Save the Redwoods/Boycott the Gap
ACTION ALERT
Posted by Mary Bull (chalicenew@earthlink.net)
Friday, January 8, 1999
Forest Defenders Across the Land!
Those of you on the EPIC (Headwaters) listserve (contact epic@igc.org to get on this excellent organization's listserve!) received an update and call-to-action yesterday afternoon (this alert is appended to the end of this email).
Because of the effort it takes to write comments to CDF, we recommend that you write a two-pronged letter that addresses both the Headwaters issues (as outlined in the EPIC call-to-action) and the Mendocino issues (as outlined below) to Mary Nichols, the new Secretary for Resources, and cc both CDF regional offices. Following is a sample letter (also attached to this email as a simple text file and Word for Windows 7.0 doc).
PLEASE, fax or snail-mail this letter or a similar one ASAP--It WILL make a difference!!!
Many, many thanks!
Mary Bull
Save the Redwoods/Boycott the Gap Campaign, SF
Sample letter:
Mary Nichols
Secretary for Resources
California Resources Agency
1416 Ninth Street - Room 1311
Sacramento, CA 95814
Transition Team fax: (916) 322-8864
January 9, 1999
Dear Mary Nichols,
I am writing you to let you know of my deep concern over the welfare of California's redwood forests and their dependent fish and wildlife. I am particularly concerned about Pacific Lumber's logging of old growth forests in Humboldt County, and the continued liquidation of Mendocino County forest lands, including Louisiana Pacific's severely overcut forests (now owned by the Fisher family of the Gap).
With regard to Pacific Lumber in Humboldt County, I strongly oppose the following:
-The renewal of P-L's logging license
-The fast-tracking of any P-L THPs, including the 40 plans that P-L wants approved prior to the approval of the HCP/SYP.
Pacific Lumber has proven itself to be particularly defiant of the law, and cannot be trusted to log in a responsible and lawful manner nor to protect endangered species.
With regard Mendocino County logging: CDF has already approved dozens of high-impact logging plans for Louisiana Pacific and its successor, the Fisher family (Mendocino Redwood Company), on severely depleted forest lands that were raked over by L-P during two decades of liquidation logging. There is almost no old growth left in these forests, and forest-dependent species such as the coho salmon are facing extinction. Georgia Pacific lands are similarly depleted and under assault. The Secretary for Resources has an obligation to do the following:
--Apprise the public truthfully of the severe depletion of the timber resource that has occurred on Louisiana Pacific and other forest lands in Mendocino County, and of the failure of the California Forest Practice Rules to prevent liquidation logging and to protect endangered species.
--Ensure the survival and recovery of the many endangered species that are at extreme risk on these forest lands, especially coho salmon and steelhead.
--Disapprove any additional logging plans submitted by MRC or any other timber company that cannot demonstrate long-term sustainability of the timber resource and forest-dependent species.
--Block approval of the high-impact THPs that are as yet unapproved, such as THP 1-97-445 MEN (a Fisher/MRC plan) and 1-98-266 MEN (a Redwood Empire plan)--in Elk Creek on the south Mendocino coast--which together constitute over 1,000 acres of high-impact logging (including more than 400 acres of clearcutting) surrounding the only Coho salmon ("10 or fewer" fish) found in a 150-square mile region!
--Support your agencies, such as the Regional Water Quality Control Board when they non-concur on THPs, as they recently did on two Georgia Pacific logging plans in Bear Haven Creek (tributary to Ten Mile River, near Fort Bragg), THPs 1-98-418 MEN and 1-98-257 MEN.
I strongly urge you and the new administration to take these actions for the environment and a sustainable future!
