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Logging the YMCA’s
Camp Jones Gulch
 
by Lennie Roberts

A controversial plan to log 733 acres of the 904 acre YMCA Camp Jones Gulch property, near Loma Mar has been submitted to the California Division of Forestry. Owned by the San Francisco YMCA since the 1930s, the Camp’s impressive groves of towering redwoods and Douglas firs have inspired three generations of kids attending “Science Camp” and outdoor education programs.

Old Growth Trees, Marbled Murrelets,
Steelhead and Coho Salmon threatened
The Camp Jones Gulch property is bordered on three sides by Sam McDonald and Pescadero Creek County Parks. Two groves of old growth redwoods and Douglas firs on the property are part of more extensive stands in Pescadero Park to the south. The Jones Gulch grove has been confirmed by California Fish and Game as occupied nesting habitat of the Marbled Murrelet, a federal and state listed species. The western part of the property proposed for logging has large mature second growth trees that are also suitable nesting sites for Marbled Murrelets. Given the precarious status of this bird, it is important to protect all of its existing and potential habitat.

Although the current plan states that old growth trees would be excluded from the first round of logging, major loopholes would allow construction of skid trails and cutting of these giant trees for fire protection and to reduce hazards.

Two creeks on the property — Jones Gulch and McCormick — join Pescadero Creek just downstream. Pescadero Creek has been declared by the federal government as impaired for sediment. As a result, each property owner must reduce any excessive sedi-ment that runs off his/her property. Timber harvests, no matter how carefully conducted, increase sediment loads in streams for several years, and possibly longer, if logging roads and skid trails aren’t maintained. This timber harvest plan proposes logging operations on slopes of up to 80% and on extremely erosive soils. Added to this concern is proposed use of herbicides, high impact logging practices, winter harvest operations, and felling of trees across streams — practices not normally seen in the Santa Cruz Mountains. Together, these proposed practices would severely impact steelhead trout, Coho salmon, California red-legged frog, and San Francisco garter snake, all resident in Pescadero Creek and Marsh.

Harvesting in perpetuity
Once approved, this particular logging plan, known as a Non-industrial Timber Management Plan (NTMP), would be in effect in perpetuity (forever). Unless the plan is changed, there will be no opportunities for public review or comment. New rounds of logging could occur every 15 years. The magnitude of the logging, both in extent and time, is of great concern.

There is a better alternative!
According to the plan, the YMCA’s reasons for logging are: “to increase the timber value of the property, to earn an economic return by operating a commercial forest, and to reduce fire hazards.” CGF values and supports the mission and programs of the YMCA, but we believe extensive commercial logging in perpetuity at Camp Jones Gulch is inconsistent with good land management and the message of land stewardship at the Camp.

Instead the YMCA should develop a much less intensive Stewardship Plan that would address the need to manage the property for forest health, reduction of fire hazards while also protecting Marbled Murrelet habitat, downstream ecology, and recreation.

To implement the Stewardship Plan while also meeting the YMCA’s need for upgrading the dilapidated Jones Gulch buildings, the YMCA should work with Peninsula Open Space Trust or Midpeninsula Regional Open Space District to sell a Conservation Easement on the property. This approach would provide both the income and the environmental protection. Recently, the Berkeley-Albany YMCA Camp worked out a Conservation Easement agreement on their Camp Gualala property in Sonoma County. In that case, funding came from the Sonoma County Agricultural Preservation and Open Space District and the California Division of Forestry Forest Legacy Program. We hope something similar could be developed at Camp Jones Gulch.

Published October 2006 in Green Footnotes.

Page last updated October 30, 2006.