Dear Friends,
Just 3 days ago we learned that the Santa Cruz County Planning Commission will hold a public hearing on a proposed ordinance that may have profound impacts on Bonny Doon and other rural areas of Santa Cruz County. Please tell the Planning Commission what you think: by email, in person, or by zoom. The details below describe our concerns, where you can find the proposed ordinance and how to provide your comments. The proposed ordinance is attached to this message, or you can download it at the following link: https://www2.santacruzcountyca.gov/planning/plnmeetings/PLNSupMaterial/PC/agendas/2024/20240313/007.pdf The ordinance would allow property owners in rural parts of the County to operate commercial “Low Impact Camping Areas” (LICAs) on parcels greater than 5 acres. Campgrounds would be exempt from CEQA (California Environmental Quality Act) environmental review. Let the Planning Commission and Board of Supervisors know your concerns. The RBDA board has the following specific concerns, which you may want to include in your comments to the Planning Commission: We believe that it is inappropriate to adopt the proposed ordinance now, as it is contrary to current state law. The ordinance should not be adopted until state law is changed to allow these campgrounds. The proposed ordinance is purported to provide access to campsites for low-income visitors. The ordinance must set a cap on campsite prices to ensure that they are, in fact, a low-cost alternative. Construction of yurts, domes, and other structures on LICA parcels should require the same County review as on other parcels. The CEQA exemption should be rejected. Meaningful CEQA (environmental) review must be conducted. There is no evidence showing that the ordinance is consistent with the County General Plan or Local Coastal Plan. Low Impact Camping Area (LICA) permits should not be allowed on parcels zoned residential, such as RA or RR. Despite “low impact” in the acronym “LICA”, the proposed ordinance encourages development rather than minimizing impact in environmentally sensitive areas. Under any circumstances, campsites in the Coastal Zone must receive a Coastal Development Permit. Because of safety issues (including fire hazard), noise, impacts on neighbors, problems with campers not following occupancy limits or other rules, it is insufficient to have the campground manager located off-site. The property manager must be on-site whenever sites are occupied. Who else will make sure rules are followed? If the ordinance is approved, permit fees should be significant. Although we are sympathetic with the goals of enabling visitors of all income levels to visit our County, we urge the Planning Commission to vote “no” on the proposed ordinance until the proposal receives adequate CEQA environmental review, the ordinance is determined to be consistent with the General Plan and LCP, and our other concerns are adequately addressed. You can provide your comments in 3 ways: (1) Attend the Planning Commission meeting Wednesday morning at 9:30am, March 13 and provide testimony in person at: Board of Supervisors Chambers, Room 525 County Government Center 701 Ocean Street Santa Cruz, CA 95060 (2) Comment by zoom at the following link: https://www2.santacruzcountyca.gov/planning/plnmeetings/ASP/Display/ASPX/DisplayAgenda.aspx?MeetingDate=3/13/2024&MeetingType=1 (3) Send comments by email to the following email address, specifying that your comments are in reference to the March 13 Agenda item 7: [email protected] Send comments by email to the Board of Supervisors: [email protected] Sincerely, RBDA board
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Santa Cruz Sentinel
By Tyler Maldonado January 12, 2024 A plan to improve North Coast parking lots, build new restrooms and potentially rent cabins at Greyhound Rock County Park is being whittled down to a priority list due this spring, county leaders said. Santa Cruz County leaders released the 86-page North Coast Facilities Master Plan draft in October partly as a response to more coastal visitors since 2020. The plan lists more than 40 potential projects from Big Basin Redwoods to Wilder Ranch state parks along Highway 1. The plan tries to “improve management while preserving one of California’s most beautiful stretches of coastline,” Santa Cruz County spokesman Jason Hoppin wrote in a statement. “Santa Cruz County’s North Coast has limited visitor amenities, infrastructure and law enforcement, and high visitation levels have increasingly overwhelmed the area and threatened natural resources, public safety and visitor experience,” Hoppin wrote. Leaders also wanted to prepare for more tourists in the coming years with the anticipated opening of the Cotoni-Coast Dairies National Monument and North Coast rail trail. Rail-trail work could begin as soon as early April, a Santa Cruz County Regional Transportation Commission representative said Thursday. Because North Coast beaches and public spaces are managed by separate agencies, a shared vision and plan was needed, said County Parks Project Manager Rob Tidmore. “Everyone felt like it was important to coordinate as much as possible” to prepare for that, said Tidmore. Private meetings took place last year among representatives of Santa Cruz County Parks, State Parks, Caltrans, the U.S. Bureau of Land Management, the Land Trust of Santa Cruz County and the Trust for Public Land. After the draft plan was published in October, county leaders held a Nov. 30 meeting in Davenport and online to gather residents’ feedback. Some potential projects in the draft plan include: “Overnight cabins, (a) discovery center, dining hall and kitchen” at Greyhound Rock County Park. A tourist “excursion train” from Davenport to Wilder Ranch State Park if a train operator proposes it. Paved parking in Davenport and Panther Beach as part of the rail trail project. Restrooms at Panther Beach and Shark Fin Cove. Restrooms and improved parking at Four Mile Beach. A Highway 1 bridge replacement and restrooms at Scott Creek Beach. Renovations in the cultural preserve area of Wilder Ranch State Park and improved accessibility at the park’s Old Cove Landing Trail. Leaders from the separate agencies will be responsible for pursuing money and approval for each of the separate projects. Agency representatives proposed many of the projects, but public input influenced proposals such as a restroom at Shark Fin Cove. Residents were asked to list the top three projects they wanted the agencies to pursue in an online poll that closed Dec. 18. A final plan with priority projects is expected in spring, Tidmore said. Road safety problems Two of the most common concerns in public feedback were a lack of traffic safety on Highway 1 and a need for alternate transportation, county leaders said. In a Nov. 30 meeting about the draft plan, Jennifer McNulty of Davenport expressed concern about the lack of safety plans for Highway 1 crossings in Davenport, as well as at the future entrance to Cotoni-Coast Dairies. “There have been accidents there, there will be more accidents there,” McNulty said of crossings in Davenport. “We have to have that figured out.” Leaders of the Santa Cruz County Regional Transportation Commission plan to gather more public input on traffic safety problems this summer as part of a separate Santa Cruz County North Coast Transit Demand Management Plan. Shannon Munz, a spokeswoman for the commission, said that plan would propose new strategies and “address visitor transportation needs, safety and operational challenges on Highway 1 created by visitor demand and behaviors.” Residents’ feedback Leaders of the Davenport/North Coast Association praised the efforts and process of the North Coast plan’s working group and were dissatisfied with the lack of public safety improvements to accompany the proposals. The association aims in part to represent the interests of North Coast residents. “Traffic conditions on the North Coast create hazards for motorists, bicyclists, and pedestrians. Beach visitors face dangers at most beaches and beach approaches, of which they are poorly advised by current signage,” Davenport/North Coast Association leaders wrote in a Dec. 11 letter to County Parks. “The plan seems to accept as inevitable a continuing siloed approach to project delivery, with functionally related and geographically proximate project elements implemented over decades rather than in parallel,” it stated. Lookout Santa Cruz
