EarthJustice Client - Humboldt Watershed Council

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Cases
California Logging Clean Water Exemption

In Brief: The Clean Water Act is meant to clean up the nation's waterways. In some areas, however, exemptions have been issued that have hampered the goal. One such is in California, where three water boards have ruled that loggers are exempt. Earthjustice is challenging the exemptions in court.

Staff:
Clients:
Environmental Protection Information Center
Humboldt Watershed Council
Updated: April 20, 2004
Case #11095

NYT - A Legal Thicket Amid the Redwoods

A Legal Thicket Amid the Redwoods
By JOHN MARKOFF,
Published: June 4, 1993
In a cluttered office overflowing with filing boxes and legal briefs, William H. Bertain is standing fast in his quixotic campaign to wrest back control of the Pacific Lumber Company, which was acquired in 1986 by Charles E. Hurwitz, a Houston financier.

A child of the lush redwood forests in this fog-shrouded country, Mr. Bertain has dedicated the last seven years to a legal fight that few believe can be won, returning the company to the Murphy family that had managed it since the turn of the century. Seeking to Undo a Buyout

Mr. Hurwitz's Maxxam Inc. bought Pacific Lumber for about $900 million in a buyout financed largely with junk bonds handled by Drexel Burnham Lambert, and three members of the Murphy family have retained Mr. Bertain to have the buyout undone, asserting that shareholders were defrauded. Maxxam also faces a barrage of lawsuits from employees, shareholders and environmentalists seeking to halt the harvesting of old-growth timber.

Despite demoralizing odds, Mr. Bertain says he carries on the crusade because outside investors -- whom he calls "corporados" -- are threatening to destroy a way of life.

"This was the crown jewel of the North American timber industry," he said. "I was just stunned for four months after the takeover, but then I set out by committing to do everything that was legal and moral to stop this."

Mr. Bertain's campaign has set him at odds with John Campbell, the president of Pacific Lumber and a 24-year veteran of the company, the world's largest holder of virgin redwood forests. "He's barking up the wrong tree," Mr. Campbell said in a telephone interview. "He's a zealot and he has his emotions and his ego involved."

Pacific Lumber is not practicing cut-and-run forestry, the Australian-born lumberman insists. Countering critics who charge that Mr. Hurwitz had to increase the company's cutting rate to pay nearly $800 million of debt incurred when it was taken over, Mr. Campbell says the company has shown that it intends to be a positive long-term economic force here in Humboldt County, on the Northern California coast nearly 300 miles north of San Francisco. At Center of Regional Conflicts

Seven years after Mr. Hurwitz's takeover, the dispute shows no signs of ending soon. Indeed, Pacific Lumber has increasingly found itself at the center of economic and environmental conflicts boiling over in the Pacific Northwest. In April, both sides of the Pacific Lumber hostilities were prominently represented at President Clinton's meeting in Portland, Ore., on forest use.

In this logging town of 27,000, the controversy has turned neighbor against neighbor and left the community bitterly divided over whether its future lies in timber or in diversifying into recreation and tourism.

And Pacific Lumber's unwillingness to compromise on environmental issues has made new enemies in this town, which once saw itself as having a one-crop economy.

"For a long time, the timber industry has controlled this area," said Phil Jurick, a Eureka developer. "They've had far too much influence."

For many residents of this community, the Pacific Lumber takeover has come to epitomize the social and environmental costs of the junk bond era of the 1980's. But beyond being vilified as a corporate raider, Mr. Hurwitz has never been charged with violating any laws, and in the short run at least, his company has increased employment in the region. Mr. Bertain's supporters include members of labor unions, community leaders and environmentalists. Nevertheless, it has not been a comfortable time for the bearded and outspoken 46-year-old lawyer, the youngest of 10 children who grew up in nearby Scotia, the company town for Pacific Lumber, where his family had run a small laundry since 1920.

Today Mr. Bertain -- who spends most of his time and much of his money on the legal battle with Mr. Hurwitz -- is more than a half-million dollars in debt. At times he has been unable to meet his house payments, and his health has deterioriated.

The dispute may soon move to a national stage. Legislation is expected to be introduced in Congress this month to clear the way for the Government to acquire more than 30,000 acres of Pacific Lumber's old-growth timber in an area known as the Headwaters. While company officials say that the fair market value is likely to exceed $400 million, Congressional staff members and environmentalists argue that because environmental restrictions prohibit logging there, the actual value may be much less.

Environmentalists have used Pacific Lumber's logging practices as the rallying point in their battle to save the remaining stands of California's old-growth redwood forests. "This is in-your-face forestry," said Joshua Kaufman, a Humboldt County paleontologist who helped form an environmental coalition after he saw Pacific Lumber trucks rolling up and down the road on which he lives. The group has brought suits against the company and hopes to force it to sell its remaining old-growth lands for a new national park.

Mr. Bertain maintains that returning Pacific Lumber to its original owners would be a perfect compromise between the environmentalists and the logging industry. Under its previous owners, the company cut about 2 percent of the trees on its land annually -- no more than the forest's annual growth rate.

In his lawsuits against the Pacific Lumber takeover, Mr. Bertain has asserted that Mr. Hurwitz conspired with other investors to defraud the company's shareholders when he acquired the company. To date, those suits have generally been rejected by Federal courts, but more than a dozen shareholder, employee and environmental suits remain to be settled.

Few people give the small-town lawyer much chance of returning the company to its former owners. But Mr. Bertain is optimistic that he will prevail in his $1 billion-plus claim against the dealings of Drexel Burnham Lambert and its fallen junk bond specialist, Michael R. Milken. Words Unspoken

Mr. Bertain and Mr. Hurwitz have testified at the same Congressional hearing, but they have never spoken to each other. Mr. Hurwitz, a Texan who rarely speaks to the press, refused to comment on Mr. Bertain.

Unfazed by the various lawsuits against his holdings, Mr. Hurwitz has forged ahead, moving to reduce the debt load of Pacific Lumber. He recently refinanced Pacific Lumber's $510 million debt and split the company into three concerns, leading many industry executives to say -- and even some environmentalists to concede -- that the Houston financier had pulled off a business coup.

"They got a phenomenal decrease in the cost of capital," said Craig Gilmore, a financial analyst at Gilmore & Company in Carlsbad, Calif.

In a daring stroke, Mr. Hurwitz shifted Pacific Lumber's timber assets to two new companies, Scotia Pacific and Salmon Creek, cutting back on the company's short-term debt, financed by junk bonds, and replacing it with bonds backed by 179,000 acres of redwood and Douglas fir timberland. Many Lawsuits

Nonetheless, Mr. Hurwitz still faces imposing legal challenges:

*Pacific Lumber and Maxxam are named in lawsuits in both Humboldt County and New York City by former Pacific Lumber shareholders seeking damages of more than $1 billion.

*The logging company faces at least 10 lawsuits brought by environmentalists who charge that its accelerated logging endangers species like the spotted owl and the marbled murrelet and damages forest watersheds.

*In 1991, the United States Department of Labor filed a civil suit against Pacific Lumber in response to the company's 1986 termination of its pension plan, which it replaced with annuities from Executive Life, an insurance company that Mr. Hurwitz controlled and whose parent later went bankrupt.

*In May 1992, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation indicated that it was moving toward suing United Financial Group, stemming from the 1988 collapse of the United Savings Association. Mr. Hurwitz once owned 24 percent of the failed savings and loan, which purchased $1.4 billion worth of Drexel's junk bonds in exchange for $1.8 billion in financing for the acquisitions of Pacific Lumber and Kaiser Aluminum.

*In April, Representative Pete Stark, Democrat of California, introduced legislation that would impose a 75 percent tax on the value of old-growth redwood timber that is used as security for bonds.

Through it all, Mr. Bertain has shown no signs of caving in.

