Tag: dark sky

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Summer 2021 Conservation News

by Ann Vileisis

Marbled Murrelet uplisted to endangered

On July 9, the Oregon Fish and Wildlife Commission (OFWC) voted 4 to 3 to uplist the marbled murrelet (MAMU) from “threatened” to “endangered” on the state endangered species list. It’s odd to cheer the listing a bird as “endangered,” but in this case, we are hopeful that the decision can provide a new framework that may truly help this little seabird to rebound.

Marbled murrelets are small dark seabirds that come ashore to nest on mossy limbs of big old growth trees in forests along Oregon’s coast. They were devastated by the clearcut logging of the vast majority of their nesting habitat, and are now impacted by continued habitat fragmentation and warming ocean conditions that affect the fish they eat. Survival of MAMU in Oregon requires protection of existing old-growth nesting habitat until surrounding forests grow large enough once again to provide sufficient habitat to support nesting of more birds. 


You may remember a similar vote by the OFWC three years ago that was subsequently reversed in response to timber industry pressure. Environmental groups cried foul, and sued. A judge ultimately agreed with their assessment of the illegal public process and directed the OFWC to take up the issue with a de novo hearing.

This time, Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife (ODFW) staff recommended against uplisting, citing a small (2%) uptick in murrelets counted in recent at-sea surveys, an increase in habitat (mostly marginal) since 1995, and the fact that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (during the Trump Administration) had not uplisted MAMU. But seabird scientists provided new research indicating that birds at sea forego nesting for many years in a row if ocean conditions are poor, and that there was really no way to know if birds counted at sea were actually Oregon nesters. Predictably, a lineup of timber industry groups opposed the uplisting while all the seabird scientists and bird advocacy groups supported. As the Commissioners took in all the testimony and then discussed the issue through a marathon 8.5-hour meeting, it became clear that a majority thought it was time to take stronger action to protect this vulnerable bird.

With the uplisting, the Commission also voted to approve survival guidelines developed by ODFW staff that will clarify and help strengthen protections for remaining murrelet habitat in state-owned forests in the Coast Range, which contain a significant amount of the murrelets’ remaining nesting habitat. The guidelines will influence how other state agencies, such as State Parks, Oregon Department of Forestry, and Department of State Lands, address land management actions that may detrimentally impact MAMU habitat. The agencies are now required to develop endangered species management plans and submit to the Commission for approval within 18 months.

Teresa Bird, who has been leading KAS murrelet advocacy efforts, testified eloquently and persuasively on behalf of KAS at the ODFW hearing in favor of the uplisting. Teresa, who has done both at sea and in forest monitoring for marbled murrelets, has come to know the science of these mysterious little seabirds and was able to point out flaws in opposition arguments and also to convey some of her personal experiences. I am proud to say that KAS members have worked to protect marbled murrelet habitat in our forests since the founding of our organization. Thanks to all who sent letters to the OFWC in support of our MAMU! And if anyone wants a chance to perhaps see a marbled murrelet, please contact Teresa about this year’s community murrelet survey up Elk River, coming up on July 31.  

Port Orford outdoor lighting ordinance passed!

I am pleased to report that the Port Orford City Council unanimously passed an upgraded version outdoor lighting ordinance at its July 15 meeting, after an extensive process of research and public meetings by the Port Orford Planning Commission. The upgrade was needed to address many changes in lighting technology that have occurred since the dark sky ordinance was first passed in 2005. Some highlights include the requirement for warm colored lighting (< 2700 kelvins), dark-sky compliant street lights on Highway 101, and stronger enforcement provisions. We’ll post the upgraded ordinance on our website when it becomes available. 

KAS has been engaged in projects to protect the beautiful starry sky over the city of Port Orford from light pollution for more than 20 years, beginning with getting the goal into our city comprehensive plan. Then for many years, KAS board member Al Geiser worked together with Coos Curry Electric Coop to install “night caps” to focus the bright light of street and yard lights down to the ground. KAS worked to pass the original ordinance in 2005. And with this recent upgrade effort, KAS has attended every single meeting pressing to get the ordinance right and across the finish line.

I want to thank everyone who has helped by attending meetings through the long process and  several individuals who played particularly helpful roles: former Planning Commission Chair Kevin McHugh (and retired electrical engineer) spearheaded the effort to upgrade of the ordinance, conducting a tremendous amount of research and bringing considerable expertise to bear; Steve Lawton helped us to collaborate with ODOT and CCEC regarding light fixtures on Highway 101; star- (and bird-) photographer Rowly Willis attended countless meetings and shared his knowledge of illumination. In the end, Planning Commissioner Greg Thelan took a special interest in making the ordinance work well, and we are grateful to all current planning Commission members and to City Council members for passing the new outdoor lighting ordinance. Please thank Port Orford’s City Council members for passing the lighting ordinance by sending them a thank you note. (email contacts: pcox@portorford.org, claroche@portorford.org, gburns@portorford.org, jgarratt@portorford.org, tpogwizd@portorford.org, lkessler@portorford.org, gtidey@portorford.org)

Finally, I am delighted to share that long time Dark Sky supporter and local, Port Orford musician Steve Montana was so inspired by our town’s beautiful starry skies that he wrote fun and moving lyrics to an old song to help inspire our effort. You can see his truly stellar performance on our brand new KAS Youtube channel. Google “Kalmiopsis Audubon, Dark Skies, Youtube,” and you’ll find it. The stunning starry background photo is by KAS member Rowly Willis. We encourage our social media-savvy members to help share this fun little music video widely to help inspire compliance. We plan to do some more community education in the fall.

River Democracy Act

Last year, Senator Wyden asked Oregonians to nominate their favorite rivers for Wild and Scenic designation. More than 2,000 people responded to the call with 15,000 nominations, and earlier this year, he and Senator Merkley introduced the River Democracy Act, which would designate more than 4,500 miles of rivers, including many in our Kalmiopsis-Wild Rivers coast region. In early July, Senator Wyden advanced the bill with a hearing in the Senate Energy and Natural Resources subcommittee, a key step in legislative process.

Some important local streams in the bill include tributaries to the Wild and Scenic Illinois, Rogue, Chetco, and North Fork Smith Rivers, plus the streams in the Sixes, Pistol River, Hunter Creek, and Winchuck basins. The bill would direct federal agencies to “protect and enhance” each river’s outstanding values and would explicitly protect designated river corridors from damming and mining. The bill allows for fire-risk reduction and management that is in alignment with protecting outstanding values (called “outstandingly remarkable values” by the Wild and Scenic Rivers Act). With rising concern about drought, the importance of protecting our rivers has come into particularly sharp relief!

The Pacific Rivers Council produced a short video that highlights some of the rivers to be protected by the new bill that you can see here: http://vimeo.com/534234263

If you’ve not yet done so, please contact Senators Wyden and Merkley to thank them for advancing the River Democracy Act in the Senate and while you’re at it, please also encourage them to advance the Southwestern Oregon Watershed and Salmon Protection Act (SOWSPA). You can send a comment on their websites, or make a call: Sen. Wyden: (202) 224-5244/ (541) 858-5122/ Sen. Merkley: (202) 224-3753/541-608-9102

Here’s a sample of what you might say or write:

Thank you for introducing the River Democracy Act. I appreciate your listening to Oregonians and working to better protecting the rivers that flow through our federal public lands. In Southwest Oregon, we have some rivers that need special protection from the threat of strip mining at their headwaters, and so I hope you’ll also continue to advance the Southwestern Oregon Watershed and Salmon Protection Act (SOWSPA), which was passed by the U.S. House of Representatives earlier this year.

Remember, it’s always good to add something personal —by tucking in a sentence about how you appreciate the natural values of rivers, getting outdoors, birds, fish or fishing. Conserving our rivers is essential because rivers are literally the lifelines of our landscapes!

Also, Senator Wyden may be coming to Curry County for an in-person town hall meeting in late summer, and if he does, it will be important for people to show up—in person— to thank him for his leadership in protecting our rivers. Sign up for the KAS HOOT OUT for news about opportunities to make a difference for conservation.

Floating offshore wind

With the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management’s (BOEM) public process for leasing offshore areas for development of wind energy on the horizon for the end of the year, I’ve continued to research how these industrial, floating turbine installations might impact our region’s birds, fish, and wildlife so we’ll be ready to provide informed and constructive input.


Here are some things I’ve learned thus far. Proponents think that locating turbines ~20 miles out will minimize conflicts with fishermen and wildlife, but it’s important to note that this offshore zone is not empty. The continental shelf gradually slopes down from the coast, and then— between 25 to 30 miles out—drops from 3,000 to 10,000 feet deep. At the shelf break, cold, nutrient rich waters rise from the deep, creating a particularly rich zone of life that attracts larger fishes and birds. Off Oregon’s coast, upwelling coupled with distinctive bathymetry and oceanographic conditions in the vicinity of the Columbia River mouth, Heceta Bank, and Cape Blanco are thought to make for particularly rich zones.

Birds known to use the upwelling zone include albatrosses, shearwaters, and fulmars—known as the dynamic soaring seabirds—which come from all around the Pacific to forage. Most of these pelagic birds never come to land except to breed, and each has a fascinating life history. For example, the endangered Short-tailed Albatross now breeds on only two islands in northern Japan. Parents raise one chick each year, and it is thought that 2- to 3-year-old birds come to feed off Oregon’s coast. Decimated by market hunters to the point of near extinction in the early 20th century, the birds have had a difficult time rebounding owing to their very small population size and limited breeding grounds. Plastics pollution, marine contamination, and long-line fishing are also considered to be threats to their recovery. 

To help minimize impacts to birds like albatrosses, wind energy researchers have been studying the idea of installing enormous-sized turbines—800-1,000 feet tall—so that dangerous rotor-swept areas will be 400-500 feet above the ocean’s surface and so that arrays might contain fewer, larger turbines. (For perspective, wind turbines you may have seen in the Columbia Gorge or in southern California are 300 to 400 ft tall!) To reduce impacts to birds and marine mammals, the turbines will need to be arranged in arrays small enough or widely-spaced enough, that north-migrating species can either avoid or go around. The noise, electromagnetism, cables, structures may displace some species entirely, while the structures may also attract forage fish and draw some species into the arrays. 

Finally, for offshore wind energy development to be economic, locations for turbine arrays will likely need to be close enough to link up to major electric grid infrastructure—such as near Coos Bay, which has a major tie-in to BPA power lines. However, stronger winds to the south may prompt wind prospectors to consider farther-afield turbine locations that could be linked by undersea cables. There is still quite a lot of uncertainty on many fronts —and a lot more to learn. Stay tuned!