By Christopher Neely May 30, 2023 More than six years after President Barack Obama included the Cotoni-Coast Dairies area on Santa Cruz County’s northern coast in the California Coastal National Monument, a dispute over parking has pushed the likely opening date to late 2024. Eight miles north of the Santa Cruz city boundary along the Highway 1 corridor sits one of Santa Cruz County’s prized natural jewels. Spread across 5,800 acres, Cotoni-Coast Dairies is a rolling landscape of grassy shelves and Pacific vistas that President Barack Obama designated as part of the California Coastal National Monument during his final month in office in 2017. Yet in the more than six years after its elevation, the public has remained, largely, kept out. Planned opening dates in 2021 and 2022 were quashed by long-simmering disagreements over the property and its management among neighborhood groups, the federal government, agricultural interests and a national land trust. Now the most ambitious estimates do not have Cotoni-Coast Dairies opening to the broader public until late 2024. When the Rural Bonny Doon Association met last Wednesday, Jonathan Wittwer, president of neighborhood group Friends of the North Coast, emphasized that although many objected to the land’s inclusion in the California Coastal National Monument, the neighborhood associations are not trying to block Cotoni-Coast Dairies’ opening. “We’re not saying ‘not in our backyard,’ but let’s do it the right way in our backyard,” Wittwer told the sparse group of nine, mostly older, residents gathered inside the Bonny Doon Union Elementary School gym, with more tuned in via Zoom. He said the North Coast Coalition, consisting of Rural Bonny Doon Association, Friends of the North Coast and Davenport North Coast Association, want proper entrances at both the southern and north ends of the monument to accommodate an expected exponential increase in traffic, as well as resource management and protection on the property. Yes, the public’s ability to access this publicly owned national monument hinges on a parking dispute. I’ll paint that in broad strokes, but first quick context on who owns what. The Indigenous Cotoni Tribe called the area home before Spanish missions flushed the tribe out and claimed ownership of the land. In the 1860s, according to the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), Swiss growers bought the land from the Spanish and turned it into a dairy farm. More than a century later, in 1998, San Francisco-based conservation nonprofit Trust for Public Lands (TPL) bought the property to rescue it from development pressure. In 2014, TPL gifted much of the land to the Bureau of Land Management, except for four agricultural plots TPL oversees today. Then, Obama included the sprawling property in the California Coastal National Monument. The monument stretches along the full coast of the state and roughly 12 miles out to sea, but Cotoni-Coast Dairies became one of six onshore areas wrapped into the federal protection. Obama’s decision meant the lands would open to the public as a new park, which initially drew local opposition as people worried about an influx of visitors. As Wittwer told the slim crowd Wednesday night, “National monuments get advertised. Not national monuments don’t.” The first major piece of BLM’s mission to open the monument came in 2020 with a federally certified resource management plan. Understanding that an expected spike in tourism would accompany the opening of the monument, that plan analyzed how best to manage the influx of cars and bodies to the property. The plan determined that two distant entrances and parking lots, one at the north end and one to the south, could help dilute traffic bottlenecks. However, the plan for the southern entrance parking lot leaned on an agreement from TPL that the parking lot entrance could use some of its agricultural land. The Warranella Gate parking lot to the north, and the Marina Gate Terrace parking lot to the south, are lots the Bureau of Land Management initially proposed before the Trust for Public Land pulled out of the agreement on the southern parking lot. The map also shows two alternative north and south parking lots proposed by neighborhood groups. Documents show BLM’s proposal for the entrance and parking lot, and its impact on the property, went well beyond what TPL originally expected. It would have harmed the ability to farm the plots, which, in turn, would have violated the terms of TPL’s agricultural stewardship. In June 2021, TPL told the federal government its agricultural land was no longer an option for a parking lot on the southern end. Christy Fischer, TPL’s director of conservation for California’s northern coast, was unable to further comment on TPL’s decision to pull out. The federal government scrapped the certified plans for a southern entrance and transitioned to a single entrance plan, at the northern end of the monument. Thirteen days into clearing land for its northern parking lot, in June 2021, Wittwer and the local neighborhood groups filed an appeal with the federal government. The appeal contended that the certified plan for the monument was based on a two-entrance design. If the federal government was going to move forward with a single, northern entrance, then the impact of a single entrance on the property’s natural resources needed to be studied. The feds agreed. Zachary Ormsby, BLM’s Central Coast field manager and man on the ground for the national monument project, expects that study, which will examine the impact of a single entrance and include a list of alternative options, to publish by year’s end. However, despite the neighbors’ feelings, finally opening the monument to broad public access does not depend on a parking lot — only completion of a new resource management plan. The federal government will consider public comment and sentiment on the plan and alternatives, but BLM has the power to unilaterally decide the path forward, Ormsby says. Ormsby says a parking lot is not guaranteed or required before BLM opens the land to the broader public. “My perspective is that we’ll come up with a plan and list of options that will allow this community to move forward with confidence and comfort without filing any more appeals,” Ormsby said. “The common element among all the groups is that we love this land. The only thing we’re trying to reconcile is that we all love it collectively.” According to Wittwer, an April 26 roundtable — which included BLM, TPL, U.S. Rep. Jimmy Panetta’s office, representatives from the California Coastal Commission and local neighborhood groups — devolved into a four-hour blame game over the monument’s stunted opening. Wittwer says he wants to attempt another roundtable to get everyone on even footing before BLM publishes its plan at year’s end. “We want this to move faster,” Wittwer said, “It’s just important that we get this right.” Bay Nature Magazine
