Christian (left) leads volunteers on a National Public Lands Day excursion to the Desert National Wildlife Refuge.
By Christian Gerlach, Our Wild America Organizer.
The Sierra Club’s core mission is intertwined with the spirit of Public Lands Day. According to the National Parks Service, “Public Lands Day was established in 1994 and held annually on the fourth Saturday in September. National Public Lands Day is traditionally the nation's largest single-day volunteer effort for stewardship of public lands. The day celebrates the connection between people and green space in their community, inspires environmental stewardship, and encourages use of open space for education, recreation, and health benefits. This year, National Public Lands Day falls on September 25, 2021.”
In 2017, the Nevada Legislature also designated the last Saturday of each September “Public Lands Day.” On this day, people may visit Nevada’s state parks free-of-charge.
Sierra Club’s acting Co-Executive Director Dan Chu, said it most succinctly that getting people outdoors to places that need protecting, connecting them with those places and inspiring those people to act as advocates and stewards of our public lands, forests, and waters is central to Sierra Club’s history, it’s mission and the organization's future. It is this mission I have taken up personally even before coming to the Sierra Club, but am very proud to be a part of professionally now.
This idea of stewardship of our Public Lands is one, I and, many of us were lucky enough to grow up with. Unfortunately however, many people did not grow up connected to Public Lands, and that's why Public Lands Day is so important. My late Father, Siegfried Gerlach, would take our family out camping constantly. Instilling in me the idea of how temporary we and all living things are on this planet. That early imparting of our mortality, as shocking as it always is to hear, is also a great motivator. My Father would tell me, “Son we are on this planet only a short while, and just like all living things, we and they will one day come to an end. But if we do things right, and act as stewards of the Earth, caring for it’s living creatures and it’s resources, we can make sure that those things will be around in perpetuity.”
Those words have inspired me and kept me working to conserve our natural resources and public lands, doing all I can to inspire others to act as stewards of the Earth. Public Lands Day has been a tremendous platform for this work and allowed many organizations, federal agencies, and individuals to plug into stewardship projects that protect and restore our public lands.
Over the years, the Sierra Club has co-hosted a lot of Public Lands Day events, and in 2019 Sierra Club’s Our Wild America Campaign hosted a service trip with legendary Conservationist Jim Boone, and Filmmaker Justin McAffee. We hosted a two day surveying project with an overnight campout in the East Mormon Mountains and Tule Desert. The area is west of the Beaver Dam Wash National Conservation Area and north of Mesquite. In 2019 the area was targeted by the Nevada Bureau of Land Management, under the Direction of Trump, in their November and December oil and gas lease sales. The trip took volunteers out to monitor wildlife guzzlers, natural springs, and document things like the Joshua tree forest of the Tule Desert and any historic or culturally sensitive sites that could help us prevent the destruction from oil and gas development. Our volunteers braved some horrible winds, hot days and a cold night, but despite the winds we had a great trip that allowed us to connect volunteers to the East Mormon Mountains, and the Tule Desert. The area that was under threat is also the source of the water supply for the City of Mesquite, Moapa Band of Paiutes, and flows into the rest of the water supply in Southern Nevada at Lake Mead.
This year for Public Lands Day we are working with community partners on two events focusing on our work to permanently protect the traditional and ancestral lands of the Mohave peoples known as Avi Kwa Ame or Spirit Mountain.
On September 25th from 10am to 3pm we will be collecting petition signatures to permanently protect Avi Kwa Ame at the Indigenous Marketplace and Festival at the Old Las vegas Mormon Fort State Park. Join us! RSVP here.
And on October 2nd from 9am to 12pm we are working with the Nevada Bureau of Land Management and Friends of Walking Box Ranch to host a stewardship project in the proposed Avi Kwa Ame National Monument. Join us as we inspire the next generations of public lands activists to explore, enjoy, and protect our natural world. RSVP here.