2007 should be remembered as the year of the bear and the year of the casino.
Summer arrived and so did the bears looking for hand-outs. Some blamed the Angora fire for driving the bears into town, but the big mammals started showing up a month before the fire started. They made their way down from the mountains, starting in Topaz Ranch Estates and the Sierra foothills and then marching into Minden and Gardnerville.
The bears became such a nuisance that Douglas County commissioners voted to extend an ordinance requiring those who've had their trash raided multiple times to purchase a bear-proof trash can to the rest of the county outside of Minden and Gardnerville. A distinction the bears didn't recognize.
It was also the year Max Baer Jr. unveiled his plan to build a "Beverly Hillbillies"-themed hotel and casino on the Douglas-Carson line.
Baer's casino was proposed and approved during the year as developers revived an older casino approval, this time on the south side of Sunridge.
The year started out on a difficult note when Army Pfc. Daniel Tingle was injured while on duty in Iraq. Tingle suffered severe damage to his left foot during a mortar attack in Iraq on Jan. 5.
In January the 2008 campaign came to Minden when presidential candidate New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson spoke to Douglas County Democrats. It was Richardson's second campaign stop after announcing he would seek the presidency.
The debate over how Douglas County should grow heated up during the first half of the year as the county held hearings to enact a growth rate. That rate was approved at 2 percent compounded annually.
And then right on cue the bottom fell out of the Valley's real estate market. In July, it was reported that the number of building permits issued for single family homes dropped from 574 to 175 and that existing home sales decreased 33 percent.
An electrical fire closed the Topaz Lodge in April and it was July before the south county casino reopened. A June 1 wildfire struck northern Mono County, threatening Coleville. The fire was contained, but on June 5, high winds sent the flames burning toward the tiny town again. Firefighters got the better of the fire and no major structures were damaged.
Then on June 25, fire in the Angora neighborhood of South Lake Tahoe burned down 200 homes and threatened large portions of the city. Valley residents opened their homes and their hearts to those made homeless by the fire.
In September Nevada was in the spotlight when international adventurer Steve Fossett borrowed an airplane and flew off into the desert.
Fossett took off from a private airfield in southern Lyon County, but the Minden-Tahoe Airport served as headquarters for the search and the media blitz that surrounded it. No trace of the airplane Fossett was flying could be found and two months after he disappeared, his wife sought to have him declared dead.
Then just when things quieted down, an escaped killer was discovered living another life in the Gardnerville Ranchos. Robert Charles Johnson had been kicking around the Sierra for 32 years since he was convicted of shooting a man in Colorado.
In November, Douglas County's K-9 police force brought home awards and brought down a robbery suspect.
Also in November, the county revived an effort to implement a business license, so it could charge businesses a minimum of $100 each for the privilege of conducting the same activity they did for free. The ordinance has not taken effect yet.
