Dear reader, recent news about the mysterious dog flu has been flooding the internet, newspapers, and Facebook. One veterinarian said there was no need to panic because over the entire United States there have only been about 200 dogs in 14 states who have been diagnosed positive. Dr. Jandrey at UC Davis issued a statement telling pet owners to remain aware and diligent but not to sound the alarm that a pandemic is coming for dogs.
CARSON CITY — Open Enrollment through NevadaHealthLink.com is the one time of year Nevadans can freely enroll or make changes to their health insurance plan without experiencing a qualifying life event. Nevada’s Open Enrollment Period began on November 1 and 14,570 Nevadans have already taken action to actively shop and enroll in plans in the first month.
The Board of Regents in charge of Nevada’s public higher education system voted unanimously on Friday to approve a historically large 11 percent cost-of-living raise for faculty in 2025, a move many faculty have lauded as long overdue. But that raise will be funded in part by an additional 5 percent hike in student registration fees, the largest one-year increase since 2012. That increase would add on to existing planned increases of 1.8 percent in fall 2024 and 2.7 percent in fall 2025.
A Nevada grand jury has indicted the six Republicans — including the chair of the Nevada Republican Party — who falsely pledged Nevada’s electoral votes to Donald Trump following the 2020 election despite President Joe Biden’s victory in the state. Attorney General Aaron Ford, a Democrat, announced the indictments Wednesday of state party chair Michael McDonald, national committeeman Jim DeGraffenreid, Clark County Republican Party chair Jesse Law (who announced plans to run for state Assembly on Wednesday), state party vice chair Jim Hindle III, Shawn Meehan and Eileen Rice.
In a major legal test of a landmark 2019 law that allowed state workers to unionize, a Carson City judge ruled against Nevada’s largest state worker union Thursday, preserving a veto from Gov. Joe Lombardo that scuttled a $25 million appropriation funding a now-2-year-old state worker arbitration agreement.
An advanced geothermal project has begun pumping carbon-free electricity onto the Nevada grid to power Google data centers there, Google announced Nov. 28. Getting electrons onto the grid for the first time is a milestone many new energy companies never reach, said Tim Latimer, CEO and co-founder of Google’s geothermal partner in the project, Houston-based Fervo Energy.
Walker Basin Conservancy announced Tuesday it has acquired additional land and water rights in Smith Valley to benefit Walker Lake.
RENO — To make CPR training among high school students and athletes more effective and save more lives, Dr. Lorrel Toft, a cardiologist and associate professor at the University of Nevada, Reno School of Medicine, is developing interactive films and other digital media with funding from the National Institutes of Health in collaboration with Coram Technologies.
Intermountain Regional Forester Mary Farnsworth selected Jon Stansfield as Forest Supervisor for the Humboldt-Toiyabe National Forest. Stansfield will replace William Dunkelberger, who will retire late December 2023. “We are excited Jon accepted the position to lead the Humboldt-Toiyabe National Forest,” said Farnsworth. “His extensive experience in fire, fuels reduction, and the multiple uses of national forest system land will help the forest continue to succeed in achieving the Forest Service mission.”
Outdoor recreation accounted for more than $6.1 billion of Nevada’s gross domestic product (GDP) in 2022, according to a U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis report released this week.
The Nevada Division of Forestry (NDF) has announced the availability of approximately $2.2 million in funding from two competitive grant programs to assist communities with the implementation of projects that support urban and community forestry goals.
In 2016, Donald Trump’s presidential victory was powered by the support of a constituency historically aligned with the Democratic Party — the working class. In 2020, Joe Biden defeated Trump through an electoral coalition that despite attempted Republican inroads relied heavily on Latino support — particularly in Nevada, where he won 60 percent of the Latino vote.
A Carson City judge has struck down an effort from reproductive rights groups to place a question on the 2024 ballot that aimed to establish a state constitutional right to abortion. District Court Judge James Russell ruled Tuesday that the proposed question — which would have guaranteed a right to “all matters relating to pregnancy,” including birth control, abortion care and prenatal care — violated Nevada law because it was too broad for a single ballot question. He also said the implications of the question were unclear and it would implicitly require a funding source.
Following an early-stage cervical cancer diagnosis, Reno resident Michelle Craig struggled to repay debt accrued from surgery to remove her uterus earlier this year. During public testimony to state officials on Monday, Craig said that she purchased a plan through the state’s health insurance marketplace, which offers coverage for eligible Nevadans not insured by an employer, Medicaid or Medicare (government programs for those with low incomes, a disability or who are 65 or older). She said she faces an array of cost-prohibitive, high-deductible plans that require $9,000 in annual premiums and a $17,000 deductible for her three-person family.
ELY, Nevada — The smell of piñon pine filled the air as the Ghost Train of Old Ely rolled to a stop. Two peaks of jagged limestone towered above the sagebrush and juniper trees that filled the range. Sundown here in the Great Basin Desert reveals some of the darkest skies in the country. Mark Bassett says for more than 20 years his full-time job has been “to put butts in seats” to see this stretch of the desert. He’s the executive director of the Nevada Northern Railway Museum, a national historic landmark, where workers dress in denim overalls and engineer caps to repair old steam engines, conduct them on the historic tracks and preserve railway records dating to the early 1900s.