Wild horses, again!

In early June, Commissioner Boice reprised his proposal to relocate wild horses from over-populated eastern Oregon’s BLM range lands to the rugged terrain of the Kalmiopsis Wilderness. He’d invited his friend, a zealous proponent of using horses to reduce fire risks in wilderness areas, to come and give a presentation to the Curry Board of Commissioners (BOC). Long-time KAS members will remember that Mr. Boice brought this misguided proposal to the BOC back in 2017, and after a series of meetings, at which KAS members and others testified persuasively against it, the Curry BOC voted 3 to 2 to not pursue it any further.

It was a bad idea then, and it remains a bad idea now, so I sent in a letter from KAS and asked KAS members who had provided persuasive testimony in the past to send in letters again. I am proud to say our membership includes people with a lot of diverse expertise to address this issue—from wildlife and rangeland management, to direct experience with horses’ behavior and of the animals’ impacts, to knowledge of the Kalmiopsis Wilderness and its botany, of the wild horse laws and of public lands laws, and more.

Commissioner Boice moved the presentation to a later date, but KAS Board member Tim Palmer went down to the BOC meeting anyway and urged Boice and his fellow commissioners to just drop the misguided proposal. Marisu Terry also spoke against. At that point, Commissioner Paasch let it be known that Boice’s horse-expert friend had sent an email to the BOC deriding and insulting Curry County citizens who had already submitted letters, and so he recommended against allowing the presentation. (We later obtained a copy of the email, which indicated that the expert did not want to come to talk to a bunch of “ignorant” Curry County citizens.) Paasch, a long-time horse owner, explained that uncontrolled wild horses would likely end up becoming a problem on private lands, echoing one of the many concerns we had raised.

To be clear, this proposal would not even be legal owing to laws protecting wild horses and wilderness, which is managed by the U.S. Forest Service, but in this age of ill-informed ideas taking root, we’ve felt that it was critically important to provide substantial information to counter the proposal. Mr. Boice’s intention was positive—to reduce wildfire risks, but we think there are far better ways for our county to do that—foremost by helping to better educate citizens about fire risks, and to encourage managing vegetation close to houses to create defensible spaces and hardening of homes to withstand fire. In the end, Commissioner Boice decided to drop the horse proposal. Thanks to all who helped with this one!

Honey Bear campground expansion

In April, new Las Vegas-based owner of the Honey Bear Campground in Nesika Beach—Dacia RV Adventures LLC—proposed a significant expansion of the RV park to 162 campsites. Apparently, the previous, locally-based owner had made unauthorized expansions of both RV and tent sites beyond the approved 65 RV and 5 tent campsites. The new owner, which also owns RV parks in Florida, Texas, and Oklahoma, sought both to bring past expansions into compliance (with proper sewer and water capacity) and to expand even further. KAS submitted comments about the need to keep campsites and parking areas out of wetlands, to properly manage stormwater to avoid impacts to Greggs Creek, and also to support dark-sky compliant illumination proposed by the new owner. Neighbors raised questions about traffic and proximity of such a dense, commercial development in their rural neighborhood, but because campgrounds are “conditional uses” for the property’s “commercial rural zone,” there was little that could be done. Ultimately, the Planning Commission approved the campground expansion with a set of 15 conditions, including ones related to protection of wetlands, riparian zones, and dark skies.

34-acres in Langlois

Curry County Roadmaster Richard Christensen has proposed to use the 34-acre County-owned land at the intersection of Airport Rd and Highway 101 in Langlois for a much-needed, clean-fill disposal area –a place to store materials in the event of landslides. This is the 34-acres that Oregon Parks traded to the county as part of the Floras Lake land swap, and the need for a clean fill storage area in north county was identified in the Road Department’s 2021 strategic plan.

Recognizing that the County seeks to now put this land to some useful purpose, at a BOC workshop on this matter held on July 7, KAS Board member Tim Palmer suggested that, with good planning, the densely forested land—with one parcel north and one south of Airport Rd—might accommodate the needs of the road department while also allowing for some other uses, such as trails and possibly educational uses in association with Pacific High School (right across the street). He recommended that the road department use the northern parcel, leaving the southern parcel, which has larger trees and more wetlands, for other purposes. He underscored the need for a wide scenic forest buffer all along Highway 101 and that clearing the land unnecessarily would allow gorse to take hold. As part of the discussion, Economic Development Director Summer Matteson also proposed the idea of a “canopy project” that might capitalize on the land’s sizable trees (all are third growth). The Commissioners directed Planner Becky Crockett to work with the road master to develop a more specific site plan proposal.

New Strain of Sudden Oak Death found near Port Orford

In May, sudden oak death (SOD) was found at a new site north of Port Orford along Highway 101 and also in the general vicinity of Arizona St. on the west side of the Highway 101. SOD is a non-native pathogen (Phytophthora ramorum), spread in part by spores carried by air currents. It has been decimating tanoaks and infests other shrubs, including rhododendrons, at a number of locations in the South County. This detection is over 20 miles north of the last known detection, which was just north of the Rogue River near Lobster Creek.

At this point, the Oregon Department of Forestry (ODF) has sampled about 151 trees and has found 107 positives. The results indicate a new strain—called the NA2, which up to this point has only been found in nurseries. ODF is still sampling in the area and are actively contacting landowners for permission to inspect properties where they suspect dying tanoaks. A helicopter flight has been done by an ODF aerial survey specialist with a number of trees marked for follow up ground visits. The SOD program is also starting to obtain permissions for “treatments,” which means cutting, piling, and carefully burning trees. Meanwhile, the Oregon Department of Agriculture has instituted an emergency quarantine in the area within 3 miles of the infected trees. (See: https://blogs.oregonstate.edu/suddenoakdeathworkshops/) If anyone in the Port Orford area has tanoaks, myrtles, azaleas, or rhododendrons that appear to be dying, please contact Randy or Casara at the Oregon Department of Forestry’s Sudden Oak Death program so your trees can be evaluated: Casara Nichols, (541) 435-5031, Casara.C.Nichols@oregon.gov, Randy Wiese, (541) 294-8425, Randall.S.WIESE@oregon.gov

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Conservation News, Spring 2021

by Ann Vileisis

Representative DeFazio Leads on SOWSPA!

I am pleased to report that, since the last Storm Petrel, the bill to protect the headwaters of Hunter Creek, Pistol River, the Illinois (Rough and Ready Creek), and North Fork Smith from the threats of strip mining — the Southwestern Oregon Watershed and Salmon Protection Act (SOWSPA) — has passed the whole U.S. House of Representatives as part of a larger public lands bill (the Protecting America’s Wilderness and Public Lands Act), thanks to a big
push by our Representative Peter DeFazio! If you’ve not yet thanked Congressman DeFazio, please send a quick note via the contact page on his website to express appreciation (and help to keep him engaged!): https://defazio.house.gov/contact/contact-peter.

Now it’s time to ask our senators to do their part! They have already introduced a different bill, the River Democracy Act, which — based on nominations from hundreds of Oregonians — would designate thousands of miles of new wild and scenic rivers throughout our state, giving clear guidance to federal land managing agencies to accord our wild rivers with a higher level of protection. But most important, we need our senators’ help to finish the business of passing SOWSPA, which remains crucial to protecting threatened headwaters from mining. As longtime KAS members know, SOWSPA builds on years of communities coming together — on both sides of the Oregon and California border — to advocate for protecting outstanding wild rivers, drinking water, salmon and steelhead runs, recreation opportunities, and other natural values. The initial impetus was a proposal for mineral exploration in the headwaters of Hunter Creek/Pistol River by a company that also held a large block of mining claims in the headwaters of the North Fork Smith River. The laterite soils (what we often call “serpentine”) are rich in minerals but are of low grade — so mining would require removal of massive amounts of overburden. Such strip mining, plus piling and leach-processing of rock, in our high-precipitation area would be like opening a Pandora’s box at the headwaters of our special wild rivers. Working for increased protections for our public lands is a long process that demands perseverance, but I know that all our local voices together — YOUR VOICES — have been absolutely critical in getting us this far. Please let’s press ahead together. I thank you for your help in keeping this ball rolling along!

ACTION NEEDED: Please send an email to Senators Wyden and Merkley thanking them for introducing the River Democracy Act and encouraging them to introduce and advance SOWSPA in the Senate. Here is the contact page for Senator Wyden:
https://www.wyden.senate.gov/contact/email-ron

Here is the contact page for Senator Merkley:
https://www.merkley.senate.gov/contact

Here is a sample message to help you with writing
your own note:

Dear Senator Wyden/ Senator Merkley,
Thank you for introducing the River Democracy Act.
I appreciate your listening to Oregonians and giving
federal agencies clear guidance to better protect the
rivers that flow through our federal public lands.
However, in southwest Oregon, we have some rivers
that need additional protection from the threat of
strip mining at their headwaters. To address this
issue, I urge you to please re-introduce the Southwest
Oregon Watershed and Salmon Protection Act
(SOWSPA). The U.S. House of Representatives recently passed this bill, and so your leadership is now needed on the Senate side to get this important act
passed into law. Please re-introduce SOWSPA soon!

Floating Offshore Wind Power: Coming SOON to a Coast Near Us

In late March, KAS along with the Oregon Audubon Coalition (OAC) hosted a webinar with planners from the federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Manage-ment (BOEM) and the State of Oregon about current planning for future installation of floating wind tur-bines in federal waters off our coast. In short, BOEM is now preparing to identify potential leasing areas, called “call areas,” for wind energy development companies, and the agency wanted to “engage” with us to tell us what they are doing to address concern about impacts to birds.

Of course, we’re very interested to know. Our “beat”— Oregon’s South Coast — is seabird central! Oregon hosts one-half of the West Coast’s breeding bird colonies, and our part of the coast hosts more than one-half of Oregon’s colonies. We have millions of seabirds that come to breed here precisely owing to the wind, which churns the surface and causes upwelling of deep, cold water and nutrients that nourish the invertebrates and fish they forage on; it’s one of the richest and cleanest marine ecosystems on the West Coast. Moreover, these rich waters also attract nearly 100 species of pelagic birds from all across the Pacific, including albatrosses, shearwaters, fulmars, and more. I’ve never yet been out on a pelagic birding trip, but friends who have say that 25 miles out is where one starts to see many of these unique species. Of course, fish and wildlife, including whales and other marine mammals, depend on rich offshore waters, too. So what is BOEM doing? It is currently assembling and starting to analyze known data with the aim of identifying areas where presumably impacts to birds, fish, and wildlife can be minimized. I am grateful that BOEM is making this effort, but I have no delusions. This is the same agency that oversees offshore oil and gas leasing, and its process aims to expedite installation of industrial-scale energy production facilities by big energy companies. Though it sounds at first like BOEM’s planning will inform the site selection, actually the companies decide where they want to site facilities first, and then a public process follows from there. It is expected that BOEM will invite companies to propose sites for projects later this year (likely in November). Then there will be two opportunities for public input — the first in response to general siting of “call areas” and another with the NEPA-required public process — after areas have been leased and companies have put forth their specific plans, which is, of course, quite late in the game for making meaningful adjustments.

