P.O.
Box 3635, San Diego, CA 92163-1635
Phone: (619) 342-5524 Website: www.dpcinc.org
Fall 2008 Editor: Larry Hogue
LETTER FROM THE PRESIDENT
A MAN FOR SOME SEASONS
I have never claimed to be your usual, run-of-the-mill kind of
guy—just ask my wife. Whenever something is “in style,” I
hate the notion of doing, owning or wearing it. Moreover, I am
a bit of a Luddite, someone who instinctively abhors the latest
invasion of technology into our daily lives, especially electronic
devices. I yearn for the good ol’ days of simpler times and a
reduced pace of life. Heck, I don’t even own a cell phone! And
Twitter? What’s that?
Maybe that’s the attraction of the desert landscape to
fellows like me; it is a place often shunned by most members of
our urbanized society as too hot, barren, lonely or just plain
dangerous. Yes, confirmed desert rats like me (and you dear
DPC members) are clearly an eccentric bunch. Somehow, we
LIKE those endless vistas of dusty, brown mountains on the
horizon with no evidence of humanity in between. We seek out
rugged canyons filled with bare boulders and a silence as sweet
as a Mozart symphony. We actually enjoy the sight of bizarre-
looking lizards, as symbols of throwbacks to earlier reptilian
eras long before humankind entered the picture. A queer fasci-
nation with barbed and other-worldly looking plant life is fur-
ther evidence of this desert affliction. Although denying it hotly
when pressed, lots of us resent the evidence of “progress,” that
hallowed and most cherished American ideal, when its incur-
sions sully the desert’s sublime open space and adversely affect
“our” lizards and favorite desert haunts.
Yes we must admit, true desert-lovers, strange as we may
be, that we even deplore summertime, that other American icon
when countless families enter upon that mystical rite: the family
summer vacation. We desert types impatiently wait for summer-
time’s wane and the approach of winter, or at least late autumn.
More specifically, if you live in or near the lower elevation
Sonoran desert of extreme southeastern California and northern
Baja (aka, the “Colorado” desert region), you impatiently await
Halloween. Outdated mystical practices aside, Halloween
signals the beginning of the long-awaited desert hiking and
camping season. Yeah!! It’s time to dust off the hiking boots,
prepare the daypack with the ten essentials or maybe retrieve
Number 202
the camping gear from the dark recesses of our respective
garages. Those who hang out in the Mojave or Great Basin
deserts of the American southwest are hardly exempt from the
desert bug; DPCers just happen to have a special fascination
with our local representative arid landscape.
How can it be that nearly everybody else’s favorite season
– the summer – is the dreaded time of year when desert-lovers
morosely settle for the consolation prize of a beach or a lake or
some forested crag somewhere? I mean, they’re lovely too
(aren’t they?). I have been criticized by some conservation
friends as having some sort of unhealthy bias against these other
lands, especially my relative distaste for the chaparral hills of
San Diego, which we jokingly call “mountains.” (Where I was
raised in the Rockies, they qualify merely as brushy foothills.)
Come on, those other folks say, every type of landform has
equal merit and its own proper place in Gaia’s plan. When
confronted I, and desert aficionados like me, will sheepishly
relent and agree that all is as it should be on Mother Earth. Ah,
but under our breath we still sing the praises of our desiccated
desert lands. Poet Richard Shelton said it best: “oh my desert,
yours is the only death I cannot bear.” So, fellow desert-lovers,
having fallen prey to the mysteries of this most often reviled
place, revel in your quiet admiration for the “long brown land
[that] lays such a hold on the affections,” as Mary Austin put it.
Oh yes, and we can talk over our secret preference around
the bend in that next desert canyon somewhere – or at DPC’s
annual meeting, coming up on October 26th. Hope to see you
there!
Nick Ervin, President
There is something infectious about the magic of the
Southwest. Some are immune to it, but there are others
who have no resistance to the subtle virus and who must
spend the rest of their lives dreaming of the incredible
sweep of the desert, of great golden mesas with purple
shadows, and tremendous stars appearing at dusk from a
turquoise sky. Once infected there is nothing one can do
but strive to return again and again.