Sincerely,
Mary Bull
252 Frederick Street
San Francisco, CA 94117
CC:
Dean Lucke, Forest Practice (Humboldt), California Department of Forestry & Fire Protection, 1416 Ninth Street, Sacramento, CA 95814, Phone: (916) 653-4298, Fax: (916) 653-8957
Rodger Thompson, Forest Practice (Mendocino), P.O. Box 670, Santa Rosa, CA 95402, Phone: (707) 576-2959, Fax (707) 576-2608
EPIC newsletter:
+++ E P I C U P D A T E A N D A C T I O N A L E R T ! ! +++
January 8, 1999
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
CONTENTS:
1) AGENCIES TAKE OVER HEADWATERS HABITAT PLAN
2) PL DEMANDS EXPEDITED APPROVAL OF 40 LOGGING PLANS
3) A LICENSE RENEWED? WELL, NOT QUITE YET...
4) ACTION! A STRONG MESSAGE TO THE DEPARTMENT OF FORESTRY
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
++ MORE TWISTS AND TURNS FOR THE HEADWATERS DEAL ++
Like a villain in a low-grade horror film, the Headwaters Deal simply refuses to die. Its longevity is no surprise given the array of business and political heavyweights that gather around to resuscitate it whenever the going gets tough.
Just before the end of the year, a three-week high-level negotiating session hosted once again by California Senator Dianne Feinstein produced another Headwaters "announcement" on New Year's Eve. The newspapers dutifully reported that something had happened, but what, exactly, remained unclear.
The announcement was indeed confusing. Department of Interior officials, accompanied by Feinstein, issued statements saying that they were going to go ahead with writing a final Habitat Conservation Plan/Sustained Yield Plan (HCP/SYP) for Pacific Lumber Company, even though the company had not yet agreed to many of the provisions of the plan. State and federal agencies had recommended changes to the plan following the receipt of tremendous public comment on the plan and the rest of the Headwaters deal, but Maxxam/Pacific Lumber balked at incorporating many of the changes into the plan. A Congressional deadline of March 1, 1999 for expenditure of federal funding associated with the deal now looms, and federal officials apparently had little choice but to proceed with writing the final documents associated with the deal.
This is confusing because an HCP, under the Endangered Species Act, is basically the centerpiece of an application for a permit to legally kill endangered species and destroy otherwise protected habitat. HCPs were designed to be written by private landowners and other entities, then presented to federal wildlife agencies for approval or denial.
In this case, the HCP/SYP written by Pacific Lumber was clearly unacceptable; the tremendous volume and scientific credibility of public comment demonstrated that fact beyond any doubt. However, because of the immense political pressure to complete the proposed Headwaters purchase, federal agency officials refused to deny the plan even as Pacific Lumber refused to change it. Instead, they chose to take matters into their own hands by writing a plan that they felt they could approve.
This decision created the unprecedented, absurd, and legally questionable spectacle of a permitting agency writing an application for a permit applicant, then waiting for the applicant to make up its mind about whether or not to accept the permit conditions. By any account, this is entirely backwards.
Details of the HCP/SYP now being written are sketchy. According to Department of Interior officials and agency staff, the plan does make a few improvements based primarily on the California Legislature's conditions for spending state money on the Headwaters transaction. These generally account for larger buffer zones along streams where logging is prohibited pending a site-specific "watershed analysis" process, to be conducted over the next three years.
Some further changes based on public comment, including 30-foot buffer zones along small, seasonal streams, will reportedly be incorporated into the plan. On balance, however, much of the public outcry over the Headwaters deal and a good portion of the sound scientific analysis of the HCP/SYP were simply, as usual, ignored. Under this deal, thousands of acres of virgin and residual ancient forest will still be liquidated just as quickly as Maxxam can cut. Given this reality, the ecological price of the Headwaters deal is still far, far too high.
++ FORTY PLANS AND OTHER DEMANDS ++
During the waning days of former Governor Pete Wilson's administration, Maxxam/Pacific Lumber demanded fast-track approval of 40 logging plans (Timber Harvest Plans, or THPs) currently under review by the California Department of Forestry (CDF). This demand was presented as a condition for agreeing to the changes recommended by state and federal biologists in the HCP/SYP.
