A decade in the making, could open to visitors as soon as fall Santa Cruz Sentinel Local News Friday, March 11, 2021 https://www.santacruzsentinel.com/2022/03/09/crews-set-to-build-first-public-trails-at-san-vicente-redwoods/ Nonprofit partners are inching closer to opening the first public trail system in the San Vicente Redwoods – some 9,000 acres of forest that nearly touches Bonny Doon and stretches to the Davenport coast. Crews are scheduled to begin building out 8.5 miles of trail in April, which could become the first segment of a new sky to sea trail system dubbed the “ridgeline to shoreline.” Horseback riders, mountain bikers and hikers could take to trails as soon as fall. “Eventually, we’re going to be able to just have this world-class network from ridgeline to shoreline, that will bring in trail users of all types,” Land Trust of Santa Cruz County Executive Director Sarah Newkirk said.
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From the Davenport/North Coast Association Facebook page: “Innovative, creative, passionate and committed barely begin to describe Big Creek’s co-founder, Homer T. “Bud” McCrary. To some, he has long been known as a pioneer of sustainable forestry. To others, a champion of community trails, an instigator of epic trail-building adventures and a cultivator of inventive mechanical solutions. His employees considered him a mentor and a friend. All of us are deeply saddened to share that on June 1, 2020, Bud peacefully passed away at his beloved home in the redwoods of Santa Cruz County at the age of 93. We will remember him as a loving father and family man, a passionate leader in our community and a tireless advocate for sound forest management and for his treasured employees. Bud led an extraordinary yet humble life. Born in Santa Cruz in 1927, he served in the Navy during World War II. Bud came home in 1946 to start Big Creek Lumber with his brother Frank “Lud” McCrary, uncle Homer Trumbo, and father Frank McCrary Sr. What started as a modest endeavor with crosscut saws and war bonds grew, with Bud’s determination, into the thriving Big Creek Lumber of today that Bud has always been proud to call his team. One of Bud’s greatest legacies was his contribution to forestry in the state of California, especially its Central Coast. Bud was influential in pioneering a style of selective forest thinning during a time when clearcutting was the prevailing practice. Nearly two decades after Big Creek Lumber instituted Bud’s single-tree selection harvesting methods, the counties of San Mateo, Santa Cruz and Santa Clara adopted this method of forestry as special county rules under state law. We witness Bud’s legacy when we look at the vibrant forestlands of the Central Coast – forestlands that continue to contribute to the well-being of all. Bud was a leader of Big Creek Lumber for many years, and we are fortunate that he had the foresight for a succession plan to ensure that Big Creek Lumber and his vision will continue for many years into the future. Bud would ask us not to be sad, but to continue to drive forward with his hard-working spirit, creativity, and ingenuity in our hearts. Thank you Bud, you will be dearly missed.” The President’s Proclamation adding the Cotoni-Coast Dairies to the California Coastal National Monument has created protections for many biota, helping to guarantee a balanced approach between public access and preservation. The property’s managers, the federal Bureau of Land Management (BLM), had previously demonstrated disregard for all but federally listed species of plants and animals, which are few on the property. The Proclamation now obligates BLM to manage for 24 species as well as 13 biotic communities that are not otherwise federally protected. The Proclamation guarantees some public access for the property only after the completion of a management plan that is ‘consistent with the care and management’ of these resources.
The following non-federally protected species (24) probably would not have received attention by BLM had this Monument proclamation not included their mention:
The following biotic groups/communities (13) must now be protected and managed for by BLM:
The following federally listed species (4)were also mentioned in the Proclamation:
The following species (2) are listed in the Proclamation and are also listed by BLM California as requiring protection on BLM lands. These species might not have been protected in perpetuity, though, as that BLM list changes with administrations.