--H.M. Wormington
 CONSERVATION CORNER
By Terry Weiner
Conservation & Imperial County Projects Coordinator
As the year progresses toward the Autumnal Equinox, as the
quota of daylight wanes, and the air and sunlight become softer,
I find myself slipping into a meditative mood. September is the
month of my birth and the season of harvest and it has tradi-
tionally been my time of year to reflect upon events and ac-
complishments of the summer. It has become a ritual, a right of
passage into the season of winter. How have you all spent the
halcyon days of this past southern California summer? For
myself, following a weekend-long desert activist meeting in the
White Mountains, I enjoyed a brief interlude of camping in the
Eastern Sierras in early August with my visiting niece from
Massachusetts. For the rest of the summer, the growing on-
slaught of proposals to develop huge energy projects in the
desert commandeered a great deal of my attention.
Our friends in the land management agencies were cer-
tainly not able to take a break this summer because of a flood of
proposals to develop large-scale industrial “renewable” energy
projects on a large swath of our western public lands, in parti-
cular in the southwestern deserts. When the Bureau of Land
Management is busy, we conservation groups must become
busy too, because one of our major roles as desert protectors is
to engage with the BLM in helping them craft good, ecologi-
cally sound management plans. This of course requires re-
searching the issues, reviewing documents that are often volu-
minous and technical, such as Environmental Impact State-
ments, and then writing comments as well as participating in
public hearings. The public’s participation in these processes is
critical. One of the important meetings at which I represented
the DPC this past summer was a meeting held in El Centro by
representatives of the U.S. Dept. of the Interior regarding their
plan to deal with over 170 proposals to develop huge industrial-
sized solar projects in the California desert. You may have read
about this on our DPC on-line web log (www.desertblog.net).
A concurrent process to these mega-energy proposals for
the desert is the California Energy Commission’s (CEC)
Renewable Energy Transmission Initiative (RETI). This is a
statewide project to identify transmission projects that help
meet California’s legislatively mandated, ambitious renewable
energy goals and to decide on where to site them. This initiative
is a collaborative process involving representatives of the CEC,
renewable energy industry people, and environmental group
representatives. One of the goals of the Environmental Working
Group of the RETI process is to prioritize areas in the desert for
possible placement of industrial solar and wind developments
based on certain criteria. This process requires vigilance and
close monitoring on our part because the Bush Administration
and the state of California has targeted the desert for production
of thousands of megawatts of electricity.
DPC has contributed comments to the environmental
working group of the RETI process and we have clearly stated
our support for the development of renewable energy with the
following caveats:
2
• that we first need to focus on conservation and becoming
more efficient in our use of energy
• that development of renewable energy in cities and towns
and other points of use should come before any rush to
build massive energy projects on desert public lands
• that parks, preserves, wildlife refuges, critical habitats, and
other protected areas should be absolutely off-limits to in-
dustrial development, despite its being labeled “renewable”
A common misconception about industrial-scale renewable
development, especially solar power, is that it is benign to the
immediate surroundings. For instance, some believe that a solar
farm’s main impact is that it shades the plants and animals liv-
ing underneath the solar collectors. In truth, solar farms usually
scrape the entire project site to provide level terrain. Renewable
development in the desert will destroy all of the natural, cultural
and visual resources within the project area. In some cases,
these impacts extend well beyond the project’s “footprint,”
particularly if it would require building hundreds of miles of
transmission lines to transport the energy produced.
Unfortunately large segments of the American urban pop-
ulation – who have not had the opportunity to learn about or to
experience the wild beauty, the fascinating array of plants and
animals, the awesome quiet and dark skies of the desert –
imagine that the desert is an empty expanse that would provide
a perfect place to meet the nation’s renewable energy needs.
The media have promoted this idea of the desert as wasteland
and some articles have tried to distill the burgeoning outcry
against these large-scale projects down to a case of simple
NIMBY-ism.
Many desert residents and activists have been deliberating
how to respond to the threats and the public perception I have
described above. We decided there is an urgent need to develop
a grassroots voice for the desert from a desert communities’
perspective. I am happy to report that, as a first step toward this
goal, a dozen or so small non-profit desert-oriented
conservation group representatives, environmental justice
groups, desert residents, and property owners met over the
Labor Day weekend in the Coachella Valley and began our
conversation about how to address this major threat to the
integrity of our deserts. (We met at Canyon House, Les and Jeri
Starks’ beautiful, Zen-like high desert retreat in Snow Canyon,
beneath the towering north face of Mt. San Jacinto. A big thanks
to the Starks for the use of this vacation rental. More info on
Canyon House: 760-323-4089.)
