Welcome to the Santa Cruz Group News, a monthly update from the Santa Cruz Group of the Sierra Club. We present articles about issues that the leadership of our six standing committees (Climate, Conservation, Executive, Outreach/Events, Political, Transportation) would like to share, along with occasional items from our events calendar. We look forward to staying in touch with you through this newsletter.
IN THIS ISSUE
• Laurel Street Bridge: For the Birds
• Town Hall Meeting - Sept. 14
• Outings to Advocacy for 30x30 • The War on Weeds • Santa Cruz Group Issues Committees
Tule Elk Photo taken by Steve Bakaley from his August hike to Tomales Point in Point Reyes
Laurel Street Bridge: For the Birds
The three bridges spanning the San Lorenzo River’s lower reach through downtown Santa Cruz host an annual migration of cliff swallows, who return to these nesting sites year after year over a lifetime to hatch and raise their chicks. Each is home to a separate location-faithful population of socially monogamous nesting pairs, which can be seen through the spring and summer diving across the water and beneath the bridge to the mud nests they build in the concrete overhangs, eaves and infrastructure of the bridge. This is a valuable urban habitat for the birds, with access to food, shelter and safe nesting sites.
However, in recent years the Laurel St. bridge’s swallow population has been displaced from their previous nesting sites by the Soquel Creek Water District’s Pure Water Soquel Conveyance Project, which pipes treated wastewater from the City of Santa Cruz to the Soquel Creek Water District to help replenish the Mid-County Groundwater Basin and mitigate saltwater intrusion due to rising sea levels. The PWS began construction in May of 2021; the pipeline runs beneath the bridge’s overhang on both sides, blocking the swallows’ access to these areas, and is in the process of being sealed off with a paneled covering meant to repeat the stepped appearance of the bridge. The project’s noise level, construction activity, equipment and personnel have disrupted the cliff swallows’ nesting activities and the current observed population has been smaller than in previous years.
Laurel Street Bridge
On April 24, 2024, after months of repeated outreach and feedback from concerned residents and environmentalists, including the Sierra Club, Santa Cruz Bird Club, and individual activists, SCWD suspended work on their Pure Water Soquel site at the Laurel St. bridge. It’s unclear whether the suspension was the result of public feedback or was due to the required project biologist’s observations. According to the letter sent to the Sierra Club from SCWD, construction work will resume on August 31 of this year, giving the federally-protected cliff swallows more time to complete their nesting season. The birds are now building nests further beneath the bridge’s span, and in deeper shade, which may affect their brooding success, but the project’s suspension is good news for the 2024 nesting season. No further mitigations to protect future seasons have been announced.
Nesting activity under the Laurel Street Bridge in the areas identified in the first photo.
Town Hall Meeting - September 14
Sierra Club, Campaign for Sustainable Transportation, and Friends of the Rail & Trail are sponsoring a Town Hall Meeting on Saturday, September 14th, at 10:20am. The Meeting will be held at the Aptos Public Library, 7695 Soquel Drive.
Outings to Advocacy for 30x30
Sierra Club and outings go together like ice cream and cake or peanut butter and jelly. Sierra Club outings started in 1901 to get people familiar with special places that need protection -- and we have not stopped yet. Outings are a wonderful route to advocacy—especially for campaigns to preserve Nature. Outings helped the Sierra Cub gain new national parks and new wilderness areas around the country. Now that we in California seek to conserve 30 percent of our natural lands and waters, we have a new campaign ready-made for advocacy via outings.
Sierra Club’s 30 x 30 task force works with our California chapters to help them fight to conserve local special areas in their territory. Now is a good time to bring local outings to boost this 30 percent effort in Chapter after Chapter.
Some benefits for Chapters can be:
To publicize and build more awareness of places that we want to save—whether it’s an urban green strip to connect two local parks, or a natural area threatened by commercial or residential development, or simply a parcel of land now available that will offer habitat connectivity. For example, the San Francisco Bay Chapter is eying a race track by the shore of the Bay that will soon close; the land that it’s on could make an excellent extension of the current Bayshore Park.
Inviting local elected officials on walks or other field trips to such places can get them interested in specifically calling for funding for 30x30 to the state legislative budget committees. Inviting reporters from your local paper can help get the word out widely.
For Chapters that already have an outings program going, how will you interest your outings leaders in leading such 30x30 focused outings? How about inviting a few outings leaders on a hike to a proposed site for preservation? Show them how bringing more people here can add voices to achieve the goal.
For Chapters that do not presently have an outing program, perhaps showing the need for 30x30 conservation of a particular place or places can get new potential leaders interested.