"He's a bulldog of a human being," said David Harris, an author and researcher who is working on a book about the corporate takeover. "Nobody else would be where he is today, but he's still after these guys."

The article also referred incompletely to Pacific Lumber's stance on issues that have angered environmentalists. The company said it had compromised on some matters.

Correction: June 10, 1993, Thursday

An article in Business Day on Friday about a legal battle for control of the Pacific Lumber Company misstated the relationship between Charles E. Hurwitz, chairman of Pacific's parent, Maxxam Inc., and the Executive Life Insurance Company, a California insurer that supplied annuities for Pacific Lumber's pension plan. Mr. Hurwitz did not control Executive Life.

The article also omitted attribution for allegations that the United Savings Association bought junk bonds from Drexel Burnham Lambert Inc. in return for Drexel's financing of acquisitions. That assertion was made in a lawsuit by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation against Michael R. Milken, Drexel's junk-bond specialist. Because Mr. Milken and Drexel Burnham settled the suit for $1.3 billion, no court ruled on the F.D.I.C. allegations.

Eureka to study impacts of Waterfront Drive extension

Eureka to study impacts of Waterfront Drive extension

by HANK SIMS

Nearly five years after it first floated the idea, the city of Eureka is beginning work in earnest on the controversial proposal to build a thoroughfare along the shore of Humboldt Bay between Old Town and the Bayshore Mall, while environmentalists are rallying to fight it.

City employees are preparing to do a study of the proposed road -- an extension of Waterfront Drive -- to determine its environmental impact. A meeting is scheduled Nov. 17 to lay the plans before the public.

Environmental Planner Lisa Shikany said last week that the city was looking at doing as broad a study as possible, in the hopes of identifying and mitigating environmental problems with the road extension, which is listed as one of the transportation priorities in the city General Plan.

"We have taken a very expansive approach to including everything we can in looking at the potential impacts," Shikany said. "We've left no stone unturned."

City traffic engineers believe that the road could significantly free up congested city streets, including the Highway 101 corridor. But opponents, including representatives from many local environmental organizations, are raising red flags about the road's potentially harmful effect on the city's revitalized waterfront -- particularly to the Palco (or Eureka) Marsh.

Representatives from the Northcoast Environmental Center, the Environmental Protection Information Center (EPIC), the Sierra Club and the Audubon Society recently wrote the city with a list of objections to what Jennifer Kalt, an EPIC consultant, recently called "that stupid road."

In particular, the organizations are concerned that the road, which will pass between the marsh and Humboldt Bay, will seriously harm concurrent city efforts to rehabilitate the marsh -- a saltwater wetlands area that Eureka acquired in 1985, thanks to a grant from the California Coastal Commission.

The groups charge that the exhaust and noise from an estimated 4,000 to 8,000 vehicles per day that the new Waterfront Drive is expected to carry will cause irreparable harm to the marsh wildlife and seriously detract from its value as a recreational facility.

Mike Buettner, founder of Humboldtwatch.org and a prominent activist when it comes to bay issues, said Monday that he believes the city is being shortsighted by going forward with the road, given the blossoming of commercial and recreational opportunities on the Eureka waterfront of late.

"I think the city has just begun to turn its face toward the bay," he said. "To put a divider between the people and the bay seems like an injustice. I don't know that this is the best solution, in light of all the compromises that will be made."

The California Coastal Conservancy, the agency which paid for the city's purchase of the marsh and provided funds for its long-delayed rehabilitation, has also expressed concerns that the road could violate the terms of its agreements with the city. Those agreements stipulate that the city must refrain from developing property it owns near the marsh if such development would "detract from the project's purposes."

"If extension of Waterfront Drive as proposed by the city were to interfere or inconvenience that Palco Marsh habitat or enhancement activities the Conservancy could be put in the position of having to evaluate its contractual, legal and equitable remedies," Conservancy Project Manager Moira McEnespy wrote in an Oct. 6 letter to the city.

Nevertheless, city staff members feel that the Waterfront Drive extension is the only feasible alternative to worsening traffic problems in Eureka. City Engineer Brent Siemer said last week that gridlock on the 101 corridor during peak hours is becoming an increasingly real threat. Frustrated drivers already detour into residential areas, Siemer said.

"We're getting neighborhoods having problems already," he said. "People are diverting all the way up at Herrick, people are trying Union -- they're all trying all different ways of avoiding 101 already. My thought is that Waterfront Drive gives us some time before 101 becomes a terrible problem."

The city's most recent documentation on the project -- a "notice of preparation" that lists details the plans to look at in its environmental study -- can be found online by going to www.eurekawebs.com/cityhall, then clicking on "City Departments," "Community Development" and "Waterfront Drive."

Shikany said that she hopes that the upcoming meeting will draw a wide cross-section of the community and that people will be encouraged to participate in the process. She reminded concerned residents that the process was still in its early stages.

"The workshop is an additional step that the city has chosen to take to bring the community Into the discussion," she said. "We want to make sure the community Is well informed as to what the project is and why were doing it -- and for the purposes of the EIR, to get input on substantive issues we should address. And we're certainly interested in hearing about potential solutions."

The workshop on the Waterfront Drive Extension Plan will be held from 6 to 8 p.m. on Wednesday, Nov. 17, at Eureka's Wharfinger Building.

Lost Coast League, Humboldt Watershed Council and EPIC

The genesis of a lawsuit?
Home >> EPIC Cases >> Cases filed - 1997 to the present >>
The Ancient Forests of the Mattole River
Lost Coast League, Humboldt Watershed Council and EPIC v. Pacific Lumber and CDF

Date Filed: September 8, 2000

While we believe that this case clearly raises a number of critical issues regarding implementation of PLs HCP, we failed to secure a Preliminary Injunction pending the trial. The future of this case is somewhat uncertain.

On Friday September 8, 2000, EPIC, the Lost Coast League, and the Humboldt Watershed Council won an emergency stay from the California Court of Appeals to stop a 53 acre logging plan in ancient forest in the North Fork of the Mattole watershed. Our local trial court was unable to find an unbiased judge to hear our motion for a restraining order, but fortunately we had anticipated this hurdle and were able to get an emergency stay from the District Court of Appeals by the afternoon.

THP 475 proposes a clear-cut in the heart of the states largest contiguous stand of unprotected low-elevation old-growth Douglas fir forest, in one of the most seismically active and geologically unstable areas in the U.S. The area is home to the threatened Coho salmon and steelhead trout, as well as rare River Otters, Peregrine Falcons, Pacific Fishers, and Northern Goshawks. This plan is the first of six pending harvest plans in the immediate area.

If these plans go forward, PL could potentially liquidate much of the 4,000 acres of ancient Douglas fir in the Mattole River watershed. Unfortunately, the California Department of Forestry has illegally waived PLs responsibility to analyze the effect of leveling this old growth forest.

This is the first logging plan that we have challenged in court that allegedly complies with the standards of the Headwaters Deal. This challenge has illustrated how difficult it is going to be to overcome the perception by the court that the Headwaters Deal protections are adequate, just because the Deal entailed mountains of paperwork and documentation. Either through this case or in some other forum, the weaknesses of the Headwaters Deal urgently need to be exposed and remedied, before all remaining high-quality habitat is liquidated.

asje.org/houston.html

A virtual lineup of activistcash's favorite subjects - and lookit that - asje is after Maxxam...

http://www.asje.org/houston.html

Houston Principles
of the
Alliance for Sustainable Jobs and the Environment

Preamble
On May 19, 1999, environmental and labor leaders confronted CEO Charles Hurwitz in Houston to demand that his Maxxam Corporation, which owns Kaiser Aluminum and Pacific Lumber Company, be held accountable for its impact on working people, communities and the environment.

