LAKE TAHOE, Nev. – Concerns at the proposed site of the new Barton Hospital at Stateline have escalated with the current storm, leading the Tahoe Regional Planning Agency (TRPA) to issue a “cease and desist” letter to Barton.
Douglas County, Barton, and TRPA staff were at the project site Saturday as heavy rain fell in the Lake Tahoe Basin. The temporary fix to the Best Management Practices (BMPs) completed Friday had failed, causing stormwater runoff to leave the site. As of Saturday night, it appears the water is going into storm drains, but that still needs to be investigated.
“Barton’s updated BMP plan and timeline to mitigate stormwater runoff at the project site did not meet the approved standards of the TRPA,” said Barton’s Director of Marketing and Public Relations Mindi Befu, “Barton began implementing portions of the updated BMP plan prior to the storm, and will implement the additional measures when possible.”
“On February 1, Barton notified the Douglas County water utility division team to let them know about the stormwater runoff, and Barton engineers visited the site to assess the impact of the stormwater. Barton is taking measures to mitigate the stormwater and then will implement a sustainable BMP plan moving forward,” added Befu. “Barton is committed to remediate this issue and ensure an approved plan is put in place to meet all regulatory requirements.”
Barton’s contractors will address the problem immediately, and then once the storm passes, a larger plan will be created. The cease and desist notice is for the BMPs, and not the project itself as no permits have been issued and no work has begun on any buildings.
Neighbors in the area have been expressing their concerns about BMPs for a few months. John Gurner, who lives in the Oliver Park neighborhood, filed a code complaint with Douglas County on Sept. 19, stating the project site needed better water management as the temporary BMPs were going to fail.
“This has been a total failure by TRPA, Douglas County, Barton, and its partners RO Engineering and JM Environmental and must have immediate urgent action today taken to capture this water into the specifically designed sediment catchment pond and stop sediment-filled flooding in the storm drains and the lake,” said Gurner’s letter to TRPA and Douglas County Saturday morning. “This has been happening and complaints filed for this exact issue go back as far as 9/19/24 and gone unaddressed based on any real scientific basis.”
TRPA was unavailable for comment at the time of this story. Once it is received the story will be updated.
