News Articles

The Lake County Board of Supervisors (BOS) Tuesday adopted a resolution supporting the Berryessa Snow Mountain National Conservation Area as it applies to the county.

A representative from Tuleyome, a volunteer nonprofit advocacy organization that aims to protect lands in the western Sacramento Valley and Inner Coastal Range, delivered a presentation on the proposed conservation area.

Sarah Husby-Good, Tuleyome executive director and campaign director, said more than 321,000 acres of federal public lands would be protected by the area.

Work is officially under way to ease the 6.3 miles of twists, turns and traffic congestion known as Jameson Canyon.

A crowd of local legislators â€" and a few protesters â€" gathered Wednesday morning near the roadway to break ground on the Caltrans-led Highway 12-Jameson Canyon Widening Project, which officials say will greatly improve the popular link between Napa County and Highway 80.

Congressman Mike Thompson (D-St. Helena) announced Friday that the Yountville Veterans Home Post Office will remain open despite having been considered last year for closure by the United States Postal Service (USPS).

Last July, the post office was included on a list of approximately 3,700 others being considered for closure by the USPS.

Thompson, who represents the Yountville veterans home, led the effort against its closure.

On any typical day, millions of families, farmers and fishermen in and around the Sacramento-San Joaquin Bay Delta rely on the Delta for their water and livelihoods. Commercial and recreational fishermen have relied on Delta-dependent salmon populations for centuries. The Delta is a vital estuary that supports farmland, fisheries, small businesses and more than 750 plant and wildlife species.

Congressmen Mike Thompson, D-St. Helena, and Chris Gibson, R-N.Y., have introduced legislation to give tax breaks for investing in energy storage systems, Thomspon's office announced Thursday.

Two local congressmen have joined an effort to urge a federal regulator to stop blocking mortgage principal reductions for struggling homeowners.

With the national foreclosure crisis continuing, "a unilateral decision by the Federal Housing Finance Agency to block all forms of principal write-down for loans backed by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac," is hindering the housing and general economic recovery, the letter signed by 110 congressmen said.

The letter calls for an end to a policy blocking modifications at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac that could save taxpayers billions.

The Arcata Fire Protection District has been awarded more than $600,000 in federal grant funds to update the Humboldt County Fire Radio Network.

Congressman Mike Thompson announced Friday that the grant was awarded through the Assistance to Firefighters Grant Program, the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the Department of Homeland Security.

The grant will be used to update mountaintop radio repeaters, the dispatch console in the command center and the infrastructure that supports it.

Tea Party politics and trillion-dollar-plus federal budget deficits have turned this year's transportation bill upside down.

Five-year transportation bills are traditionally bipartisan earmark fests that send hundreds of billions of dollars for highways, bridges, transit and other infrastructure to California and other states.