By clear cutting ancient redwoods in Northern California, and by locking out striking steelworkers in five cities, the Maxxam corporation and its subsidiaries, Pacific Lumber Company and Kaiser Aluminum Corporation, have become icons of corporate irresponsibility.

Recognizing that we have a common interest in making corporations more accountable for their behavior world wide, environmental and labor leaders have formed the Alliance for Sustainable Jobs and the Environment and circulated the following statement, dubbed the "Houston Principles."

Whereas:
• The spectacular accumulation of wealth by corporations and America's most affluent during the past two decades has come with a huge price tag.
•
• Corporations have become more powerful than the government entities designed to regulate them.
•
• The goal of a giant, global corporation is to maximize wealth and to wield political power on its own behalf. Too often, corporate leaders regard working people, communities, and the natural world as resources to be used and thrown away.
•
• Recognizing the tremendous stakes, labor unions and environmental advocates are beginning to recognize our common ground. Together we can challenge illegitimate corporate authority over our country's and communities' governing decisions.
•
• While we may not agree on everything, we are determined to accelerate our efforts to make alliances as often as possible.
•
We believe that:
• A healthy future for the economy and the environment requires a dynamic alliance between labor, management, and environmental advocates.
•
• The same forces that threaten economic and biological sustainability undermine the democratic process.
•
• The drive for short-term profits without regard for long-term sustainability hurts working people, communities, and the earth.
•
• Labor, environmental and community groups need to take action to organize as a counter-balance to abusive corporate power.
•
The environmental and labor advocates who have signed these principles resolve to work together to:
• Remind the public that the original purpose behind the creation of corporations was to serve the public interest - namely working people, communities, and the earth.
•
• Seek stricter enforcement of labor laws and advocate for new laws to guarantee working people their right to form unions and their right to bargain collectively.
•
• Make workplaces, communities and the planet safer by reducing waste and greenhouse gas emissions.
•
• Demand that global trade agreements include enforceable labor and environmental standards.
•
• Promote forward-thinking business models that allow for sustainability over the long term while protecting working people, communities, and the environment.
•
This ground-breaking alliance of labor and environmentalists invites all people to join with us in a spirit of creative cooperation. Together, we can forge a partnership that protects people and the planet.
Signed:
ENVIRONMENT

Bruce Hamilton
Conservation Director
Sierra Club

Paul Hawken
Author

David Brower
Brower Fund

John A. Knox
Executive Director
Earth Island Institute

John Cavanagh
Director
Institute for Policy Studies

Michael Renner
Senior Researcher
Worldwatch Institute

Richard Drury
Acting Executive Director
Commentates for a Better Environment

Juliette Majot
Executive Director
International Rivers Network

Brent Blackwelder
President
Friends of the Earth

Carl Anthony
Executive Director
Urban Habitat Program

Jonathan Parfrey, MDA
Executive Director
Physicians for Social Responsibility

Suzanne Murphy
Managing Director
Redefining Progress

Paul Schwartz
National Campaign Director
Clean Water Action

Mark Ritchie
President
Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy

Carol L. Wright
Executive Director
Klamath Forest Alliance

Kelly Quirke
Executive Director
Rainforest Action Network

Jim Jontz
Executive Director
American Lands Alliance

John Passacantando
Executive Director
Ozone Action

Lois Gibbs
Executive Director
Center for Health and Environmental Justice

Tom Turner
Director of Publications
Earthjustice Legal Defense Fund

Peter Rosset
Executive Director
Food First/ Institute for Food and Development Policy

Paul Mason
Executive Director
Environment Protection Information Center (EPIC)

Hal Kane
Executive Director
Pacific Environment and Resource Center

Marguerite Young
California Director
Clean Water Action

Huey D. Johnson
President
Resource Renewal Institute

Diane Takvorian
Executive Director
Environmental Health Coalition

Paul Spitler
Executive Director
California Wilderness Coalition

Patricia M. Clary
Executive Director
Californians for Alternatives to Toxics

Samuel La Buddy
Executive Director
Endangered Species Project

Christine Stevens
President
Animal Welfare Institute

Paul Hughes
Executive Director
Forests Forever

Dr. Henry Clark
Executive Director
West County Toxics Coalition

Gary Cohen
Director
Environmental Health Fund

Greg Small
Executive Director
Pesticide Watch

David Korten
President
People Centered Development Forum

Ted Smith
Director
Silicon Valley Toxics Coalition

Franses F. Korten
Executive Director
The Positive Futures Network

Dave Henson
Executive Director
Occidental Arts and Ecology Center

Jay Letto
President
Central Cascades Alliance

David Cobb
Secretary
Green Party of Texas

Jill Ratner
President
Rose Foundation

Craig Thomas
Director
The Center for Sierra Nevada Conservation

Gina Giazzoni
State College Coordinator
Allegheny Defense Project

Adam Roberts
Research Associate
Society for Animal Protective Legislation

Sanford Lewis
Attorney
Strategic Counsel on Corporate Accountability

Karen Pickett
Coordinator
Bay Area Coalition for Headwaters

Luke Cole
Director
Center on Race, Poverty & the Environment

David E Ortman
President
Wise Use Movement

Thomas R. Lent
President
Association of Flight Attendants--Alaska Airlines

Wenonah Hauter
Director
Public Citizen's Critical Mass Energy Project

Paula Palmer
Executive Director
Global Response

Cal Broomhead
Bureau of Energy Conservation
San Francisco, CA

Prof. Lee Altenberg
Information and Computer Sciences,
University of Hawaii at Manoa

Jim Puckett
Director
Asia Pacific Environmental Exchange (APEX)

David Wood
Senior Associate
Center on Wisconsin Strategy

Lisa Mastny
Staff Researcher
Worldwatch Institute

William A Shutkin
President
New Ecology Inc.

Chris Ford
Steering Committee Member
Southern Arizona Alliance for Economic Justice.

Charles M Miller, esq.
Attorney
Law Office of Charles M. Miller

Celia F. Alario
Communications Team
USWA and Amazon Watch

Thomas Ryan
Community Services Director
San Francisco Labor Council

Scott Tundermann
Sustainable Energy Choice Project
Institute for Science and Interdisciplinary Studies

EMT O'Nan
Director
Protect All Children's Environment

Bill Welsch
President
Safe Alternative for our Forest Environment (SAFE)

Beth Burrows
President/Director
The Edmonds Institute

Harlin Savage
Director
Colorado Forest Program

Fredy Champagne
President
Veterans for Peace, Inc.

Julia Butterfly Hill

Alan Rose
Professor Emeritus
University of Idaho

Nancy Kubasek
Author
"Environmental Law"

Hugh M. Carola
Coordinator
Hackensack Meadowlands Preservation Alliance

Mary Bull
SF Coordinator
Boycott the Gap Campaign

John Grech
Public Officer
Earth Worker Inc., Canada

Steve Brooks
Coordinator
Virginia Forest Watch

Larry Weiss
Coordinator
Labor, Globalization and Human Rights Project
Resource Center of the Americas

Stephen Bezruchka, MD, MPH
Affiliate Assistant Professor
Department of Health Services
University of Washington

David Muhly
Chair
Virginia Forest Watch

Bill Devall
Chairman
Deep Ecology Resource Center

Shirley J Shelburn
Humbolt Watershed Council
Rt 1 Trinidad ,Ca 95570

Ken Miller
Salmon Forever
Mckinleyville, Ca 95519

Marianne DE Sobrino
Redwoods Chapter Sierra Club
Eureka, Ca 95503

Kyle Haines
Forest Protection Coordinator
Klamath Forest Alliance

John Sellers
Director
Rukus Society

Karen Litfin, Associate Professor
Department of Political Science
University of Washington - Seattle