Meanwhile, with the Biden Administration’s big push to address climate change with green energy projects, there is now a rush to bring these facilities to Oregon to take advantage of substantial, time-limited federal subsidies. On the state level, in early April, the Oregon House Committee on Energy heard a bill put forth by our Representative David Brock Smith to expedite installation of three gigawatts of power — roughly 250 to 300 massive turbines — off our coast by 2025 or 2030. The initial bill called for a task force to expedite development and included no mention of birds, fish, wildlife, or ecosystems, but it was substantially amended to instead direct the Oregon Department of Energy to collect information about the benefits and challenges of connecting the offshore energy facilities with Oregon’s electric grid. The amended version includes a statement about minimizing impacts to ocean ecosystems and also, very fortunately, includes clear language about the need to plan for decommissioning of such facilities. This improved bill has bipartisan support, is expected to pass, and aims to give different economic stakeholders and the State of Oregon greater leverage in deciding where and how wind energy facilities might be sited — though to be clear, the primary permitting process will be federal.

In the past, land-based wind power on our coast had been deemed economically infeasible because the big BPA (Bonneville Power Administration) transmission lines stop at the California border and so could not carry electrons south to lucrative, larger markets seeking renewable energy. Now, however, a new model is being put forth — to tap Oregon’s offshore wind to supply power to coastal communities and then use our state’s existing grid infrastructure to also convey electricity into the Willamette Valley, freeing up other energy for energy-demanding metropolitan areas to the north and south. It is widely thought from a national perspective that wind power will help to reduce our dependence on polluting fossil-fuel energy sources, namely oil and gas, with an overall benefit of ultimately reducing impacts of climate change.

National Audubon has a policy of supporting wind energy development that minimizes impacts on birds — recognizing that the environmental stressors associated with climate change are already affecting birds, fish, and wildlife. The harsh reality is that we now live in a time of increasingly heartbreaking tradeoffs based on the tragic failure of past energy policy decisions.

One thing I have learned about reducing impacts of wind turbine arrays is that siting is supremely im-portant; wind generators are a good idea but are not suitable everywhere. With concern about potential impacts of industrial wind installations on birds, fish, and wildlife in the rich waters off Oregon’s coast, KAS and the OAC intend to engage to ensure that the expedited federal permitting process will not sidestep these concerns.

Honestly, when I listened to the state hearing online, heard our coast described as the “Saudi Arabia of Wind,” and saw that the initial bill to expedite energy development included not a single word about birds, it was hard not to worry about the gold-rush mentality of wind developers. It made me realize we’ll surely need to stand up for the albatrosses, petrels, and puffins, and hopefully be a force to make sure these potentially massive industrial facilities get sited in the least damaging locations and operated in the least damaging manner possible. Please stay tuned on this important emerging issue.

Administration Revokes Bad MBTA Opinion

In early March, the Biden Administration revoked the controversial opinion made by the former administration’s Department of the Interior Solicitor, the so-called “M-Opinion,” which in 2017 had weakened the Migratory Bird Treaty Act — one of America’s bedrocks for bird conservation. Reversing decades of legal interpretation, the “M-Opinion” declared that the Act did not prohibit incidental — albeit the predictable and preventable — killing of migratory birds by commercial activities. In addition, the Biden Administration started a public process that hopefully will also revoke the pending regulation intended to further codify the unfavorable-to-birds “M-Opinion.”

With ever increasing development along their migra-tory flight paths, our birds face increasing threats — from potential for collisions with tall buildings, wind turbines, and communications towers, to finding former wetland resting and feeding habitats reduced to crowded, disease-ridden, or polluted-by-industry sinks. Several industries, including wind energy, have made great effort to develop best practices and miti-gation measures to reduce incidental bird mortality, owing precisely to the “stick” of the MTBA. This bedrock law remains critically important as a tool for bird conservation into the future.

Protect Forests to Address Climate Crisis

President Biden’s first big action on the environment was to re-enter the Paris climate agreement, and his administration has hit the ground running with efforts to accelerate a transition to renewable energy. How-ever, there is another important approach that many in the conservation community would like to see advanced, too: protecting our forests.

Safeguarding current carbon stored in forests and in-creasing those stores is recognized by the Intergov-ernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) as an essential strategy for addressing the climate crisis. U.S. forests already sequester nearly 12 percent of our nation’s annual carbon emissions, but they could do more if public lands forests were strategically managed to retain carbon.

Mature trees in old-growth forests play an outsized role in storing and sequestering carbon because they serve as a centuries-old bank. Intact, primary, or un-logged forests store 30 percent to 70 percent more carbon than logged forests. It will take quite a long time for newly planted trees to catch up — 100 or 200 years, of course. In addition, protecting mature forests would have the multiple benefits of also pro-tecting clean water and biodiversity.

For all these reasons, Kalmiopsis Audubon joined with more than 100 conservation and environmental groups in sending a letter to Biden Administration climate policy leaders, urging them to include protection of mature and old-growth forests as a key strategy to assure compliance with the Paris climate treaty. At a global climate summit on Earth Day, Biden announced an ambitious new goal of reducing carbon emissions by 50 percent by 2030 — signaling greater urgency and commitment to addressing the climate crisis. There is a lot of focus on new technologies, but let’s not forget the value of our trees and forests as tried-and-true carbon sequesterers.

KAS Supports ODFW Efforts to Protect Habitat

Earlier this year, the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife (ODFW) submitted applications for “in-stream water rights” to ensure future flows for fish in more than 100 streams around the state, including in our area the Sixes, Chetco, and Winchuck. The flows of all our local rivers are pretty much already “fully-appropriated” for the low-flow summer months, which means that water users already have the rights to take all the water that is available down to a fairly minimal flow level, not always leaving enough as would be optimal for fish and aquatic life. Like most states in the West, Oregon’s water allocation system is based on the antiquated doctrine of first in time, first in right — established long before anyone could envision a scenario of scar-city and certainly before anyone remembered to leave some water in the river for fish.

Fortunately, many of our rivers already have some minimal in-stream water rights for fish, and in some cases, farmers or ranchers have worked with ODFW to allow their water rights to flow in-stream for the purpose of conservation — so the new ODFW applications were submitted as a kind of insurance policy, giving fish priority should any flows become available in the future. Nevertheless, Curry County’s commissioners decided to oppose the in-stream flow proposals, suggesting that they would preclude “future development” that would be more important. I honestly can’t imagine many local residents prefer-ring more development to rivers with insufficient water in the summer or fish in the fall. On behalf of KAS, I submitted a letter to the commissioners and also to the State Water Resources Department to back up ODFW’s applications for local in-stream flows, and I appreciate other KAS members from the specific watersheds who helped by sending addition-al letters. We also sent a letter to support ODFW in updating the state’s Essential Fish Habitat maps. These official maps determine where the many laws intended to protect salmon habitat actually apply — and affect activities such as mining and logging.

Port Orford Dark Sky Ordinance

Keeping Port Orford’s skies dark — for natural beauty, birds and wildlife, human health, and energy conservation — has been an issue championed by KAS for more than two decades with notable success, but evolving LED lighting technology has made an up-grade of the Port Orford outdoor lighting ordinance necessary. The public process has taken longer than expected, but we’re now getting close. At its March meeting, the City Council sent the latest version back to the Planning Commission (PC) with a request for some specific fixes related to enforcement provisions, street lights, and security lights. At its April meeting, the PC stated its intent to make the fixes in May and then to hold another public hearing in June. The ordinance will then head back to the City Council, hopefully for final approval. Please sign up for the KAS HOOT OUT to learn more about how you can help at the critical junctures. It will be important to show public support!

Interactive Map of Clearcuts and Sprays Across Oregon

If you haven’t done so yet, I’d recommend checking out the map created by Coast Range Forest Watch that compiles all the clearcuts and sprays planned so far in 2021. A zoomed-out view shows just how much forestry activity is planned in the Coast Range, and zooming in will allow you to see if activities may be planned in a specific area you care about. It also al-lows you to see which clearcuts and sprays are taking place within municipal drinking watersheds. You can view the map online at www.sprayfreecoast.org/sprays-across-oregon/ which also provides information about more of the map’s functions and how to use it.

If you’re interested in helping to monitor forestry activity in a watershed near you, please contact teresa @kalmiopsisaudubon.org. – Teresa Bird

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Conservation News

By Ann Vileisis, from January 2021 Storm Petrel

Floras Lake Land Swap Complete

I am pleased to report that the Floras Lake land exchange was finalized just before the 2020 year-end deadline, so it’s now official! We succeeded in adding 90 acres to the magnificent Floras Lake State Natural Area, including some important lake frontage. The effort to fend off ill-conceived development plans for County-owned lands at Floras Lake has been going on since at least 2005. That year, longstanding KAS members will remember we fended off the first secret deal, and then we did it again in 2015, when two county commissioners proposed a pie- in-the-sky plan to take over part of the state natural area to develop a golf course. I am reminded of the BOC’s images of golf “greens” photoshopped onto scruffy headlands, of the ensuing scandal of county involvement with digging illegal test pits INSIDE the state park, but most of all, of the more than 200 people who showed up at critical OPRD Commission hearings to speak in support of State Parks. OPRD staff and Commission members said it was the largest show of public support for Oregon State Parks ever! 

In 2016, we aimed to turn a new page by pushing for a more proactive effort for the county land at Floras Lake. We urged Curry County to consider a land swap with Oregon State Parks. With the support of then Commissioner David Smith, and then Tom Huxley and Sue Gold, County Planning staff researched options, and then organized a special outreach event in Langlois for community input in 2017. For the past three years, KAS members from throughout Curry County, together with citizens from Langlois, have shown up at key meetings to show overwhelming public support for the land swap. Commissioner Court Boice became an enthusiastic supporter of the swap, reaching out to OPRD to build goodwill; both he and Commissioner Gold made the votes needed to proceed. Though Commissioner Paasch was not in support at the outset, he earned my respect because he put aside his disagreement, supported the direction of the Board, and subsequently voted to get the job done.

