Forest Protection Committee

Welcome to the Sonoma Group's Forest Protection Committee. The Forest Protection Committee believes that climate protection strategies, including forest conservation, have become critically important, and there is urgent work to be done in Sonoma County to protect our local forests The Sonoma Group encompasses all Sierra Club members (about 6,000) living in Sonoma County. For more information, contact Jay Halcomb halcomb@sonic.net or call 707-869-3302.

Current issues:

Bohemian Grove Logging

This non-industrial timber management plan proposes to aggressively log the 2,500+ acres of the Bohemian Grove property in Monte Rio, under the rubric of “a Healthy Forest Initiative” - ostensibly but dubiously in order to reduce fire danger. The first submission of this logging plan would have first doubled, then tripled, the historical rate under which the Grove has been logged until now The Bohemian Grove represents one of the most remarkable remnant stands of old- growth and late successional redwood and fir forest within Sonoma County.

On December 29, 2009, the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (CDF) approved the Bohemian Club’s nonindustrial timber management plan (NTMP) for the Bohemian Grove, a mixed conifer forest of 2,500-plus acres near the town of Monte Rio in Sonoma County. On January 28th a group of environmentalists and local citizens represented by the Bohemian Redwood Rescue Club and the Sierra Club (Redwood Chapter & Sonoma Group) filed a legal petition against CDF to halt implementation of the NTMP.Read more about the lawsuit here, and read the legal filing here. Historical materials are here.
"Preservation" Ranch

The ironically named "Preservation" Ranch project is the 20,000 acre vineyard conversion project near Annapolis, Sonoma County. Among other environmental impacts, roughly 1700 acres of forest will be permanently converted to vineyards.

ACTION ALERT: "PRESERVATION" RANCH: PUBLIC SCOPING, INITIAL STUDY and PUBLIC NOTICE of the EIR (Environmental Impact Report)

For more, please see: We Propose a Better Plan.
Forest Conversion Resolution re Climate Change

Suit filed to prevent Bohemian Club over-logging

On December 29, 2009, the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (CDF) approved the Bohemian Club’s nonindustrial timber management plan (NTMP) for the Bohemian Grove, a mixed conifer forest of 2,500-plus acres near the town of Monte Rio in Sonoma County. On January 28th a group of environmentalists and local citizens represented by the Bohemian Redwood Rescue Club and the Sierra Club (Redwood Chapter & Sonoma Group) filed a legal petition against CDF to halt implementation of the NTMP.

The Bohemian Grove represents one of the most remarkable remnant stands of old- growth and late successional redwood and fir forest within Sonoma County, and the property includes two direct tributaries of the Russian River. It is in some respects comparable to the publicly owned Armstrong Grove in Sonoma County or to Muir Woods in Marin County. The controversial NTMP, originally filed with CDF in May 2006, was approved just days before the landowner would have come under stricter regulations to protect steelhead and salmon. The NTMP proposes to aggressively log the property under the rubric of “a Healthy Forest Initiative” - ostensibly but dubiously in order to reduce fire danger. Although the Bohemian Club continues to assert that the NTMP's only goals are to restore old growth forest characteristics and to reduce fire hazard, both these claims have been rejected by several experts as contrary to modern forestry science.

Why is this important? - An NTMP differs from the more usual timber harvesting plan (THP) in having no set expiration date and it may allow for logging in perpetuity. Also, after the NTMP is approved by CDF, the public and relevant state agencies such as the Dept. of Fish and Game and Water Quality have reduced opportunity to monitor the long term effects of logging operations while the mechanisms for making necessary environmental adjustments to the plan to allow for altered circumstances are unclear and not transparent.

The first submission of this logging plan would have first doubled, then tripled, the historical rate under which the Grove has been logged until now. Although subsequently reduced the approved logging rate is still unreasonably high and the NTMP would allow the Bohemian Club to log the Grove for the next 100 years with limited environmental review and regulatory oversight.