Bob Martel
Executive Director
Humboldt Watershed Council

Chad Hanson
Executive Director
John Muir Project

Christine Cooper, Ph.D
Faculty of Business
University of New Brunswick Saint John

Jacek Purat
School of Information Management and Systems
University of California at Berkeley

Steve Thompson
Natural Resource Consultant
Whitefish, MI

Cam Walker
Friends of the Earth Australia

Darryl Cherney, Executive Director
Environmentally Sound Promotions
Redway, CA

Stephen Graves
Land Use Consultant
Soquel, CA

Bryony Schwan, Exec. Director
Women's Voices for the Earth
Missoula, MT

Nancy Fesco
Boreal Forest Campaign Coordinator
Northern Alaska Environmental Center

Julian Powers
Co-Chair for Legislative Affiars
Spokane Transportation Choice Coalition

Kimberly Burkland
Director
Central Cascades Alliance

Robert Cramer
Co-founder
Taxpayers for Headwaters

Martha Bergotten
Campaign Coordinator
Southern Appalachian Biodiversity Project

Lois Barber
International Coordinator
EarthAction

Tim Bristol
Organizer
Southeast Alaska Conservation Council

Larry Campbell
Executive Director
Friends of the Bitterroot

Bill Metzger
Publisher
Great Lakes Brewing News

Kurt Newick
Global Warming activist

Juliette Beck
Campaign Director, Global Exchange
LABOR

Elizabethe A. Brown
Assistant Administrative Officer
The Newspaper Guild Communications Workers of America

Emil Ramirez
Staff Representative
United Steelworkers of America

Carole Reed
Rapid Response Coordinator
USWA Local 9444

Joseph T. Lesh, Jr.
President, Local 1181
Washington Federation of State Employees AFSCME, AFL-CIO

Jeff Mansfield
President
Greater Seattle Area Local
American Postal Workers Union

Randy Berriochoa
Treasurer
Idaho Federation of Teachers, local #4582

Richard Warner
Staff Representative
USWA Local 300A

Jack Gilchrist
Executive Secretary
Seattle/King County Building and Construction Trades Council

George Holmes
President
SEIU Local 202

Sandy Sawyer
President L-3197
American Federation of Government Employees

Brian White
Chair SAOP Steward
Local 120 AFL-CIO

Jason Oringer
Communications Team
USWA

Marlene Myers
Secretary
Local 1066

Gene Achziger
President
TNG/CWA Local 37082

Paul F Glavin
Administration Officer
TNG/CWA Local 37082

Wayne B. Pretts
President
Wenatchee Aluminum Trades Council

Dan Buell
President
Cowlitz & Wahklakum Central Labor Council

Kenneth White
President
Idaho Association of Letter Carriers

Gary Sites
President
USWA Local 341

W C Beck
President, Local #338
United Steel Workers of America

Doug Godinho
President
USWA Local 703

Larry L Kenck
Business Representative
Teamsters Union Local 582

Rudy Hashberger
Secretary, Linn-Benton-Lincoln Labor Council
Oregon AFL/CIO

Douglas Baier
Secretary
Bremerton Fire Fighters, 1 AFF #437

Terry L Bonds
District Director
United Steelworkers of America District 12

Gil Hayes
Secretary-Treasurer
Mid Columbia Labor Council

James D Phillips
Chairman, L & E Committee
USWA 917

Robert N Woodson
Business Manager and Secretary-Treasurer
Laborers' International Union of North America, Local 901

William Bokovoy
Secretary-Treasurer
United Food and Commercial Workers Union, Local 381

Donald Goldberg
Senior Attorney
CIEL

Tony Micciche
President
USWA Local 8599

James Karr
Professor
University of Washington

John Morgan
Financial Secretary/Treasurer
UBC Local 1532

Shirley Kenck
State Committee Woman
Kootenai County Democrat Central Committee

Jean Patterson
Clerk, San Jose Friends Meeting
Friends Committee on Unity with Nature

Ronald Forest
Financial Secretary
Carpenters Local No. 131

Laura Huth
Urbana City Council Member
Ward 5

Normand Coen
Rec. Secretary
USWA Local 7263

Harold Withrow, President
AFSCME Local 120,
Tacoma, WA

Jan Conley
Lake Superior Greens
Superior, WI 54880

Shirley Haglund
USWA Local # 9444
Roseville,Mn

Michael Wodaszewski
USWA Local # 7263
Vadnais Ht, Mn 55109

Jean Frogner
USWA
Duluth, Mn 55805

Robert Hollenbach
USWA Local # 9444
Minnapolis, Mn 55411

Dennis A Gille
USWA Local # 7263
Lakeland, Mn 55043

Wilbur L Wilson
USWA Local # 310
DesMoines, Ia 50313

Charles R Cassatt
USWA Local 105a
Bettendorf, Ia 52722

Robert Marsden
USWA Local 7945
Tacoma, Wa 98421

Thomas Card
USWA Local # 460 g
Kassota, Mn 56050

Bradford Lynch
Mid Columbia Labor Council
The Dalles, Or 97058

Gilbert L Hayes
Mid Columbia Labor Council
The Dalles,Or 97058

T Jay Kelso
USWA Local 13214
Green River, Wy 82935

Albert Battisti
USWA Local 13214
Rock Springs, Wy 82901

Daniel Haanpaa
USWA Local # 13214
Green River Wy, 82935

Arthur Sumstine
USWA Local # 8907
Kansas City, Mo 64120

Robert Sprague
USWA Local 8907
Holden, Mo 69040-9460

Terry Bush
USWA Local 105
Bettendorf, Ia 52722

Carole J Reed
USWA Local # 9444
Chisago City, Mn 55013

Will Herold
USWA Local # 2175
Farmington, Mn 55024-9425

Gary Partlow
USWA Local 2175
Lakeville, Mn 55044

Keith Porter jr
USWA Local # 6803
Albert Lea, Mn 56007

Michael King
USWA Local # 216
Kansas City, Mo

Janice Vochoska
USWA Local # 9444
St Paul, Mn 55117

A. E Stattelman
USWA Local # 307
Topeka, Ks 66608

Sally Edwards
USWA Local # 286
Lincoln, Ne

Earl Ransom
USWA Local # 307L
Topeka, Ks 66608

Wil Leiker
USWA Local # 307
Topeka, Ks 66615

Randy L Hague
USWA Local # 307L
Topeka, Ks 66608

Don Grow
USWA Local # 286
Lincoln, Ne

Victor Hernandez
USWA Local # 2561
Kansas City, Ks 61106

Richard Warner
Staff Rep USWA
Vancouver, Wa 98683

Steve Powers
Staff Rep USWA
Minneapolis, Mn 55414
(612) 623-8840 Fax

Jacks Calvaresi
USWA
Bloomington, Mn 55420

Emil Ramirez
Staff Rep USWA
Independence, Mo 64555

Tereasa Gunderson
SMDC Ashland
Grandview, Wi 54839

Lynn Wedlund
SMDC Ashland
Ashland, Wi 54806

Kim Welty
SMDC Ashland
Ashland, Wi 54806

The Alliance for Sustainable Jobs and the Environment (ASJE)
1125 SE Madison, Portland, OR 97214 503 736-9777, 503-736-9776 (fax)
asje@asje.org
Please make any donation checks payable to ASJE and mail to the address above.

by Ken Miller of Salmon Forever

So clever, pretending that you aren't Humboldt Watershed Council, but that you have teamed up with "them"
in your "Sunny Brae sediment lab" no doubt

Salmon Forever
http://www.treesfoundation.org/publications/article_print_friendly-40
by Ken Miller of Salmon Forever
November 1, 2000

Measuring stream velocity with an orange peel and measuring tape
Photo: Clark Fenton

Salmon Forever was founded in 1996 to encourage enlightened, constructive public debate on issues related to forests, watersheds, and the beneficial uses of water. To fulfill this mission, we work with the scientific community, the public, and regulatory agencies. We also conduct scientific research using relatively low-tech methods accessible to community volunteers. A key part of our work is monitoring turbidity and suspended sediment. We also examine revegetation rates on logged-over lands, the extent of canopy cover, and the “batting average” of certified engineering geologists who provide consultation about timber harvesting–associated landslide risks. We are interested in the mechanisms by which impacts occur and methodologies for cumulative impact analysis.