Over the course of a long day, we aired our individual
groups’ concerns and actions to date and developed goals and a
mission statement. We began developing a group strategy to
inform the public, the media and decision makers of our
intention to protect our desert from gigantic solar and wind
farms and to promote local, point-of-use, low-carbon energy
development as a more economical, less damaging alternative
that can meet California’s aggressive renewable energy goals
equally well. (continued)
 Our Mission Statement: “We support sustainable local
energy that contributes to social, economic and ecological
health.” The name of our new group chosen by vote: POWER –
“People Only Wanting Energy Responsibility.” We will be
joining our voice and actions to the voices of people throughout
the California desert and backcountry areas where the threat of
industrial energy infrastructure also looms.
Group members have already leapt into action, with several
of them quoted in a New York Times article on Sep. 24, entitled
“Solar Projects Draw New Opposition.” The same article
quoted the Sierra Club’s Carl Zichella, who doubted the
effectiveness of our specific proposal for local, point-of-use
solutions such as rooftop photovoltaic power. Mr. Zichella’s
thinking is very outdated, and it’s unfortunate that it comes
from a Sierra Club representative. While photovoltaic power (or
PV) has long been scoffed at as too expensive and inefficient
compared to “concentrating solar power plants,” that assess-
ment is changing with the advent of “thin-film” PV. Our current
Educational Bulletin reprints an article from Public Utilities
Fortnightly that makes exactly this point. Zichella and other
renewable energy advocates need to catch up to the new solar
power landscape, as indeed have Southern California Edison
and PG&E. Both companies have announced huge PV programs
on a scale unheard of before, matching CSP plants in terms of
megawatts produced, and beating them in terms of price.
If you want to participate in this new group’s efforts, please
email me: terryweiner@sbcglobal.net or Donna Charpied of the
3
Center for Community Action and Environmental Justice
(ccaej) at donna.c@ccaej.org. DPC will need your voice as we
develop and implement our plan of action to promote responsi-
ble renewable energy alternatives and steer these projects away
from the desert. I invite you to share your ideas with me on this
and on your pet desert issues via email, phone or letter.
Meet Howard Wilshire and Jane Nielson,
Authors of The American West at Risk
DPC advisory panel member Howard Wilshire and his wife and
co-author Jane Nielson will appear at two DPC-sponsored book
signings in the Coachella Valley, Oct. 25th and 28th. The couple
are on a tour in support of their new book, The American West
at Risk: Science, Myths, and Politics of Land Abuse and Recov-
ery, (Oxford Uni. Press, co-authored with Richard W. Hazlett).
Wilshire and Nielson will also be the key note speakers at
DPC’s annual meeting in Twentynine Palms on Oct 26th.
The Saturday, Oct 25th event will take place from 2:00 to
4:00 p.m., at the Borders Bookstore in Rancho Mirage, Ca,
located at the River Shopping Center, 71800 Highway 111;
Phone: 760-779-1314. For exact location and directions, use
the store locator at www.borders.com.
The Palm Springs Public Library will host a reading on
Tuesday, Oct. 28th, at 6 p.m. The library is located at 300 South
Sunrise Way (corner of Baristo). Phone: 760-322-7323.
Website: www.palmspringslibrary.org. Books will not be
available for sale but you can bring your own copy for signing.
 Hundred-Year Flood
by Ruth Nolan
At the end of the Mojave River,
100 miles downhill from mountain woods,
You arrive at this sere topography of white salts,
crusted devil horns, angelic duplexes
of sand dune prayers floating
across the oceanic expanse like tract-home miracles
at the end of ZZYZX Road,
named to create the word
that would be the last
in the English language dictionary
by a health food preaching, 8th grade dropout
who had three different P.O. Boxes in Baker,
one for his food-supplement business,
one for his Dr. Curtis Springer commentaries
and the other for his skid-row-exile desert resort
where the floodwaters rest their pressures
of cottonwood, pine limbs, suburban garbage
and tangled weeds delivered insanely northward,
to the bottom of a dead inland sea.
