Washington

If you’re spending Labor Day weekend in rural Nevada, beware. Drivers are more than twice as likely to die in a car crash on a rural road than on other roads throughout the state.

I guess it comes down to ideology. This budget mess we are now in really started two years ago when House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and crews refused to presen...

I guess it comes down to ideology. This budget mess we are now in really started two years ago when House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and crews refused to presen...

Helmuth Lehmann and Tim Fasano were caught in the crossfire last night as Mark Amodei and Kate Marshall threw rhetorical punches at one another during an hour-long debate between the four candidates for Nevada’s second congressional district.

CARSON CITY, Nev. — The Silver State has ranked high on the U.S. Chamber of Commerce's recently released "Enterprising States: Recovery and Renewal for the 21st Century" report.
"To be ranked first in export intensity growth and export growth among other Western states like Alaska, California, Hawaii, Oregon and Washington is a real point of pride for our state," said Nevada Gov. Brian Sandoval.

Funding of $4.5 million for two bikeway projects at Lake Tahoe, Nevada has been secured by the Tahoe Transportation District through the Nevada Department of Transportation and the U.S. Department of Transportation, according to a news release. Development of a 3.2 mile segment between Stateline and Round Hill at South Shore — part of an eventual 43 mile route along U.S.

CARSON CITY – Assembly Speaker and announced candidate for Congress John Oceguera acknowledged today that a number of Democrats are seeking seats in the House of Representatives in the 2012 election, and that hopefully any costly primary battles can be avoided.

CARSON CITY – Nevada’s First Lady Kathleen Sandoval is one of only 24 nonprofit leaders in the nation to be selected for the American Express Leadership Academy sponsored in collaboration with the Corporation for National and Community Service (CNCS) and the Center for Creative Leadership (CCL).

Note to people intent on carrying methamphetamine: Speeding in a Corvette through downtown Carson City probably isn't a good idea.

Two people found that out early this morning when a Carson City Sheriff's deputy stopped them near the intersection of Carson and Washington streets for going 41 mph in a 25 mph zone.

CARSON CITY – If a $490,000 grant to plant trees in Clark County public places as part of a federal job-creating stimulus project should be measured by the “greening” of Southern Nevada, then the effort might be considered a modest success.
Thirteen different government and nonprofit entities applied for 1,814 trees for planting at 35 different public areas in Southern Nevada through the grant. A total of 1,541 trees have been provided to the agencies and groups for planting, mostly at schools and parks around the Vegas valley.

Saliman Road remains closed at Robinson Street due to construction of a water transmission line. Detours are marked. The road is expected to remained closed until August 21.

A project to complete a new north-south water transmission line on the east side of Carson City will result in one lane traffic with flagger controls from 7:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. on weekdays for the following roads:

• Damon Road between Tucker Court and South Edmonds Drive
• South Lompa Lane south of Edmonds Drive
• Conte Drive from Valley View Drive to Snyder Avenue

CARSON CITY – Nevada finds itself at the bottom of another economic analysis, this one related to entrepreneurial activity.
The State Entrepreneurship Index, a nationwide analysis and ranking system that shows how states compare in areas of business formation, patents and related activities, shows Nevada dropping a major 40 spots, from 7th in 2008 to 47 in the newest rankings released in July but using mostly 2010 data.

CARSON CITY – Gov. Brian Sandoval today appointed Robert Halstead as executive director of the Agency for Nuclear Projects, the agency responsible for oversight of the proposed Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository. He will start in the job Sept. 19.
Halstead will replace Joe Strolin, who has been serving as acting director since January.

CARSON CITY – Gov. Brian Sandoval had a teleconference with the Nevada press today from Kuwait, where he is staying in the midst of a week-long trip to the Middle East, including visits with Nevada troops at several bases in Iraq.
Sandoval left Monday with the governors of Kentucky, Tennessee and Utah on the trip, and he expects to return this weekend.

CARSON CITY – Nevada Democrat U.S. Senate candidate Byron Georgiou said he is in the race to win it in 2012 despite facing opposition from U.S. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev.

Saliman Road remains closed at Robinson Street due to construction of a water transmission line. Detours are marked. The road is expected to remained closed until August 21.

