A call for support went out early in 2021. Logging was to begin in a coast redwood forest in Mendocino County on the Pacific ocean that many of us believed was protected since it is owned by the State of California. The State purchased almost 50,000 acres from a bankrupt logging company in 1949. The Jackson Demonstration State Forest, located between the city of Willits inland and Fort Bragg on the coast, is managed by CalFire, the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection.
Research showed quickly that CalFire, except for a short pause, never stopped logging the land of their second growth coast redwoods. But now, in the age of climate change and devastating forest fires, their timber harvest plans come under intense scrutiny. CalFire claims their logging reduces fire danger; the community and fire ecologist say cutting large second growth redwoods takes out the trees that are most fire resistant. They also demand protection for coast redwoods in order to slow down climate change. Redwood trees can live for up to 2,000 years all the while removing carbon from the air.
In early April 2021 two of the biggest redwoods marked for cut were occupied by tree sitters and as of today, April 27, logging has not yet begun.
Meanwhile something else is holding up the chainsaws, bulldozers and road builders that are ready to begin logging. The local tribe of Pomo Indians is intervening in the process since much of the Jackson Demonstration State Forest is on their ancestral land. When this area was an intact old growth forest as recently as in the mid 18-hundreds there existed a network of villages and trails between the coast and the Little Lake Valley inland.
My thanks to the radio program Pomo Perspective and the Program Director of KZYX, Alicia Bales, for permission to rebroadcast a conversation that took place on April 19, 2021. You will hear from a Pomo tribal elder, Priscilla Hunter, and the long-time indigenous rights attorney, Polly Girvin. Opening music clip by Holly Near.
Pomo Perspective and the program director of KZYX, Alicia Bales.
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