Sometimes, after spring floods from the San
Bernardino Mountains
jump Silverwood Lake, squeeze through
the dam at the union of Deep Creek and the old
river channel,
coursing like a vintage roller coaster car
on creaking tracks, Manifest Destiny came
through here,
carrying old bits of wagon boards from Mormon
settlers
who followed a page of Catholic Bible torn from
Father Garces,
who led the minions out of this forsaken zone,
rough men of the wild west, who slaughtered the
stray Pai-Ute
and fished for the Mojave Chub in infrequent pools,
4
under the bridges on Bear Valley Road, at Mojave
Narrows
outracing heavy, long-winded trains,
beneath I-15 past Barstow, a surprise of heavy river
to travelers racing from Las Vegas
and then on quiet, last lap
through Afton Canyon, where the bones
of Shoshone, woolly mammoth elbows and teeth
sometimes protrude, silent wiles after you carve away
more of your work
and then your waters pause,
gather prayer-like
in one low mass,
Lake Manix was once your name,
You made the pilgrimage yet again
your life span refracting in a progression
of water to light, and making a pretty show
for the travelers heading west, backtracking
along Interstate 15
towards your snowmelt,
exhausted, below sea level now,
your devotion sinks
into miles of sand,
it’s the old, going-nowhere,
the miners and fortune-seekers who
rode the Tonopah Tidewater Railroad
make their splintered benediction to you
leave bits of gold and silver dreams,
the ruins of miner’s shacks and homesteader cabins
scattered along your shores.
Photo by Chris Clarke
 OFF-ROAD VEHICLE ISSUES UPDATE
by Terry Weiner
The late 1960s and early ‘70s brought about a burst of popu-
larity of recreational off-road vehicles (ORVs). This boom in
popularity and purchase of ORVs has further expanded in the
past 35 years and sales of an increasing variety of ATVs, dirt
bikes, and sand rails continue to soar. Some new models are
more powerful than old types and able to negotiate all types of
terrain and conditions. The ORV industry and owners of ORVs
continue to pressure our public land managers for more places
to “play.” Their voices are loud and well funded. Our ability to
protect our public and private desert lands from the negative
impacts of off-road recreation is to a great extent contingent
upon the quality of the land management and law enforcement
tools we have available. The legislation that currently regulates
the management of ORVs in California is sadly lacking. The
$50.00 fines for violations such as intrusion into wilderness and
closed areas are laughable. The OHV Grant program allocates
only 20% of the State’s total available grant money for federal
and local law enforcement grants. The total trust fund for ORV
recreation will top $55 million in 2008/09 and of that, $7
million or so is earmarked for statewide law enforcement.
One of the ways we can build a stronger voice for protec-
tion of our public and private lands from ORV impacts is to
build a coalition of groups and individuals working on this
issue. In August 2007 I was appointed Chair of the newly
formed ORV Issues Committee of the California/Nevada Desert
Committee of the Sierra Club. The purpose of this committee is
to build a public awareness campaign about the threat to our
natural and cultural resources from ORV recreation, and to build
grassroots support for more effective state legislation to protect
public and private lands from ORV impacts. This campaign has
many facets and we intend to engage other conservation groups
as well as community groups and eventually gain support of
state representatives. Our accomplishments over the past year
include developing a wilderness-monitoring handbook and
planning and participating with the Alliance for Responsible
Recreation in a meeting to discuss ORV problems and solutions
with the BLM Desert District Director and his staff. Senator
Feinstein is taking ORV abuse of the California desert seriously
and she designated her local staff person to facilitate this
meeting. I believe that in wearing this “second hat” of chairing
this ORV Issues committee, I am able to expand upon DPC’s
ORV issues efforts in Imperial County. I want to ultimately
expand and diversify the coalition of stakeholders working on
educating the public on ORV impacts and building support for
more stringent regulation of these vehicles.
This summer the committee crafted two ORV-related
resolutions. The Sierra Club Desert Committee at the August
meeting approved these resolutions unanimously. One of the
resolutions involves working with the Air Resources Board to
urge them to include recreational ORV emissions in their
climate change plan. The second resolution addresses the
components of future ORV legislation, including higher fines
5
for ORV violations with vehicle impoundment for multiple
offenses, special ORV driver’s licenses, points against one’s
driver’s license for violations, mandatory insurance for ORV
drivers, and full-size vehicle registration numbers (to make it
easier for both law enforcement and citizens to identify
vehicles). At their quarterly meeting of the Sierra Club Regional
Conservation Committee (CNRCC) the weekend of September
13 2008, both resolutions were passed unanimously and we will
now be able to move full-steam ahead with expanding our
educational outreach and building support within the Sierra
Club.
