Public Comment Period Extended for

SF YMCA Logging Plan!

1/04/07

 

On Sunday, December 3rd the San Francisco YMCA held a public meeting at their Camp Jones Gulch property near La Honda.  The meeting was a response to the many comments local residents and environmentalists sent to the YMCA regarding its logging proposal for Camp Jones Gulch (aka “Science Camp”).  The event provided participants an opportunity to learn more about the logging plan, ask questions, and voice their concerns directly to the YMCA.  Many folks, including current and past camp counselors and students, as well as local community members and environmentalists, attended the meeting.  The audience, including many Sierra Club members, strongly encouraged the YMCA to withdraw this permanent commercial logging plan and explore other alternatives.  Recently the public comment period was extended, and comment letters are needed soon!

 

Background:

 

The San Francisco YMCA is proposing a very large timber harvesting plan — in perpetuity — on their Camp Jones Gulch (aka “Science Camp”) property near La Honda in San Mateo County.  The YMCA submitted the original Non-industrial Timber Management Plan (NTMP) application to CDF in July, 2006.  The plan proposed to log 733 acres of the 907 acre property, cutting up to 60% of redwood and Douglas fir trees 18 inches in diameter or larger, on slopes of up to 80%.  Though old growth trees in the Jones Gulch Grove were excluded, loopholes allowed cutting old growth "hazard" trees.  The plan also proposed cutting smaller stems of the unentered four-acre grove of old growth redwoods in the southeast corner of the property.

 

In response to public and agency comments, and as a result of meetings with environmentalists, the YMCA has revised the plan to clarify vague or conflicting provisions in the original application.  The revisions reduce the cutting from 60% to 40% of the trees 18” in diameter or greater.  They also developed a road maintenance plan, not previously part of the original application.  But because the plan is an NTMP, the logging permit, if granted, would be in perpetuity, and every 15 years another round of logging could occur with no more public review opportunities.  Once approved, the NTMP could also be amended without further public review or comment.

 

Old growth groves and mature second growth Douglas firs scattered throughout the property would not be permanently protected under the NTMP.  The revised plan still includes winter harvesting, the use of herbicides, logging on steep slopes, and significant impacts to local creeks.  Potential downstream impacts from the proposed operations include sedimentation adversely impacting steelhead trout and Coho salmon in Pescadero Creek and Pescadero Marsh.  Adjacent Sam McDonald and Pescadero Creek County Parks, and the downstream Memorial Park could also be affected.  The plan also would increase fire hazard by creating tinder-dry slash (logging debris) and increasing growth of flammable brush at the Camp.

 

Camp Jones Gulch is used by thousands of school children during the school year and by many families and groups during the summer.  The YMCA wants to log the property to "increase the timber value of the property, to earn an economic return by operating a commercial forest, and (ostensibly) to reduce fire hazards."  We value and support the purposes of the YMCA, but believe extensive commercial logging in perpetuity at Camp Jones Gulch is not consistent with good land management or the message of land stewardship at the Jones Gulch outdoor education programs.

We believe the YMCA should withdraw the NTMP and work with community and environmental groups to develop a comprehensive Stewardship Plan instead that preserves the larger trees, while providing for management of the YMCA lands to reduce fire hazards.  This is a different approach from commercial timber harvesting cycles every 15 years. 

 

To help financially with the Camp's need for upgrading its buildings and implementing the Stewardship Plan, the YMCA should work with Peninsula Open Space Trust or another land trust to place a Conservation Easement on the property.  The YMCA has agreed to convene a community stakeholder group to help them craft a stewardship plan, but continues to move forward with the NTMP application simultaneously.

 

What You Can Do:

 

The California Department of Forestry (CDF) will be making a decision on this ill-advised plan soon.  This is the only time the public can speak up.  Once this plan is approved, it is in effect forever.

Please send your comment letters as soon as possible!

 

Using the information above, and in your own words, please:

1. Write, fax, or email CDF and ask them to deny this plan.  Send your comments to:

         Leslie Markham, CDF

         135 Ridgeway Ave., Santa Rosa, CA 95401

         Fax:  707-576-2608         Email: SantaRosaPublicComment@fire.ca.gov

         Important!  Be sure to reference Timber Plan #1-06NTMP-014-SMO

 

2. Write, fax, or email YMCA Camp Jones Gulch and ask them to withdraw this commercial logging plan and to explore other land stewardship alternatives.  Send your comments to:

         Bill Worthington

YMCA Camp Jones Gulch

11000 Pescadero Road, La Honda, CA 94020

Fax: 650-747-0986 Email: bworthington@ymcasf.org

 

3. Write a Letter to the Editor (LTE) to the following newspapers, expressing your concerns about this open-ended logging plan.  Do not send attachments with your letters, but do include your full name, home address, and daytime phone number.  Send your letters to:

San Francisco Chronicle:  letters@sfchronicle.com  (Limit: 200 words or less)

San Mateo County Times:  smctletters@sanmateocountytimes.com  (Limit: 250 words or less)

         Half Moon Bay Review:  letters@hmbreview.com

San Jose Mercury News:  letters@mercurynews.com  (Limit: 125 words or less)

 

Please send copies to us so we can track our efforts on this issue:  bill.young@sierraclub.org

 

Also, please print out, sign and circulate the petition opposing this flawed logging plan.  You can find the petition and more information at:  http://lomaprieta.sierraclub.org/ForestProtection/

Fax the signed petitions to Bill Young at 650-390-8497.

 

Read the plan at the CDF Web site:  ftp://thp.fire.ca.gov/THPLibrary/North_Coast_Region/

It is in the “NTMPs2006” folder: 1-06NTMP-014-SMO

 

Visit our friends at the Committee for Green Foothills at http://www.greenfoothills.org/index.shtml  for more information, or call Patty Mayall at 650-851-1902, or Bill Young at 650-390-8494.

 

Thanks!