California in unparalleled drive to save coast from development

FResno Bee ^ | 3/24/04 | Jim wasserman - AP

[NormsRevenge]

PESCADERO, Calif. (AP) - Mark and Dawn Kemp never thought such coastal quietude was possible on the Pacific shore, just 20 miles from the hustle of Silicon Valley.

"I can't believe that we aren't seeing hotels and commercial growth scooping all this up," said Mark Kemp, making just his second trip to the seaside.

[NormsRevenge]

fyi

[Gunslingr3]

Collectively, nonprofit trusts raised $27 million in efforts to pass three ballot initiatives in 2000 and 2002 that authorized $11.1 billion in state bonds to buy land for open space preservation, restore wetlands and wildlife habitat and create new urban parks.

Gee, it only cost them $27 million to compel Californian's to borrow over $11 Billion and buy up land to sit idle. It's amazing what you can accomplish with other people's money...

[Carry_Okie]

Oh goody! I get to post this again! Well, let's look at some of their (the foundations and the Coast Dairies Partnership) handiwork, shall we? The white stuff you see in the following photo is water hemlock. It is a poisonous weed from the Middle East. The pollen causes birth defects. The quail that eat the fruit don't die, but the bobcats that eat them do. There are thousands of tons of it thanks to the Coastal Conservancy and the Pacific Land Trust.

All images in this post are copyright by Mark Edward Vande Pol. No retransmission reprinting or reuse without written authorization. Please, I want to use these for an article.

Here is what they want to save:

Here is what they are doing to it.
They are "preserving" it.
The highlighted areas are hemlock.
Doesn't it look a little rugged for weeding?

Who's going to go get those weeds now?

And more right above Scott Creek, the principle salmon stream in the area. The clear area is where cattle graze...

And here's what happens when it really gets going.
It's the whole hillside above that building.
The seed lasts at least ten years. Is this an environmental impact?
Where are the air quality authorities?

Let's hear it for our environmental heroes, and their appropriately landscaped sign!

Here is more.

5 posted on 07/29/2002 11:29:50 PM PDT by Carry_Okie

Isn't it pretty?
It's mixed in with tick infested dwarf coyote brush, bush lupines, rare wildflowers, and poison oak.

Who's going to go get those weeds now?

Now here is what the farms do. They are weed buffers that protect nature from the weeds along the State Highway. If farmers got paid for weed control, would they be broke? Would land use be organized differently?

Would this...

...be preferable to this?

or this (the red stuff in the foreground is thistle)...

or this?

Want an alternative

[international american]

No wonder California is bankrupt!

[farmfriend]

Rights, farms, environment ping.
Let me know if you wish to be added or removed from this list.
I don't get offended if you want to be removed.

[E.G.C.]

BTTT!!!!!!!

[calcowgirl]

ROFL. Let it be known... today is "Oh Goody" day!

Great research Mark... I read the Coast Dairies stuff yesterday and bookmarked.

[sphinx]

I've got mixed feelings .... If California locks up all that land, where will the Mexicans live?

I mean, what else is California building houses for? They're losing native born population.

[Amerigomag]

If California locks up all that land, where will the Mexicans live?

Short answer: the San Joaquin Valley

Long answer: Over the past 10 years, because of a combination of the effects of statewide public policy (Prop 13) and land conservation the traditional metropolitan haunts of the illegal immigrant are being gentrified out of their economic reach. Both the indigenous blue collar worker and the illegal immigrant have pushed the occupancy factor to its limits and are no forcing a migration to the San Joaquin Valley where agricultural land prices are depressed and small communities welcome the new tax base.

Sanger, California, a small, rural, ag community located in Fresno County, in the heart of the San Joaquin Valley, experienced the largest growth in new homes of any Incorporated city in California in 2003. Many other small communities in the valley experienced record growth while their large brethren along the California coast showed decreases in new housing starts.