Opinion

MLTPA talks trails and public lands

November 26, 2010

By Kim Stravers

It was short, this summer – a tease. Skiing in shirtsleeves through June and early July, we sunned ourselves on ridges, looking wistfully at the meadows and mountains beyond and wondering how long it would be before they’d grow wildflowers instead of rotten corn. It was August before the high country melted out enough for most of us to explore it in hiking boots and running shoes, and the aspens went gold within a few short weeks. Then, by November: winter.

I am a rock, I am an island

November 19, 2010

Mammoth Times Editorial
A place for Mammoth High School students to gather during lunch time is a gift worthy of recognition by the entire community. Some students hang out at Vons during their break; others clamber like goats on the rocks in the High School parking lot. Joanne and Byng Hunt just made the goat option more attractive.

The midterm elections on Mammoth TV

October 29, 2010

Perhaps the most noteworthy aspect of this midterm election has been the swarm of negative Nevada TV ads from Tea Party candidate Sharron Angle and incumbent U.S. Democratic Senator Harry Reid.

To state the obvious, we do not live in Nevada. This is not our election. It seems absolutely obscene that we must be subjected to these repetitious, superfluous ads. They turn to gray, vision blurs and mute buttons are pushed.

Which is not to say that we wouldn’t equally be inundated by ads for California governor, among others.

Blame Game in the county schools

October 15, 2010

When the Eastern Sierra Unified School Board learned it was facing a $2.5 million deficit earlier this year, it should not have found that out at a figurative “two minutes to midnight.”

The economic writing has been on the wall for years, now.

But it did, and in three months, it cut dozens of teachers and classified staff, without the time to give the issue the in-depth kind of analysis such a radical move deserves.

Boola Boola - Mammoth Times Editorial

October 1, 2010

Mammoth plays at Bishop tonight in football. That’s about as big as it gets around here. We’re fired up.

The Mammoth/Bishop rivalry has been going on for more than 50 years. Bea Beyer tells us that when she moved from the Bishop schools to Mammoth, she and some students would sleep in the gym to protect their turf from the vandalism that had been going on for years.

There have been effigies hung from freeway overpasses, Clorox poured on a field, toilet papering, etc. It’s been your basic cross-town rivalry, up and down U.S. 395 and we think it’s actually pretty great.

Think Positively- Mammoth Times Editorial

September 27, 2010

The relinquishing of the Beekley Collection by the Mammoth Lakes Foundation strips a vital layer away from Mammoth. The collection has enhanced the ski reputation of the town and ski area. It added considerable cachet to the International Ski History association annual meeting two years ago.

But it’s losing its home in Edison Hall on the campus of Cerro Coso Community College.

'Tis the season for fattening up

September 20, 2010

On our calendar, we see the Millpond Music Festival is coming up this weekend, signaling either the end of summer or the beginning of fall.

Whatever. One thing is for certain: the fall shoulder season is here, and all around us, everyone is fattening up.

The bears are getting more plump, for sure, and as they lumber through the town, they no doubt notice with disheartening alarm that the sloppy visitors are gone and the dumpsters are secure again. Bummer for them, we suppose.

Bike shops are turning into ski shops. Around here, that’s like aspens turning. Time is getting short.

Who you gonna call...Bearbusters?

September 10, 2010

At last Tuesday’s Wildlife Committee meeting, police chief Dan Watson commented that there was a bit of a communications breakdown over Labor Day weekend when it came to bear complaint response.
Watson, who was out of town over the long weekend, said he is going to call for a conference with members of the U.S. Forest Service (who were not present at the wildlife committee meeting), Department of Fish and Game, as well as Mono County and Mammoth Lakes Police Department, to talk about these jurisdictional issues in the Mammoth area.