Congress extends Lake Tahoe preservation efforts for another decade with 10-year pact

Congressional lawmakers this week passed a 10-year extension of the Lake Tahoe Restoration Act, ensuring hundreds of millions of dollars to protect and preserve the natural landmark over the next decade.

Congress approved the legislation, a late-career centerpiece of California Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s legacy, on Tuesday, carried by a cadre of California and Nevada lawmakers.

“Lake Tahoe is an American treasure. Preserving its beauty and accessibility is a national interest and a national responsibility,” Rep. Kevin Kiley, R-Rocklin, said in House floor remarks supporting the lake legislation broadcast on C-SPAN.

Eighty percent of the Lake Tahoe watershed is under federal ownership, the congressman noted.

Forest management efforts made possible by the act were key to halting the rampaging 2021 Caldor Fire that threatened the Tahoe Basin, Kiley said.

“This work proved crucial in stopping the devastating Caldor Fire from becoming an even more catastrophic event, saving the city of South Lake Tahoe,” Kiley said.

California Sens. Alex Padilla and Laphonza Butler, appointed in 2023 to the seat held by the late San Francisco senator, carried the legislation with Nevada senators Catherine Cortez Masto and Jackie Rosen. Kiley and Rep. John Garamendi, D-Walnut Grove, supported the extension in the House.

The extension through 2034 allows for time to appropriate funding. A $416 million extension in 2016 was set to expire at the end of September, with about $123 million — 29% — of extension funds allocated, said the Tahoe Regional Planning Agency.

Without the extension, program officials said, forest thinning and fuels reduction projects, projects to preserve and improve the clarity of Tahoe’s water and other project would be jeopardized.

Tahoe-area forest managers praised the decision in a statement following the extension’s approval.

“These federal funds will continue to allow work with states, local governments, and other public and private entities to provide for fuel reduction, erosion control, reforestation, watershed restoration, and invasive plant projects on federal and non-federal lands in the Lake Tahoe Basin,” said Rosalie Herrera, a deputy forest supervisor for the U.S. Forest Service’s Lake Tahoe Basin Management Unit, in a statement to the Sierra Sun newspaper.

Congress in 2000 approved an initial $300 million through the original restoration act.

Since 2016, more than 100 projects have been completed or accelerated as a result of restoration act funding, from forest health to watershed restoration and water quality to projects to control aquatic invasive species, according to the planning agency.