customers had their power restored by PG&E crews that were able to shift the power grid around slightly. The remainder of the customers saw their power restored by about 1 am last night. According to PG&E spokesman JD Guidi as permanent repairs are made through out the day today customers will be taken off line, for a few minutes at a time, as tests are conducted. This will occur through out the day today but these outages will be planned, temporary, short in duration, and part of the overall fix.