Santa Cruz Sentinel Op-Ed, 12/18/2016 Planned sale of land to fossil fuel, mining and and timber concerns mirrors rollback of Obama-era pollution regulations The Trump administration has ratcheted up its efforts amid the coronavirus pandemic to overhaul and overturn Obama-era environmental regulations and increase industry access to public lands. The secretary of the interior, David Bernhardt, has sped efforts to drill, mine and cut timber on fragile western landscapes. Meanwhile, the EPA, headed by the former coal lobbyist Andrew Wheeler, has weakened critical environmental laws and announced in March that it would cease oversight of the nation’s polluters during the Covid-19 crisis. The rollbacks appear to follow a playbook put forth by influential conservative thinktanks, urging the White House to use the pandemic as justification for curtailing, or eliminating, environmental rules and oversight. President Trump should have “the ability to suspend costly regulations without extensive process”, according to a recent report by the Heritage Foundation. One of the most controversial sales would offer up 150,000 acres in southern Utah to energy companies. Some of the parcels are located within a half-mile of Canyonlands national park. The bureau did not respond to requests for comment. Environmentalists, however, say that the push to drill near the iconic red rock landscapes of Arches and Canyonlands is not only destructive but also unnecessary in light of an oil glut that has swamped storage capacity, driving oil prices last week into negative territory for the first time in history. “The idea that it would be ‘critical’ work to speed up oil production on public lands while the planet drowns in oil tells you all you’d ever want to know about the corruption, both intellectual and actual, of the Trump administration,” said the climate activist and author Bill McKibben. In addition to ramping up oil and gas development on public lands, the Department of Energy announced plans last week to “revitalize” the US uranium mining and processing industry. Such a scheme, say environmentalists, puts uranium-rich Grand Canyon national park and Bears Ears national monument at extreme risk. “Enriching special interests with taxpayer resources so they can plunder national treasures like Bears Ears and the Grand Canyon will harm our land, water and public health,” said America Fitzpatrick, a spokeswoman for the Wilderness Society. “To do so in the face of a global pandemic is an abuse of public trust.” The water demands of the uranium industry are significant. Depending on the method of extraction, a mine can require hundreds, even thousands, of gallons per minute. Those requirements are particularly onerous considering that the largest uranium deposits are found in some of the most water-starved parts of the country. Another rule change takes aim at the western forests. In March, the BLM announced a proposal that would allow the BLM and US Forest Service to destroy large parcels of piñon and juniper forests across the western US with minimal environmental review. READ MORE HERE. By Ted Benhari, Friends of the North Coast
In a recent OpEd the Hilltromper.com editors Traci Hukill and Eric Johnson raise the possibility that if Coast Dairies doesn’t become a national monument it could be sold to developers to build “an exclusive enclave” of estate homes, as proposed by an entrepreneur 20 years ago. Monument status would keep that from ever happening, they write, so urge President Obama to proclaim it before Trump and his allies in Congress sell it off. Ironically, in their self-contradictory, inaccurate, and misleading editorial Hukill and Johnson quote from the deed which transferred Coast Dairies from the Trust for Public Lands (TPL) to the federal Bureau of Land Management in 2014: The property “shall be used and managed for open space and public recreation in a manner consistent with the protection and preservation of natural habitats.” The protections in that deed, which are also enshrined in a Coastal Development Permit that local citizens, including members of the Friends of the North Coast (FONC), pressured TPL to obtain, is permanently attached to the property. Both deed and permit contain several other protections that guarantee that Coast Dairies will never be developed except for trails and visitor facilities. While it is true that without monument status the federal government can sell Coast Dairies, the deed restrictions and permit will remain in force and binding on whoever acquires it, in perpetuity. Why would a developer spend many millions of dollars to buy a piece of land that can’t be used for housing or commercial activity? As Hukill and Johnson know, the “plan” that they cite, to checker Coast Dairies with expensive homes, never had a chance of being realized. It was drawn up, and promoted in a slick video, by an entrepreneur whose business model is to buy an option on environmentally valuable properties and threaten to develop them, so that environmental groups are panicked into buying them at inflated prices. The Hilltrompers also should have revealed that Sempervirens Fund, the backers of the monument campaign, is a sponsor of their website. Monument status for Coast Dairies will do little but greatly increase visitation to the property, by gearing up a worldwide publicity machine fueled by outdoor and recreation organizations, websites and publications, without any guarantee of additional funds for stewardship. Local police, fire and rescue services, already stretched thin, will be overburdened. Davenport, the town residents proudly proclaim the “Slow Coast”, will be inundated with visitors who will forever alter the ambience of that tiny community. Davenporters have repeatedly rejected plans to boost tourism. The coast from southern San Mateo through northern Santa Cruz is not only one of the world’s biodiversity hotspots, but a marvelous outdoor playground for the millions of people in the San Francisco and Monterey bay areas. Thanks to the efforts of many people and groups, including FONC, that fought hard to preserve and protect Coast Dairies, the great majority of it is now safe from development. But funds to manage this marvelous heritage are inadequate. State Parks can’t properly care for the beaches, which are being trashed, and the hills where outlaw cyclists (a small percentage of the biking community) cut new trails at will. Besides more money, what is needed is regional planning, to study and map resources and determine the best uses for the various preserved properties, so we have the least impact on animal and plant communities while still accommodating recreation and appreciation of nature. The best way to ensure that Coast Dairies isn’t impacted by too many human users is to let BLM quietly manage it, with local oversight. Monument status will just be too much of a good thing. At the least, if President Obama does issue a proclamation, it must include the conditions demanded by our Board of Supervisors, to minimize impacts. Email (www.whitehouse.gov/contact) or call (202-456-1111) the White House and tell the President that. The Cotoni-Coast Dairies monument campaign’s claim that 84% of county voters support the monument designation is totally bogus. They asked people if they’d heard of the effort to make Coast Dairies a national monument, after they read them a statement explaining what a national monument is. Only 10% of the respondents said they had previously seen, read or heard a great deal about Coast Dairies, and 29% said they had heard a little. Then they read them two statements about how wonderful it would be if it were a national monument, and that many environmental organizations, businesses and politicians, including Sen. Boxer and Rep. Eshoo, supported it. Even then only 61% said they strongly support it, and 23% said they support it a little. Finally, they read them a statement, that they made up, of what opponents say, leaving out the strongest arguments, and that knocked support down to 72%, of whom only 48% said they still strongly support it. So, even after their best effort to get the result they wanted, the campaign still decided, in their ads, to claim 84% support it, instead of 72%! And that so-called support came predominantly from people who mostly weren’t even aware of the issue before they were called by the pollsters! It’s sad to see an organization like Sempervirens that has done so much good sinking to this level.
