Modesto Bee - Letter to the Editor
Do your part to stop SPI turning forests into moonscapes
By Brad Barker
April 9, 2007
Quick, name the largest private landowner in California.
Need some clues? The company owns more than 1.5million acres, mainly in the Sierra Nevada. Each year it clear-cuts thousands of acres of forest. Its logging techniques damage watersheds throughout the Sierra. And most Californians have never heard of it.
Meet Sierra Pacific Industries, a privately owned company led by billionaire timber baron Red Emmerson. SPI could eventually clear-cut a million acres in one of the most beautiful mountain ranges on earth. Perhaps we should take notice.
Clear-cutting is, to say the least, controversial. It's the method of timber extraction where every tree on a given plot is cut, the land is scraped into a barren moonscape, the site is sprayed with toxic chemicals, and a sterile tree plantation is installed. The rich ecological values of a diverse forest are stripped away.
A Sierra forest is worth much more than the value of its timber. No one knows the true costs of a clear-cut landscape: the loss of wildlife, scenic beauty, eroded topsoil, polluted streams, changing climate, increased fire risk, decreased recreation and tourism.
Check the pictures for yourself at Google Maps on the Internet. Search "Arnold, California" — a town about 80 miles from Modesto — and click the tab for the satellite view. The dark green area to the east is Calaveras Big Trees State Park, where two groves of giant sequoias are protected.
But look at the bare patches north, south and east of the park. Those aren't sand traps at the country club. They're some of the hundreds of clear-cuts just in Calaveras County, and nearly all belong to SPI. Scroll to the east. Zoom in on the devastation. That isn't war-torn Iraq; it's the Sierra Nevada.
The California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection enforces state laws regarding timber harvests on private lands. Its job is to encourage sound forestry management, to ensure that watersheds and wildlife habitats are protected, but they're not stepping up. One theory is the CDF is conflicted by a revolving door with the timber industry — officials and lobbyists rotating between public and private positions.
Our elected officials could pressure the CDF, but they're conflicted, too. In just the 2003-2004 election cycle, the Emmerson family and other SPI affiliates contributed hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Some of our local representatives received donations: Reps. Dennis Cardoza and George Radanovich, Assemblyman Dave Cogdill (now a state senator), State Sen. Mike Machado and others. Gov. Schwarzenegger received more than $30,000.
That means it's up to us, the consumers of wood products, to do something. There are timber companies who do the right things. They practice selective, sustainable logging that protects endangered forests. Their lumber is certified by the independent Forest Stewardship Council. We consumers need to insist that home builders and others use FSC wood. (The timber industry's misleading "certification," the Sustainable Forestry Initiative, condones business-as-usual destructive logging. Don't be fooled.)
SPI says it's replanting trees, but monoculture tree plantations are not forests. A forest has trees of different sizes and species, snags and fallen logs, mosses, ferns and fungi. There are brambles and brush. Wildflowers bloom in season. Wildlife thrives in forest niches. The streams run clear.
SPI's vision is a checkerboard of moonscapes and plantations. Its corporate values are destroying Sierra forests. What are your values?
Barker is the librarian at Mark Twain Junior High School. E-mail him at columns@modbee.com.