Roanne Withers
Mendocino Group Secretary

2003 - What an exciting year it portends to be for conservation activities in Mendocino county!

The Mendocino Group welcomed and seated its Executive Committee members on January 7th - some old, and some new.

Newly elected "newcomers" Linda Leahy, Bernie McDonald, and Michele White bring experience, freshness and enthusiasm to the Group, while old-timers Ron Guenther, Flo Ann Norvell, Linda Perkins, Roanne Withers and Bill Heil renewed their life commitments to preservation and protection of the environment.

But that's not all...

Active Group members Horace Mann and Laura Edminster also discovered an interest in common with each other - accessibility for the physically challenged to public lands.

Combine ebullience with some cookies and humor and it's a Mendocino Group meeting!

So, mark your calendars.

The Mendocino Group will hold joint Membership and ExCom meetings this year at 6:00pm, at the Fort Bragg Library, on February 4, April 1, June 3, August 5, October 7, December 2 and January 6, 2004.

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Thanks for Your Help

The Mendocino Group wishes to extend its own special thank you to all the people in the Sierra Club - local, state and national - who helped stop Alaska Water Exports' attempts to extract water from the Albion and Gualala Rivers and ship it to San Diego. Working together, we achieved a significant win for the wildlife of these rivers.

Protecting Endangered Species?

Last month we commented on the first part of Mendocino Redwood Company's (MRC) application - to federal agencies - for an "incidental take permit" which would allow them to kill listed species while conducting otherwise lawful activities - that is, if they develop a Habitat Conservation Plan that can show how, in the long term, conservation of species is achieved.

The second step of MRC's application - the state portion - we commented on this month. This is a planning agreement between California and MRC that outlines the steps that will be taken by both parties to develop a Natural Communities Conservation Plan. If the permit is issued, this would give a state "license to kill" similar to the federal permit.

A slice from our Sierra Club comment: "...in particular, we believe that the lands and waters under consideration in this Planning Agreement, having been so badly degraded - with severe reductions especially in late seral habitat types and in natural diversity, and with virtually all of its waters listed as impaired by pollutants by the Environmental Protection Agency under Section 303(d) of the Clean Water Act - are not suitable for the development of a joint HCP/NCCP (Habitat Conservation Plan/Natural Community Conservation Plan) which would allow any additional impacts to the endangered and threatened wildlife found therein. In addition, with no baseline studies established for the wildlife on these lands - including biological assessments of the viability of the species proposed in the "initial focus list" - we have no way of ascertaining whether the impacts of 'incidental take' will be balanced by conservation measures.

We therefore believe that the State of California ought not to sign this planning agreement."