To see the survey, and a step by step analysis of how they manipulated the results, go to bonnydoon.got.net/monument.survey.html Today Sen. Barbara Boxer – and co-sponsor Sen. Dianne Feinstein – as expected introduced a bill (see link below to the full text of the bill) to add Coast Dairies, and five small areas around California, to the California Coastal National Monument.
The news release they sent out, below, was telling, emphasizing how monument status would be “helping boost tourism”. It also claims, falsely in the case of Coast Dairies, that it would be “permanently protecting these pristine areas.” As we know, Coast Dairies is already permanently protected by deed restrictions and a Coastal Development Permit. It’s disappointing to see these two staunch advocates for environmental causes (Boxer in particular) not bothering to study in depth the implications of national monument status—many more visitors—on the environment, animals and plants, underfunded local public services like police and fire, traffic and the surrounding communities, and just bending to the will of the monument advocates. Here’s their news release: “Washington, D.C. August 5, 2015 – U.S. Senators Barbara Boxer and Dianne Feinstein (both D-CA) today introduced the California Coastal National Monument Expansion Act, legislation that would provide lasting protection to six majestic sites along the California coast by including them in the California Coastal National Monument. This expansion of the National Monument would provide visitors with greater access to the coast, improve management of these areas, and highlight the historic, cultural, scientific and ecological significance of each of these public lands. Senator Boxer said, “This legislation would create a new network of spectacular public lands up and down the Pacific coast, boosting tourism in our communities and permanently protecting these pristine areas for current and future generations to enjoy.” Senator Feinstein said, “The California coast is a national treasure and is highly worthy of preserving for future generations. This bill will add more than 6,200 acres to the existing California Coastal National Monument, safeguarding the pristine land and helping boost tourism and recreation activities in local communities.” “Expanding the California Coastal National Monument would provide greater access to this national treasure and ensure that these beautiful landscapes along California’s coast are preserved for all to enjoy,” said Congressman Lois Capps (D-CA 24). “I am particularly pleased that Senator Boxer’s legislation would redesignate Piedras Blancas Light Station as a National Monument, an honor befitting this outstanding landmark, which is teeming with historic importance and natural beauty.” The expansion would cover five onshore sites, including the Lost Coast Headlands (440 acres), Trinidad Head (13 acres), and the Lighthouse Ranch (8 acres) in Humboldt County. The Cotoni-Coast Dairies in Santa Cruz County (5,780 acres) and Piedras Blancas in San Luis Obispo County (20 acres) would also be included in the California Coastal National Monument. Additionally, the expansion would cover one offshore site – a group of small rocks and islands off the coast of Orange County; the Coast Guard once considered these properties for lighthouses, but the agency now agrees they should be permanently protected as part of the National Monument. These areas feature stunning views of the Pacific Ocean, historic lighthouses and a variety of diverse ecological habitats along the coast. For more information on each of these sites, see Senator Boxer’s full statement on the legislation here. The new designation would permanently protect each of these areas from development [Coast Dairies is already permanently protected from development.—Editor] and would ensure stronger protections for a diverse array of wildlife that call the areas home, many of which are endangered. It would also help restore habitats and protect water quality by placing these properties under one management plan to allow for better coordination of available resources. Adding these lands to the existing monument would make them part of the Bureau of Land Management’s (BLM) National Conservation Lands program, making them eligible for Land and Water Conservation resources. Expanding the Monument would also increase tourism in each of these communities. In Humboldt County, tourism is responsible for more than $330 million in economic activity every year. In Santa Cruz County, tourism brings in more than $700 million every year and is one of the county’s top industries. And tourism in San Luis Obispo County produces more than $1 billion annually and is also the county’s largest industry, supporting 15,570 jobs in 2011. The California Coastal National Monument, designated by President Clinton in 2000, stretches the entire 1,100 miles of California’s coastline and protects more than 20,000 small islands, rocks, exposed reefs and islands between Mexico and Oregon. It also protects the habitat