Until their population crash twenty-five years ago, salmon were the mainstay of a $100 million fishing industry in California. Dr. Peter Moyle, renowned fisheries professor at UC-–Davis, calls watershed deterioration the principal cause of the coastal salmonid decline, with logging and road-building as major factors. Because approximately 50 percent of coho habitat is privately owned, and 100 percent runs through private property, salmon must pass through severely impacted areas before reaching presumably more protected, often public, stretches. Such impacts can destroy entire runs. By protecting private property from the effects of irresponsible management of watershed lands, we simultaneously promote biologically viable creeks, the integrity of objective science, and the potential recovery of native salmonid populations.

According to a 1996 National Research Council report on Pacific Northwest salmonids called “Upstream: Salmon and Society in the Pacific NW,” genetic diversity underlies the success of the species; healthy habitat sustains local variations. The report poignantly notes: “One important reason to protect local populations is that they are locally adapted to the streams that support them. In other words, evolution has made a local breeding population better able to survive and reproduce in its home stream than in other streams. Re-establishing new populations through introductions once the local populations have been lost has proved to be extremely difficult”.

This is where we come in—those of us invested in an ecological future that not only sustains us economically but also nourishes us spiritually. This is the vision of Salmon Forever.

Why turbidity?
The North Coast Water Quality Control Board uses “turbidity levels” as thresholds: the Basin Plan will not permit turbidity levels in streams to rise (due to sediment entry) more than 20 percent over naturally occurring background levels. Quantities of sediment that settle out and cause nuisance, such as aggradation causing flooding, are also prohibited. The Pacific Lumber (PL) Habitat Conservation Plan (HCP) recognizes turbidity “as the single-most sensitive measure of the effects of land use on streams.”

Young salmonids are exquisitely sensitive to turbidity, which obscures their vision and hence decreases their ability to feed. They are also sensitive to suspended sediments, which cause injury in direct proportion to sediment levels and duration of exposure. Fine sediments smother the egg nests of salmonids and fill the interstices in which the young hide. Since smolt size is correlated with ocean survival of salmonids, if sediment-choked water results in smaller fish migrating to the ocean, the number of healthy adults returning to spawn likely will be reduced.

State agencies have identified increased flooding resulting from accelerated logging by PL as a major problem for Freshwater and Elk watersheds. In Freshwater last year, more than 4.5 million kilograms of suspended sediment went down the mainstem of Freshwater Creek past Salmon Forever’s sampling station equivalent to more than 220 truckloads of dry sediment. Each of the 6–7 square miles of logged watershed above the station probably contributed about 600–700 tons. Each of the three biggest storms moved more than a million kilograms past the sampling stations.

By monitoring watersheds with comparable geology, such as the Little South Fork Elk River in Headwaters Forest and Humboldt Redwoods State Park lands, we hope to be able to answer the question: how much sediment is natural? We are monitoring six watersheds in the Trinity, Eel, Van Duzen, and Humboldt Bay drainages. The information not only shows the impacts of ground-disturbing activities that have taken place but also provides an early warning system about upstream landslides, failing culverts, or other sediment sources posing threats to water quality, channel form, and in-stream habitat.

Samples are taken regularly during storms and measured in a portable turbidity monitor, and the filtered sediment is weighed in our Sunnybrae sediment lab. By measuring channel cross-sections, a 3-D picture of the channel can be used to calculate volumes. Correlations among turbidity, suspended sediment, and water discharge (volume or cubic meters/feet per second) characterize the turbidity “signature” of a stream. Comparing these signatures among similar watersheds undergoing different intensities of land use helps to reveal the effects of upstream management activities.

Since monitoring requires multiple samples taken 24-hours, seven days a week during rainstorms, the only economically feasible strategy might be local volunteers invested in the health of their creeks. (A side effect is watershed residents’ enthusiasm for turbidity monitoring as they learn the dynamics of their streams.) Alternative automatic sampling is available for remote sites and for more comprehensive data-gathering.

Salmon Forever has recruited and trained more than fifty volunteers in fifteen watersheds and analyzed more than 2,800 samples in our Sunny Brae Sediment Lab. The U.S. Forest Service Redwood Sciences Lab has provided technical assistance to analyze this data. We are developing a web site for this information. Public agencies contemplating large-scale monitoring programs are evaluating the protocols we have developed. The protocols are also undergoing final review by the U.S. EPA, and, when approved, qualify us to certify monitors under EPA standards.

almon Forever has joined with the Environmental Protection Information Center (EPIC) to develop the THP Watch Program. This program provides citizens with access to our data and research library for their comments on timber harvest plans submitted to CDF. Our input has modified many THPs and helps establish a useful administrative record should THPs be litigated.

We made a video with Howard Russell which presents some of the scientific evidence for the logging-related flooding in Freshwater, and residents’ experiences. Our PL HCP/Sustained Yield Plan Watch program is integrated with community participation in watershed analysis, which will be coming to all of the watersheds in which PL has some ownership. In conjunction with esteemed Steelhead publisher Emelia Berol, we plan to publish a quarterly interview featuring local scientists’ work relevant to salmon and watershed issues.

Salmon Forever has worked closely with local groups to emphasize the vulnerability of the North Fork Mattole River to sediment impacts, where more than 3,000 acres of virgin old-growth Douglas fir are proposed to be clearcut—1,000 within the next ten years. (The Mattole, which means “clear water” to the Mattole Indians, is known as “the other Headwaters” by local residents and is treasured for its beauty and wild native salmon.) We also serve as a scientific consultant to Voices of Humboldt County, a monthly publication of the Humboldt Watershed Council. The publication’s name comes from a video Salmon Forever and Humboldt Watershed Council co-produced in 1997.

Salmon Forever helps those who want to better understand the mechanisms by which impacts occur so that they can protect their home watersheds more effectively. We invite you to join our efforts. If we can help with your monitoring, watershed analysis, or THP comment needs, let us know. 


This article can be found online at www.treesfoundation.org/publications/article-40

Branching Out is produced by Trees Foundation. For more information contact:
Salmon Forever
P.O. Box 3014
McKinleyville, CA 95519
Phone: (707) 839-7444 Fax: (707) 839-7447

Crying crocodile tears...

---- Mark Lovelace wrote:
February 23, 2007

Free Public Workshop Offered:

Bankruptcy 101:
Understanding the Palco Chapter 11 Case

Friday, March 2nd, 6pm to 8pm
Fortuna River Lodge

A coalition of environmental, labor, and forestry organizations are presenting a free public workshop to help the community understand the Pacific Lumber Company's bankruptcy. The workshop will be held at the Fortuna River Lodge on Friday evening, March 2nd, from 6 to 8 pm. The event is being sponsored by the Humboldt Watershed Council, the Alliance for Sustainable Jobs and the Environment, and other partners.

The purpose of this workshop is to help the public understand what Chapter 11 is, how the reorganization process works, the specifics of the Palco case, and some of the possible outcomes. The event will feature a presentation by Peter Clapp, an attorney with many years' experience in corporate bankruptcy law. Mr. Clapp will explain the details of the process, what's at stake, who the parties are, and some of the significant issues which have emerged so far.

This educational workshop is designed to be useful to anyone with either a financial stake or an interest in the Palco bankruptcy, including workers, retirees, contractors, and community members. The presentation will be followed by a facilitated question-and-answer session to allow attendees to further explore the Chapter 11 process and specific relevant issues.