But the devil is always in the details, so we waited and waited for the roads to be vacated and the parcels to be partitioned. With Covid-19, county staff attentions were understandably directed elsewhere, while State Parks saw its budget deeply slashed, with many staff members laid off. Nevertheless, we persisted with friendly reminders, attending BOC meetings, and saw the deal to its completion. Of course, the county still owns ~400 acres at Floras Lake –so we’ll need to keep vigilant (and, at some point, begin work on “Phase 2”); but with this swap, we’ve hopefully turned a critical corner. Also, the final exchange agreement does have a reversion clause dependent on trail planning work –so that is another detail we’ll need to watch.

I am proud that KAS has defended Floras Lake and the special lands between the lake and Blacklock Point, and post-covid, I am still hoping we can celebrate this success!

Please consider sending a note of thanks to our Curry County Commissioners for their leadership in conserving beautiful Floras Lake. Here is a sample note—you can add a personalized touch at the end. 

Dear Commissioners, 

I was glad to learn that Curry County recently finalized the Floras Lake land swap with Oregon State Parks. Thank you for your forward-looking leadership in conserving beautiful Floras Lake through your support for this exchange. 

Send a thank you note via snail mail to: Curry County Commissioners, 94235 Moore Street, Gold Beach, OR 97444. Or email them (Chris Paasch, Court Boice, and former commissioner Sue Gold): PaaschC@co.curry.or.us, boicec@co.curry.or.us, golds@co.curry.or.us, and PLEASE cc John Jezuit jezuitj@co.curry.or.us, who can forward any emails of thanks to former Commissioner Sue Gold. 

A path to protect Port Orford’s drinking water

Last fall, through her work monitoring the Oregon Department of Forestry FERNS website, Teresa Bird noticed a clearcut slated for the North Fork Hubbard Creek, the watershed that supplies the city of Port Orford’s drinking water. She shared that info with Port Orford Watershed Council (POWC) Chair Linda Tarr, who reached out to express concerns to the timber company, which granted 20-ft buffers, not required by law for the small stream. Oregon Forest Practices laws are notoriously inadequate to protect municipal water supplies, and so this agreement from the land owner was some measure of protection that otherwise would not have happened. 

Through this interaction, POWC learned that an even larger, steeper parcel of timberland in the city’s watershed was up for sale and would likely be logged the next year, given the high price of timber. The City’s reservoir has already been heavily silted in by past logging, and the City’s Water Plan recommended finding ways to prevent logging and road building, ideally through city ownership. With that, the POWC set out to find some way to proactively protect the city’s watershed from logging. 

With lots of research and networking, the POWC found the possibility of the Conservation Fund (CF) acting as a bridge buyer; the CF has a special revolving fund to help cities buy their water supply lands. In our December HOOT OUT, we asked Port Orford based KAS members to write letters to City Council, urging them to partner with the CF to purchase this crucial 160 acres of timberland very close to the city’s reservoir, with several tributaries and steep slopes. 

The Council received dozens of supportive letters and voted unanimously to proceed with this proactive effort that will hopefully protect our municipal water supply as well as the forest habitat into the future. The owner agreed to take the land off the market while CF carries out due diligence and an appraisal that are necessary for a successful transaction. There is still much work to be done and funding to find, but there is real reason for optimism that this key piece of forested land might be preserved to protect our drinking water. A huge thanks to Linda Tarr and the POWC for working to find this proactive, protective option, and to all KAS members who pitched in with letters of support. It was so good to see the Port Orford City Council vote for a proactive and protective step instead of repeating the error of past inaction. 

Please thank Port Orford City Council members for taking this proactive, protective step by giving them a call or sending an email. Here is a sample message you can use:

Dear Port Orford City Council members, 

Thank you for your recent vote to partner with the Conservation Fund to purchase forest lands in our city’s watershed, which will help protect our city’s water supply into the future. Many other small coastal cities have seen their watersheds ruined by logging so I am glad to know that our City Council has taken a proactive, protective, and cost-effective approach.  

Email them at: pcox@portorford.org, claroche@portorford.org, gburns@portorford.org, jgarratt@portorford.org, tpogwizd@portorford.org, Lkessler@portorford.org

Please remember, if you are interested to help track clear cuts and aerial spraying on the timber lands in your watershed, please contact Teresa Bird at Teresa@kalmiopsisaudubon.org

Federal Environmental Policy update

Over the past four years, dozens of federal policies protecting public lands, clean water, birds and wildlife were targeted by the Trump Administration. Under the rhetoric of “deregulation,” numerous longstanding environmental rules, as well as opportunities for public input, were cut. Several egregious changes were finalized in just the past few weeks. 

For birds of the Pacific Northwest, some of the most troubling rule changes include evisceration of the Migratory Bird Treaty Act, and then a surprising, last-minute effort to remove protection for over 3 million acres of critical habitat for the Northern Spotted Owl. 

Draft rule changes to weaken the Migratory Bird Treaty Act (MBTA) have been in the pipeline since 2017. In response to an earlier lawsuit filed by National Audubon and other conservation groups, a District Court ruling last summer found that the proposed changes did not align with the intent of the 100+ year-old law. Despite this ruling, the Trump Administration proceeded to finalize regulations that shield industry from fines and prosecution if migratory birds are incidentally rather than intentionally killed. It’s important to note that the MBTA has long served as disincentive for companies to kill large numbers of birds through their operations, such as with oil spills; and damages paid have provided for important mitigation and habitat restoration efforts (such as, locally, with the 1999 New Carissa spill, which killed ~3,000 birds on Oregon’s coast including threatened marbled murrelets). 

Rule changes that remove protection for 3.4 million acres (42%) of critical habitat for the Northern Spotted Owl were finalized by the Trump Administration in mid-January. Just weeks earlier, US Fish & Wildlife Service biologists had released a report indicating that the rapidly declining population of owls warranted uplisting from “threatened” to “endangered”; but despite the urgent need for increased protection, the Trump Administration had decided not to uplist owing to “higher priority actions.” Rather than simply not uplist, the Trump Administration then proceeded to remove 42% percent of owl habitat from protection, citing only “discretion” of the Secretary of the Interior. For nearly 30 years, National Forests (and BLM lands) of the Pacific Northwest have been managed under the Northwest Forest Plan, with specific protections for remaining old growth forests that provide habitat not only for spotted owls but also for other birds, fish, and wildlife –including our region’s iconic salmon. Many biologists regard this new rule as accelerating the owl’s path to extinction. 

So with the recent inauguration of President Biden, where do we now stand with rollbacks to these and many other federal laws that affect our local public lands and wildlife? The Biden Administration issued a “hold memo” that requires all federal agencies to hold and review any recently published final or draft rules. That will apply to both the MTBA rule and the last-minute Spotted Owl rule. There is also the Congressional Review Act, a procedural tool that allows lawmakers to consider and possibly nullify recently finalized regulations with a simple majority vote. It’s also very likely that the worst administrative rule changes will be litigated. National Audubon and a coalition of conservation groups have already filed suit against this final MBTA rule change. Until challenges are resolved, the new Spotted Owl critical habitat rule will likely create a fair measure of chaos for land management agencies. Stay tuned. 

BRIEF updates

Southwestern Oregon Mining Withdrawal

With the new Congress, we need our Senators and Rep. DeFazio to reintroduce and advance the Southwestern Oregon Salmon and Watershed Protection Act in order to finally make permanent the 20-year mineral withdrawal we all worked so hard to secure back in 2016. In the last Congress, SOWSPA was paired up with the Rogue Wilderness bill as the Oregon Recreation Enhancement Act but did not advance beyond hearings. Meanwhile, Red Flat Nickel Company (RFNC) continues to assert that its mining claims at Red Flat, up atop the headwaters of Hunter Creek and Pistol River, are valid while Forest Service continues to evaluate RFNC’s assertion through a technical process known as a “Surface Use Determination.” Also important to note, St. Peter Paul Capital, the offshore, U.K.-based company that owns RFNC, recently indicated it intends to auction off its RFNC holdings. Given rising interest in EV batteries, there is also increasing interest in nickel mining. The auctioning-off could be a sign of the company’s weakness, but a new buyer could also re-invigorate interest in further exploration. Southwest Oregon’s nickel deposits are relatively small, low grade, and thus far, have not proven economical for mining development in a global context, but as long as the Mining Law of 1872 remains in place, they remain vulnerable to exploitation. EV batteries typically require high grade nickel sourced from nickel sulfide deposits. The low-grade nickel in Southwest Oregon’s laterite deposits can only be extracted by strip mining the unique ecosystems at the headwaters of our cherished rivers. We’ll keep you posted on how to help. 

Jordan Cove dealt major setback

On Jan. 18, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) handed down an important decision that we hope will put the kibosh on the Jordan Cove LNG export terminal and gas pipeline across southern Oregon. The Canadian Company Pembina had asked FERC for a waiver from Oregon water quality regulations, but FERC upheld the requirement that projects must meet water quality standards. In Oregon, the state has the regulatory authority and responsibility to implement the federal Clean Water Act.  KAS has long opposed the Jordan Cove project along with a broad coalition of Tribes, conservation groups, fishermen, impacted landowners, and citizens concerned about clean water, climate change, and public safety. Pembina may petition for re-consideration or apply for a water quality permit again, but given the changing economics of natural gas, this permit denial is a significant setback. 

Rocky Shore Proposals, now under review

In December, KAS sent a letter to support three Rocky Shore Habitat proposals put forth by the South Coast Rocky Shores group, which includes Oregon Shores and PISCO (the Partnership for Interdisciplinary Studies of Coastal Oceans), for Blacklock State Park, Crook Point, and Cape Blanco. As part of its Territorial Sea planning process, the State is currently updating its Rocky Shore Habitat plan and had requested citizen proposals for new designations. The aim is to protect the diversity of marine life in these rich habitat areas. All proposals are currently under review by the Rocky Habitat Working Group, and a public comment period is expected later this spring.

Port Orford Dark Sky, update

Port Orford’s Dark Sky lighting ordinance has simmered on the backburner for the past few months. Last fall, City Council sent it back to the Planning Commission (PC) for refinements. However, they also sent the PC a request to work on building heights, which took higher priority. The lighting ordinance update has been a work in progress for over a year now, so hopefully 2021 will be the year to get it done. Meanwhile, ODOT still plans to install 6 pairs of new lighting fixtures on Hwy 101 next summer as part of its reconfiguration and paving project. ODOT has selected shielded LED fixtures with 2,700 kelvin (warm) color temperature that we hope will comply with “dark sky” goals of the ordinance, and now CCEC wants to field test them to assure they can withstand coastal weather. We’ve been told that demonstration fixtures will be installed some time in February. This will give us all a chance to see what the new LED fixtures actually look like. CCEC aims to shift toward LED lights throughout its service area, but has been leaning toward 3,000 kelvin fixtures –so pay attention to changes in street lights in your neighborhood. 