One lane will be closed in each direction on the Carson City Freeway between the US 50 and Fairview Drive interchanges due to maintenance.

Work will continue on a NDOT project to mill and overlay a section of US 395 from the junction with US 50 (Spooner) in Carson City to south of Waterloo Lane in Gardnerville. There will be nightly lane closures occurring from 8:00 p.m. through 6:00 a.m.

Sen. Dean Heller, R-Nev., has introduced legislation that would require Congress to pass a budget in order to get their paychecks."Clearly Washington is broken," he said. "It's been more than 800 d...

A mother bear and her twin cubs were released into the wilderness Monday afternoon after being captured on West Washington Street. Nevada Department of Wildlife spokesman Chris Healy said a 35-p...

By Jeff Cowen
The Tahoe Regional Planning Agency has added two experienced staff members to key positions who will help keep the agency on course to build the partnerships needed to deliver environmental gains and to raise the focus on efficiency and community engagement.

CARSON CITY – Nevada’s skilled nursing homes avoided the deepest cuts initially proposed by the Sandoval administration to pay for serving Medicaid clients, but the reimbursement rate is still inadequate to cover actual costs, an industry official said today.
The industry is also concerned that any resolution to the federal deficit discussions under way in Washington, DC, could further exacerbate the economic challenges facing it, said Daniel Mathis, chief executive officer of the Nevada Health Care Association.

CARSON CITY – Term limited Assembly Speaker John Oceguera, D-Las Vegas, today announced he will run for Congress in one of four districts that have yet to be finalized in Nevada’s contested redistricting process.
Oceguera, a native fourth-generation Nevadan, said he wants to bring his skills in finding compromise on difficult issues honed in the Nevada Legislature over the past nearly dozen years to the House of Representatives.

Fareed Zakaria is a TV talk show who knows the complex world of economics, the Mideast and international politics. His book "The Post-American World, Release 2.0," paints a world where the United States is no longer the sole superpower. Not that superpowers are measured in size of armies but rather in economic sense.
Zakaria writes well and with a tremendous fund of knowledge, and while he paints a grim picture for the USA, he doesn't write the country off.

The Carson Nugget will donate $100,000 to send a Western Nevada College photo and poetry exhibit about war to Washington, D.C."As part of its Community First initiative, the Nugget will donate $...

CARSON CITY – Thousands of Nevada residents who rely on financial assistance to pay their power bills likely won’t get help this year because of federal funding cuts, a state agency reported today.
Miki Allard, staff specialist with the Division of Welfare and Supportive Services, said federal funding for Nevada’s Energy Assistance Program will amount to only $4 million this year, down from $15.8 million in the fiscal year that just ended June 30.

It's been a couple of weeks since I wrote about our local GOP candidate for Congress Mark Amodei and his politically opportunistic attempt to shed his moderate past and prove he's just as crazy as the other Tea Party people by declaring he would vote against raising the debt ceiling.

Nevada’s jurists are well compensated in comparison to their counterparts in other states, according to a 2011 report by the National Center for State Courts (NCSC).

Frankie Lee Lemos, 40, of Mill Creek, Washington, was arrested Monday morning by a Carson City deputy in Douglas County after he allegedly bit off part of his brother's finger during an argument in a bar.

According to the arrest report, deputies were called to a bar on East Long Street where they met the suspect's brother, minus one part of his left pinky finger. The victim told deputies that his brother had left the bar in a cab after the incident.

CARSON CITY – Nevada ranks 46th among states in the total amount of federal subsidy payments to farmers and ranchers over the past 16 years, with 89 percent receiving no payments at all, according to information from the Washington, DC-based Environmental Working Group.

CARSON CITY – Attorneys for the state Democrat and Republican parties argued their cases Tuesday before the Nevada Supreme Court over whether they should pick their candidates for the special election to fill the vacant 2nd Congressional District seat, or whether it should be a “ballot royale.”

I've said it before and I will keep saying it, that Congressman Paul Ryan's plan is disastrous for seniors, and anyone who votes for it is not a friend of our older population. Make no mistake; his...