Engineering

From the Board of Supervisor meeting held on February 4, 2016
Agenda item #18
To approve Contract No 1415-145B Downtown Carson Project CMAR Construction Services for an amount NOT to exceed $8,123,628.85
The Board Voted 3 to 2
Aye - Crowell, Abowd, Bonkowski
Nay - Bagwell, Shirk

It has been said, this 8 million dollar project will enhance the downtown area to better provide residents with a fantastic dining, shopping and recreation venue. This statement is without substantiation. As far as I know, business activity numbers are accrued citywide not by area.

Motorists on I-580 and other freeways approaching Washoe Valley will temporarily see roadside flashing signs prohibiting semi-trucks and other vehicles over nine feet tall between 9 a.m. and 1 p.m. Tuesday, Feb. 16 as the Nevada Department of Transportation tests a new, enhanced wind warning system through the Valley.

Kindergarten students at Empire Elementary School were treated Thursday by a visit from educators with KNPB Channel 5 in Reno. The visit was part of KNPB’s Ready To Learn workshops, which bring special learning topics into classrooms around the Reno-Sparks and Carson City areas.

Thursday's guest educators taught students about the forces of motion, KNPB Ready To Learn Facilitator Joy Foremaster said.

It’s only Thursday, but I expect that you have one eye on the weekend. Super Bowl, the wine walk, and the Carson High Safe Grad 5K are just around the corner. Get a jump on the fun with some karaoke at Jimmy G’s Cigar Bar, line dancing at Beercade, or music at Living the Good Life. Congratulations to the amazing kids waiting to be honored tonight at the Boys and Girls Club Annual Awards Celebration.

THURSDAY:
•*’Pinhole Properties’ exhibit by artist Nancy Raven at the BRIC: 108 E Proctor St (8am-12pm and 1pm-4pm)

Carson High School’s Career and Technical Education program is presenting its Career Expo Thursday, Feb. 18 from 4:30-7 p.m. The Expo is open to the general public as well as all Carson High School students.

Greg Hess, a retired miner, surveyor and Storey County Commissioner will discuss “The Virginia City Water System - An Engineering Marvel” at the Gold Hill Thursday Night Presentation Series at 7:30 p.m. Thursday, Feb. 4 at the Gold Hill Hotel, 1540 Main St., Gold Hill, just one mile south of Virginia City on SR 342.

Hess is a fifth-generation Comstocker, who has been involved in mining, surveying and construction for many years.

With a theme that takes aim at the future — creating the community you want to live in — TEDx Carson City is an all-day event where speakers from a variety of disciplines share their life's work, passions and concepts through thought-provoking and entertaining talks that run between 10 to 15 minutes.

Patrons of the Carson City Library will be seeing new cards in January that feature photos highlighting all the city has to offer.

“Instead of just promoting the library with the cards, we’re promoting the community,” said Library Director Sena Loyd. “It gives us an opportunity to showcase how proud we are to live here.”

Library Assistant Aubrey White talks to teens, from left, Anu Praveen, Seth Taylor and Jessica Artz about using the 3D printer during a Habits of Mind(craft) workshop at the Carson City Library in Carson City, Nev., on Saturday, Jan. 16, 2016. The library hosts two Saturday workshops each month where students use Mindcraft as a fun platform to apply science, technology, engineering, artistic and math skills.

Lance Gilman, Storey County Commissioner and partner in the Tahoe Reno Industrial Center will present “History, Present and Future of the Tahoe Reno Industrial Center at the next Gold Hill Hotel’s Thursday Night Presentation at 7:30 p.m. Jan. 21, 2016.

A $930,000 engineering services contract on the first phase of an eventual $30 million wastewater treatment plant project received unanimous approved Thursday after several questions at Carson City’s ...

Halen Harrison, 10, spent a recent Saturday afternoon building a civilization with his friends. “We’re mining minerals and diamonds and emeralds and stuff,” he said. “I like working with other people like this. It’s exciting.”

Harrison is one of several participants in the Carson City Library’s Habits of Mind (Craft), where youth are invited to play the adventuring video game Minecraft that allows them to collaborate in building structures as well as entire communities.

Carson City experienced two traffic related fatalities in 2015 compared to five in 2014, according to figures released Monday from the Nevada Office of Traffic Safety. Of those, one involved a pedestrian and one was alcohol related. There were not any motorcycle related fatalities in Carson City for the year. In 2014 there were three.

This will be our last column until after the school break. Congratulations to all of our students and staff for surviving finals and finishing up this semester. This column will return on Jan. 10, 2016. I hope everyone has a restful break.