I would be pleased to hear your suggestions and ideas
related to ORV issues and ideas for what should be included in
future state ORV management legislation, or if you would like
to hear more about the ORV Issues Committee of the Desert
Committee of the Sierra Club.
WHAT YOU CAN DO
Comment on OHV Regulations
On August 12, 2008, the Notice of Proposed Rulemaking
for the OHMVR Division Grants and Cooperative Agreements
Program was submitted to the Office of Administrative Law.
The 2008 proposed regulations are currently on the OHMVR
website for your review. The deadline for comments is
Monday, October 6, 2008.
In your comments, please request the changes in ORV
legislation outlined in the article above.
In addition to accepting written comments, the OHMVR
Division will host two public meetings to receive further
comments. The meetings are scheduled in Sacramento on
Tuesday, October 7, 2008 and in San Diego on Thursday,
October 9. Details for the San Diego meeting:
Holiday Inn Express – San Diego Old Town
3900 Old Town Avenue, San Diego
(619) 299-7400
6:00 p.m. - 9:00 p.m.
For more details, visit the OHMVR Division website:
http://ohv.parks.ca.gov/default.asp?page_id=1164. Or contact
Barbara Greenwood, California State Parks – OHMVRD, 1725
23rd Street, Suite 200, Sacramento, CA 95816; ph: (916) 322-
2651; fax: (916) 324-1610; e-mail: bgreenwood@parks.ca.gov.
More Desert Issues and Events We’re Following:
• Desert Tortoise Recovery Plan
• Peninsular bighorn critical habitat reduction
• 29 Palms Marine Base expansion
• Proposed Ivanpah airport
• Wilderness Monitoring opportunities
• Desert Outings
For more info on all of these please visit our
website (www.dpcinc.org) and our blog
(www.desertblog.net).
DPC’s “Citizen Naturalist” Program: Instilling a
love of the desert in Imperial County’s students
By Pat Flanagan
In his memoir Naturalist, Edward O. Wilson, the great scientist,
naturalist, and explorer with a special love for the small, con-
cludes that “to the degree which we come to understand other
organisms, we will place a greater value on them, and on our-
selves.” Broadsided by
wonder at an early age,
Wilson spent hours in soli-
tary watching – anticipating
nature’s monsters quietly
moving through the sloughs
of his backyard waterways.
Because of a childhood eye
injury his “monsters”
necessarily became small –
ants – while his explora-
tions and curiosity seeded a
world-class mind capable of
encompassing the breadth,
complexity and order of
nature’s biodiversity. It is
clear that Wilson does not
mean us to build our under-
standing on television docu-
mentaries but on first-hand
exploration, starting very
early in life. Children need to explore, get dirty, blow their
minds with discovery and mystery. The DPC agrees and has
supported Imperial Valley student field trips since 2006. Now,
following a meeting with teachers in 2007, the board is going
the extra step to develop a field trip curriculum for 4th-6th grade
students that encourages “dirt time” while also correlating field
trips with the state science framework. (See El Paisano #201.)
Since April of this year I have been working on this
curriculum, called “The Salton Basin’s Living Laboratory Field
Trips.” Before going further let me confess to a personal dream.
I know there is no better way to learn about plate tectonics, fault
zones, mountain building, ancient life, sand dunes, ecosystems,
life cycles, food webs, habitats and adaptations than to look,
touch, smell, walk through, and even slide down the evidence
that proves that what’s in the text book is also real life stuff.
Even better, it’s actually happening where you live! Field work,
while fun, requires a certain discipline. Exploring students are
required to take field notes, to capture their observations for
later reflection and analysis. So here comes the dream – each of
those students, their brains nicked by curiosity, will find them-
selves, who knows when, stunned to stillness, staring in wonder
at what used to be an ordinary sight. A light bulb moment! I also
like to think of them grabbing those field notes, parents, and
sibs and repeating the field trip.
Early in his narrative, Wilson reminds us that it is the Tal-
mud which cautions, “We see things not as they are, but as we
6
are.” I now live in 29 Palms, north of Joshua Tree National
Park, not San Diego, and when I enter the Salton Sea Basin it is
either from the north, through the Coachella Valley, the apex of
the basin, or from the east through Box Canyon in the Mecca
Hills. Either way, for much of the trip south I am driving in the
San Andreas Fault Zone. Previously, in my San Diego days, I
would arrive at the Salton Sea from the west having traversed
the Peninsular mountain
ranges. Seen against those
incredibly interesting moun-
tains and valleys, the Salton
Basin topography looked
flat – stunningly beautiful,
but flat. That is not how it
is. What was I overlooking?