March 22, 2023 Julia Busiek The steep topography and unusual concentration of perennial streams contribute to the impressive biodiversity of Cotoni-Coast Dairies. Redwood and Douglas fir forests grow on the property’s steep upper slopes, giving way to stands of coast live oak, coastal scrub, and a mix of native and introduced grassland species on the mellow, sunny terraces that step down toward the coast. Red alders and arroyo willows shade the streams, which harbor critical habitat for steelhead trout and coho salmon. Mountain lions, black-tailed mule deer, bobcats, gray foxes, and badgers are among the bigger mammals found on the land. Hermit thrushes and Wilson’s warblers hang out along the streams, and red-tailed hawks, northern harriers, and great horned owls hunt in the forests and grasslands. At least superficially, locals and the BLM are aligned on the land’s ecological significance. But when it comes to the details of balancing preservation, parking, and traffic, the agency and a host of local groups have struggled to agree. The watchdog group Friends of the North Coast was “not excited” about the prospect of Cotoni-Coast Dairies becoming a national monument in the first place, says the group’s president, Jonathan Wittwer. They believed that the protections placed on the property when TPL transferred the land to the BLM in 2014—which barred mining, logging, and motor vehicles—were plenty strong. And they were skeptical of promises of federal funding to help local first responders handle any incidents that might ensue from an estimated 300,000 annual monument visitors. Wittwer’s group pushed for conditions written into the monument designation that would guarantee such funding, “but those conditions have never been honored,” he says. Aside from headaches for residents of Davenport and Bonny Doon, Wittwer worries how the anticipated influx of people could affect wildlife, including the mountain lions that currently roam the land. His concerns on that score are shared by Chris Wilmers, the cougar expert who leads the Santa Cruz Puma Project, a partnership between UCSC and CDFW. The BLM’s plan situated the southern parking lot in an area that Wilmers has pointed out would indirectly interfere with mountain lion habitat. Ultimately the agency had to abandon its plans for the southern entrance when it lost permission to build through a private property adjacent to the lot. “We will still have trails and visitation on the southern portion of the property, but we’re still navigating this sticking point,” Murphy acknowledges. He says visitor access to the southern part of the monument might not come until 2026 or later. The fate of the northern parking lot, meanwhile, is pending a second pass at the environmental review process. The U.S. Department of the Interior’s Interior Board of Land Appeals found deficiencies in the BLM’s first review, and neighbors have raised concerns over whether the proposed lot location threatens habitat for monarch butterflies and creates a traffic hazard. A decision might come this summer, but Murphy says it’s unlikely the BLM could build the lot before next winter’s rainstorms shut down construction season. It’s slim odds that any part of Cotoni-Coast Dairies will open before summer 2024. Click HERE to read the full article. Grey Hayes
Bratton Online January 23, 2023 https://brattononline.com/ In my last column at BrattonOnline.com, I outlined the tragic history of the 5,600 acre Cotoni Coast Dairies property leading to BLM’s takeover of managing the property and urging readers to pay more attention and to be more active in the evolution of that management. January 30th is an important deadline that provides you an opportunity to help better protect the property: BLM is proposing sweeping regulations that supposedly ‘protect’ this public land, but they are acting prematurely. After reading this, I am hoping that you will write a public comment note suggesting a delay for BLM’s rulemaking until that agency completes its required planning process for protecting Cotoni Coast Dairies as it is supposed to be with its designation as part of a National Monument. If you want to cut this read short and write comments, skip the upcoming critique and go to the last section below for more guidance. Designed to be a Federal Yawner If you were managing BLM and you didn’t want anyone to comment on your oversight of Cotoni Coast Dairies, you’d design public comment period notifications to be filled with confusing jargon, contradictory statements, and pointless direction for commenters. Here’s a link to the current set of rules which would govern Cotoni Coast Dairies in perpetuity and which BLM has published for public review through January 30. Confusing Jargon The press release announcing this public comment period opens with this typically confusing jargon: “The supplementary rule would provide consistency and uniformity for visitors.” Huh? And there’s more confusing jargon – the comment period is about a ‘supplementary rule‘ – supplementary to what, you might ask, aren’t all rules supplementary? This seems either deeply philosophical or something that might better contemplated by Zippy. Contradictory Statements The press release for this public comment period begins with a curious and confusing quote from Acting Central Coast Field Manager Shekeetah Allen Genoway: “We believe this plan will help…” (emphasis mine) Errr…I thought this was a ‘supplementary rule‘ not a plan?? Someone at BLM might be reading this and scoffingly muttering ‘Big Deal!’ ‘What’s the Diff?’ or ‘Who Cares!?’ Well, there is a big difference between a rule and a plan, and it is BLM’s duty to engage with and educate the public about said differences. Pointless Direction Acting Central Coast Field Manager Shekeetah Allen Genoway’s quote goes on to give very narrow advice on what the BLM hopes the public will comment about: “We are seeking public comments to help us clarify language in the rules to ensure they are easily understood by users and public.” (Jargon note: anyone who might visit the property is known to BLM as a ‘user,’ but I’m unclear about the difference between ‘users’ and ‘public’) In short, BLM says that if the rules aren’t clear, then please give them feedback on how to make them clearer. In other words, don’t question the rules…don’t think about why such rules are necessary…don’t suggest better rules or how to improve the rules-making processes, etc. However, the rationale for public comment periods in a democracy is to open up all of those subjects for discussion. The Wizard of Odd Don’t pay attention to the man behind the curtain! If you are brave enough to open the Federal Yawner ‘Supplementary Rule,’ you can get to the root of what I see as the Big Problem by reading the ‘Discussion’ section. There, you will find a profoundly deceptive misstatement: “The BLM completed the Cotoni-Coast Dairies Resource Management Plan (RMP) Amendment on June 23, 2021, to establish land use decisions that protect the objects and values of the Cotoni-Coast Dairies unit of the California Coastal National Monument and support responsible recreation opportunities.” In fact, the RMP did not contain a list of the ‘objects and values’ called out in the Obama Administration’s Monument designation for the property. Therefore, the plan could not and did not ‘establish land use decisions that protect‘ them. Moreover, the RMP’s recreational planning analyses harkened back to pre-WWI-style parks planning with no mention of modern recreational planning principles: social carrying capacity analysis (to avoid overcrowding and user conflicts – for instance, mountain bikers vs. family hikers with small children, or natural resource carrying capacity analysis (to avoid disturbing sensitive wildlife, etc.). So, the plan could not and did not ‘establish land use decisions….