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Fall 2020 Conservation News

Port Orford’s Dark Sky, update

KAS has continued to participate in the City of Port Orford’s effort to upgrade its “Dark Sky” outdoor lighting code to account for changes in technology. The basic principle of “dark sky” lighting is to point lights down or properly shield them to reduce sky glow and light trespass into other people’s yards. However, new LED fixtures pose new challenges, requiring us all to learn a new language of illumination. Watts remain the energy required per second; lumens are the measure of light output (brightness); and kelvins describe a light’s “color temperature” on a scale, with 2700 kelvins (k) describing the warmest LED fixtures (the color of incandescent bulbs), to 3000k (cool white), to 3200k (florescent bulb-like) and beyond, with lights rated at 4000k and above having blue elements experienced as extremely cool and bright.

While LED fixtures are excellent for conserving electricity, lights that are too blue and bright can have unintended impacts to human health and wildlife. Reports from the American Medical Association (AMA) have raised concerns about possible adverse effects of shorter wavelength blue light that can adversely suppress melatonin during night. According to the AMA, recent large surveys found brighter residential nighttime lighting associated with reduced sleep times, dissatisfaction with sleep quality, excessive sleepiness, impaired daytime functioning and obesity. The AMA concluded that communities should be careful “to minimize and control blue-rich environmental lighting by using the lowest emission of blue light possible” and recommended using fixtures no higher than 3,000k. Beyond human health, studies have found impacts of excessively bright lights on birds, wildlife, pollinating insects, and more. The capacity for new LED fixtures to emit such bright, blue glaring light prompted KAS to urge a cap on kelvins.

This has particular relevance for the streetlights on Highway 101. ODOT has plans to repave and re-line Highway 101 through Port Orford and says it must now must apply national crosswalk safety standards. This will require 6 new pairs of lights mounted on 30-foot poles, taller than what we currently have (a motley collection from 20-28ft). The small town of Port Orford has low pedestrian use and low traffic at night. We’ve long had crosswalks without lights, and so many have questioned whether new lights are truly needed, worried that our main street will end up looking like a Walmart parking lot. ODOT’s answer is simply that all cross walks now need to meet national safety standards.

Other coastal cities have met the safety requirements by footing the sizable bill for greater numbers of low, decorative lights, but Port Orford doesn’t have the budget or inclination for that. Initially, the ODOT lighting design called for 3,000k lights. Fortunately, in response to strong public concern, ODOT’s engineer has now approved use of warm lights (2700k) with full cut-off fixtures to meet Port Orford’s  “dark sky” goals as long as lights can be mounted high on the 30-foot poles, but it remains unclear whether Coos-Curry Electric Coop will be able and willing to source these Dark-Sky compliant fixtures. They say not all fixtures can stand up to coastal conditions. KAS has pressed for use of warm colored lights and has also asked city council to urge ODOT to consider other options for pedestrian safety, such as lights that come on only when someone needs to use a crosswalk.

In August, the Port Orford Planning Commission (PC) passed its upgraded outdoor lighting ordinance and recommended it to the City Council (CC), which voted unanimously to pass it in September. But then, during a “second reading,” CC members decided to make some changes to address concerns about placement of security lights and how fines would be levied. Owing to outstanding questions related to the ODOT required lights on Highway 101, the CC has sent the code back to the PC and is now waiting for answers before considering a final version. A huge thanks to all KAS members who are helping to work on this issue. It’s not over yet, so if you want to help, please send me an email.

Salmon on the South Coast

ODFW is currently developing a plan to manage several fisheries on the South Coast. The public process has been limited this time primarily to angler stakeholders with the exception of the Lower Rogue Watershed Council, but KAS has participated to advocate for the local species that are not fished (threatened coho), for birds unfairly vilified (cormorants) because they are fish predators, and for stronger consideration of climate change impacts to our local fish runs. SONCC coho are a threatened species that has already been reduced to perilously low levels, and ODFW scientists have identified that our cherished rivers will come under far greater stresses with climate change, including lower flows and higher water temperatures.

This new plan will deal with steelhead, coho, and cutthroat trout from Elk River south (2 other plans deal with chinook and rivers from Elk north) and aims to specify “harvest” levels and hatchery output, as well as some goals for habitat improvement. Some fish conservation groups are pressing ODFW to allow anglers to harvest steelhead only if there is sufficient monitoring and data to demonstrate that populations can handle fishing pressure. There has also been discussion about the need to evaluate both harvest goals and hatchery programs in light of climate challenges, recognizing that natural origin fish will have greater genetic capacity to adapt to new conditions. Planning ahead for how we will have resilient salmon and steelhead populations and fisheries into the future will likely require a more precautionary approach from ODFW.

If ODFW doesn’t take climate change seriously in all aspects of its work, it will be harder to ask individuals who own riverfront properties to actively engage in the river stewardship and restoration activities that will also be critical, such as conserving water if you tap into groundwater or river flows for irrigation or lawn watering, planting trees and native plants that can help provide shade to cool the water temperature, or allowing beavers to recolonize in tributary streams. If you are a riverfront property owner and want to help to do more to help our rivers prepare for climate change, contact Curry Watersheds Partnership ((541) 247-2755, ext. 0), to learn more. Also, if you are new to our area, you may not be aware that Curry County has a “Riparian Buffer Corridor Overlay Zone” (50-75 feet from rivers and streams, depending on flow) that prohibits permanent clearing of riparian vegetation, a policy that helps to protect water quality and fish habitat. It’s going to take us all supporting conservation policies and restoration of riparian habitats if we want to keep our birds and fish into the future.

Oregon’s Rocky Habitat Plan update

The state of Oregon is currently updating and revising its policies to protect rocky coastal habitat areas for the first time in 25 years. Rocky coastal habitats include offshore rocks and islands, tidepools, and headlands—features that provide natural beauty but also outsized ecological values to so many creatures that depend on them for food and shelter, from unique invertebrates to our beloved black oystercatchers and turnstones.

The Rocky Habitat Management Strategy will provide for three new types of protective designations—Marine Conservation, Marine Gardens (focusing on education), and Marine Research— to safeguard these unique habitats into the future.

To develop the new Rocky Habitat Management Strategy, the state of Oregon has asked citizens and communities to nominate rocky sites that deserve protection. At this point community groups have formed up and down the coast and are in the process of developing substantial, site-specific proposals based on input received earlier this summer. Full proposals, which will go to state agencies and decision-making bodies for review, are due at the end of the year.

On the South Coast, Shoreline Education for Awareness, South Coast Rocky Shores Group, Partnership for Interdisciplinary Studies of Coastal Oceans, based at Oregon State University (PISCO), the Oregon Kelp Alliance, and Oregon Shores Conservation Coalition have taken the lead to develop site specific proposals for Coquille Point, Blacklock Point, Cape Blanco, part of Port Orford Heads, Rocky Point, and Crook Point.

You can help support these designations by writing letters of support, sharing observations about proposed sites you regularly visit, and participating in community meetings to support the site designation process (currently being held online). To learn more about sites being considered for designations in our area, and how you can get involved, please contact CoastWatch Volunteer Coordinator Jesse Jones (503-989-7244, jesse@oregonshores.org). 

More information on the Rocky Habitat Management Strategy, which nests within the state’s Territorial Sea Plan, can be found at: https://www.oregonocean.info/index.php/tsp-rocky-shores-amendment. 

Shasta-Agness Project

In late July, the Rogue River-Siskiyou National Forest released the Record of Decision for its “Shasta-Agness Landscape Restoration Project,” a plan that will guide management of nearly 7,000 acres of public lands in the vicinity of Agness. The idea for this project started many years ago, with Forest Service planners and the Forest Collaborative aiming to find common ground on logging that could provide timber but also accomplish conservation goals, such as restoring oak savannas, while supporting recreation opportunities.

Owing to fire suppression, the landscape around Agness in particular has been shifting from oak savanna vegetation to Douglas firs. But the warming climate may now be making it harder for Douglas firs to thrive in thin soils. Already some have died owing to persistent drought. According to Forest Service, thinning in areas with encroaching firs, plus prescribed fires, could help shift the ecosystem back to white oaks; then revenues generated from timber could fund positive conservation actions such as replacing old culverts and decommissioning old logging roads that still spill sediment into tributaries. However, one controversial aspect of this plan is to log some firs in LSR (Late-seral reserve) areas that are now more than 80 years old –and so already well on the way to providing the kind of big tree habitat that is more resistant to fire and that is needed by some forest birds and wildlife. The plan includes 3,770 acres of commercial logging in oak woodlands, pine forests, and riparian zones.

This project, like all public-lands projects, has gone through a NEPA public process designed to identify environmental impacts and consider different options. (NEPA is the National Environmental Planning Act.) KAS has submitted comments through the entire public process. We supported thinning of plantations (already logged areas that are now thick and fire-prone) and all actions related to stream restoration. We supported restoration of oak savannas but urged a cautious approach, especially with regards to hazards of invasive plants taking over in the wake of logging, questioning the feasibility of how prescribed burns could actually be implemented, and asking for more explicit plans for how restoration will actually be accomplished after logging is done and underscoring the need for adaptive management, since this type of restoration is new to this area. We questioned the need for commercial logging in riparian areas and serpentine pine areas, where mineralized soils already create a mosaic of habitat. In addition, we asked for more careful consideration of how recent wildfires affected the larger landscape of southwest Oregon, pointing out that the forest habitat still standing in the vicinity of Agness may now be all the more important for birds and wildlife, including the coastal marten, that have dispersed from the large areas burned in the Chetco Bar and Klondike Fires.

With the Final Record of Decision, we were disappointed that our main concerns were not adequately addressed. We submitted objections raising concern about several aspects of the project: commercial logging in Riparian Reserves and serpentine pine areas, the likely increase of invasive species in oak savanna restoration areas; and the short timeline of the project over a large area, which precludes the ability to actually apply the promised “adaptive management” approach. In short, it’s hard to shift gears and adapt management to new information after all the trees have been cut. Objections were considered at a meeting in late October. In early September, the coastal marten was designated as a federally threatened species under the Endangered Species Act. We hope this will require the Forest Service to make some adjustments to its plan. The last major timber management plan in our area, “Coastal Healthy Forest Treatments,” focused on plantation thinning and has guided the direction of local timber sales for over ten years. This plan has scheduled timber sales over the next 4 years.