The short list:
The Salton Basin – its
history, extent, depth, and
regional significance • The
Colorado River through
time • The Colorado River
Delta • The beginning of
the San Andreas Fault at
Bombay Beach with its first
subtle tracks barely visible •
Ancient Lake Cahuilla his-
tory and shoreline visibility
• Dos Palmas and Bat Caves
Buttes • The San Andreas Fault bend with the upturned and
twisted seismic effects in the Mecca Hills (Painted and Box
Canyons) • The Brawley Seismic Zone, Salton Buttes Lava
Domes, the Imperial Seismic Zone • The termination of the
East Pacific Rise (active crustal spreading zone beginning near
Antarctica), with geothermal fields, boiling mud pots and mud
volcanoes • The Salton Sea State Recreation Area Visitor
Center • Basin sediments three to five miles deep – deeper than
the Grand Canyon • New River Wetlands Project • Algodones
Dunes • Microphyll woodlands and hidden springs • Cultural
and sacred sites throughout the area • A continuous tribal
presence • The new Ocotillo Desert Museum • The fossil
treasures of Anza-Borrego Desert including the marine fossils in
Coyote Mountain • The Fossil Treasures of Anza-Borrego
Desert (Sunbelt Publications) • The life-sized Pleistocene
animal sculptures scattered about on Galleta Meadows Estate
lands in Borrego Springs www.galletameadows.com.
This assignment of helping Imperial Valley students to see
the desert around them has changed how I see. On this earth,
there is no other place like the Salton Sea Basin – literally. It
uniquely connects, breaks, stretches, dips, slides, bubbles,
grows, blooms, floods, blows, buries, and continues to amaze.
In their travels, students will not only experience these obvious
wonderments of the basin; they will also be given opportunities
to look hard for the hidden treasures, treasures that may
reappear in daydreams when least expected.
 Senate Committee Approves 3 Wilderness Bills
from the California Wild Heritage Campaign
Approval on September 11 by a key Senate Committee means
legislation to permanently protect wilderness and wild and
scenic rivers in the Eastern Sierra and Northern San Gabriel
Mountains, Riverside County, and Sequoia and Kings Canyon
National Parks is bound for a vote by the full Senate. Together,
the three bills will protect more than 732,000 acres of wilder-
ness and over 80 miles of wild and scenic rivers for future
generations to enjoy.
The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee
voted on and passed the Eastern Sierra and Northern San
Gabriel Wild Heritage Act, sponsored by Sen. Barbara Boxer
(D-CA) and Rep. Howard “Buck” McKeon (R-CA), to per-
manently protect 465,000 acres of wilderness and 52 miles of
wild and scenic rivers; the California Desert and Mountain Her-
itage Act, sponsored by Sen. Boxer and Rep. Mary Bono Mack
(R-CA), which will protect more than 190,000 acres as wil-
derness and 31 miles of wild and scenic river in Riverside
County; and the Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Park
Wilderness Act, sponsored by Sen. Boxer and Rep. Jim Costa
(D-CA), to designate some 77,000 acres of wilderness. Our
thanks go to the bills’ sponsors, as well as Senator Dianne
Feinstein (D-CA).
The Senate Committee’s approval was a vital step if the
bills are to pass into law before the 110th Congress adjourns for
the year. The Riverside County bill and the Sequoia-Kings
Canyon bill were both passed in the House of Representatives
June 8, 2008. A vote by the full Senate is all that remains for
these two bills to be passed on for the President’s signature.
The Eastern Sierra and Northern San Gabriel Wild Heritage
Act was also approved by the House Subcommittee on National
Parks, Forests and Public Lands. Much work remains to get all
three bills passed by the Senate, and to get the eastern Sierra bill
approved by the House, before the end of this congressional
session. In San Diego and Imperial County, support for current
proposed and future potential federal wilderness and wild river
areas is tracked and coordinated by volunteers working through
a network called ‘Wilderness4All,’ headed up by our own DPC
Board Member, Geoffrey Smith. To learn more and to partici-
pate, visit www.wilderness4all.org.