The Bohemian Club got off on the wrong foot with both the public and government agencies in its original 2006 draft by proposing un-sustainably high harvest levels and by failing to disclose the existence of significant stands of old growth redwoods and Douglas-fir on its property. During an extended 3 1/2 year review process, the NTMP was redrafted several times in response to serious concerns on the part of environmentalists, experts and the local community and to meet legal requirements. Most NTMPs take around 6 months to get approved. However, during that prolonged review period, the Bohemian Club appears to have put more effort into revising the rhetoric of the plan to make it sound more environmentally progressive than to improve its management strategy. During the past 31/2 years, the Bohemian Club has consistently refused to meet or discuss matters involving its logging plan in spite of repeated attempts to talk from critics of the plan. "The Bohemian Club has forced the filing of a lawsuit which would have most likely been unnecessary had the Club been willing to sit down with its critics,” said Jay Halcomb of the Redwood Chapter of the Sierra Club.

The approved plan continues to pay only lip service to managing the property toward restoration of old growth forest characteristics and reducing fire hazard rather than actually developing credible plans to achieve these goals. "These stated goals sound commendable, but, in actuality, you cannot harvest your way to restoration of old growth characteristics or reduce fire hazard by commercial logging in redwood forests," stated John Hooper of the Bohemian Redwood Rescue Club .

From its inception, the NTMP generated public and expert opposition as a result of miscalculations and unscientific claims. Scientists strongly criticized its assertions that, for example, old growth forests were characterized by relatively small, widely-spaced trees, and that redwood groves were prone to catastrophic crown fires. It took members of the public to uncover the fact that the NTMP miscalculated sustained yield and proposed to log more than the forest grew, an error so fundamental as to defy belief. Despite the public’s efforts, the final iteration of the plan violates the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) and the Forest Practice Act (FPA) on numerous grounds.

The NTMP’s treatment of alternatives, for example, makes a mockery of CEQA’s most important requirement. Under CEQA, CDF is required to consider a range of reasonable alternatives to the proposed project. CDF violated these and related laws, regulations and rules in approving the NTMP. The NTMP gives “detailed examination” only to two alternatives, the no project alternative, which is required in every case, and the so-called “alternative approach to harvesting.” This is not a range of reasonable alternatives as CEQA requires. In addition, all of the alternatives considered were either more damaging and/or infeasible, rather than less damaging and feasible, as CEQA requires. <
The NTMP’s treatment of the project “baseline” is no better. Under CEQA, a plan must define the baseline, the reference against which the plan’s impacts are measured. The NTMP violated this requirement, because it changes the baseline to avoid acknowledging adverse effects.
The NTMP fails to identify, evaluate, and mitigate all of the project’s significant environmental effects. An NTMP must identify, evaluate, and mitigate the possible significant environmental impacts of the proposed project. For example, the NTMP fails to calculate or even estimate the project’s greenhouse gas emissions. The NTMP states that the significance of the project’s effects regarding greenhouse gas emissions may be measured according to the extent the project “could help or hinder attainment of the state’s goals of reducing greenhouse gas emissions to 1990 levels by the year 2020 as stated in the Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006.” The project failed this test: During its first 20 years, the project shows a decline in carbon stocking, thus hindering the state’s 2020 goal.
The NTMP fails to adequately consider cumulative impacts. An NTMP must analyze the project’s cumulative impacts. This NTMP does not describe and analyze the incremental effects of related projects in combination with the incremental effects of the present project. In these respects the NTMP hinders rather than helps achieve the goal of salmon restoration in the lower Russian River as required by the Biological Opinion, a 15-year recovery plan to implement the mandates of the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) as they relate to threatened and endangered fish in the Russian River and its tributaries. This NTMP contemplates scores of logging operations over the next 100 years. But it does not describe a single operation, including its location, size, sequence, silviculture, yarding method, whether there will be winter operations, or any other relevant information, let alone analyze how those operations may combine with other similar operations and projects to effect the environment. Rather than identify and analyze the incremental effects of this project in combination with others, the NTMP concludes that standard mitigations will obviate such impacts. It identifies a resource, describes it, and then concludes that it will not be cumulatively impacted because of the Forest Practice Rules. This rationale, however, has been rejected as contrary to the concept of cumulative impacts.