Protecting forest waters

Over the past several years, Teresa Bird has headed up KAS efforts to help local citizens and communities better understand and find out about aerial spraying on nearby private timberlands. As we’ve come to learn, Oregon’s Forest Practices law is weak, with only narrow buffers from logging and spraying to protect fish-bearing streams and no buffers to protect smaller non-fish bearing streams, even those that flow into drinking water sources. Earlier this year, we hosted an online training to help volunteers learn how to monitor for spraying through the state’s aerial spraying notification program (FERNS).

I am pleased to report a positive outcome from these efforts. Through monitoring of the Hubbard Creek watershed, which supplies drinking water for the city of Port Orford, Teresa identified an upcoming timber sale and spray in the North Fork. She alerted the local Port Orford Watershed Council. The Council was then able to reach out to the landowner to request that the logging company leave a buffer around the stream and avoid aerial herbicide spraying. Because this stream is both non-perennial and non-fish bearing, there are absolutely no requirements to leave buffer trees or to avoid spraying, even though it flows into a public drinking water supply. In the end, the company agreed with a handshake to leave a 20-foot buffer and to use only manual application of herbicides. The Chair of the Port Orford Watershed Council went out with the company to flag the buffer zone. Kudos to the Port Orford Watershed Council for negotiating this positive deal for Port Orford’s water drinkers!

In the absence of meaningful reform of the Oregon Forest Practices Act, continued vigilance by citizens will be needed to protect the streams that flow through Oregon’s private timberlands, many of which are now owned by real estate investment companies. If you’d like to help us monitor for local aerial sprays, please contact Teresa at teresa@kalmiopsisaudubon.org

Marbled Murrelet Surveys Continue by Teresa Bird

This summer I continued to look for murrelets in our nearby coastal forests with the help of Max Beeken. The most exciting surveys this year were along the South Fork Sixes River, where Max and I both saw an amazing amount of murrelet activity on both sides of the river! I also heard many of the murrelet’s distinctive keer! calls from all around me during a survey about a third of the way up the Humbug Mountain trail. While we usually focus our survey efforts in the forest surrounding Elk River, this year we also helped Coast Range Forest Watch survey a proposed timber sale on the Board of Forestry lands in the Elliott State Forest. The many combined murrelet sightings from our surveys in the area effectively confirmed that the area was being used by murrelets, and the timber sale was halted by the Oregon Department of Forestry. Thanks to the National Audubon Society for a grant that helped to fund this survey effort!

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Conservation News, Summer 2020

Port Orford Dark Sky lighting

On Tuesday August 11 at 3:30pm, the Port Orford Planning Commission (PC) will have its final hearing on the city’s new outdoor lighting ordinance. Last year, the City Council directed the Commission to update the old ordinance to reflect new advances in lighting technology (eg. LEDs) and to tighten language to make it more enforceable. KAS has attended monthly meetings over the past year as the PC has worked to upgrade the ordinance, drawing upon municipal ordinances from other small towns. Once the ordinance is passed at the official hearing in August, it will be referred to the City Council. 

It will be helpful for KAS members and other citizens in Port Orford to participate in the PC meeting, probably via zoom, and even more important, in the subsequent City Council meetings to voice support for the new ordinance. I will let everyone know more via our HOOT OUT about meeting call-in information when it becomes available. 

As long-time members know, Kalmiopsis Audubon, under the leadership of board member Al Geiser, has been involved for more than two decades in efforts to conserve the dark night sky in Port Orford—from installing “night caps” to getting the first “dark sky” ordinance passed. The gist is that light fixtures need to be pointed down to reduce light trespass (onto neighbor’s property) and also to avoid pink sky glare. Bright light at night can be harmful to human health, can be disruptive to birds and wildlife, and diminish the beauty of the night sky and our ability to enjoy sights like the recent Neowise Comet. Please talk to your neighbors and friends about the value of conserving the night sky and the benefits of a sensible lighting ordinance. For more background, see: www.kalmiopsisaudubon.org/dark-sky

Jordan Cove project update

In the last Petrel, we reported that the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), had approved the Jordan Cove LNG facility and pipeline, despite the fact that the Canadian company Pembina, had not yet qualified for state permits needed to move forward. Shortly thereafter, landowners whose property would be condemned by eminent domain for pipeline construction—plus community groups, conservation groups, and tribes—filed lawsuits against the decision. In mid-June, the state of Oregon submitted its own petition to challenge the project since the FERC seemed intent to totally preempt the state’s critical roles in permitting under the Clean Water Act and the Coastal Zone Management Act.

In early July, around the same time that several other large energy pipelines were struck down by court decisions (Dakota Access and Keystone XL) or cancelled owing to the declining market for natural gas (Atlantic Coast), the Trump administration went ahead and approved gas exports from the Jordan Cove facility, further signaling disdain for state environmental laws and its intent to keep pushing oil and gas production, despite mounting scientific concerns about fossil fuels damaging our climate and a marked downturn in the natural gas market. 

Our organization has long opposed this proposal because of its promotion of fossil fuels at a time of climate crisis, condemnations of private property owned by rural landowners, hundreds of pipeline crossings of our fine southern Oregon rivers and tributaries, infringement on irreplaceable forest and estuary habitat for birds, fish, and wildlife, and threats to public safety, water quality, and commercial and sport fisheries. We’ve helped at the local level, with our members showing up at hearings in Coos Bay. [Breaking news is that Oregon’s Land Use Board of Appeals (LUBA) has just denied Pembina a key local land use permit, too.] At this point, the fate of the pipeline will lie mostly in the hands of the federal courts, but Governor Kate Brown will continue to play an important role to make sure state laws are followed.

ACTION ITEM: Please thank Oregon Governor Kate Brown for her leadership thus far. Make a quick phone call (503) 378-4582); make a comment via her email portal; or send a note with a message like this: Dear Governor Brown, Thank you for challenging FERC’s approval of the Jordan Cove LNG facility and pipeline and for voicing your commitment to make sure all state laws are followed. I appreciate your standing up for citizens of Oregon. (personalize or add reasons!) Snail mail address: Governor Kate Brown, 900 Court Street NE, Suite 254, Salem, OR 97301-4047.

Floras Lake exchange update

In early June, I attended a Curry Board of Commissioners (BOC) meeting (with a mask!), aiming to keep the Floras Lake Land exchange on track. As stipulated by the land swap agreement finalized by the BOC last fall, the county must vacate the roads and right of ways in its parcel. Yet again, there was a delay, this time owing to a disagreement between the county assessor and attorney over the format of the order. Ultimately, two weeks later, the BOC passed the final order unanimously. However, around the same time, Oregon State Parks announced massive staffing cuts owing to a huge budget shortfall related to the pandemic reducing revenues from camping and lottery. Despite pandemic and budgetary chaos, we’ll need to make sure the final steps of the exchange are completed to close the deal before the agreement expires at year’s end. 

A Tragedy in Progress: Elk River Chinook update

Over the past several years, we’ve tracked the troubling situation with the wild (also called natural origin) Elk River fall Chinook. In 2013, we were shocked when ODFW determined that wild Elk River fall chinook run was the only non-viable chinook run on the entire coast and that our fish had an alarmingly high risk of extinction (16.9 %). Owing to questions about older data used in the 2013 population viability analysis, ODFW recently completed a new one, with far more alarming results. According to the new population viability analysis, Elk River fall Chinook have a 97 percent risk of extinction over the next one hundred years, under the most likely scenario, with current climate and fishing conditions.

This situation is utterly tragic because the Elk River has been renowned for its salmon habitat, with a highly intact forested watershed that Jim Rogers and so many of us have worked hard to protect, plus an undeveloped mouth (though there is a lack of adequate summer rearing habitat in the lower river), and positive restoration efforts underway for coho that will also benefit chinook. Most all other fall chinook runs up and down the coast have extinction risks less than 5%, typically considered the threshold for concern.

What’s gone so wrong at Elk River? A key problem is hatchery interactions. Because the local hatchery has pumped so many smolts into our small river over the past 50 years (>325k annually until a few years ago, and upwards of 500k in decades past), there has been too much interbreeding between wild and domesticated hatchery fish. Because too many hatchery fish are not caught and do not return into the hatchery, the unfortunate outcome is that natural- origin fish now have depressed productivity.

Wild fish that have returned to Elk River for hundreds of thousands of years are adapted to river conditions. Hatchery fish are adapted best for life in a hatchery through epigenetic changes (also called domestication), but when they interbreed with wild fish, the result is offspring that are less fit and less productive. Imagine breeding chihuahuas with wolves—the outcome would be offspring less capable of surviving in the wild. 

Since 2013, ODFW has taken some actions to try to reduce the crisis of interbreeding of wild and hatchery salmon. Aiming to reduce the number of hatchery fish spawning in the wild, ODFW reduced smolt output by 50k, and fixed the hatchery pump and fish ladders. These actions have slightly improved the situation. In addition, the Oregon Hatchery Research Center has been studying the strategy of adding a special scent to hatchery water during incubation with hopes of better drawing returning fish back into the hatchery. After many years of study, 2020 was the first year the new scent was added to chinook incubation water; we’ll not really know how well it works for another 3 to 7 years.

But ODFW’s new population viability analysis indicating up to a 97 percent risk of extinction for fall Chinook in Elk River raises serious alarm bells. How much longer do we wait to see what happens—especially since questions have been raised about this problem since at least 2005? The 2013 Coastal Multi-Species Management Plan stipulated that ODFW must revisit the situation with Elk River chinook in 2021. 

The Elk River hatchery was built not to mitigate for lost habitat but as a way to “enhance” sport fishing. That was back in 1969 when people were unaware of the insidious risks that hatcheries posed to wild fish runs. Instead of enhancing our sport fish run, it appears this very oversized hatchery program is now putting our local wild chinook run into a dangerously unsustainable position. This is not theoretical. Over the past few years, with poor ocean conditions, there have been years with extremely poor returns of hatchery fish, years with no bubble fishery for Chinook off the river’s mouth, and this year there will no longer be retention of wild fish for sport anglers. 

To build ecosystem resilience in the face of climate change—or even earthquakes—we need for our fall Chinook to be able to evolve with changing conditions, and the locally adapted native Elk River fish will be far better suited to that task than their domesticated hatchery cousins. Ultimately, to conserve our locally adapted fish into the future, we will need to reduce the smolt output and right-size the hatchery program for our small river. Stay tuned. 

