C a l i f o r n i a ’ s O l d e s t N e w s pa p e r – E s t. 18 51
Volume 169 • Issue 30 | 75¢
mtdemocrat.com
Friday, March 13, 2020
Local couple on Grand Princess wait out quarantine n Cruise passengers ordered
to keep 6 feet of separation Dawn Hodson Staff writer
Several weeks ago Cameron Park residents Bob Jerauld and wife Beverly were off to Hawaii aboard the Grand Princess cruise ship for what they thought would be a luxury voyage. Instead it turned into a close encounter with the coronavirus that has now ended in quarantine at Travis Air Force Base. A trip Bob described as wonderful as the ship traveled to all the Hawaiian Islands, they were scheduled to make a quick stop in Ensenada, Mexico, before heading back to San Francisco. All was going according to plan when
the ship was stopped midway across the Pacific and it was announced there was a possibility the ship may have picked up the coronavirus (COVID-19). So instead of Mexico, the ship headed for San Francisco. Bob said the same ship had previously made a one-week trip down to Mexico and it is suspected that’s where a passenger on the cruise picked up coronavirus. That passenger turned out to be the Placer County resident who later died. Since some of the passengers on the Hawaii trip had previously been on the cruise to Mexico and never left the ship, the concern was that they may have been exposed to the coronavirus as well. In the meantime, quarantine procedures were implemented. Bob said everyone was told to wear a mask when leaving their n
Courtesy photo
Passengers aboard the Grand Princess cruise ship disembark in Oakland before See Coronavirus, page A10 being put in quarantine for 14 days.
Pedestrian killed on Missouri Flat Dylan Svoboda Staff writer
Democrat photos by Kevin Christensen
Property owner Ben Sher, left, explains how as a private landowner he utilized financial assistance from the Environmental Quality Incentives Program to purchase a tractor and masticator to clear part of his ranch in Camino/north Placerville as part of a fire-prevention demonstration Wednesday.
Assistance available to clear private, forested land of fire fuels Vegetation management demonstration highlights available funds Kevin Christensen Staff writer
equipment and maintain the land yourself or to contract out to With peak fire season professionals.” around the corner it’s Sher stressed that time for El Dorado it is in the interest of County residents to get landowners to apply for serious about wildfire EQIP and to be proactive prevention and land in removing dangerous management. wildfire fuel from their Legislation passed in property. 2018 has appropriated “Removing wildfire fuel funds that will help and maintaining your locals do just that. The property will increase the Environmental Quality value of it long-term,” Incentives Program, Sher added. “Doing this offered through the not only protects their local USDA Natural home and trees, but an A tractor with attached masticator chews through brush and trees. Resource Conservation owner’s property value.” Service (NRCS), aims On hand for the twosafety land management. to relieve private landowners of the hour public demonstration and Funds for EQIP came from the financial burden — and that was the information session were local fire2018 Farm Bill or Agricultural focus of a vegetation management safe councils (El Dorado County, Improvement Act that authorized demonstration and information Placerville, Mosquito and Oak Hill), $867 billion for such uses. presentation off Fruitridge Road in Eldorado National Forest staff, Sher led the hands-on demonCamino Wednesday. representatives from SMUD and stration on clearing land of wildfire The two-hour demonstration was conservationists with NRCS. fuel and vegetation with a tractor and held on the 280-acre LBS Ranch Danny Marquis, a NRCS masticator he purchased with help owned by Benjamin Sher and named conservationist for El Dorado County, from the EQIP. for his mother, Linda Bowser Sher. provided specifics on how people can “I want to see the Placerville area The event highlighted assistance apply for assistance through NRCS develop a strategic plan for defending Sher received through EQIP. Owners and how EQIP works. of forested private land can now apply itself against wildfires,” said Sher. for EQIP financial assistance for fire
“EQIP allows for you to invest in
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Don J. Dedinas, 52, of Foothill Farms was killed in Placerville March 4 when he was struck by a truck on Missouri Flat Road. Investigators suspect the man may have been rolling a car tire in a traffic lane of the roadway. The incident occurred at about 7:40 p.m. near Perks Court, just south of Highway 50. Pollock Pines resident Maria Caceres, 73, driving a 2007 Mitsubishi Raider, was traveling north on Missouri Flat and about to merge onto the eastbound Highway 50 onramp when her pickup truck “came upon a pedestrian in the middle of the road,” according to a news release from the Placerville office of the California Highway Patrol. The driver hit the pedestrian head-on, causing fatal injuries. Caceres was unharmed. CHP officers determined that Caceres was not under the influence of drugs or alcohol. The investigation is ongoing. Authorities are looking into whether drug or alcohol impairment of the pedestrian were a factor in the incident.
EDC woman pleads no contest to welfare and fraud charges Democrat staff An El Dorado County woman has pleaded no contest to felony charges of welfare and Maegen Abbott Medi-Cal fraud and was ordered to pay more than $31,000 in restitution to the state. The El Dorado County District Attorney’s Office on April 6, 2018, received a referral from the California Department of Health and Human Services regarding suspected welfare fraud. DA investigators determined that Maegen Abbott had repeatedly provided false information to the Department of Health and Human Services in her application for food stamps, cash aid and Medi-Cal for herself and her children over a n
See Abbott, page A7
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