El Dorado County Local News

A new report from the Schatz Energy Research Center at Cal Poly Humboldt evaluates potential scenarios for electric grid transmission development to support floating offshore wind along the northern coast of California and the southern coast of Oregon.

Salmon populations in the Scott and Shasta rivers have crashed, so state officials are about to restrict irrigation again. And the controversial rules may even become permanent.

The number of nursing students enrolling in high-priced private programs has nearly doubled over the past 10 years as the state’s public universities have stagnated in growth. Private universities charge up to seven times the tuition of public schools for a bachelor’s degree, but nurses say their starting salaries are worth the cost.

Darby Patterson, a local journalist, novelist and bronze sculptor, will soon unveil her latest work: a bronze monument dedicated to the Heroes of the Caldor Fire.

All but two California counties are delaying their implementation of a new law that makes it easier for a court to place someone in involuntary confinement if they can’t care for their own medical needs or personal safety.

The wolf pack discovered this summer in Tulare County will now be called the Yowlumni Pack. The pack was found in the Sequoia National Forest near the Tule River Tribe of California’s reservation.

Water fights have shaped California since its infancy as a state, when its abundance seemed limitless. Now, Californians are being forced to confront limitations, and the state that prides itself on creating the future is now reckoning with its past.

No one remarked on the empty seat at the Dec. 14 El Dorado Hills Community Services District Board of Directors meeting. After members of the public inquired, board Chair Noelle Mattock said General Manager Kevin Loewen’s absence was a “personnel and confidential” matter.

Gov. Gavin Newsom defended his work and that of current or former California leaders like Rep. Nancy Pelosi and Vice President Kamala Harris during an appearance on “Late Night with Seth Meyers.” Newsom suggested conservatives focus unduly on California's failures.

Federal judge David O. Carter has declined to dismiss a lawsuit that could force the Veterans Administration to house veterans experiencing homelessness in the Los Angeles area. Carter’s 41-page ruling could pave the way for a trial in mid-2024.

The California Occupational Safety & Health Standards Board is strengthening protections for stone cutters who have been breathing dangerous silica dust. At least 10 stone cutters have died in the past five years from silicosis.

The fentanyl epidemic has pushed San Francisco to a grim milestone: a new record for overdoses. A total 752 people overdosed in the first 11 months of this year, surpassing 2020’s record number of 726.

California’s projected $68 billion deficit has led to a number of cost-saving measures. Among them, a popular program for state workers to cash in unused vacation time has been paused.

California Attorney General Rob Bonta has formally backed an August motion by two law groups to keep the Temecula Valley Unified School District from being able to notify parents about transgender children or censor instruction about race. A hearing for the motion is scheduled for Jan. 24.

The Exclusive Poultry Inc. agreed to pay $3.8 million in wages, damages and penalties in part for hiring children for dangerous work. The case is one of hundreds federal labor officials investigated last year.

Dr. Rachel Rosenthal is the new Area 6 trustee, representing the west border of the district shared by Nevada and Placer counties. Dr. Rosenthal will serve until the next regularly scheduled election in November 2024.

Two El Dorado County employees were honored at the Chief Probation Officers of California awards ceremony Dec. 7.

UC Davis researchers have sequenced the whitebark pine genome, presenting new opportunities to help the threatened, high-altitude tree, which is particularly imperiled in the Rocky Mountains, Pacific Northwest and northern Sierra Nevada.

The California Department of Fish and Wildlife has conducted the first beaver conservation release in nearly 75 years, working with the Maidu Summit Consortium to release a family of seven beavers into Plumas County.

A group of protesters sat down with interlocked arms on the 110 Freeway near downtown LA on Dec. 13, halting southbound traffic for more than an hour. Multiple people were arrested according to the CHP.