{sic}(that) support responsible recreation opportunities.’ In sum, this current proposed “supplementary” rule compounds and builds on the shaky house of cards that has been BLM’s balderdash-based planning for Cotoni Coast Dairies. And, it is on that level that I urge you to give feedback to BLM. What to Do? The best current direction for BLM is to keep the property closed until the requisite planning processes have been completed and there is a credible approach from which to establish regulations for the property. According to BLM’s guidelines for managing National Monument properties (Manual 6220), the agency is required first to undertake studies inventorying the ‘objects and values’ of the Monument and determining how best to protect them. And yet, BLM has been opposing conservationists and the State of California’s natural resource protection agencies in its attempt to avoid such work. The proposed “Supplementary” Rule compounds BLM’s prior mistakes, and in doing so confuses the public into thinking they are embarking on good conservation work by limiting visitor use. You might find it confusing to oppose such a ‘supplementary’ rule when it allows BLM to enforce off-limits areas if what we are looking for is to protect the large swaths of Cotoni Coast Dairies from being ‘loved to death’ by visitors. Perhaps they might need some rules like this, but the BLM’s decision to make these rules is premature. They must first recognize, list, and analyze the human impacts on the ‘objects and values’ protected by Monument designation. For now, if we show BLM we aren’t fooled by their tactics and demand that they do a more complete job of protecting resources, BLM will be forced to follow its own guidelines and get the planning right. And so, I urge you to please write the BLM and let them know that they should complete the planning and analysis outlined in their guidelines for managing National Monuments (Manual 6220) before they create regulations that may or may not be necessary. A short note would suffice: Bureau of Land Management, BLM Central Coast Field Office, 940 2nd Ave., Marina, CA 93933, or emailed to: [email protected] or https://www.blm.gov/ Grey Hayes
Bratton Online January 16, 2023 https://brattononline.com/ Ever since the United States Department of Interior’s Bureau of Land Management (BLM) took control of 5800 acres of northern Santa Cruz County, conservationists have been asking themselves “what have we done?” The fateful transfer day was in 2014 when a private land trust, the Trust for Public Land, donated the property to BLM. It would be years before the negative repercussions of that handover were obvious. 7 years later BLM unveiled a draft management plan for Cotoni Coast Dairies, a document rife with errors including tables cut-and-paste from other plans from faraway places, lists of misidentified species, and proposals with little analysis and findings absent scientific rigor. How did such a bungling land management agency gain control of such a precious part of California’s coast? The story unfolds… BLM’s Standard Bearers Support Poor Standards As one comes to expect in our community, unctuous support for BLM’s draft plan for the property was lugubriously lauded by affiliates of profiteering recreational industries and their political hacks while conservationists carefully documented voluminous errors and omissions and suggested reasonable improvements to protect natural resources while providing access to open space. Subsequently, BLM perfunctorily changed the plan to address only the most egregious errors and, as expected, chose the ‘moderate use’ alternative, publishing an Environmental Analysis (EA), the easy, low-input, and cheap means for the agency to officially finalize approval. Shortly thereafter, conservationists filed an appeal to the Department of Interior and BLM asked for two extensions of the appeal window. During those extensions, and before the appeal was settled, BLM staff bulldozed areas of the property to prepare for one of its planned, but not yet permitted, parking lot. We don’t yet know which BLM official ordered that disgusting and undemocratic act, but we will find out. Conservationists won their appeal, but meanwhile the BLM had destroyed sensitive coastal prairie and cut trees that had long supported the federally threatened monarch butterfly. Meanwhile, it became clear that the only other parking lot location that BLM’s faulty plans had analyzed could not progress as planned because the road to the parking lot traversed private property without the consent of the owners. That was almost as surprising as the Coastal Commission’s allowance for that access road, which would have also paved a stream channel. It seems wherever one looks these days, the Coastal Commission pushes for maximizing public access even if it means careless destruction of natural resources. That matches well with BLM’s management philosophy. No One Home and No Friends Left Back in 2014, someone working at BLM told me that their office was ill-prepared for Santa Cruz. For years, their staff had managed land where there was no conservation constituency, where nature degrading recreational activities and other “resource” uses were unquestioned. Since BLM moved into Santa Cruz County and took control of Cotoni Coast Dairies, they have been unable to retain consistent managers: two field managers overseeing the property have departed and the newest one is rumored to be ‘remotely managing’ the property while living far away from the region. And yet, our community has long offered BLM friendship. At first, BLM welcomed enthusiastic friendships, signing partnership agreements with the University of California at Santa Cruz and the Amah Mutsun Tribe. Now, BLM only admits to being partners with the group previously known as Mountain Bikers of Santa Cruz (see sidebar, from BLM’s Cotoni Coast Dairies property homepage). Why has BLM rejected its tribal and science partners in favor of the mountain biking industry? We need to go back to the beginning of the story to understand. Swiss Dairyman and Subdivision Moguls The Cotoni Coast Dairies got its two last names from a Swiss dairy and land investment company, which started in 1901 and ended in 1998 when the investors sold to the Trust for Public Land instead of a subdivision mogul. For 97 years, the land referred to locally as ‘Coast Dairies’ was managed by farmers and ranchers who made it clear that the public was unwelcome. Much of the rest of the County had been explored by botanists and wildlife experts whose