Calling for more Wild and Scenic Rivers

Last fall, Senator Ron Wyden put out a call to citizens throughout the state to nominate more Oregon rivers to be designated in the National Wild and Scenic Rivers system. In response, Kalmiopsis Audubon nominated a number of important tributaries to our local rivers. Wild and Scenic designation most notably prohibits dams, but it also affords greater protection through the requirement that public land agencies plan and manage to conserve the rivers’ “outstandingly remarkable values.” To follow up on our advocacy for the Southwest Oregon Mineral Withdrawal, we nominated public land tributaries of Hunter Creek and Pistol River and the North Fork Smith. We also nominated some outstanding tributaries of the lower Rogue, the Sixes, and the Chetco. 

As long time KAS members know, our region currently has one of the highest concentrations of wild and scenic rivers in America—and the designations have helped to conserve water quality, fish habitat, ecological values, and recreational opportunities in our public lands. Senator Wyden’s wild rivers initiative has understandably been delayed owing to the pandemic and its economic fallout, but we expect the Senator will press forward with this project as soon as he can. We are also hope he’ll continue his efforts to make the Southwest Oregon Mineral Withdrawal permanent. 

ACTION ITEM: To help, please call (202) 224-5244/ (541) 858-5122 —or send Senator Wyden a short note (via his website portal) with this message: Thanks for your efforts to advance the Southwest Oregon Mineral withdrawal legislation and to protect more Wild and Scenic Rivers in Southwest Oregon (you can add in your favorites and otherwise personalize!). 

ODFW proposes and drops new Rogue River Bear hunt

In mid-July, ODFW announced a proposal for a new black bear hunt in the Wild and Scenic Rogue River canyon—the one place in Oregon where it’s been off limits since 1965. A week later the proposal was dropped owing to strong public opposition. 

The agency’s primary aim was to address an issue with so-called “problem bears” that have become habituated to human foods, improperly stored by campers who hike and raft in the Wild & Scenic Rogue River canyon. Black bears generally mind their own business and have ample wild foods to eat (except for in some drought years), but periodically, managing bears in the Rogue canyon has been a challenge. In years past, some lodges and campers backpacking and rafting the river neglected to take sufficient care with food and trash storage, with the unfortunate effect of drawing in bears. There is an old truism: a fed bear is a dead bear. 

About 20 years ago, citizen groups and public land and wildlife agencies pulled together and came up with a partial solution: for river campers to use mini-electric fences to store food at campsites known for bear problems. This approach worked relatively well for many years, but owing to a delay in putting out the food storage fences last year, there was a season of especially troubling interactions between campers and bears. ODFW and public land agencies have also tried to educate campers about proper food storage, but there is no requirement, or even a recommendation, for hikers or boaters to use bear proof storage containers, as required in so many other wilderness areas with high bear activity.

The good news is that this year, fences went in early and problems have lessened, but it remains critically important that Rogue River campers and hikers take personal responsibility to store their food and trash properly—and for ODFW and public lands agencies to redouble their efforts to educate the public about proper food and trash storage. In many other places where there have been conflicts between people and bears, proper storage of food and trash has been the key to reducing problematic interactions. 

This is critical to recognize in storing food and trash at home, too. Curry Transfer and Recycling (CTR) recently offered new bear-proof trash cans to its customers. They were so popular that CTR is already out of stock! The containers have a special lock that is automatically opened when trash is retrieved. If you are interested in getting one of these bear-proof trash cans (also good for wind), call CTR (541-469-2425) and ask to be placed on the waiting list. They expect to get them in again next year. Also, please pay attention to bird feeders and pull them down for a while if you suspect bear activity.

National environmental rollbacks, finally coming to fruition

Those who follow national environmental news know that the current Administration has been on a determined path to rollback many laws intended to safeguard public health, wildlife, and nature. Unfortunately, in mid-July, the Trump Administration finalized rules to weaken the most fundamental law, the National Environmental Policy Act, known by its acronym NEPA. For fifty years, NEPA has required that federal agencies consider environmental consequences, and alternatives, before they take actions. The law also provides for transparency in federal decision making and public input from citizens. From local experience, we know public input is critically important because sometimes agency staffers (which come and go) lack crucial knowledge or perspective or are subject to political pressures. 

The new rule gives federal agencies broad discretion to exempt certain projects from NEPA and to avoid consideration of cumulative and indirect impacts, though the law’s statutory language requires such consideration. What this means locally is yet to be seen. The Forest Service may start to fast track projects through the new streamlined regulatory process. Though the rule change will purportedly fast-track approvals for pipelines, mines, logging, and oil drilling, it will no doubt be litigated, which may well lead to more delays. 

Migratory Bird Treaty Act rollback proceeding apace

The Trump Administration has also targeted an even more longstanding bedrock conservation law. The Migratory Bird Treaty Act (MBTA) has been in effect since 1918, when leaders in the U.S. and Canada recognized the important value of migratory birds to the economies and enjoyment of all citizens. Treaty protection was soon expanded to include Mexico, Japan, and Russia. For a century, the threat of MBTA prosecution had served to deter those who would harm birds. 

That changed in 2018 when the Trump Administration decided to “celebrate” the 100th anniversary of this critical law by issuing a new legal opinion that effectively gutted it. Under this new interpretation, the MBTA forbids only intentional killing, such as hunting without a permit, and no longer applies to industries that inadvertently kill a whole lot of birds, such as the oil and gas industry (with their toxic wastewater pits and oil spills), communications and wind power (with their towers), and fishing (with long lines). To be clear, many of these industries, to comply with the MBTA, had already adopted bird friendly practices that have no doubt saved the lives of millions of birds. In addition, financial penalties imposed under the MBTA have helped recover species harmed by reckless negligence, such as the Exxon Valdez and Deepwater Horizon oil spills.

In response to the Trump Administration’s rollback of the MBTA, a bi-partisan group of former wildlife officials from previous presidential administrations (going back to Nixon) sent a letter strongly urging reinstatement of traditional rules. Shortly thereafter, a bipartisan group of Congress members, led by California Rep. Alan Lowenthal introduced a bill to close the loophole and restore the Migratory Bird Treaty Act. Our Congressman, Peter DeFazio, was one of the original co-sponsors of this bill, H.R. 5552. In March, a group of 23 Senators, including Senators Wyden and Merkley, sent a letter, strongly urging the Secretary of the Interior to reconsider the Administration’s decision, calling it “the most significant rollback of migratory bird protections in our nation’s history.” 

Nevertheless, the Trump Administration has pressed ahead. KAS recently joined with other Audubon chapters in Oregon (and across America), to comment on a Draft Environmental Impact Statement (DEIS) to oppose the damaging rule change. 

So far, HR 5552 has moved ahead with a markup in the House Natural Resources Committee, but it has not yet been referred for a full House vote. Honestly, the bill has little chance of passage with the current political configuration, but it’s heartening to know that our elected officials are fighting to keep the MBTA intact. It’s important that they know we care and appreciate their efforts to stand up against rollbacks to environmental protection laws. 

ACTION ITEM: Please give our federal elected officials a call (or send an email via their website portals) to thank them for standing up against rollbacks to the Migratory Bird Treaty Act, the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), and other bedrock environmental protection laws. 

Rep. DeFazio (202)-225-6416/541-269-2609

Sen. Merkley: (202) 224-3753/541-608-9102

Sen. Wyden: (202) 224-5244/ 541-858-5122

Cormorants under siege again

In tandem with rolling back the Migratory Bird Treaty Act, the Trump Administration has also pursued a new rule that specifically targets Double Crested Cormorants, one of the most persecuted birds in the United States. The new rule would allow killing of more than 120,000 birds each year. Based on current estimates, this could potentially result in the annual killing of up to 14% of the national population and represents nearly a 140% increase over the average annual take between 2007 and 2018. The rule would also turn over jurisdiction for management of these birds over to state wildlife agencies.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) already has a poor record of protecting this species. You may recall that the agency permitted killing nearly 11,000 cormorants and destroying more than 28,000 nests at in the Columbia River Estuary, resulting in the complete collapse of this colony, which represented 40% of the entire Double-crested Cormorant population west of the Rocky Mountains.

However, we are concerned that turning over cormorant management to states with such high ceilings for lethal take could be far worse. State agencies are already strapped for funds to manage non-game species, and we know that ODFW managers are frequently pressured by fishermen to kill or haze cormorants in order to reduce competition for fish. KAS joined other Audubon chapters in Oregon and around the U.S. to submit comments opposing this overreaching proposal that flies in the face of 100 years of federal bird protection policy. 

Help Monitor for Aerial Spraying on the Curry County Coast!

For the last few years, KAS has been helping our community to better understand and find out about aerial herbicide spraying on timberlands. You may have already heard that the Oregon Department of Forestry (ODF) has an online notification system called FERNS, which will send emails to notify subscribers about pending chemical applications in particular areas. Our goal is to recruit KAS members who can use FERNS to help us monitor sprays in all the watersheds on the Curry County coastline. Basically, all you need to do is sign up and start paying attention. We are looking for volunteers who can cover watersheds north of Elk River (eg Floras Creek, Sixes River), South of Hubbard’s Creek to Gold Beach (eg Euchre Creek, Lobster Creek), and in the Brookings area (we just got some great volunteers to monitor Hunter Creek and Pistol River – thank you!!). Having better information about aerial spraying in our communities can help us advocate for better practices, and it can enable you to better protect your and your neighbors’ health and wellbeing. If you are interested to help, please contact Teresa Bird: teresa@kalmiopsisaudubon@org.

Posted on

Conservation News – Winter 2020

by Ann Vileisis

Wild Rivers Headwaters Update and Opportunity to Help!

