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Indybay Feature

A National Monument on Our North Coast?

by Land Trust of Santa Cruz County
At its first meeting of the New Year, the Land Trust Board endorsed the idea of designating more than 10,000 acres on the North Coast as a national monument – and of finding out if there is community support for the idea.
2014-winter-web.jpg
A National Monument on Our North Coast?

This article originally appeared in our newsletter, Landmarks, Winter 2014

At its first meeting of the New Year, the Land Trust Board endorsed the idea of designating more than 10,000 acres on the North Coast as a national monument – and of finding out if there is community support for the idea.

National monuments are a category of federal conservation lands, sort of minimalist national parks, without all the bells and whistles, wild and beautiful places people can enjoy while leaving a light footprint. Fort Ord is a national monument. The Pinnacles was a national monument for more than a hundred years before it became a national park.

At the core of the proposed national monument on the North Coast is 5,500 acres of Coast Dairies, a property protected in 1998 and still not open to the public. The federal Bureau of Land Management (BLM) is to take ownership of Coast Dairies any day now (yes, we’ve been hearing that for a while) and would administer the national monument. BLM already administers 31 national monuments under policies that focus on protecting the natural resources that are very different from BLM’s multi-use policies for non-national monument lands.

The Land Trust Board also supported adding up to 4,700 acres of the former CEMEX Redwoods Forest to the national monument – excluding the 3,800 acres to be set aside as a working forest by the CEMEX Partners. National monument regulations do not allow sustainable timber harvesting – or a wide variety of other activities allowed on other BLM lands. The emphasis in national monuments is on protecting natural resources, not using them for economic purposes. And on letting visitors enjoy them in ways that have minimal impact on the land.

Our Board’s decision is just that – what one organization thinks is a good idea. The property certainly has the outstanding conservation values national monument designation is meant to protect: fabulous views, creeks that provide habitat for endangered fish, and an abundance of biodiversity across a varied landscape. National monument status provides an additional layer of protection for these resources and will bring more financial resources to support access and stewardship.

Providing this level of protection makes sense to us – and we hope to the community. Our Board is committed to a robust community input process to see if there is support for the designation – just as we sought community input on our Conservation Blueprint and seek it now on access plans for the CEMEX Redwoods. The ultimate decision belongs to either the Congress or (more likely in this case) the President. President Clinton created 23 monuments, President Bush, six, and President Obama has created nine, including Fort Ord. You’ll be hearing more about this in the months ahead and we hope everyone involved will be hearing more from you.

http://www.landtrustsantacruz.org/newsletters/14_winter/national-monument.htm


Land Trust of Santa Cruz County
http://www.landtrustsantacruz.org/
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Comments (Hide Comments)
by SCM Lover
From a funding perspective alone, seeking federal support is the way to go to protect even more Santa Cruz Mountains park land. The state system seems to be stretched a bit thin locally and relies passively on wealthy donors to acquire new land. Then there was the Sempervirens fund, I believe, that actually leased or sold off some of its Redwood acreage for logging to preserve other portions of the parcel as park land.
Will there be clear language banning such things? Broadly enforced, long term prison sentences for violators, and their enablers, even those enjoying 'immunity from prosecution'?

Without REAL protections, this effort smells of greenwash.
I can appreciate the concerns that G raises, but at the same time I can appreciate that the alternatives are significantly less attractive, in my opinion, than the National Monument even without the bannings that G mentions.

Making a national monument, even if wrongdoings occur, is still far far better an option than not doing it at all. I would propose that we should go for it and work towards 100% protection and compliance; rather than immediately look for flaws in the national monument option.

G say's it smells of greenwash. I ask that G provide a better alternative that I can pick from. Without it, I'll take the existing option rather than get caught up in worst case scenario.
by The Land Has Rights Too
What if bringing the feds in would increase the land's risk to something like fracking?

In Santa Cruz County we currently have a fracking moratorium in place. I wonder if that moratorium would be totally obliterated by any future desires on the part of the feds. Isn't that what the feds always do with national lands? Exploit the resources?

By itself, National Monument designation would not necessarily offer any extra protection to the land. I found this on the web:

Q: What kind of development is allowed in a national monument?

A: National monuments protect “existing rights,” meaning, whatever you did there before it was protected as a national monument, you can probably still do after it is designated. This includes previously-existing:

Oil and gas leases
Access to private property
Valid mining claims
Roads and utility infrastructure
Livestock grazing

From: http://wilderness.org/article/monument-designation-faqs
by Dan
Realities. If this area is designated as monument land future development that isn't covered by existing rights could not occur.

G brings up the county moratorium on fracking. The reality is the feds and state occupy this subject in law. A local ordinance banning fracking is, I suspect, of dubious legality in California. Push hasn't come to shove yet, but if it does SC's ordinance is toast.
The defensive, pro-'blindly trust authorities' responses are interesting. Especially when greedy developers might be lurking in the shadows (e.g. https://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2014/04/12/18753997.php). But that is off topic.

What seems to be on topic, given the 'no worries, anything that is not being done now can not be done later' assertions, is an obvious question in response: 'OK, what existing rights/usages do exist, now'? I would assume any well planned proposal would have seen that question coming, and have researched answers for it, so hopefully asking the question isn't a great and undue burden for promoters of the proposal.

What the enforcement mechanisms might be for violators of rules, regulations, and laws, is apparently beyond the scope of the promotion, even though rancher Bundy is in the news...
Interesting.
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