wisdom and documentation led to so many parks purchases. But this was not the case with this huge part of the County: it had remained largely uncharted. In 1997, real estate magnate Brian Sweeney announced that he had an option to build more than a hundred luxury homes on the property. The owners were able to quote extravagant property value, so conservationists had to raise a lot of funding to conserve the property and thwart the threat from development. Without biological surveys, conservationists had to convince funders about the value of the ‘spectacular views’ and recreational potential instead of conservation values. That seems to me to be how the seed was sown for how people came to value the property in the years to come. Trust for Public Land: 14 Years at Coast Dairies After purchasing the property, for 14 years the TPL managed the property while trying to find a way out. TPL managed to give State Parks the ocean side of the property, including the beaches. State Parks opened those beaches to public access without any planning or environmental review. It took many more years to find any organization willing to own the inland portion of the property. TPL solicited proposals from various potential landowners. UC Santa Cruz made a proposal, which didn’t work out. Meanwhile, it was costing TPL a lot of money and headaches to retain the property and the funders wanted it opened for public access. As a last resort, TPL turned to the federal land management agency that had long served as property managers of the last resort: BLM…there didn’t seem to be another option. Besides, some of the illuminati of open space purchasers thought perhaps it could soon be a part of The Great Park, owned and managed by the National Park Service. The Great Park For a while after TPL purchased the property, the Open Space Illuminati advertised something called “The Great Park,” an expansive interconnected park system, with a National Park nucleus derived from Coast Dairies and the adjoining San Vicente Redwoods. For a while, it seemed like this idea had become fet a compli, but enough powerful opponents started asking questions…politics changed…and perhaps funders’ willingness waned. After some time, the Great Park was a dim memory held only by a few. A National Monument As the Great Park idea waned, a new idea dawned: Cotoni Coast Dairies could become part of a National Monument! Charged up with a great deal of funding from the Weiss Family Foundation, the Open Space Illuminati parachuted in something that appeared to be popular movement: glossy brochures and websites popped up and The Monument Campaign was born. When conservationists exclaimed concern at the number of visitors that would be attracted to the property with such a designation, the Illuminati said ‘Shut up! This is the only way to make BLM accountable to protecting the property!’ They succeeded: in the last days of the Obama Administration, the president decreed that the property would become part of the California Coastal National Monument. Post Monument Blues Shortly after the President’s decree, the BLM dissolved the only staff positions whose work entailed guaranteeing protection under National Monument regulations. Since then, the BLM has refused to abide by its own regulations for managing National Monuments. Meanwhile, the Great Park and Monument Campaign Illuminati have likewise disappeared from the scene, their concerns for protecting the land swept away as they entered the next funding cycle’s focus in some other arena. Enter stage left the influential Outdoor Industry Association where business and profits pour from Nature commodified. Advertisements for ‘rad times’ on Santa Cruz County trails bring thousands of visitors, supporting a ‘green’ economy. Sales of super-expensive bikes skyrocket. Many conservationists are getting too old for the fight. It is easy to see what we have done, but what’s next is anyone’s guess. Best to stay apprised and keep asking questions; perhaps this is a good time for a renewed conservation movement in Santa Cruz County. By Grace Stetson September 2, 2022 https://santacruzlocal.org/2022/09/02/opening-delayed-at-cotoni-coast-dairies-national-monument/?utm_source=Santa+Cruz+Local&utm_campaign=0779a08e7e-Newsletter+for+MEMBERS+sept+4&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_f5d347e2d2-0779a08e7e-11760233 Five public trails are nearly complete at the Cotoni-Coast Dairies National Monument on Santa Cruz County’s North Coast, but a date has not yet been set to open the trails, Bureau of Land Management officials said this month. Construction also recently halted on a visitors parking lot on Cement Plant Road in Davenport. Some residents sent appeals to the Interior Board of Land Appeals to relocate the parking lot, and the board’s recent ruling in their favor has “paused” work on the lot, said Eric Morgan, acting field manager for the Bureau of Land Management. “The BLM will respond to the appeal with intent of resuming construction in the near future,” Morgan wrote in an email Thursday. Some Davenport residents said they remain wary about traffic safety as visiting drivers turn on to Cement Plant Road to visit the trails. The area around Cement Plant Road is expected to be the monument’s primary entrance, bureau representatives said. Some residents added that communication with the Bureau of Land Management has become less clear since the site’s field manager Ben Blom, who took on the role in June 2017, left the position this summer. Morgan, Blom’s replacement, answered a reporter’s questions in early September but declined to discuss project timelines. “There’s always a conflict between visitor use and nature conservation, so that is something that is missing” in the planning, said Noel Bock, chair of the Davenport North Coast Association. “The Bureau of Land Management are not parks and recreation managers. They are used to protecting land, but not necessarily with a recreation component,” Bock said. Recreation plans Cotoni-Coast Dairies National Monument is about 15 minutes’ drive north of Santa Cruz. On the inland side of Highway 1, it stretches from Laguna Creek to just north of Swanton Road near Davenport. As a refuge for native Central Coast plants and animals, the land includes California red-legged frogs, mountain lions and mule deer. Coho salmon and steelhead trout are in the waterways, Bureau of Land Management leaders said. Cultural and archeological sites of the Amah Mutsun Tribal Band also are on the property. The Trust for Public Land gave the property to the Bureau of Land Management in 2014. Planning for public access has been in the works since at least 2017. The bureau’s June 2020 management plan included trails for hiking, cycling and horseback riding. It also allows prescribed burns, other efforts to help reduce wildfires and continued livestock grazing, bureau representatives have said. An updated management plan from June 2021 included 27 miles of new trails for hikers, bicyclists, horseback riders and dog walkers. In that plan, the agency also called for the construction of three day-use parking lots and planned trail connections to San Vicente Redwoods and the North Coast Rail Trail. The first phase of the Bureau of Land Management plan includes five trails that are nearly complete. On the north end of Cotoni-Coast Dairies National Monument, two trails are accessed from a trailhead off Cement Plant Road just south of Swanton Road.