As longtime KAS members know, we continue to support permanent protection of the headwaters of Hunter Creek, Pistol River, the North Fork of the Smith, and the Illinois Rivers from the threat of strip mining. All these areas were temporarily withdrawn from new mining claims for 20 years with the 2017 Southwest Oregon “mineral withdrawal,” which gives Congress time to act on legislation. Last year, Senator Wyden combined the bill that would make this protection permanent with another bill to protect more wilderness on the Rogue River (between Galice and Marial, upstream in Josephine County) in new legislation called the Oregon Recreation Enhancement (ORE) Act. I am very glad to report that in December, Senator Wyden advanced the ORE Act through a markup in the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee. This is a critically important step toward making the protections we need permanent.
While it may seem that the push for mining has faded into the background with the 20-year mineral withdrawal in place, Red Flat Nickel Company (RFNC) continues to assert that it has valid existing claims in the headwaters of Hunter Creek that would be exempt from the mineral withdrawal. The Forest Service has yet to make a determination about the validity of the company’s claims. Moreover, on the national level, the mining industry continues to push Congress to roll back already lax regulations that govern hard rock mining, so we need to stay vigilant.
Meanwhile, Senator Merkley has introduced entirely different legislation to expand the Smith River National Recreation Area into Oregon, which would make permanent the mineral withdrawal for the watershed of the North Fork of the Smith River, located at the southern tip of the Kalmiopsis Wilderness.
We need to thank our senators for continuing to work to permanently protect the headwaters of our extra-ordinary wild rivers — so that they know we are still paying attention and that we still care. Senators Wyden and Merkley are cosponsors of both bills.

Please call with a simple message of thanks. Here is a sample script:
Thank you for your leadership in protecting South-west Oregon’s wild rivers from the threat of strip mining.
Senator Wyden, thank you for your work to advance the ORE Act, with the Southwest Oregon Mineral Withdrawal, through committee markup, and I hope you’ll keep working to get it passed.
Senator Merkley, thank you for introducing the bill to protect the North Fork Smith, and I hope you will also continue to support efforts to advance mineral withdrawals for our other cherished wild rivers through the ORE Act.
Senator Wyden: (202) 224-5244 / (541) 858-5122
Senator Merkley: (202) 224-3753 / (541) 608-9102
You can also send a brief thank you note through the senators’ websites.

Floras Lake Exchange, Brief Update

Last fall, both the Curry County Board of Commissioners (BOC) and the Oregon Parks and Recreation Commission (OPRC) voted to move forward with an exchange of 90 acres of inaccessible, county-owned land on Floras Lake (adjacent to Floras Lake Natural Area) and 33 acres of accessible, state-owned land on Highway 101 at the corner of Airport Road. Since we’ve been working toward a conservation outcome for the Floras Lake lands for nearly a decade, we are looking forward to celebrating! However, though the BOC signed an agreement on December 5, the ex-change is not yet complete. The agreement stipulates a closing date of December 31, 2020 — almost a year from now — and before then, the county needs to “vacate” all of the roads in the parcel to be ex-changed. The agreement stipulates that costs of this legal task will be split, with the state paying no more than $3,000 to get the job done. According to county staff, this final work has not yet been budgeted or scheduled and may require additional direction from the BOC. Given the difficulties and politics of getting the agreement signed, we intend to watchdog this until the job is truly complete.

Pistol River Gravel Extraction Project Update

In last quarter’s Storm Petrel, we reported that the Curry County Planning Commission (PC) had denied a proposal for gravel extraction along the lower Pistol River because the application lacked information required by law to inform a proper decision. We also reported that the project proponent had declined to appeal the decision. That was the best information available from the county when we went to press, but, shortly thereafter, he did, in fact, decide to appeal the decision to the Curry County Board of Commissioners.
Meanwhile, neighbors in Pistol River held two local gatherings — one convened by the project proponent and another by the project opponents. KAS was invited to participate in the second meeting, where the project proponent spoke about his desire to, in fact, restore the lower river. We were heartened to hear that and also to learn that the Curry Watersheds Partnership (which includes the South Coast Watershed Council and the Curry Soil and Watershed Conservation District) had already started to work with other willing landowners in the lower river to consider potential restoration projects. They had even submitted a grant proposal to fund hydrologic and sediment studies needed to determine how best to proceed and where gravel removal might be warranted for restoration purposes.
However, despite the hopeful rhetoric, when the BOC considered the appeal at a de novo hearing in mid-November, the proposal remained focused on taking out gravel and still lacked basic information about the amount of gravel to be removed and impacts to the estuary and to salmon. We urged the commissioners to encourage the project proponent to withdraw his appeal and work together with the watershed council to develop a restoration-oriented plan. The record was kept open for several weeks for additional information and rebuttals. Then on January 8, the BOC made a final decision, voting two to one to affirm the PC’s decision to deny the still-deficient proposal. Commissioner Boice voted against, wanting to keep the record open to allow the applicant still more time.
It is critical to carefully scrutinize projects proposed in and around the estuarine zones of our coastal rivers because these areas are especially important for fish that use them for migration, juvenile rearing, and even nursery habitat in the case of some marine species. Even if there is good habitat upstream, degraded estuary habitat can serve as a bottleneck for salmon runs. For this reason, anyone proposing a project in aquatic estuarine habitat must secure permits not on-ly from local government but also from state and federal agencies to assure that impacts to water quality and fish, especially threatened coho salmon, will be minimized.
At this point, the project proponent may decide to appeal the BOC decision to the state Land Use Board of Appeals. Otherwise, he will need to wait for a year to submit a new application to the county. We hope that he will work with a restoration consultant and Curry Watersheds Partnership to develop a proposal that could help to restore the lower Pistol River.

Jordan Cove LNG Terminal and Pipeline Update

In mid-November, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) issued a Final Environmental Impact Statement (FEIS) for Pembina Corporation’s Jordan Cove Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) pipeline and terminal facility. The facility is proposed by a Canadian corporation to export American gas to Asia, condemning Oregonians’ land along the pipe-line route and building a dangerous facility squarely in a high-hazard earthquake and tsunami zone. Ac-cording to the FEIS, constructing and operating the LNG project would impact soil, water, wetlands, vegetation, wildlife, 15 threatened and endangered species, land use, recreation, landscape views, traffic, cultural resources, housing, air quality, and noise levels. In particular, the pipeline would cross more than 300 waterbodies, including the Rogue, Klamath, and Coos Rivers, and would require clearing of more than 2,000 acres of forest, including 750 acres of old-growth.
In mid-January, the National Marine Fisheries Ser-vice (NMFS) released a “biological opinion” (BiOp) that the project’s impacts would not jeopardize the long-term survival of any federally threatened or endangered species. The FEIS and BiOp are intended to inform FERCs final decision, which is expected next month.
Meanwhile, on the local front, the Coos Bay City Council on January 7 considered a proposal for dredging Coos Bay in order to accommodate massive ships that would service the proposed LNG facility at Jordan Cove. Analyzing the project as a contractor for the city, planning staff from the Lane Council of Governments determined the project was not in the “public interest” and recommended disapproval. Nevertheless, the city council’s vote was a tie, with three against and three in favor. Ultimately, the mayor broke the tie, tipping the balance for city approval of this part of the LNG plan.
A contingent of about nine KAS members attended the city council meeting to show opposition to this project that would degrade Coos Bay and commit us to another 30 years of burning fossil fuels. At a pre-meeting rally, retired Oregon Institute of Marine Biology scientist Alan Shanks explained to the crowd how the proposed dredging would bust into bedrock, permanently changing the flow of seawater in the bay in unknown ways. This could be disastrous for juvenile crabs that rely on the sheltered habitat for nursery grounds, an issue that has not been sufficiently analyzed, in his view. It is likely that the city council’s decision will be appealed. Keep in mind, too, that earlier this year, the state Department of Environmental Quality denied a critical clean water permit. As we go to press, there is big news that Pembina has withdrawn its application for a key state “dredge and fill” permit. Stay tuned for further news about this consequential project.

Port Orford “Dark Sky” Ordinance Ready for an Upgrade

Over the past several months, the Port Orford Planning Commission (PC) has been considering up-grades to Port Orford’s Dark Sky lighting ordinance. The intent of the ordinance is to keep light focused downward to the ground where it’s needed, preventing light pollution that would obscure the town’s beautiful starry night sky and light trespass that errantly falls onto neighbors’ properties.
The ordinance was first adopted in 2010 after many years of effort from KAS members, especially Al Geiser, who worked together with Coos-Curry Electric Cooperative, helping to install “night caps” on dozens of lights around town. An upgrade is now needed to address new LED technology, with new terms and units to describe light, such as Kelvins and lumens. Problems with enforceability also need to be addressed. The PC has drawn upon outdoor-lighting ordinances from a number of other small cities to develop language for this upgrade.
The ordinance was scheduled for consideration by the PC in mid-January but was bumped by a proposal to increase the height of the cell phone tower on Boot Hill Road. Thanks to all who turned out anyway to speak in favor of the lighting ordinance. At this point, the ordinance is expected to be considered at the PC meeting on February 11 at 3:30 p.m., but it’s important to check the agenda ahead of time, given that the schedule may change. After the ordinance is approved by the PC, it will be considered by the Port Orford City Council. We’ll need help from supporters at the city council meeting to ensure that the new ordinance will pass.
Some may take our beautiful night sky for granted in Curry County, but it’s important to note that fewer and fewer places in the world remain unaffected by light pollution. Beyond annoying neighbors and creating pink glare in the night sky, too much light at night has impacts on birds; seabirds such as storm petrels can be drawn to night lights like moths to a candle and become disoriented, with dire effect. Bright lights at night are also known to affect human health. For these reasons, many communities cherish their dark skies as a benefit to residents and visitors alike.

Forest Reforms Coming to the Ballot Box

For years, Oregonians concerned about insufficient riparian buffers for logging and aerial spraying of herbicides have tried to reform Oregon’s Forest Practices Act, the law that regulates forestry on private lands, but to little avail given the power of the timber industry. It’s well known that Oregon’s forestry rules are weaker than those in all surrounding states, including Idaho, so this past fall forest activists tried a new tack using the citizen ballot initiative process, aiming to put forest practice reforms directly to voters — in particular, expanded buffers for aerial spraying and logging around waterbodies. However, the secretary of state deemed the initiatives were too complex for the initiative process (and has been accused of siding with industry), and she threw them out. That decision was appealed in December. Mean-while, activists are aiming to place alternative provisions on the ballot for the 2020 election to accomplish similar goals.
Those of you who live in small watersheds know firsthand the risks of aerial spraying of herbicides and also how lack of buffer zones beside streams can lead to sedimentation that fills up pools and other-wise degrades aquatic habitat. The ballot initiatives will be a good opportunity to make headway on forest practice reforms that are critically important for public health, wildlife, and ecosystems. Below is info on an upcoming event about this — and we’ll keep you posted on more opportunities to support this effort.

Feb. 17, Monday, 6:30-8pm, Improving Protections for Forest Waters Workshop, Port Orford Public Library

Join us at this workshop to help citizens learn about shortcomings in Oregon’s current state forestry rules and upcoming ballot measures intended to improve them—by increasing buffers for logging and aerial spraying along streams. Come find out how you can help press for rules to better protect our streams and communities!