For more information, please contact:

Mark Lovelace, President
Humboldt Watershed Council
(707) 822-1166
sheds@humboldt1.com

Salmon Forever, HWC, EPIC and more

Salmon Forever
http://www.treesfoundation.org/publications/article_print_friendly-40
by Ken Miller of Salmon Forever
November 1, 2000

Measuring stream velocity with an orange peel and measuring tape
Photo: Clark Fenton

Salmon Forever was founded in 1996 to encourage enlightened, constructive public debate on issues related to forests, watersheds, and the beneficial uses of water. To fulfill this mission, we work with the scientific community, the public, and regulatory agencies. We also conduct scientific research using relatively low-tech methods accessible to community volunteers. A key part of our work is monitoring turbidity and suspended sediment. We also examine revegetation rates on logged-over lands, the extent of canopy cover, and the “batting average” of certified engineering geologists who provide consultation about timber harvesting–associated landslide risks. We are interested in the mechanisms by which impacts occur and methodologies for cumulative impact analysis.

Until their population crash twenty-five years ago, salmon were the mainstay of a $100 million fishing industry in California. Dr. Peter Moyle, renowned fisheries professor at UC-–Davis, calls watershed deterioration the principal cause of the coastal salmonid decline, with logging and road-building as major factors. Because approximately 50 percent of coho habitat is privately owned, and 100 percent runs through private property, salmon must pass through severely impacted areas before reaching presumably more protected, often public, stretches. Such impacts can destroy entire runs. By protecting private property from the effects of irresponsible management of watershed lands, we simultaneously promote biologically viable creeks, the integrity of objective science, and the potential recovery of native salmonid populations.

According to a 1996 National Research Council report on Pacific Northwest salmonids called “Upstream: Salmon and Society in the Pacific NW,” genetic diversity underlies the success of the species; healthy habitat sustains local variations. The report poignantly notes: “One important reason to protect local populations is that they are locally adapted to the streams that support them. In other words, evolution has made a local breeding population better able to survive and reproduce in its home stream than in other streams. Re-establishing new populations through introductions once the local populations have been lost has proved to be extremely difficult”.

This is where we come in—those of us invested in an ecological future that not only sustains us economically but also nourishes us spiritually. This is the vision of Salmon Forever.

Why turbidity?
The North Coast Water Quality Control Board uses “turbidity levels” as thresholds: the Basin Plan will not permit turbidity levels in streams to rise (due to sediment entry) more than 20 percent over naturally occurring background levels. Quantities of sediment that settle out and cause nuisance, such as aggradation causing flooding, are also prohibited. The Pacific Lumber (PL) Habitat Conservation Plan (HCP) recognizes turbidity “as the single-most sensitive measure of the effects of land use on streams.”

Young salmonids are exquisitely sensitive to turbidity, which obscures their vision and hence decreases their ability to feed. They are also sensitive to suspended sediments, which cause injury in direct proportion to sediment levels and duration of exposure. Fine sediments smother the egg nests of salmonids and fill the interstices in which the young hide. Since smolt size is correlated with ocean survival of salmonids, if sediment-choked water results in smaller fish migrating to the ocean, the number of healthy adults returning to spawn likely will be reduced.

State agencies have identified increased flooding resulting from accelerated logging by PL as a major problem for Freshwater and Elk watersheds. In Freshwater last year, more than 4.5 million kilograms of suspended sediment went down the mainstem of Freshwater Creek past Salmon Forever’s sampling station equivalent to more than 220 truckloads of dry sediment. Each of the 6–7 square miles of logged watershed above the station probably contributed about 600–700 tons. Each of the three biggest storms moved more than a million kilograms past the sampling stations.

By monitoring watersheds with comparable geology, such as the Little South Fork Elk River in Headwaters Forest and Humboldt Redwoods State Park lands, we hope to be able to answer the question: how much sediment is natural? We are monitoring six watersheds in the Trinity, Eel, Van Duzen, and Humboldt Bay drainages. The information not only shows the impacts of ground-disturbing activities that have taken place but also provides an early warning system about upstream landslides, failing culverts, or other sediment sources posing threats to water quality, channel form, and in-stream habitat.

Samples are taken regularly during storms and measured in a portable turbidity monitor, and the filtered sediment is weighed in our Sunnybrae sediment lab. By measuring channel cross-sections, a 3-D picture of the channel can be used to calculate volumes. Correlations among turbidity, suspended sediment, and water discharge (volume or cubic meters/feet per second) characterize the turbidity “signature” of a stream. Comparing these signatures among similar watersheds undergoing different intensities of land use helps to reveal the effects of upstream management activities.

Since monitoring requires multiple samples taken 24-hours, seven days a week during rainstorms, the only economically feasible strategy might be local volunteers invested in the health of their creeks. (A side effect is watershed residents’ enthusiasm for turbidity monitoring as they learn the dynamics of their streams.) Alternative automatic sampling is available for remote sites and for more comprehensive data-gathering.

Salmon Forever has recruited and trained more than fifty volunteers in fifteen watersheds and analyzed more than 2,800 samples in our Sunny Brae Sediment Lab. The U.S. Forest Service Redwood Sciences Lab has provided technical assistance to analyze this data. We are developing a web site for this information. Public agencies contemplating large-scale monitoring programs are evaluating the protocols we have developed. The protocols are also undergoing final review by the U.S. EPA, and, when approved, qualify us to certify monitors under EPA standards.

Salmon Forever has joined with the Environmental Protection Information Center (EPIC) to develop the THP Watch Program. This program provides citizens with access to our data and research library for their comments on timber harvest plans submitted to CDF. Our input has modified many THPs and helps establish a useful administrative record should THPs be litigated.

We made a video with Howard Russell which presents some of the scientific evidence for the logging-related flooding in Freshwater, and residents’ experiences. Our PL HCP/Sustained Yield Plan Watch program is integrated with community participation in watershed analysis, which will be coming to all of the watersheds in which PL has some ownership. In conjunction with esteemed Steelhead publisher Emelia Berol, we plan to publish a quarterly interview featuring local scientists’ work relevant to salmon and watershed issues.
Salmon Forever has worked closely with local groups to emphasize the vulnerability of the North Fork Mattole River to sediment impacts, where more than 3,000 acres of virgin old-growth Douglas fir are proposed to be clearcut—1,000 within the next ten years. (The Mattole, which means “clear water” to the Mattole Indians, is known as “the other Headwaters” by local residents and is treasured for its beauty and wild native salmon.) We also serve as a scientific consultant to Voices of Humboldt County, a monthly publication of the Humboldt Watershed Council. The publication’s name comes from a video Salmon Forever and Humboldt Watershed Council co-produced in 1997.

Salmon Forever helps those who want to better understand the mechanisms by which impacts occur so that they can protect their home watersheds more effectively. We invite you to join our efforts. If we can help with your monitoring, watershed analysis, or THP comment needs, let us know. 