Residents’ concerns Some Davenport residents said their major concern is the proposed park entrance location and safety. An entrance is slated on the north end of the property at Highway 1 and Cement Plant Road in Davenport. “It’s really quite dangerous, and we’ve pointed that out,” said Bock, the Davenport North Coast Association leader. “We feel strongly that there is a need for a turn pocket,” Bock said. “That is a No. 1 concern for us, and our requests have been rebuffed.” Morgan, of the Bureau of Land Management, did not respond to questions about the proposed north entrance. Bock said the community was told the Cotoni-Coast Dairies National Monument entrance would be on Laguna Road on the south end of the property. But there have been problems there with potential easements between the Bureau of Land Management and the Trust for Public Lands. The monument’s primary entrance has now transitioned to Cement Plant Road, bureau representatives said. New Town, a neighborhood north of Cement Plant Road with at least 60 residents, is close to the proposed entrance. “We’re trying to mitigate the impacts to that little neighborhood,” Bock said. Colin Hannon lives with his wife and two children in New Town. Hannon said he has been primarily concerned about safety around the entrance and parking lot location. “What we’ve been asking for is to put the parking lot down by the (Mocettini Barn), but instead, they’ve started bulldozing this hilltop,” Hannon said. “It’s close to our community, and Cement Plant Road is a substandard road with no sidewalks. Their projected visitorship is going to overrun that road.” Hannon and Bock participated in the appeals against the Bureau of Land Management at the Interior Board of Land Appeals. Friends of the North Coast, the Rural Bonny Doon Association and the Davenport North Coast Association also participated. Hannon said he hoped to pause the project for review in accordance with the agency’s appeals process. CommunicationsSome of the residents’ other concerns relate to staff changes at the Bureau of Land Management since the bureau took hold of Cotoni-Coast Dairies in 2014. Rick Cooper was a long-term field manager who oversaw the property and communicated with residents. He retired in March 2017. Ben Blom replaced Cooper in June 2017. Then Blom left the role this summer. Blom was helpful as a community advocate with the agency, said Hannon, the New Town resident. “Ben Blom told us, ‘You have to trust us and give us a chance’,” Hannon said. “And then he disappeared.” Now, Interim Field Manager Eric Morgan and Assistant Field Manager Shekeetah Allen Genoway have filled the position. “They don’t have a permanent, local head of their office,” Hannon said. “We’ve all submitted comments, and the BLM has not really responded to the main gist of our comments.” Hannon added, “It’s definitely concerning — it just feels like it would have been wiser to listen to the people who live here and have some input about what may be a good idea. Instead, it feels like they shoved us to the side and didn’t listen to what we had to say.” Bock said she and others “want better coordination with these agencies.” Bock noted that the Cotoni-Coast Dairies would be overseen not only by the Bureau of Land Management, but also would include collaboration with the Santa Cruz County Sheriff’s Office, the California Department of Fish and Wildlife, and the County of Santa Cruz. Bock expressed hope to continue a long-standing relationship and communication between the Davenport North Coast Association and Bureau of Land Management. “We hope to continue to be able to contact them whenever there’s issues. Sometimes, we have quick responses, or like when they helped us out during (the) CZU” Lightning Complex Fire, Bock said. “It is important for us to have direct contact and work directly with BLM. And we intend to continue to do that.” by Jonathan Wittwer
BLM’s Contractor Santa Cruz Mountains Trail Stewards (formerly Mountain Bikers of Santa Cruz) is working on the first nine miles of trails on the northern section of the property, which BLM expects to open by the end of 2022. FONC’s main concern at this point is that this is happening without the required and promised prior inventory and documentation of the existing wildlife population and habitat/corridor locations (known as a “Baseline”). FONC made substantial efforts to get this to occur prior to trail construction disturbance and will continue its efforts (working with others) to get a Baseline documented prior to opening. Unfortunately, BLM’s current position is that “formal monitoring protocols for each species discussed in the Proclamation is not recommended or proposed.” BLM is attempting to foist its own obligations onto others to fundraise for Baseline inventories and future monitoring. For most wildlife, monitoring is “Subject to Availability of Funding" despite BLM’s “general assumption” made in the adopted Resource Management Plan Amendment that “Funding and personnel would be sufficient to implement any alternative described”, including specifically “to facilitate the analysis of potential impacts and common to all resources.” If you have knowledge, training, or skills and can volunteer to work with a team to document portions of a Baseline, please contact FONC. Santa Cruz Sentinel March 25, 2021 Hannah Hagemann https://www.santacruzsentinel.com/2022/03/25/crews-cut-trails-at-to-be-opened-santa-cruz-north-coast-national-monument/ DAVENPORT – On a recent Tuesday morning, a dozen people armed with shovels, backhoes and rakes marched from coastal terraces – that overlook the shimmering Pacific – inland to the redwood forest.