Wilderness and wild and scenic river designation for these
lands will mean that a wide range of recreational activities will
be allowed, including hunting, hiking, camping, backpacking
and fishing; but that development, such as road building and
motorized access, will not.
DPC is a proud member of:
7
DESERT PROTECTIVE COUNCIL – WHO WE ARE
Nick Ervin, President
Geoffrey Smith, Vice President/Secretary
Larry Klaasen, Treasurer
Martha Bertles, Fifth Officer
Terry Weiner, Imperial Projects & Conservation Coordinator
Shirley Harshenin, Webmistress – www.nutheadproductions.com
Larry Hogue, Communications Consultant
SUPPORT DPC BY JOINING, RENEWING
OR MAKING A SPECIAL DONATION
Membership in the Desert Protective Council is the best way to
support our desert conservation and education goals. Just fill out
the form below and mail it in with your check. If you are
already a member, you will now receive a reminder when it’s
time to renew. And if you’re a life member, you do not need to
renew. However, you can always use the form below to send in
an additional donation. Your support ensures that DPC will
remain a strong voice for conservation in all of our deserts.
Much of our current activity is based on projects in
Imperial County, as required by the settlement of the Mesquite
lawsuit. But these funds cannot be used for many general
operating expenses or for our many projects and issues in other
parts of the desert. That’s why your support is so important!
DESERT PROTECTIVE COUNCIL NEW AND
RENEWAL MEMBERSHIP FORM
Enclosed is my remittance of $_______
[ ]New Membership [ ]Gift Membership [ ] Renewal
Name_________________________________________
Address_______________________________________
City, State, Zip________________________________
Phone_________________________________________
Email_________________________________________
Please make checks payable to: DPC
Mail to P.O. Box 3635, San Diego, CA 92163-1635
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SAN DIEGO, CA 92163-1635
INSIDE THIS ISSUE
Big Solar Land Rush..................................... page 2
Annual Meeting Invite .................................. page 3
100-Year Flood (poem by Ruth Nolan) ........ page 4
ORV Issues Update....................................... page 5
Making of a Citizen Naturalist...................... page 6
Wilderness Bills Update ............................... page 7
FAVORITE DESERT PLACES: McCAIN VALLEY/CARRIZO GORGE WILDERNESS
Okay, so it’s not truly a desert, but it overlooks one: On
Sep. 4, I had the opportunity to accompany Craig Deutsche on a
wilderness monitoring expedition to McCain Valley. The goal:
document changes in the landscape, both
positive and negative, and provide a report
to the Bureau of Land Management. This
both provides land managers and rangers
with information about these lands that they
might not otherwise get, and lets them know
that people care about the public lands and
wilderness areas they manage. Plus, it makes
for a great day in the outdoors!
We scouted the BLM lands to the east
of McCain Valley Rd., which provide a good
buffer zone between the road and the Car-
rizo Gorge Wilderness to the east. We also
visited the Sacatone and Carrizo overlooks,
and hiked a portion of the Pepperwood Trail.
What we found: On the positive side,
the BLM has done a good job of signing the
areas east of McCain Valley road as “closed
to vehicles.” On the negative side, we docu-
mented several spots where dirt bikes and
other vehicles had gone around the signs and “Thumb Rock” in McCain Valley, rumored to “deutsche AT earthlink DOT net”.
have first been climbed by the DPC’s own
even around considerable stretches of fencing. Larry Klaasen
There are several old jeep tracks in this area that people seem to
insist on using. Fortunately, the wilderness itself is relatively
safe from vehicle incursion because it drops away so steeply to
the desert below. On the other hand, the
chaparral habitat on the more level area
west of the wilderness is not well repre-
sented in the wilderness preservation
system, and it could use more protection.
On the Pepperwood Trail, we found that
many of the signs marking the trail need
replacing.
All of San Diego and Imperial
counties’ wilderness areas could use more
citizen monitoring. From the rugged
slopes of the Carrizo and Jacumba
wilderness areas to the dunes of the
Algodones Wilderness and the sunbaked
rocks of the Indian Pass Wilderness, there
are lots of opportunities for volunteers to
adopt a wilderness or wilderness study
area. If you’re interested, contact us at
“connect AT dpcinc DOT org” or
Craig Deutsche at 310-477-6670 /