Loma Prieta Chapter's eNewsletter: January, Volume 2
January 27, 2024
YOU Can Make a Difference; Read How in This eNewsletter
► Learn about our 30x30 efforts, and then volunteer to help.
► Take action at the Palo Alto City Council meeting on January 29th and the San Benito County Planning Commission Decision on the 31st.
► Volunteerwith our event planning team.
► Read our comment letters to San Jose.
► Learn about one volunteers creative contributions, and then let us know how you'd like to contribute.
► Take a hike! See the comprehensive list of activities available with your chapter into early January.
Sierra Club 30x30
Scientists have proposed the idea of conserving 50 percent of the Earth's natural landscapes as a crucial step to combat the alarming loss of biodiversity. This concept has gained significant attention and support globally, with United Nations resolutions highlighting the urgency of preserving our planet's ecological balance. California has emerged as a leader in this conservation effort by setting an ambitious target to conserve 30 percent of its land and waters by the year 2030. In October of 2020, Governor Newson issued an executive order to conserve 30 percent of the state’s land and water by 2030. Read more.
Palo Alto Nature Lovers Please Take Action Today
On Monday, January 29, 2024 | 05:30 PM the Palo Alto City Council will hold its Annual Retreat/Priority Setting Meeting at the Mitchell Park Community Center. At this meeting, Mayor Stone and Council members will review and select a few high level topics that will receive significant attention during the year. This is an opportunity for community members to share our thoughts on what priorities the City Council should adopt for 2024. Read more.
Volunteer with our Event Planning Team
We are looking for enthusiastic people who love organizing parties to help us with our annual Guardians of Nature Benefit. Join our fantastic team of staff and volunteers, gain hands-on experience in event planning and coordination, and connect with fellow Chapter members. Here is your chance to make a meaningful positive impact while having plenty of fun.
Attention San Benito: Take Action to Stop the John Smith Landfill Expansion
Please consider attending this meeting (in person or on Zoom), writing to the Planning Commission, or sending the form letter.
Attend the Meeting Jan. 31, 2024, at 6 PM
San Benito County Planning Commission will decide on the landfill expansion, including the amount of out-of-county waste the landfill can receive. Please speak out during public comments and urge them to deny the Use Permit or limit waste deliveries to 300 tons daily. Read more.
UPDATED MEETING DATE: Valley Water Board to Discuss Six Topics Related to Pacheco Reservoir Project in 2024
Valley Water’s proposal to construct a huge new dam and reservoir would result in huge environmental costs and questionable benefits. The Valley Water Board of Directors is set to discuss six topics related to the Pacheco Dam project during regular Board meetings starting on February 13th: proposed operations and benefits; environmental impacts and mitigation measures; 2050 Water Supply Master Plan portfolio recommendation; project costs; partnership approach; and requirements unique to the project. Read more.
Forest Protection Forum Recording Available
Why Recent Wildfires are the Salvation of Giant Sequoia Groves
Aiden Chen, 15 year old student, artist and Loma Prieta Chapter volunteer, has a passion for birds and worries about their welfare as sea levels rise due to the progressive impacts of climate change. Aiden has found a fun way to expand his volunteer contributions and raise awareness around sea level rise impacts on birds and wildlife. He has been drawing and painting San Francisco Bay shoreline birds and wildlife in their natural, wild habitats and is writing fun facts or quiz questions to accompany his artwork. We’ll be sharing these, so keep an eye on our social media accounts, Chapter eNewsletter, and the Bay Alive Campaign and Loma Prieta Chapter websites to see Aiden’s work. Read more.
Newfangled Horizontal Levees Rise (Gently) Across the Bay
Our Bay Alive Campaign heavily emphasizes the value and importance of using “natural and nature-based adaptation strategies," wherever feasible, to protect our Bay shoreline from sea level rise impacts. Horizontal levees are a great example of effective nature-based solutions. Although man-made, their gradual, vegetated slopes allow shoreline ecosystems to migrate upland as water rises, sustaining Bayland biodiversity and also allowing us to continue to benefit from the critical ecoservices our living shoreline provides: carbon sequestration, water purification, wave attenuation and flood retention. We’re thrilled that more and more Bay communities are pursuing this option, including an ambitious pilot project in Palo Alto’s Baylands!
LTE from Bay Alive Volunteer Gita Dev Published in the San Mateo Daily Journal
OneShoreline is an intergovernmental agency that creates plans for climate adaptation impacts, and has recently come forward with a sea level rise flood protection plan. Regarding that plan, Sierra Club Bay Alive Campaign Vice-Chair and Loma Prieta Chapter Sustainable Land Use Committee Chair Gita Dev wrote a letter to the editor in the San Mateo Daily Journal.
“[the plan] proposes a 2.65-mile offshore barrier, with tidal gates, encroaching into the Bay, despite a 50-year old state law forbidding such actions to preserve the Bay’s ecology and reverse damage caused by landfill and garbage dumping.” Read the full letter.