And since we work in the Power in Nature Coalition with other groups on 30 x 30, maybe invite different groups onto your trips—even consider a joint outing with a different Power in Nature group that works in your area. We seek to make our outings more inclusive, giving more diverse communities good access to Nature; thus, bringing other civic or diverse community groups outdoors with us can be extremely beneficial. It can also help increase the diversity of our volunteers and leaders.
Outdoors, on a hike it is easier to get to know people and make new friends than on a Zoom screen or even in a civic meeting room.
One Chapter already using outings to promote a 30 x 30 local conservation priority is Loma Prieta: they led a fine hike in the Portola redwood State Park recently, focused on biodiversity protection. And Angeles Chapter was gearing for a hike to a local priority area, Elephant Hill. Where will your Chapter go to highlight Nature protection?
--Vicky Hoover, Sierra Club 30x30 Task Force
The War on Weeds
The Santa Cruz Group of the Sierra Club is currently dealing with the issue of two highly invasive, non-native ornamental grasses currently being sold in local wholesale and retail nurseries. Both of these grasses are very attractive visually, hence their sale and the resultant spread in urban areas.
The greatest concern of the Santa Cruz Group is that these species are escaping from individual properties and into the public sectors, resulting in greater maintenance costs and tax burdens. Eventually they could find their way into native habitats and agricultural lands. And because they can only be controlled through the use of herbicides (glyphosate), putting a dangerous chemical into the air and water becomes a secondary health and human safety issue.
Green Fountain Grass (Pennisetum setaceum) was imported to a Los Angeles herbarium in 1907 and escaped captivity at that point. It has become a highly ranked species of concern in both Los Angeles and Riverside counties. The seeds of both of these grasses are very light and carried by the wind. Because the seeds are very small, they are able to find their way into the cracks of streets, street medians and the ideal environment of road edges, where the heat collected by asphalt and water runoff combine to make an ideal growing environment.
Pennisetum invading 41st and Portola Avenues medians
Mexican feather grass (Nassella tenuissima ) is native to parts of Texas and New Mexico, as well as Mexico and all the way to Argentina. Like Pennisetum it’s seeds are very small and carried by the wind it is also showing itself to be highly invasive. The illegal import and sale of this species has already been banned in both South Africa and Australia, where it has been described as “…a potential disaster for the Australian environment.” Australia has implemented a number of reduction strategies, including:
The tightening of biosecurity regulations and enforcement that have made it easy for nurseries to repeatedly import this prohibited plant.
The regular surveillance of plant nurseries to check whether prohibited plants are being sold .
Development of a compliance strategy to prevent illegal Internet sales of prohibited imports.
Nassella planted along Portola Ave.
The Weed Management Area (WMA) of Santa Cruz County, composed of more than 25 governmental agencies and non-governmental agencies are fighting weeds throughout the county, but primarily as they invade natural areas and agricultural areas. Their work is primarily reactive. Contrarily, the control of both of the two non-native species of concern would be proactive , stopping their spread before they invade natural and agricultural areas beyond the urban environment. By lobbying with the County of Santa Cruz, local retail and wholesale nurseries, and professional organizations, there is a chance that the further spread of these invasive species could be controlled. In addition, continuing education with the public could also positively affect the continuing spread of these species. In the meanwhile, labels could be made to be placed in current nursery stock for sale that describe these two plants as "Highly invasive in natural environments." Once the Group has put together a cohesive letter and a plan of action, more information will follow in the next newsletter. Included will be a list of names and organizations that the members of the Sierra Club can contact on their own to affect a positive change in our environment.
Santa Cruz Group Issues Committee
Conservation Committeeworks on habitat conservation, monitors logging activities, reviews development projects, and participates in creation and modification of parks master plans, and city and county general and local coastal plans. Contact: Chair Mike Guthmguth@guthpatents.com
Transportation Committeereviews transportation projects within the Cities and County, supports public spending on increased Metro service with bicycle and pedestrian infrastructure, and large-scale bicycle and pedestrian projects. Contact: Chair Rick Longinottiricklonginotti@gmail.com
Climate Committeeworks to promote State and local Sierra Club climate change policies to help build a sustainable future, free of fossil fuels. Approaches include support for renewable and alternative energy, energy conservation, and increasing carbon sequestration, as well as providing opportunities for members, students, and the general public to expand their understanding of climate change. Contact: Mike Guthmguth@guthpatents.com
Political Committeemakes endorsements of candidates and ballot measures during election years. Contact: Chair Micah Posnermicahposner@cruzio.com
Who We Are
We are the Santa Cruz Group of the Ventana Chapter of the Sierra Club, the world's oldest, largest, and most influential grassroots environmental organization. With over 3.8 million members and supporters, the Sierra Club has the resources to empower people and to influence public policy through community activism, public education, lobbying, and litigation.
Our mission is to Explore, Enjoy and Protect the Planet.