The Santa Cruz Mountains Trail Stewardship crew has been on the ground at the Cotoni-Coast Dairies unit of the California Coastal National Monument since December. Here, volunteers and staff have cut into forest floor overgrown with fern, blackberry brush and poison ivy to build what will become the first section of public trail on the property. The nearly 6,000 acre national monument – which was historically stewarded by the Cotoni Tribe – hasn’t been open to the public in modern history. It’s also home to iconic California species – mountain lions, coho salmon and red legged frogs. The stewardship coordinates and funds most of the trail work at Coast Dairies, in a partnership with the Bureau of Land Management. The groups aim to open up some 4 miles of trails to recreators by the end of 2022. “Typically we’re playing catch up on trails, or using old roads – they get beat up,” said Ben Blom, BLM Central Coast field manager. “The fact we’re building a world class trail system from scratch is exciting and kind of unusual.” Creating such public access has been decades in the making. The vast property of coastal prairie, redwood forest and riparian shrubland has a storied history. It was formerly tilled by dairy farmers and owned by the Coast Dairies Land Co. – which at one point considered developing the land into a luxury home site. But after years of planning, community meetings and coordinating, two first trails could open as soon as November. Inaugural trails Coast Dairies is set to open in two phases, according to Santa Cruz Mountains Trail Stewardship Superintendent Garret Hammack. The stewardship plans to build 46 miles of trails, broken up into northern and southern access points. While the south side of the property will be open to hikers and horseback riders, the northern section – which encompasses 19 miles – is targeted to bikers and hikers and will open first. So far, the stewardship has fundraised around 7 miles of that trail building work. “To make the funding for this project happen quicker, the way to do it was just fund it ourselves,” Hammack said. “I think there’s the community push because people really want to see it happen.” Stewardship staff and volunteers are currently building out roughly 4 miles of trail that is slated to open later this year. One of those trails is targeted for families, as well as bikers and hikers of all levels. It will also be wide enough for adaptive bikers, who commonly ride recumbent bikes or e-bikes. “There are a lot of people who reach out to us about [wanting] more trail networks that will accommodate their needs and we’re finding this community coming out of the woodwork more and more and growing and feeling empowered, which is fantastic,” said Santa Cruz Mountains Trail Stewardship Communications Manager Katy Poniatowski. A second trail – with a single-track feel – will likely appeal to those more advanced mountain bikers and hikers. The groups also plan to eventually create a trail system that would link Coast Dairies to the adjacent San Vicente Redwoods, where a new “ridgeline to shoreline” thru-hike is in the works. Trail work partnerships The stewardship relies on its volunteers, Poniatowski said, but also sees trail building as a way for people to cultivate relationships with nature. In addition to hosting weekly volunteer meetups, the group also hosts “dig days” to attract larger weekend crews. On one section of trail, crews are shoveling dirt, storing it in buckets and carrying it out, rather than dumping it. That extra step protects watershed health and vulnerable coho salmon. “It’s hard work – we’re trying to do it right the first time, balancing all these competing interests and uses of the property and natural resources,” said Santa Cruz Mountains Trail Stewardship Trails Planning Director Drew Perkins. To BLM Central Coast field manager Blom, the partnership is a win-win. “It’s good from a financial perspective, but fundamentally I think it’s really important that the community has ownership of these trails, and what better way to create that sense of stewardship than the community actually building it?” Blom said. The BLM plans to preserve and manage half of Coast Dairies – some 3,000 acres – which will be off limits to recreators. The work includes keeping track of 149 grazing cattle, which visitors may see wandering from time to time. The impacts of that grazing, Blom said, were critical in preventing serious wildfire from spreading onto the property during the 2020 CZU August Lightning Complex. The agency will also continue to collaborate with the Amah Mutsun Tribal Band on stewardship activities at Coast Dairies, such as igniting prescribed burns, which reduce overgrown vegetation and the risk of wildfire. As the community eagerly awaits, stewardship volunteer Rod Evans said the trail building work is rewarding, particularly during an inaugural mountain bike ride. “It’s just fun working on the stuff you’re going to ride, to come back and say ‘I did that’,” Evans said. by Gray Hayes
March 13, 2022 https://greyhayes.net/2022/03/21/recreation-vs-conservation-in-natural-areas/ We face a quandary for which there are many solutions: the northern region of Santa Cruz County is one of the nation’s top biodiversity hotspots which is increasingly facing one of the largest threats to biodiversity – recreation within conservation areas. Globally, the coast of California is recognized as one of the most important crisis areas where natural areas tourism impact overlaps with critical conservation areas called biodiversity hotspots. Biodiversity Hotspots Biodiversity hotspots have been scientifically catalogued in precise ways to direct conservation funding and activities. These areas have particularly high numbers of species limited to small geographic areas, correlating with large numbers of endangered species. Areas with numerous endangered species in different groups receive higher hotspot scores: Santa Cruz County has many endangered species in three groups: ‘herptiles, arthropods, and plants,’ and so is one of only two counties in the nation to receive the highest hotspot score. Similarly, with a larger lens than county boundaries, the San Francisco Bay Area, including northern Santa Cruz County, is recognized as one of the top three biodiversity hotspots in the country. The rationale for using biodiversity hotspot indices for conservation prioritization is so widely accepted that this measure has become the focus of the most funding of any other conservation initiative, a total of $750 million up to 2010. Our region has long benefited from such largesse, including the generous funding to set aside areas like the BLM’s Cotoni Coast Dairies and POST/Sempervirens Fund’s San Vicente Redwoods conservation areas. And yet, purchasing of land for conservation purposes only begins the process of conservation, which will last many lifetimes. Fortunately, there are many strong protections in place for these areas that help to guarantee that they will long be managed primarily for biodiversity protection. Wildlife Protected at Cotoni Coast Dairies There are a host of guarantees for biodiversity protection at the Cotoni Coast Dairies property. In 2017, Obama’s presidential proclamation making the property a part of the California Coastal Monument there are protections for such a breadth of ‘Objects of the Monument.’ Monument designation carries with it mandates for very careful planning, inventory, and adaptive management to assure natural resource protection. In addition, the property has been designated as part of the most protected lands in the Country: National Conservation Lands. In addition, BLM maintains and regularly updates lists of ‘special status’ plants and animals to guide protections on their lands. For those interested in mandates for BLM management for biodiversity on National Monuments, I encourage perusal of their Manual 6220. Using one ‘Object of the Monument’ as an example, the 6220 Manual requires that BLM inventory the dusky footed woodrat on the property and, in collaboration with experts at its National Conservation Lands Office, include in its property-wide science plan specifics about how managers will monitor and adaptively manage the property to assure the species’ protection. Regulations protecting biodiversity on the nation’s highest value conservation lands well reflect the majority of citizen’s interests in protecting wildlife, even if it means personal sacrifice. This is good news for conservation in natural areas because of the natural conflict between recreation and conservation. Recreational Use is Contrary to Wildlife Protection There has been much published about the negative impacts to wildlife of recreational use in natural areas, but here are a few illustrations of types of negative impacts. The following species are listed as “Objects of the Monument:” gray fox, bobcat, and mountain lion. Predators such as these three species are well recognized as extremely sensitive to recreational use in natural areas, leading to decreased density and abundance of these types of animals. Researchers working in the Santa Cruz area have noted that mountain lions are substantially sensitive to noises from humans, which reduce their use of recreational areas and lead to changes rippling through the rest of the wildlife community, including increased numbers of mice and potential increased frequency of Lyme disease. But, mammalian predators aren’t the only types of wildlife to be disturbed by recreational use. The Monument Proclamation also calls out protection for Wilson’s and orange-crowned warblers, downy woodpecker, tree swallow, Cooper’s hawk, and American kestrel. Burrowing owl, golden eagle, tricolored blackbird, and white-tailed kite are also listed as protected on BLM’s special status animals list for California. Some bird species have been shown to be especially ‘flighty’ in the face of recreational use, requiring study and specific trail design to adequately buffer distances to avoid impacts. While the effects on specific species varies, some species can be negatively affected by the mere presence of humans, so, unless specific studies can ascertain effects, scientists suggest that avoiding new trails in natural areas is the best measure for conserving sensitive birds. Grassland birds, such as the burrowing owl, are particularly sensitive to recreational disturbance, perhaps because it is so difficult for these species to hide. There are also studies that would suggest care must be taken to avoid recreational disturbance to species like the California red-legged frog, deer, and native plants. BLM’s Dilemma BLM managers of Cotoni Coast Dairies face the many dilemmas of managing land for conflicting visitor uses alongside the conflict between recreational access and nature conservation in an especially sensitive ecological area. The varying types of recreational users run the gamut from mountain bikers who use trails for the physical thrill of staying upright with speed and obstacles…to more scenery- and/or exercise-oriented mountain bikers and hikers…to more passive recreational users such as wildlife viewers…to photographers and painters…to restorationists…and scientists of natural history. Each user group conflicts with the next and the ones further apart with their expectations conflict even worse. I have not seen a plan by BLM to accommodate or monitor such conflicting uses, which will lead to what is called displacement, mainly of families with children and more passive natural areas users. Instead, BLM managers have shown a personal and strong affinity with the mountain biking community, which is also the agency’s closest ally in advocating for and developing recreational trails designed for their use on the property. On the other hand, BLM managers have turned away from engagement with passive users such as wildlife viewers, restorationists and scientists of natural history. Without welcoming this engagement which would have made up for their professed lack of such capacity, BLM managers are now moving forward with little understanding of the distribution and abundance of species, including those protected by statute. The evident BLM managerial-mountain biking community conflict of interest should be a great concern of those of the public who are concerned with biological conservation. The Collaborative Management Solution We should be advocating for an alternate way forward where BLM public engagement staff serve as facilitators of solutions-based approaches to the conflicts between users and between recreational use and natural resource conservation. The first step would be for BLM to adhere to its policy requiring a science plan informed by a baseline inventory of the Objects of the Monument and other special status species; this plan would include a carrying capacity analysis and an adaptive management framework to assure protection of the resources. All of those steps could be done collaboratively with scientists and volunteers as is outlined in BLM’s policy guidance. There have been offers for substantive financial resources to assist with this planning. Instead of hiding its scientific studies as it does now, BLM would proudly share what science it has gathered on a public interactive website. Once completed, the science plan could then be the focus of collaborative management of the property including all interested parties working together with the common goal of conservation of biological diversity while providing recreational access to the maximum extent possible. We are lucky to have a coalition of many groups working to make this vision real, including: Rural Bonny Doon Association, Friends of the North Coast, Sempervirens Fund, and Davenport North Coast Association. Your support of those organizations will help greatly. |
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