This article can be found online at www.treesfoundation.org/publications/article-40

Branching Out is produced by Trees Foundation. For more information contact:
Salmon Forever
P.O. Box 3014
McKinleyville, CA 95519
Phone: (707) 839-7444 Fax: (707) 839-7447

***
Check out the cross-pollinization of these supposedly separate groups:
Salmon Forever
Home / Publications / Branching Out / Fall 2000 / Salmon Forever. by Ken Miller of Salmon Forever November 1, 2000. Measuring stream velocity with an orange ...
www.treesfoundation.org/publications/article-40 - 27k - Cached - Similar pages (Trees Foundation, that's Earth First)

Groups Demand Water Board Curtail Excessive Logging: Independent ...
Michael Shellenberger, Salmon Forever, 510-525-9900 Ken Miller, Humboldt Watershed Council, 707-839-7444 Jesse Noell, Salmon Forever, 707-443-7433 ...
www.wildcalifornia.org/pressreleases/number-29 - 10k - Cached - Similar pages (wildcalifornia, that's EPIC)

Deep-Water, Industrial Port Development vs. Sustainable Future
Dr. Ken Miller President, Salmon Forever /s/ Tim McKay Executive Director, Northcoast Environmental Center /s/ Ruth Jameson Eureka Homeowners Committee ...
www.wildcalifornia.org/pages/page-168 - 28k - Cached - Similar pages

Bay Area Coalition for Headwaters - The Bay Area Coalition for ...
It's hard to believe, but the Bay Area Coalition for Headwaters is 10 years old! ... Senator Barbara Boxer's office with one of BACH's founders, Ken Miller ...
www.treesfoundation.org/affiliates/update-77 - 15k - Cached - Similar pages

EPIC & Humboldt Watershed Council v PL

Home >> EPIC Cases >> Cases filed - 1997 to the present >>
The Ancient Forests of the Mattole River
Lost Coast League, Humboldt Watershed Council and EPIC v. Pacific Lumber and CDF

Date Filed: September 8, 2000

While we believe that this case clearly raises a number of critical issues regarding implementation of PLs HCP, we failed to secure a Preliminary Injunction pending the trial. The future of this case is somewhat uncertain.

On Friday September 8, 2000, EPIC, the Lost Coast League, and the Humboldt Watershed Council won an emergency stay from the California Court of Appeals to stop a 53 acre logging plan in ancient forest in the North Fork of the Mattole watershed. Our local trial court was unable to find an unbiased judge to hear our motion for a restraining order, but fortunately we had anticipated this hurdle and were able to get an emergency stay from the District Court of Appeals by the afternoon.

THP 475 proposes a clear-cut in the heart of the states largest contiguous stand of unprotected low-elevation old-growth Douglas fir forest, in one of the most seismically active and geologically unstable areas in the U.S. The area is home to the threatened Coho salmon and steelhead trout, as well as rare River Otters, Peregrine Falcons, Pacific Fishers, and Northern Goshawks. This plan is the first of six pending harvest plans in the immediate area.

If these plans go forward, PL could potentially liquidate much of the 4,000 acres of ancient Douglas fir in the Mattole River watershed. Unfortunately, the California Department of Forestry has illegally waived PLs responsibility to analyze the effect of leveling this old growth forest.

This is the first logging plan that we have challenged in court that allegedly complies with the standards of the Headwaters Deal. This challenge has illustrated how difficult it is going to be to overcome the perception by the court that the Headwaters Deal protections are adequate, just because the Deal entailed mountains of paperwork and documentation. Either through this case or in some other forum, the weaknesses of the Headwaters Deal urgently need to be exposed and remedied, before all remaining high-quality habitat is liquidated.

NCJ - The more things change...

The more things change...
PL and EPIC at odds again

by KEITH EASTHOUSE

Déjà vu.

Some might have had that sensation when news broke last week that the Garberville-based Environmental Protection Information Center had uncovered evidence that the Pacific Lumber Co. was logging illegally.

According to an eight-page report by the group titled "Setting the Record Straight," the company has been slapped with 325 violations since it signed the Headwaters agreement in 1999. About 75 percent of the violations were for the illegal cutting of trees -- some of them old growth giants -- in streamside areas. The remainder had to do with cutting in areas that had been set aside for the marbled murrelet and the northern spotted owl, both protected species.

Most of the noncompliance notices -- 227 -- were issued by the California Department of Fish and Game for failing to comply with provisions of the document that forms the cornerstone of the agreement: the habitat conservation plan, which is supposed to govern logging on the company's 211,000 acres for the next 45 years. The remaining 98 violations were issued by the California Department of Forestry for breaking state forest practice rules.

PL's chief scientist, Jeff Barrett, in a written statement Tuesday, accused EPIC of deliberately distorting the facts. He said that the violations of the conservation plan are actually "noncompliance reports [that] are most often errors with little or no environmental effect." He compared them to actual breaches of state forestry rules, which he said the company considers "significant because they usually involve some impact on the environment."

The familiarity of the situation stems from the fact that, generally speaking, this has all happened before, or something like it. In 1998, the forestry department pulled Palco's timber license after the company had racked up hundreds of violations of state logging regulations from 1994 to 1997. Those violations were not brought to the public's attention by the agency, often criticized for favoring timber interests. Instead, environmentalists uncovered them.

"Once again, it's falling on the shoulders of EPIC to uncover this information and press for action," program director Cynthia Elkins said in a telephone interview last week.

Of course, it's the media's job to reveal such matters, so there has evidently been a lack of aggressiveness on the part of the local press the Journal included. More troubling, perhaps, is Fish and Game's silence on the matter. Even as the number of violations of the conservation plan piled up 82 in 2001, 79 in 2002, 116 last year, according to the EPIC report -- the department apparently did nothing to notify the public. In fact, while it periodically issued press releases about a host of comparatively minor matters -- like penalizing duck hunters -- Fish and Game was publicly giving the impression that Palco was adhering to the conservation plan.

"We think Pacific Lumber is dealing in best faith to comply" with the habitat conservation plan, Michael Valentine, general counsel for Fish and Game, told the San Francisco Chronicle in an article that appeared last year. In that same article, a forestry department spokesman was quoted as saying that Palco's compliance with the conservation plan was improving over time. The reality, it now appears, was just the opposite.

Bill Condon, a senior environmental scientist with Fish and Game, confirmed the number of violations in an interview with the Times-Standard last week. He said that not all of them were serious, but that some were -- including two incidents in which Palco was fined $100,000 for logging trees in restricted areas. Condon could not be reached for comment by the Journal.

Elkins said imposing penalties after the fact is not enough; regulators need to head off violations before they occur.

"The agencies' lack of actions to prevent further violations and damage is just as disturbing as PL's egregious violations," Elkins said.

Forestry department deputy chief John Marshall said Tuesday that most of the state forest practice rules violations were relatively minor "paperwork" violations. He said that since the signing of the Headwaters deal, CDF had imposed financial penalties of "several thousand dollars apiece for two or three violations [for] harvesting in areas where harvesting was not supposed to occur."

Under the terms of the Headwaters agreement, CDF can levy financial penalties of up to $10,000 per day for each violation. Elkins said that the forestry department should be treating some of the violations of the conservation plan as also being violations of state regulations.

For months now PL has conducted a seemingly expensive television and print advertising campaign touting its environmental achievements.

In the view of Elkins -- and others -- the EPIC report completely undermines that effort.

"PL believes that if they tell the big lie often enough, people will start to believe it," Elkins said. "But that theory is running up against another maxim -- you can't fool all of the people all of the time."

Someone else, someone with plenty of hands-on experience trying to regulate the company's logging operations who asked to remain unidentified, put it more succinctly.

"I think their PR campaign is total bullshit."

ER - PALCO called to task by environmental group

PALCO called to task by environmental group
by Mike Morrow, 3/23/2006

The Environmental Protection Information Center is continuing its pressure on MAXXAM Inc. and its Scotia Pacific Co., seeking what it says is full disclosure on potential sales of land in excess of 9,000 acres.

In a letter to Realtors throughout Humboldt County, the Garberville-based group noted the land in question is covered by provisions of the company’s habitat conservation plan and other agreements and that Scotia Pacific should reveal all required information relating to proposed land sales.

“Considering (MAXXAM’s) long history of rule-breaking and statements that the company might not be giving full disclosure about restrictions on the land, we believe we have a right to know,” said Larry Evans of EPIC.

EPIC’s letter of inquiry to Realtors Monday also asked if MAXXAM has made its full disclosure.

A PALCO spokesman said the company would have no comment at this time.

