By Arthur Feinstein
What are they thinking?
The San Francisco Public Utilities Commission (SFPUC) has proposed to open its San Mateo Watershed (also called Crystal Springs Watershed) to unsupervised public access. This 23,000-acre watershed and its reservoirs play a crucial role in the Hetch Hetchy water supply system and over two million people depend upon it for their water. It also supports the largest number of listed and sensitive species of any habitat of comparable size in the Bay Area.
So what’s the problem? Don’t we want access? Usually yes. But as we have seen in the Soberanes Fire, the Yosemite Rim Fire, and many others this year, most wildfires are started by people. In fact, people start 95% of all wildfires in California.
In 2002 the SFPUC dealt with a similar proposal to increase public access to the Crystal Springs Watershed. In its adoption of the 2002 Watershed Plan, the SFPUC determined that unsupervised access would likely result in significant impacts to the watershed, especially for fire. As a result it instituted a docent-led access program that has been a great success.
Now, the SFPUC is once again being pressured for increased access, and so far has evidently forgotten its previous conclusion. Part of that pressure initially came from the SF Board of Supervisors, which recently considered a resolution that urged the SFPUC to allow unsupervised access to the entire watershed. To our great appreciation, however, the Board of Supervisors rejected this resolution by an overwhelming vote of 10 to 1. Even the original author of the resolution, Supervisor John Avalos, voted against it; only Supervisor Wiener voted in the affirmative. The Sierra Club, alongside our partners at the Committee for Green Foothills, the Sequoia and Golden Gate Audubon Societies, and the California Native Plant Society, worked hard to educate our Supervisors on this issue, visiting offices and writing letters. We truly appreciate this vote and thank our Supervisors for recognizing the importance of this issue.
We hope the SFPUC will take the hint. It is reckless and foolhardy to risk the water supply of two million people and the fate of innumerable wildlife. There are hundreds of miles of trails in San Mateo County (many in habitats similar to Crystal Springs) available to hikers and other users of our Bay Area’s beautiful natural areas. Let’s leave Crystal Springs to its wildlife inhabitants and preserve our water supply long into the future.
Read more in "Expanded Peninsula Watershed docent program will increase public access, protect vital water supply."
Photo: The Crystal Springs Reservoir is part of the Peninsula Watershed, a vital water source for San Francisco and suburban water districts. Photo by David Hallock.