Back to Stewards Keep Parks Open page
A Community Connected - Diane Barth
A bus, chartered by the Stewards of the Coast and Redwoods took over 60 Sonoma County residents to Sacramento on Monday, April 7th for Park Advocacy Day. Lead by Michele Luna, Executive Director this group attended meetings with legislators and their aides, talks by major government officials and a noontime rally on the Capitol Hall Steps. Connecting with other park volunteers and communicating our message to legislators that we do not want to see Armstrong Woods be closed, we don’t want to see 48 of our State Parks closed.
Following up on the Town Hall Meeting of March 13th, where over 500 people overflowed from Guerneville’s Vets building to express their concern and displeasure of the proposed closing of Armstrong Redwoods SR and Austin Creek SRA. Over 1,500 signatures were added to petitions and hundreds of “Save our Parks,” postcards were hand delivered, along with resolutions from many cities, towns and organizations and letters from local school children.
With pickup locations in Guerneville, Forestville, Santa Rosa and Petaluma our merry band of park supporters made our way to Sacramento on a beautiful clear bright day. We took our seats, greeted old friends and introduced ourselves to new faces – we were a team, together on this trip. It was a wonderful cross-section of people coming together with a united concern. Our community, which has disagreed on so many issues over the years, is in total agreement that this fight must be won.
The Legislators reminded us that they are being forced to make very difficult budget decisions to bring balance to a budget, which is in deficit by billions of dollars. These are challenging times, we were told over and over again. We were told to “look at the big picture,” come up with solutions, organize grass-roots advocacy, connect with other parks on the closure list, hold local rally’s, and continue to fight and write letters – to newspapers, legislators, budget committee representatives.
From a statement by local representative, Senator Patricia Wiggins, “Will closing 48 state parks have a significant impact on the state’s budget deficit? Let’s see: The deficit is projected to be around $14 billion for the next year-and-a-half – closing the parks, we’re told, will lead to “savings” of about almost $4 million in revenue for these sites – reducing the supposed net cost benefit by quite a bit.”
The Legislators do look at dollars. How much will the closing of Armstrong Redwoods hurt our local economy? How many people come here to see an old grove of coastal redwoods? How much will be the potential damage to this forest and our beloved park if it is left in “caretaker” mode? How much will we lose from the quality of our life if we are not allowed to find our solace and recreation in this sacred area of ancient giants.
A trip to Sacramento reminds us all that we must get involved to protect the things we love. We have a responsibility to future generations to maintain important legacies.
A special thanks to Annie Cresswell who organized this field trip and to Michele Luna, and the Stewards’ Board of Directors, who has provided leadership to us all since early January when we first heard the devastating news.
We had hoped that this nightmare would somehow “go away,” that they would agree this cut needed to be removed from the bargaining table. With our hard work and some luck we hope that the May revision of the budget will have state parks cuts removed.
What should you do between now and then?
*******
From Sandra VanVoorhis
Hi Michele - hope we did some good. seemed like we were preaching to the choir as our representatives are in agreement (hence they were elected). the problem is not going to go away with the current economic outlook and there is no quick fix. it seems to me the most salient point is that if the park generate $3+ dollars of revenue (not quite sure how they fiqure this out or what it means but i heard it several times that day) for every dollar of cost, then they are REVENUE GENERATORS not REVENUE CONSUMERS hence they should be immune from budget cuts. "death by a 1,000 nicks" is a good description of the state of affairs in the parks - they are already bleeding to death. the entire budgetary system in Calif is disfunctional and needs major revamping. the other major issue is the ambivalence of most Californians - a major campaign to create awareness and appreciation is needed to keep the parks safe for future generations.
********
From Leslie Dale
HELLO MICHELE,
This is a follow-up on Park Advocacy Day. When I attended the Guerneville town meeting, I realized that the parks all over California, had been so much apart of my life, as I enjoyed many hours spent with family and friends. I knew I had to make the commitment to come to the capitol, just if for nothing else, to be another "body" saying NO to the 48 closures slated to happen very soon. This was my first visit to the capitol. I rode the bus, along with the 50 or so, from Sonoma County, feeling very glad that I had stuck to my plans, to make my voice heard among the others there for this noble cause. The bus ride was so well organized, which gave me a secure feeling this was going to be a good "first" for me. When we got to the capitol the first thing that I noticed was the massive gardens and trees around the property of the domed historic building.It made me think what if they took that away from the capitol, how different the people's experience would be, that use those grounds, as their own personal park during lunch breaks, and other times, also the working staff, needing to escape to the outdoors for some peace and a breath of air. We had our assigned groups and entered the building through security and up the elevators to the first of our meetings. What became apparent was the fact that just because all of us had volunteered to spend the day here, the workers had their day to day jobs to attend to and our being there was just another cog in the wheel to take care of. The officials weren't there for each of our appts so we had to see the alternative person, that handled things in place of that official. After the dialog between all was over, we'd leave and discuss the impression that we thought our visits made.
I have to say that I really think the rally during mid-day was so well presented, all the possible goods of the day had come together to be ONE VOICE. I felt proud of all of us standing together for OUR PARKS.. ! The follow-up that happens now, to keep the information ball rolling, is very important. I have ideas to share at the next get together. The speakers at the days end, were very clear on their platform,the one fellow that made the most impact was the educator, Jack O'Connell. He had a very real hands-on attitude as he spoke of his daughter and her opinions early on in her youth. The way he sited information was easy not double talk. I'd vote for him as an elected official based on my spending a short time in his presence.I think he would be a good person to concentrate on as a "go to" person in this (our) cause. At the days end I got back into my car and felt this was a great experience in so many ways. I had done something positive for a cause that I Believe In. I learned a little something about the way the political system operates .I shared an experience with fellow Sonoma County residents. All said, the day could not have gone better ....well unless the 48 parks were saved from closing.
Back to Stewards Keep Parks Open page