The Bohemian Club is missing a wonderful opportunity to practice true forest restoration on an unusually ecologically valuable property. “This could be a very important building block where the Bohemian Club could work with restoration groups and think in terms of habitat corridors, rather than look like a greedy absentee landlord with little concern for the outside world,” said John Hooper of the Bohemian Redwood Rescue Club. View a video about the logging plan at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ew4_aYhEE8E

For further information, contact:

Jay Halcomb, 707-869-3302, halcomb@sonic.net
John Hooper, 415-626-8880, hooparb@aol.com
Dan Kerbein, 707-481-3903, dkerbein@att.net

ACTION ALERT:"PRESERVATION" RANCH: PUBLIC SCOPING, INITIAL STUDY and PUBLIC NOTICE of the EIR (Environmental Impact Report)

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 29, 2009, 4:00 p.m. to 6:00 p.m.
PRMD Hearing Room, 2550 Ventura Avenue, Santa Rosa.

SATURDAY, MAY 2, 2009, 1:00 p.m. to 3:00 p.m.
Horicon Elementary School 35555 Annapolis Road, Annapolis.

The PRMD website provides a link to the project proposal and background information at:

http://www.sonoma-county.org/prmd/presranch/presranch.htm

Please attend and express your concerns. Or write to PRMD at: PRMD, Attention: David Schiltgen - File No. PLP06-0107, 2550 Ventura Avenue, Santa Rosa, CA 95403-2829.

DETAILS & ISSUES:

The "Preservation" Ranch proposal is the largest forest-to-vineyard conversion project ever proposed in California coastal forestlands.

Premiere Pacific Vineyards, Inc. has now started the formal applcation process for a permit to convert 1,681 acres of timberland to vineyard on an approx. 19,000 acre project in northwest Sonoma County near Annapolis. As a result, the Permit and Resource Management Department (PRMD) of Sonoma County has initiated the required Environmental Impact Report (EIR) process to publish detailed information on this proposal.

Forest conversion to vineyards is prohibited under current zoning. The core components of the proposal are: permanent rezoning from timber production use to rural residential development; use permits for 17 ridge top vineyard blocks; and “consideration” of other project activities.

Over 1700 acres of forest is proposed to be permanently deforested. The Initial Study describes a project that includes a 3 to 5 year construction period for ridge top vineyards, reservoirs, gravel quarries, internal road expansion and upgrades, drainage and water delivery systems, worker housing and renewed timber operations.

The current proposal does not appear to include any vineyard estate luxury homes, however past versions of the project proposed over one hundred such residences, and they might appear in subsequent proposals after initial permits are issued.

This land has been over-logged for decades, which is why it now looks profitable for a land conversion and this new use. Consider, what will the landscape look like in thirty years if this project goes ahead? Is there a better alternative than vineyard conversion for this property?

Potential adverse impacts and issues of the project include:

Water impacts: the project will affect tributary creek flows, requiring 40 new reservoirs to be constructed, each of 10 to 40 acre-feet capacity; will result in greatly increased agricultural water demand for irrigation and frost protection; over 10 miles of seasonal creeks are to be filled; the impacts on water quality and salmonid recovery for the Gualala watershed.

Forest impacts: invasive species spread; loss of the actual and potential carbon sequestration values of the landscape; permanent loss of 1700 acres of ridgetop forest and habitat through conversion; potential for piece-mealing of residential development and of future logging.

Habitat, wildlife and fishery impacts: over 85 miles of 8 foot high wildlife fencing are to be installed, resulting in habitat fragmentation and permanent wildlife hazards; the vineyard buffer zones will be adopted from the forest practice rules, providing inadequate protections.

Fire impacts: fire ignition risks due to agricultural and construction operations; and increased need for fire protection services. Current fire response time for this area is estimated to be about 45 minutes.

Road impacts: increased public road use; major road expansion in forestland; gravel quarry mining to be done on-site with gravel trucking from off-site.

Noise and permanent lighting impacts, both during construction and normal operations.

Vineyard impacts: soil fumigation for vineyards is not prohibited; the “sustainable” agriculture proposed may be unenforceable; there is potential for emergency pesticide spraying targets.

Tax impacts: the public would need to support greatly increased road maintenance, fire protection, and other infrastructure needs resulting from forty or more permanent workers and more than 200 seasonal workers serving the project.