Concerns Over Sea Barrier Grow
As we’ve previously reported, the Bay Alive Campaign has raised significant concerns about a precedent-setting proposal by San Mateo County’s Flood and Sea Level Rise Resiliency District, OneShoreline, to build a 2.65 mile offshore barrier off the Bay coast of Millbrae/Burlingame from the San Francisco Airport to the northern edge of San Mateo. We’re collaborating with fellow environmental organizations to highlight the challenges this project presents, and the press is taking note! Read quotes from Bay Alive volunteer leader Gita Dev in this San Mateo Daily Journal article!
King Tides Offer Glimpse of Future Coastlines
King tides (extreme high and low tides) typically occur during a full or new moon when the gravitational force between the Moon and Earth is the highest. Today’s king tides provide an important glimpse into what our Bay coastline will look like as a result of climate change. Sea levels are rising due to the melting of land-based ice, such as glaciers, but also due to the thermal expansion of water as Earth’s temperature rises. If our region doesn’t plan now for adaptive solutions to sea level rise, the flooding and other impacts we see from today’s king tides could become a daily occurrence in the not-too-distant future. Future king tides will raise water levels above that new normal. Read more.
Sea Level Rise Webinar Series
How can local cities and residents use nature-basedadaptations to sea level rise? Watch recordings of our webinar series with SF Bay experts and please share with your local elected officials.
Thank You for Your Generosity
A heartfelt thank you to all the fantastic supporters who recently made a year-end gift! Your financial contribution inspires and enables our critical environmental advocacy for Dark Skies, Bird Safe Designs, the protection of San Francisco Bay, and more. We are deeply grateful for your commitment to making a positive impact and are excited about the prospects that 2024 brings. Your Loma Prieta Chapter's environmental successes are a testament to the collective strength of our extraordinary community.
Collisions with Buildings are Killing Millions of Birds Nationwide
"A dark-sky movement to save them is sweeping the Bay Area. Several cities have passed or are drafting laws restricting light pollution while making windows easier for birds to see."
Featuring Shani Kleinhaus, Environmental Advocate with Santa Clara Valley Audubon Society and member of Sierra Club Loma Prieta's Executive Committee, and Dashiell Leeds, Loma Prieta's Conservation Coordinator.
Congratulations to Jayah Faye Paley on winning this year’s Guardians of Nature Award for Outings Leadership! In an interview, I had the chance to talk to her about her background and work with local environmental organizations and her advice for others that want to volunteer and make this world a better place. Read the full interview.
[Image: Lisa Barboza (left) and Jayah Faye Paley (right) at the Coyote Hills Veterans Veterans Day Wander and Wonder Hike.
Comment Letter: Informational Update and Providing Feedback on the Development of Valley Water’s Water Supply Master Plan 2050
"The Sierra Club appreciates any opportunity to provide input on the Water Supply Master Plan update, especially early in the process. Please consider the following comments and suggestions based on the information provided about the Plan update so far.
The National Park Service announced that entrance fees would be waived on the following six dates in 2024 (at those sites that charge them):
January 15 — Martin Luther King Jr. Day April 20 — First Day of National Park Week June 19 — Juneteenth August 4 — Great American Outdoors Day September 28 — National Public Lands Day November 11 — Veterans Day
Cleanups (January 28th and February 4th), "Naturalist Training - Nature Interpretation for the Rest of Us" webinar (February 7th), and a BioBlitz (February 11th) from our friends at Keep Coyote Creek Beautiful.
"The Future of Dams" in-person and virtual presentation, January 29th, noon - 1:30 pm, from our friends at Midpeninsula Regional Open Space District.
One of the best ways to safeguard a thriving and just future is by ensuring that your Loma Prieta Chapter remains a champion for the environment of Santa Clara, San Mateo, and San Benito Counties. Naming us as a beneficiary in your bequest will provide meaningful and enduring resources that will allow continued local and powerful environmental activism.
Please contact our Chapter Development Coordinator Justyna Guterman for the specific language for your estate planning and/or read more here. For additional information about planning a bequest please contact Julia Curtis, (800) 932-4270.
Your connection: Our team helped put our resolution and the state resolution together, was at the Coastal Commission session, and spoke against the plastic grass. Plastic grass is toxic, especially for young children. We encourage you to reject it at your schools or neighborhood. Learn more about and join our Plastics Pollution Prevention Conservation Sub-Committee.
Photographers, see the great images in our Chapter Annual Summaries and help protect local nature with your images! Share with us your high-resolution photos of local nature, with or without people, to inspire local residents to support Loma Prieta Chapter work. Please contact Chapter Development Coordinator Justyna Guterman.
2024.01.15 Chapter Director's hike in Pinnacles National Park, which is inside the Loma Prieta Chapter.
The rain surrounded the whole cabin with its enormous virginal myth, a whole world of meaning, of secrecy, of silence, of rumor. Think of it: all that speech pouring down, selling nothing, judging nobody, drenching the thick mulch of dead leaves, soaking the trees, filling the gullies and crannies of the wood with water, washing out the places where men have stripped the hillside! What a thing it is to sit absolutely alone, in the forest, at night, cherished by this wonderful, unintelligible, perfectly innocent speech, the most comforting speech in the world,
the talk that rain makes by itself all over the ridges, and
the talk of the watercourses everywhere in the hollows!