While such a quid pro quo seems on the surface illogical, Maxxam has an interest in getting these plans approved prior to the time that the HCP/SYP takes effect (if, in fact, it ever does). Whatever its weaknesses, the HCP/SYP contains provisions for protecting streams that are far stronger than those outlined in the 40 logging plans, many of which date back several years. Furthermore, a number of these plans are extremely destructive even by Pacific Lumber standards, and have been held up by agency concerns over their impacts to water quality, fisheries, wildlife and other public trust values.
The plans include THP 1-98-109, in the already devastated Freshwater Creek area north of Headwaters Forest, which calls for construction of nearly six miles of new road. Other plans would log portions of Bear Creek, devastated by a debris slide during the winter of 1996/97, and Grizzly Creek, where Earth First! Activist David "Gypsy" Chain lost his life last September. Most of the plans contain residual ancient forest, and many border salmon spawning streams or their tributaries.
If CDF goes through with approving these plans, they will be short-circuiting the public process mandated by the California Environmental Quality Act and quite possibly exposing Pacific Lumber to liability under the Endangered Species Act. This will be a major test for Governor Gray Davis and his newly appointed Resources Secretary, Mary Nichols. Unfortunately, most of Pete Wilson's old guard still remains in control of CDF. Dean Lucke, a CDF official, plainly announced at this month's Board of Forestry meeting that the department was already prioritizing 13 of the 40 plans for approval by March 1.
Pacific Lumber's request is offensive, inappropriate and requires CDF to engage in a patently illegal display of favoritism. To voice your opposition to the department's apparent acquiescence, see the ACTION
below...
++ BUT FIRST: PACIFIC LUMBER IN LICENSE LIMBO ++
Readers of these alerts will recall that Pacific Lumber's license to log (their timber operator's license) was suspended late last year due to repeated egregious violations of state forestry laws. Without much fanfare, CDF later informed Pacific Lumber that their license would not be renewed for 1999.
This state of affairs will probably not last very long. According to agency sources, the company has approached the department with drafts of a "stipulated agreement" similar to the one that allowed PL to keep its license throughout most of 1998. While no agreement has been reached yet, CDF will probably renew the license sometime soon, albeit under as-yet-undisclosed additional conditions.
Pacific Lumber does not deserve a license to log. The company has flagrantly disobeyed laws protecting fisheries, forest productivity, wildlife and water quality. Their operations are a nuisance and should be treated as such. Perhaps CDF needs to hear from us on this issue.
++ ACTION: TWO MESSAGES TO THE NEW, NOT YET IMPROVED CDF ++
Over the past several years, CDF on the whole has earned a well-deserved reputation for coddling the timber industry at every turn, despite the efforts of a few brave and dedicated souls within the agency to do otherwise. Now the incoming Davis administration has a chance to set a new tone for the agency, one that restores the public trust to its rightful constitutional place in the decision-making process.
Both the 40-THP demand and the license renewal controversy provide excellent opportunities for a new tone. The message is very simple: don't approve the plans, and don't renew the license.
MESSAGE 1: DON'T APPROVE THE PLANS! The Department of Forestry has no business short-circuiting the public and agency review process by promising approval, and shouldn't be granting potentially illegal favors in exchange for Maxxam's agreement on the HCP/SYP.
Because the Davis Administration has not yet picked a new CDF Director, send the message to Dean Lucke, Assistant Deputy Director of Forest Practice:
Phone: (916) 653-4298
Fax: (916) 653-8957
MESSAGE 2: DON'T RENEW THE LICENSE! Pacific Lumber routinely and arrogantly violated the last stipulated agreement they made to keep their license, and will probably do the same in the future. CDF enforcement officials should be thanked for not yet renewing the 1999 license, and encouraged not to do so under any stipulated agreements that PL will only violate again.
Send the combined thanks and encouragement message to: Gerry Ahlstrom, Forest Practice Regulation:
Phone: (916) 653-5305
Fax: (916) 653-8957
THANKS!
The Environmental Protection Information Center (EPIC)
P.O. Box 397
Garberville, CA 95542
(707) 923-2931
Fax 923-4210
http://www.igc.org/epic/
Contact us at epic@igc.org to join our listserver
For questions and comments please e-mail us!
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