Friends of Gualala River Protecting the Gualala River watershed and the species living within it
Thursday March 17, 2016 at 5:30 p.m.
at the Gualala Community Center
The Gualala Municipal Advisory Council (GMAC), a committee that reports to the Mendocino County Board of Supervisors, is holding a public forum on the proposed “Dogwood” Timber Harvest Plan (THP) for Gualala area residents and other interested members of the public.
The public forum is scheduled for Thursday March 17, 2016 at the Gualala Community Center, starting at 5:30 p.m. The meeting will be facilitated by GMAC Chair and Co-Chair and local citizens Robert Juengling and Charlie Ivor, respectively. The GMAC facilitators will manage the forum and allocation of speaker times.
The “Dogwood” THP (1-15-042 SON) extends from the mouth of the Gualala River upstream for 5 miles. Logging of mature redwoods is proposed on 300 acres of the Gualala River floodplain redwood forest, including 85-100 year old trees neighboring or adjacent to public and private campgrounds and parks. The unprecedented logging in riparian redwood forest here generated substantial local public interest and commentary in the summer and fall of 2015.
CAL FIRE officials and elected State and County lawmakers will be invited to attend and respond to comments. The timberland owner, Gualala Redwoods Timber LLC, will also be invited.
The purpose of the public forum is to facilitate a dialogue between local stakeholders of the Gualala River Watershed, CAL FIRE (the state permit agency for commercial logging), and elected officials. To date, CAL FIRE has engaged in dialogue with state resource agencies and the private THP applicant / landowner, Gualala Redwood Timber LLC, but it has not responded to the hundreds of public comments sent to CAL FIRE about the THP. Without the GMAC meeting, it is likely that the only responses to public comments by CAL FIRE would be after the permit decision.
For more information about the meeting, contact GMAC co-chair Charles Ivor at cfifish@mac.com.
For more information about the “Dogwood” logging plan, see the floodplain logging section of this website.
