Welcome to the Web site of the Tuolumne Group of the Sierra Club. Our group is one of eleven groups in the Mother Lode Chapter of the Sierra Club. This Web site has information about our activities and conservation issues here in Tuolumne and Calaveras Counties.
BETWEEN TWO RIVERS
Thanks to Ria Rice-Lawson for presenting her movie “Between Two Rivers” at the Sonora Library on October 23rd. Here are some links to share the video, and to river advocacy groups, local and national.
Flow the Movement View and share the film, “Between Two Rivers” and find out more about screening events at the official film website: www.flowthemovement.org.
The Sierra Club is one of the most enduring and influential grassroots environmental organizations in the US. We amplify the power of millions of members and supporters to defend everyone’s right to a healthy world. Our mission is to explore, enjoy, and protect the wild places of the earth; practice and promote responsible use of the Earth’s ecosystems and resources; educate and enlist humanity to protect and restore the quality of the natural and human environment; and to use use all lawful means to carry out these objectives. www.sierraclub.org
1 Pile at a Time was founded in 2021 by Jason and Trisha Revord with a simple mission to combat the ongoing problem of illegal dumping plaguing Tuolumne County and its watersheds. Each of their clean-up efforts is an organized, targeted clean-up project at specific locations, with each planned and mapped out to allow volunteers to participate in a coordinated effort to restore the natural beauty of the area. To donate or volunteer, email Jason Revard at 1pileatatime@gmail.com or call 209.770.6303
Tuolumne River Trust works to protect and restore the Tuolumne River watershed for present and future generations. They do this through three key program areas: education, advocacy, and restoration. www.tuolumne.org
Friends of the River (FOR) is a grassroots organization that protects and restores California rivers by influencing public policy and inspiring citizen action. Founded in 1973, FOR has led successful campaigns for the permanent protection of many outstanding rivers and streams in the state. Including the effort to grant Federal Wild & Scenic status to the Tuolumne and Merced Rivers. www.friendsoftheriver.org
CSERC Since 1991, the Central Sierra Environmental Resource Center (CSERC) has effectively served as the foremost environmental defender of more than 2,000,000 acres of forests, rivers, lakes, wetlands, roadless areas, old growth groves, scenic oak woodlands, and other precious areas within the Northern Yosemite region of the Central Sierra Nevada. www.cserc.org
American Rivers has a half-century of experience addressing river threats from coast-to-coast: helping partners protect vital habitat, working with communities to reduce river pollution, securing policies to ensure we all have clean, abundant water, driving solutions that reduce the risk of floods, working to remove unnecessary dams, and strengthening a river movement that adds power to all of this work. www.americanrivers.org
MASSIVE FOREST PLAN FOR MOKELUMNE RIVER REGION IS RELEASED
In late September, the U.S. Forest Service announced the opening of a “scoping period” to invite public comments on a new plan for a huge 250,000-acre area called the MAC Project.
The giant “large landscape” national forest project would authorize tens of thousands of acres of forest treatments that will take place over many years. Some of those treatments appear to be mostly positive, such as applying prescribed burns to thousands of acres to get fire back into the forest and to reduce a build-up of fuels. The project area straddles the Calaveras District of the Stanislaus National Forest on the south side of the Mokelumne River and the Amador District of the Eldorado National Forest on the north side of the river.
Other proposed treatments would include the thinning of conifer trees to “open up” dense forest stands. Such treatments that focus on removing small and some mid-size trees can reduce the risk of the treated forest areas burning severely in a wind-driven wildfire. But thinning logging can be highly controversial if the agency proposes to log large trees (for example, up to 40” in diameter) or if logging will be proposed in wild, roadless areas. At this stage of the MAC Project, the agency is asking for general comments on such topics, but the scoping plan provides no clarity as to what is being proposed for logging large trees.
Another potential area of controversy is the degree to which the Forest Service plans to spray herbicides to kill groundcovers or brush species along fuel breaks. How much chemical treatment is proposed is one of the key questions to be answered for the new MAC Project. At the moment, there is no information provided to give the public a clue as to the agency’s herbicide use plans or how many acres could be sprayed with chemicals.
Our Sierra Club group already submitted comments of opposition to proposed herbicide use for fuel breaks in a previous local forest project called SERAL 2.0. Because of comments of concern about chemical use were also received from numerous other conservation groups as well, the Stanislaus Forest staff postponed a decision on herbicide use for fuel break treatments in that SERAL 2.0 project – but the agency indicated it still may move forward to allow thousands of acres of controversial herbicide spraying in that SERAL 2.0 Project.
Now in the new MAC Project (which will affect an even larger area of public forest than SERAL 2.0), the question arises again: “How much herbicide use (if any) should be allowed for treating fuel breaks?” It’s important to note that the Forest Service acknowledges that broadcast burning, mastication of brush by shredders, targeted grazing by livestock, and hand cutting of brush are all feasible alternatives to chemical treatments. But the agency insists that chemicals are cheaper and more effective.
The Tuolumne Group of the Sierra Club has worked hard to collaboratively engage in discussions about forest management across the local region and to support balanced outcomes. As this new MAC Project is developed, our hope is to be supportive of as many aspects of the planned treatments as possible, but to also make clear to the Forest Service that we oppose the logging large trees and that we oppose widespread herbicide spraying on public forest lands.
To learn more on this topic, visit the USFS MAC Project Page.
Individual members of the public can submit scoping comments for the MAC Project here: USFS MAC Project Comments Page