Comments from the Chair

Looking backward and forward

2019 has been a year of struggle, as always it seems, when it comes to protecting our environment, improving our health and enhancing our civil institutions for freedom, democracy and social and environmental justice. In 2019 Climate change denial finally became pathetic and laughable.

Climate change is not a Chinese hoax, except in Trumpistan. Stories of the challenges we face are finally appearing frequently, and the scientific reports mount the alarm with ever increasing urgency. It is now clear that the decade of the 2020s will be critical for our climate. The repercussions of our decisions in the next several years will extend well into the next century. Our children and grandchildren and their children will bear the brunt of our present day short sightedness and selfishness.

City of San Antonio (COSA) passed a Climate Action & Adaptation Plan (CAAP) which begins implementation. Volunteers are needed for the Technical and Community Advisory Committee, and for the Climate Equity Advisory Committee. Please check out the website for more information and applications.

Put the “public” back in “public utility”

We have a struggle on our hands to get CPS Energy to act like a public utility owned by the citizens of San Antonio. CAAP will only be successful with closure of the Spruce coal plants before 2030. We demand and expect that COSA will force CPS to begin a public resource generation planning process, involving CPS, COSA and stakeholders like the Sierra Club, to develop our path to a sustainable energy future that is affordable, renewable and equitable, improving our air quality and health, while removing 8 million tons of carbon emissions annually from our climate.

Opportunities abound in transportation

San Antonio is one of the most motor vehicle dependent cities in America, worse even than Houston and Dallas by some measures. This dependency results in decreasing mobility, worsening air quality and more dangerous road conditions. Our sprawling pattern of growth is an essential part of our transportation problem. Anti-transit forces have prevented transportation alternatives, while TxDOT has focused primarily on adding pavement to our city, resulting in more sprawl, more heat island effects, more economic segregation, and no improvement in mobility.

Mayor Nirenberg and Judge Nelson Wolff are now pushing to add funding to VIA by taking funding from our Edwards Aquifer Protection Program and Linear Parkways. The intersection of our needs for parks, aquifer protection and mobility will be complicated and no doubt a challenging struggle.

Turning on the tap

Two thousand twenty (April 15th) is when SAWS plans to begin pumping Vista Ridge water into our water faucets. We are still waiting for the fiscal and managerial review of this project that is warranted when we are spending billions of dollars on water four times more expensive than what our Edwards Aquifer provides.

Time for HEB to reduce plastics

I again urge readers to complain to HEB store managers about excess plastic use throughout HEB. It is time HEB start acting like the good corporate citizen they claim to be. I have found that HEB stores do have comment cards at every checkout (if you do not find them ask for one!). Our oceans are dying.

Planning the Priorities and Initiatives for 2020-2021

At our January General Meeting, we solicit input on the Alamo Group’s priorities and initiatives for 2020. Please note: Non-members are also welcome to attend.

Tuesday, January 21st
Doors open 6:00 pm, program starts 6:30 pm
William R. Sinkin Eco Centro, 1802 North Main Avenue
Map

The Alamo Group faces a huge number of important issues in the coming year. These include but are not limited to:

• implementing the city’s Climate Action and Adaptation Plan (including the effort to shut down San Antonio’s coal-fired power plants),
• making SAWS and CPS more accountable to rate-payers, and
• moving SAWS toward a more sustainable water policy. 

After the results of this meeting are compiled, along with the results of an earlier on-line survey sent to all Alamo Group members, the Executive Committee will organize a planning retreat to distill your input into a plan of action for 2020-2021.

One of the great concerns of the Executive Committee is to involve more of the Alamo Group’s nearly 3,000 members in our club activities.  For too long, the backbone for our leadership and community activism has been provided by a tiny group of dedicated, but overcommitted, members.  The Executive Committee wants to change this.  Therefore, please attend this important meeting, let your voice be heard regarding the club’s future direction, and then plan to participate actively in the work of the Alamo Group.

We also encourage non-members who are interested in the goals of the Sierra Club to join us actively in this important work, and to become members. Many of you have indicated interest in particular aspects of conservation, water, parks and gardens, political activism, urban planning, building codes, low impact development, sustainability, utility rate structures, recycling and waste management, and of course climate change. This is your chance to get involved and help guide the activities of the Alamo Group.

This meeting is free and open to the public. Please post or forward to anyone who may be interested in this program. Our next general meeting will be Tuesday, February 18^th; topic to be determined.

Grand Canyon of the Tuolumne River

October 2018 I drove around the Sierra Nevada range. Here’s a day hike in Yosemite National Park, south from Tuolumne Meadows, off CA Hwy 120, Tioga Road. Resulting from that same trip there was an article in the June 2019 issue about climbing Telescope Peak in Death Valley National Park, and one September 2019 about a hike in Inyo National Forest, just east of Tioga Pass and the Yosemite east entrance.

This is a popular backpacking route, 33 miles from Tuolumne Meadows to White Wolf campground, which is hiking west and down river. Or a 57 mile loop. Or you can just day hike down and back to see as much of the canyon and as many waterfalls as you can manage. I did the latter, 17 miles round trip to Waterwheel Falls and back, elevation difference 1900’. Here are more pictures of the waterfalls.

Just north of White Wolf campground and the usual end of the backpacking route is the east end of Hetch Hetchy Reservoir, which resulted from a dam finished in 1923. A Wikipedia article notes that the damming of the Tuolumne and creation of the reservoir are the only cases of significant development in a national park. Here’s a Sierra Club document about potentially removing the dam and restoring the valley.

Dam Hetch Hetchy! As well dam for water-tanks the people's cathedrals and churches, for no holier temple has ever been consecrated by the heart of man. -John Muir

One rather grand view in the canyon, looking west, downstream, not far below Tuolumne Falls.

The Tuolumne River a mile or so from the trailhead, looking southeast. Echo Ridge behind, with from the left pointy peaks Unicorn, Cockscomb, and I believe the Echo Peaks group on the right.

Tuolumne Falls, 4.3 miles from the trailhead. 

California Falls, 6.5 miles from the trailhead.

Glacially sculpted wall above the river with aspen in Fall color.

Outings: The Call of the Wild

Visit the Alamo Sierra Club Outings page on Meetup for detailed information about all of our upcoming Sierra Club Outings.

The Alamo Sierran Newsletter

Richard Alles, Editor
Published by The Alamo Group of the Sierra Club, P.O. Box 6443, San Antonio, TX 78209, AlamoSierraClub.org.
The Alamo Group is one of 13 regional groups within the Lone Star Chapter of the Sierra Club.

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