(AP) - The parents of a Lake Tahoe-area firefighter killed while battling a California wildfire in 2015 are raising money to install memorial signs on a stretch of highway named after him.
Michael Hallenbeck was struck by a falling tree during the fire that broke out in August 2015 south of the Echo Summit mountain pass on U.S. Highway 50 south of Tahoe.
The California Legislature approved a resolution last year naming a portion of the highway after the 21-year-old Shingle Springs man who fought fires for the Forest Service also worked as a ski-lift operator at Sierra-at-Tahoe.
His mother, Toni Hallenbeck, says they hope to raise $9,000 for memorial markers. She says the signs would recognize the ultimate price her son paid in defending communities around the Lake Tahoe Basin.
A fundraising site has been set up at http://www.tahoefund.org
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