for a variety of wildlife including seabirds, California sea lions and southern sea otters. Senators Boxer and Feinstein, along with Congressman Mike Thompson, introduced legislation in 2012 to expand the Monument to include the Point Arena-Stornetta Public Lands in Mendocino County. In 2014, President Obama included these lands as the first onshore addition to the Monument.” You can read the full text of their bill at: http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/BILLS-114s1971is/pdf/BILLS-114s1971is.pdf On January 12, 2017, then-President Obama, under the auspices of the National Antiquities Act, proclaimed Coast Dairies a national monument. Out of respect for the history of the 5,800 acre property that stretches from Highway One up into Bonny Doon, he added the name of the Cotoni band of Amah Matsun people, who used to inhabit the area, to the Coast Dairies name.
Responding to concerns raised by the Rural Bonny Doon Association and the Davenport North Coast Association, in April 2015 the Santa Cruz County Board of Supervisors approved a resolution that based their support for the monument on a set of conditions that would help mitigate the impacts of the increased visitation that properties designated as monuments attracts. The Proclamation fails to meet several of those conditions, starting with the inclusion of Cotoni-Coast Dairies as part of the California Coastal National Monument (CCNM), the huge expanse of water and coastal rocks that stretches along California’s shoreline. (The Supervisors resolution specifically stated, “There should be no implication in the Proclamation that the National Monument is adjacent to the California Coastal National Monument.” Instead, Coast Dairies is now part of the CCNM.) Several critical aspects of the Proclamation don’t meet the criteria set by the Supervisors for support of monument status. For example, Condition 10 is that “Long-term funding from private, as well as public, institutions should be secured to assure adequate management of the Monument.” While Sempervirens Fund, which initiated and spearheaded the campaign for monument status, has promised some funding, it is paltry compared to the amount needed for “adequate management.” More importantly, the Dept. of Interior, which manages Coast Dairies through the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), has long been pinched for funding by the Republican dominated Congress, and the Trump Administration will almost certainly be opposed to increasing Interior’s budget. In fact, a shrinking of Interior’s budget is more likely to occur. Condition 3 stated that “The Proclamation designating the National Monument shall contain a commitment that the National Monument Management Plan shall: a. Be comprehensive and specific to the land included in the Coast Dairies National Monument.” The Proclamation made no mention of that, and it seems that the management plan may instead be made part of the CCNM management plan. The Proclamation also ignores Condition 2, which calls for the management plan to be completed within 3 years. Condition 3f. said the Proclamation should direct that the management plan “Assure that local fire and rescue services are not overburdened by increased use.” No such language is in the Proclamation. Condition 3g. demanded that a fee-for-service be negotiated for emergency services, and take into consideration “costs that occur off the property as a result of its public use.” Again, not in the Proclamation. Condition 9 was that “There should be no specific reference to plant communities not specifically listed as endangered on Federal or California state endangered species lists.” The Proclamation specifically names several such plant communities. The big question now is whether there will be enough additional funding, from public and private sources, to minimize the impacts of greatly increased visitation on the flora and fauna, on the neighboring communities of Davenport and Bonny Doon, and on local emergency and law enforcement services. As for the increased traffic, especially on Highway 1/Mission St., but also on Highways 17 and 92, and on Bonny Doon and Felton Empire roads, we find it hard to come up with any viable solutions. We hope, though by no means expect, that the Supervisors will actively pressure the BLM, which most likely will continue to manage Cotoni-Coast Dairies, to live up to the conditions their Resolution demanded. Sempervirens Fund and other organizations that pushed monument status on us have a moral obligation to make this work as best as possible. Those of us who fought this designation, on the grounds that Coast Dairies was already fully protected and that greatly increased visitation would have only negative consequences, also have an obligation to try to make the best of this, through public participation in the management plan process, oversight of BLM’s implementation of the management plan, and by volunteering our time as docents on the property itself. |
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