Altogether, 9,264 acres are configured by eight parcels, ranging in size from 152 to 3,795 acres, and are part of a larger real estate offering totaling 14,631 acres.

The proposed real estate sale has been characterized by EPIC as corporate asset liquidation aimed at forestalling a debt-driven bankruptcy of Scotia Pacific.

“In addition to the letter of inquiry highlighting specific sections of the governing agreements, a (compact disc) containing complete copies of the three relevant documents was enclosed in certified mail packages,” Evans said. “The documents include the habitat conservation plan and an accompanying implementation agreement, and the enforcement agreement for Assembly Bill 1986. Each of these arose from negotiations leading to the 1999 Headwaters Forest deal.”

Evans said that while the scattered tracts of ranchlands are being listed by local real estate companies, a larger offering that could total as much as 45,000 acres reportedly is being offered to unnamed timber companies.

“In our view,” Evans said, “the MAXXAM-controlled Scotia Pacific and the Pacific Lumber Co. has a scandalous record when it comes to following the law. The message is ‘buyers beware.’”
EPIC, according to Evans, “supports conservation of species, habitat and a sustainable forest products industry. Both are possible.”

But he said the “dismantling of the once-proud Pacific Lumber Co. threatens to leave the county with an even more depleted resource base, already pillaged by MAXXAM in its 20-year liquidation scheme.”

Copyright (C) 2005, The Eureka Reporter. All rights reserved.

ER - Another local group decries toxins and big boxes

Larry Evans, transitioning between EPIC and Baykeeper. Healthy Humboldt's Mark Lovelace is also Humboldt Watershed Council/Ken Miller. The "Local Solutions" links to Richard Salzman's "Alliance for Ethical Business," and to the newly formed CREG "Citizens for Real Economic Growth" are worth noting.

Another local group decries toxins and big boxes
by Wendy Butler, 2/9/2006

When Security National Senior Vice President Brian Morrissey was still employed by Union Pacific Railroad Co. as its real estate general director, his company worked with developers on cleanup of three major pieces of property.

“In each of these cases they are almost identical to the type of cleanup and the type of project we’re talking about on the Eureka ‘Balloon Track,’” he said.

His response was sparked by a comment made by Larry Evans, volunteer and member of Democracy Unlimited.

The Eureka resident sent a news release to media Wednesday on behalf of his organization and Local Solutions and Healthy Humboldt Coalition.

The groups have “joined together” to urge local residents to attend the Eureka City Council’s adjourned council meeting today at 7 p.m. in the City Hall Council Chambers.

On Tuesday, Security National presented a petition to the council for it to authorize the company to submit a rezoning application to accommodate its plans to construct its mixed-use Marina Center project on the Eureka Rail Yard or “Balloon Track,” which it is in the process of purchasing from Union Pacific.

The Council Chambers were full and people waited in the hallway to speak on the issue. Council voted to continue the meeting today.

During an interview, Evans said that when Morrissey was with Union Pacific the company had a history of doing “full cleanups” of its contaminated parcels.

Evans’ news release demands that Union Pacific be held responsible for a “100 percent cleanup” of the rail yard, located between Waterfront Drive and Washington Street.

The news release also included a plea for local residents to urge council to vote against big box development, referring to SN’s plans to put a Home Depot on the Balloon Track.

The cleanup demand pales somewhat in comparison to another issued a week ago by another local group.

Nonprofit organization Humboldt Baykeeper issued a notice of intent to sue Union Pacific over what the group claims are violations of federal Clean Water Act and other state and federal laws on the 29.45-acre parcel.

The site contains toxic contaminants, which include chromium, oil and gasoline, as well as lead.

Morrissey previously said that to his knowledge Union Pacific has “fully complied” with rules and regulations for monitoring and cleanup.

As part of its purchase arrangements with Union Pacific, SN has agreed to assume the responsibility for the remainder of the cleanup necessary for it to construct a Marina Center.

Morrissey said that during his tenure with Union Pacific, partial cleanup and capping was utilized by developers of three Union Pacific sites — Salt Lake City Gateway Project, the Sacramento Rail Yard and Victory Center in Dallas.

“All of those projects were my projects,” he said. “In all three of those cases, the developer cleaned (and) we made sure we understood how (and) where and made sure it didn’t adversely impact the railroad.”

SN will fully clean some parts of the site and cap some other areas, Morrissey said.

He said that when he was on Union Pacific’s staff, one of the sites that his company monitored was the Balloon Track.

He added that he had a full staff that took care of that and Eureka “didn’t hit my radar screen very often.”

(Security National owns The Eureka Reporter.)

Copyright (C) 2005, The Eureka Reporter. All rights reserved.

Local Solutions related stories:
Salzman's Empire The Local Solutions sham
No connection?
It's in the Headers
Local Solutions' 460 Campaign Statements
Any doubt what Local Solutions' agenda is?
What happened to Local Solutions?
Where is "Local Solutions"?
TS - Local Solutions by Michael Twombly
ER - Another local group decries toxins and big boxes

ER - Court nixes ruling on part of Headwaters agreement

Court nixes ruling on part of Headwaters agreement
by Kara D. Machado, 12/18/2005

A state appellate court last Monday overruled a Humboldt County Superior Court judge’s ruling that sided with environmentalists over The Pacific Lumber Company.

The appellate decision threw out the July 2003 ruling by Judge John Golden, which invalidated a major portion of the PALCO’s 1999 Headwaters agreement.

“Of course we are delighted with the decision,” said PALCO president and CEO Robert Manne.

Larry Evans, president of the Environmental Protection Information Center, was not.

EPIC was one of two plaintiffs that sued the California Department of Forestry and other “interested parties,” including PALCO, with regard to what EPIC considered a “flawed” Headwaters agreement concerning species and habitat.

Evans said EPIC’s next step will be to analyze the decision and, should it decide to do so, appeal to the state Supreme Court.

“We will be reading through it with a fine-tooth comb,” Evans said. “Overall, we disagree with it, respectfully, and we stand by our basic case, which is that (PALCO’s environmental) plan doesn’t represent the realities on the ground, meaning species are being pushed to the brink of annihilation.”

According to Chris Manson, manager of regional government relations at PALCO, Golden’s ruling invalidated the company’s Sustainable Yield Plan — which allowed it to cut up to 178 million board feet per year; its State Incidental Take Permits — in relation to the steps PALCO took to protect species and habitat; and its Streambed Alteration Permit — which allowed PALCO to put in crossings on water courses.

Despite Golden’s ruling, PALCO did not have to shut down operations, it just shifted gears and obtained different permits and a different option in its sustainable yield plan.

Throughout the 84-page appellate ruling, there were several comments that stated EPIC “confused” distinct notifications and its attacks against PALCO and the environmental plan were “nonsensical,” erroneous, “simply wrong,” have taken too “narrow a view” and even stated that EPIC’s complaint that no mitigated measures were provided for the geologic impact identified in the environmental report were “meritless.”

Evans said the science the appellate court relied on to make its ruling is “suspect.”

“It has been politicized from the highest levels, from the Bush administration and its cabinet,” Evans said. “They are taking science from people in the field and rewriting it and then deleting whole sections in some cases and sending them back down as agency science.”

Evans said EPIC believes PALCO has logged about 120 percent in the overall watershed within the first seven years of its 10-year equivalent acreage and “the only thing they’ve sustained the yield of is mud and sediments into the creeks and sustained the yield of floods.”

EPIC plans to continue to closely watch PALCO’s operations and Evans said that it is not EPIC’s intention to “just beat up on PALCO.”

“We want reform of forestry across the board,” he said.

Manson said what’s important for PALCO regarding the appellate decision is the validation.

“It’s a validation for what we’ve said all along,” he said. “ ... We’re operating in a sustainable and environmentally sensitive manner.”

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