The PRMD website provides a link to the project proposal and background information at:

http://www.sonoma-county.org/prmd/presranch/presranch.htm

What can you do?

Contact these groups of concerned citizens:

Friends of the Gualala Rriver website: http://www.gualalariver.org/default.html
Contact: Chris Poehlmann, poehlman@mcn.org, 707-886-5182

Sierra Club website: http://www.redwood.sierraclub.org/sonoma/Forest.html
Contact: Dan Kerbein, dkerbein@earthlink.net, 707-535-0326

View the video at YouTube: "Worse than a clearcut"

Attend one of the two initial public scoping meetings scheduled on the EIR:

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 29, 2009, 4:00 p.m. to 6:00 p.m.
PRMD Hearing Room, 2550 Ventura Avenue, Santa Rosa

SATURDAY, MAY 2, 2009, 1:00 p.m. to 3:00 p.m.
Horicon Elementary School 35555 Annapolis Road, Annapolis.

"Preservation" Ranch - We Propose a Better Plan.

The "Preservation" Ranch project materials are still being submitted to Sonoma County Permits and Resource Management Department, after which the EIR phase will begin. The Redwood Chapter has been following the progress of this project for several years. This Premier Pacific Vineyards investment in deforestation, funded by CalPERS, is being made to support a non-essential agriculture, the production of luxury, high-end wines. Furthermore, the investment bodes to become an exemplar of how our overlogged forests are treated in the future; it is precedent-setting since it is the largest-scale attempted conversion of forest in No. California. In the present political and financial times, when the public and the world are learning the 'inconvenient truths' about global warming and at the same time the world is threatened with grave financial collapses, we do not think CalPERS should be financing such work. Here is our latest letter to the CalPERS Board, in which we suggest that, rather than deforestation, there are other options for managing and restoring over-logged timberlands, such as those employed by the Nature Conservancy for their Garcia River Forest Climate Action Project.

For more, please see:

Forest Conversion Resolution. After having been previously adopted by the Redwood Chapter, the following version of the Forest Conversion Resolution was approved by the Nevada/California Regional Conservation Committee on March 11, 2007.

"With the passage of the Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006 in California, climate protection strategies will become increasingly important in California, including forest conservation. The Nevada/California Regional Conservation Committee strongly supports the adoption of State laws and local ordinances, General Plan amendments, and zoning ordinances that prevent environmentally detrimental conversion of forestland, encourage carbon sequestering, and protect the State's waters, according to the best scientific practices."

Press Release

IN THE NEWS

Media often fail in their global warming coverage, says climate researcher "The U.S. has to walk the walk if they expect to talk the talk and convince China and India and Indonesia, Brazil and Mexico ... into following suit. We have to clean up our own act... "

Garcia River Forest Climate Action Project -- A better way.

Australian Broadcasting Company -- Good forestry can help fight climate change

Sacramento Bee, Sunday, August 5, 2007-- CalPERS vineyard venture attacked: North Coast project will worsen global warming, critics say

Healdsburg, California (PRWEB) April 5, 2007 -- Organic vineyard & winery uses solar power as integral part of sustainable business.

A forest landowner in Mendocino County was recently assessed a fine of $105,600 dollars

Environmentalists fight vineyards' spread

Why local forests deserve protection

Gualala River Steelhead Studies - Website of a fisheries biologist "The River's future hangs to a large degree on [the vineyard] issue. Any future conversions of the landscape to vineyards inevitably comes at a cost in terms of Juvenile Steelhead habitat, as the watershed's hydrodynamics are inextricably altered."

Wine country casualties

Grape-eating bears killed as vineyards' territory expands (SF Chron). Wildlife is often the loser as vineyards steadily creep into the hinterlands.

Timberland-to-vineyard rules before supervisors

What's Wrong with "No Net Loss"?

Nowhere Near No Net Loss

Pursuing the Perfect Grape

Pinot craze sows seeds of conflict

ARCHIVES

Letter to BOS (12/13/05)

Sonoma County Timberland Ordinance

Sonoma County General Plan Update

SC and SCCA Press Release, 12/09/05