Alum Presents Refugee information
CHS alum, Kaitlin Brush (class of 2004), presented to social studies classes this past month. Her informational presentation focused on the definition of refugees, migrants, and internally displaced persons, and the current refugee crisis in the Middle East and Europe and how different European countries are working to address the growing number of refugees.

Diane McCoy, director of operations for the Boys and Girls Clubs of Western Nevada, shut the doors of the van that was overflowing with bags and cartons of gifts for the Club’s annual Adopt-a-Family Christmas drive, donated by the Ridge Tahoe EAGLES employees group.

She went back inside to thank the donors, and found she had missed several more boxes full of cleaning supplies, pots and pans, dishes, laundry detergent and gift cards for local grocery stores.

A hand-worn robotic device is being developed that will help millions of blind and visually impaired people navigate past movable obstacles or assist in their ability to pre-locate, pre-sense and grasp an object.

Cookies, Cocoa and Cram: Finals are around the corner. Link crew leaders are ready to help you study for your exams. Most semester exams are worth twenty percent of your overall grade. Think you have it all figured out? Have a Link leader check your work.

When the Federal Highway Administration needed to update it’s crucial and complicated 30-year-old formula for fuel consumption and vehicle operating cost predictions, it awarded the project to the University of Nevada, Reno’s renowned Pavements/Materials Program. The results of the study will give federal highway managers more accurate data as they seek to improve the nation’s transportation network.

Glenn Miller is leading the effort in a project at the University of Nevada, Reno to convert roadside gumweed into biofuel, which could help contribute to fuel supplies for the military.

Gil Tapia embodies today’s CNC, or computer numerical control, machine shops: Neat and well groomed, smart and ambitious. From his neatly tucked in CGI polo shirt to his perfectly trimmed hair, he represents the precision and quality his employer is known for.

Welcome to the weekend, Carson City. The temperatures will be brisk, but nothing a scarf and sweater can’t help guard against. The real cold shows up late Sunday and brings with it a good chance for snow. Mary Poppins would advise we bear it with a spoon full of sugar.

The League of American Bicyclists has recognized the University of Nevada, Reno with a bronze level designation as a Bicycle Friendly University. The University joins 127 other colleges and universities across 42 states and Washington, D.C. to receive this designation for 2015.

More than $177 million has been invested through the USDA into rural Nevada communities in the past year, assisting more than 700 families in either helping them buy homes or to make improvements to their properties, and investing more than $28 million for community water and sewer system repairs, officials said Friday.

The Northern Nevada Development Authority announced Wednesday the launch of a new program that is designed to shorten the amount of time it takes for a company to acquire or build a new facility.

The Nevada Certified Site Program as part of their continuing effort to attract more businesses to the Silver State. The program is aimed to provide critical decision making information to business owners and site selectors to allow informed decisions, said NNDA Executive Director Robert Hooper.

More than 125 students were awarded over $150,000 across 90 different scholarships at the Western Nevada College Foundation 16th Annual Scholarship Appreciation and Recognition reception in Carson City. Student award recipients and their families and scholarship donors filled the Carson Nugget ballroom Friday, Oct. 16.

Carson City School District teacher expertise will be on display at the National Science Teacher Association area conference on science education Thursday through Saturday, Oct. 22- 24, at the Reno-Sparks Convention Center.

The tradition of homecoming is once again here at Carson High School. Congratulations to the following students who have been nominated by their senior classmates as queen and king candidates: Tess Corda, Paris Regan, Kassidy Cox, Delaney Fine, Lindy Lehman, Haley Gray, Ikela Lewis, Todd Lani, Asa Carter, Conner Pradere, Joe Nelson, and Eddie Duarte.

The following list of activities will take place for students next week to celebrate homecoming. For more information regarding these events, please contact Ann Britt at abritt@carson.k12.nv.us.

Every 15 minutes, the chimes in the Laxalt Building ring through downtown Carson City, marking the passage of time with a classical tune or a Beatles melody, even the state’s song, “Home Means Nevada.” But it hasn’t always been that way.

AZZ Galvanizing Services, a global provider of steel protection, will build a new plant and fill dozens of jobs at the Tahoe-Reno Industrial Center in Storey County, according to a joint announcement by the Northern Nevada Development Authority and the Economic Development Authority of Western Nevada.

The tradition of homecoming continues at Carson High School the week of Sept. 21-26 with events every day for students and the community to participate. The newest event added to the week of homecoming will be the addition of a family night.