The Implementation Committee's job is to write the local ordinances that will implement the Strategy. The Committee's meetings are public and usually held at 9:00 am on the third Wednesday of each month in the Sonoma County PRMD hearing room at 2550 Ventura Avenue, Santa Rosa. Call the City of Santa Rosa at (707) 543-3085 to confirm meeting times.

Implementation Committee Website

Draft Implementation Plan (464K pdf)

What Can You Do to Influence the Committee?
You are invited to come to a study group that meets the last Tuesday of every month at 7pm at the Environmental Center. More about the study group.

Recent and Upcoming California Tiger Salamander Study Group Meetings:

January 29, 2008: Larry Stromberg, wetlands consultant, will discuss created pools on the Santa Rosa plain and ecosystem management requirements. Larry and his business partner Steve Talley designed and built the Carinalli Todd Preserve on Todd Rd and the Slippery Rock Preserve on Occidental Road. Larry is also one of a group of botanists and biologists collaborating with the US Fish and Wildlife Service on the revised Programmatic Biological Opinion for wetland-filling permits issued by the US Army Corps of Engineers. A presentation of Larry's on vernal pool hydrology (Sacramento) at the 1996 California Native Plant Society Vernal Pools Ecosystems Conference can be found at http://www.vernalpools.org/proceedings/contents.pdf.

February 26, 2008: John Hopkins will discuss Habitat Conservation Programs (HCPs) and his recommendations for positive conservation outcomes. John is the President of the Institute for Ecological Health, Steering Committee vice-chair of the South Sacramento HCP and Steering Committee vice-chair of the Yolo Natural Heritage Program. A pdf of John's Regional Conservation Planning in California: A Guide can be found at http://www.cnps.org/cnps/conservation/pdf/CPGUIDE.pdf.

March 2004 - December 2005

The SRPCS Team, a closed-meeting group made up mostly of representatives from federal and state agencies, but also including reps for the county, cities, environmentalists and landowners, came up with a biology-based plan for conserving and recovering California tiger salamander populations in Sonoma County. The plan is also a recovery strategy for four endangered vernal pool plants: Burke's goldfield, Sonoma sunshine, Sebastopol meadowfoam and many-flowered navarretia.

The SRPCS plan requires developers converting tiger salamander habitat within the Urban Growth Boundaries of the cities to buy land from willing sellers in the wetlands areas to the west of the cities and to the east of the Laguna de Santa Rosa. The Strategy goal is that this land will be preserved from all future urban development and will be managed to conserve and recover the wetlands species found there.

The SRPCS was peer-reviewed by independent conservation scientists. To read their comments, click on Final SRPCS and download Appendix L - Peer Reviewer Comments.

Final SRPCS

Development and filling of wetlands in Sonoma County's Santa Rosa Plain has decreased the vernal pools and seasonal wetlands to an estimated 20% of their original number. These wetlands are home to plants and animals that are found nowhere else. Efforts to save the remaining wetlands began in the county in the 1980's, and led to the drafting of the Vernal Pool Preservation Plan, which was never signed by all participants or put into effect. During the 1990's, petitions were made to the state and to U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service to list the California tiger salamander and several of the vernal pool endemic plants as endangered species. The California tiger salamander was finally listed as endangered in 2004.

• Center for Biological Diversity
• U.S. Fish & Wildlife Species Profile
• U.S. Fish & Wildlife Sacramento office - species account
• U.S Fish & Wildlife Endangered Species Program