MADERA COUNTY – Motorists should plan for delays over the next two weeks as work continues on Highways 41 and 49 out of Oakhurst. Northwest Paving is currently completing pavement chip seal operations, including the placement of reflectors within the center line as part of a pavement rehabilitation project scheduled to be completed by the end of the month. Portable ...

COARSEGOLD – Sheriff’s deputies responded to a commercial alarm that turned out to be an attempted burglary last night in Yosemite Lakes Park. Law enforcement is looking for a man who attempted to break into a building at the YLP Business Center on Corral Drive between 6 and 7 p.m. on Tuesday. The suspect was wearing a yellow shirt with ...

SIERRA NATIONAL FOREST – The Rough Fire, burning near Hume Lake, is now 30,901 acres with 3 percent containment. Though it is some 50 miles southeast of Eastern Madera County and the Central Sierra, the area continues to be impacted by heavy smoke, especially during the morning hours. On Tuesday afternoon the Rough Fire spotted across the South Fork of ...

MADERA COUNTY – Following are details from the Madera County Sheriff’s Office of reports taken locally during the week of Monday, Aug. 10 through Sunday, Aug 16, 2015. Oakhurst Arrest A deputy was on patrol in the Oakhurst area on Monday, Aug. 10 at 8:16 a.m. when he spotted a subject who was wanted by probation. The deputy arrested the ...

SACRAMENTO – California Department of Public Health (CDPH) Director and State Health Officer Dr. Karen Smith announced that the department has been notified of a presumptive positive case of plague contracted by a recent visitor to California from Georgia. Testing is being conducted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to confirm if this is indeed plague. Prior ...

BASS LAKE – As the main source of water for the residents of Bass Lake stops flowing, residents are being urged to conserve or face dire consequences. Water storage within the Bass Lake Water Company service area has now dropped to critically low levels. As of Tuesday morning, Aug. 18, the available storage is just 33 percent of normal conditions ...

MADERA – The juvenile who allegedly started the Willow Fire that burned over 5,700 acres near North Fork, appeared in Madera Superior Court this morning, and was ordered detained in the Madera County Juvenile Detention Facility while awaiting his next court appearance, scheduled for Aug. 28. The boy is accused of starting the fire on Saturday, July 25, by playing ...

YOSEMITE – Public health officials and Yosemite National Park staff successfully dusted rodent burrows in the Tuolumne Meadows Campground yesterday with the insecticide deltamethrin (DeltaDust), say park officials, after a case of human plague was identified last month. The California Department of Public Health began investigating a case of human plague after a child from Los Angeles County became ill ...

YOSEMITE – The two juveniles killed in Yosemite when they were struck by a tree limb on Aug. 14, have been identified as Justin Lee, 14, of Irvine, Calif., and Dragon Kim, 14, of Tustin, Calif. The accident occurred at approximately 5 a.m. when a limb fell from an oak tree in Upper Pines Campground in Yosemite Valley, striking a tent ...

OAKHURST – A full wildland dispatch was called up for another vegetation fire today near the top of Deadwood, about one-half mile down Road 425B. A call came in just before 4 p.m. about a fire burning approximately 100-yards downslope from the scene of a fire that burned last Thursday. The first engine on scene reported the fire at 100 ...