Action Opportunity: Speak up about Oakland’s Vegetation Management Plan

The stated purpose of Oakland’s Vegetation Management is to reduce fire hazards in Oakland.  Oakland’s Vegetation Management Plan will determine the fate of 2,000 acres of public parks and open spaces and 300 miles of roadside in Oakland.  It will also substantially increase the use of pesticides if approved in its present form.  Two public meetings will take place in November to discuss revisions of the draft plan:

Date: Thursday, November 15, 2018
Time: 5:30-7:30 PM
Location: Richard C. Trudeau Training Center, 11500 Skyline Blvd, Oakland, CA 94619

Date: Tuesday, November 20, 2018
Time: 5:30-7:30 PM
Location: Oakland City Hall, 1 Frank Ogawa Plaza, Hearing Room 2, Oakland, CA 94612

The agenda for these meetings has been carefully crafted to accommodate the wishes of native plant advocates, as expressed in their public comments on the draft plan.  This is the agenda for these public meetings:

1. “The Plan should better incorporate the role of volunteers and stewardship groups that actively maintain vegetation at various City-managed parks/open space areas. The City should conduct additional outreach to such groups to continue to receive their input and feedback.”
2. “The Plan should include more specificity regarding vegetation management recommendations at each City-managed parcel.”
3. “The Plan should include cost estimates, or a range of potential costs, for the recommended treatments to assist the City for longer-term work budgeting and planning. The cost estimates and site-specific plans for City-managed parks would also help identify activities that volunteers can conduct.”

The first meeting on November 15^th is “targeted towards the park steward/volunteer groups working on City-owned parcels.”  The second meeting on November 20^th “will focus on the issue of plan specificity.  It is requested that participants come prepared to discuss their recommended edits/comments.  At each meeting we will briefly discuss each project site/area, and your feedback will be collected and considered for the revised draft Plan to be released in 2019.”

In other words, the public process that will result in a Vegetation Management Plan for Oakland is now entirely in the hands of native plant advocates (“park stewards/volunteer groups”), despite the fact that there were other important issues raised in the public comments.  Only the public comments of native plant advocates are being considered in the revision of the draft.  None of their requested revisions have anything to do with reducing fire hazards.  Their revisions are intended to greatly increase Oakland’s commitment to native plant “restorations.”

These are the issues being ignored

If you are an Oakland resident with a sincere interest in fire hazard mitigation, who does not believe the draft plan will reduce fire hazards, please attend one of these meetings.  These are the issues we believe are being ignored and must be addressed by the City of Oakland.

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  Pesticide use in Oakland city parks and open spaces is presently prohibited by Oakland’s city ordinance because no Environmental Impact Report has been completed for a revision of the ordinance that was proposed by the City Council in 2005. If the draft Vegetation Management Plan is approved and an Environmental Impact Report is completed as planned, pesticides will be permitted in Oakland’s parks, open spaces, and roadsides. 

• Pesticide use will increase greatly because pesticides are required to prevent the tens of thousands of trees that the draft plan proposes to destroy from resprouting. Pesticides will also be needed to eradicate the flammable weeds that will colonize the unshaded ground.
• Native plant advocates are opposed to goat grazing because goats eat both native and non-native plants. Goat grazing is a non-toxic alternative to pesticides.  Shade is the most benign method of weed control.
• Native plant “restorations” do not mitigate fire hazards because native vegetation is as flammable as non-native vegetation. When non-native trees are destroyed, as proposed by the plan, no native trees will be planted to replace them.  Therefore, the moist forest will be replaced by grassland that ignites more easily than forests.
• Every wildfire we have witnessed in California in the past 20 years has occurred exclusively in native vegetation. Wildfires in California have become more frequent and more intense because of climate change.  Deforestation is the second greatest cause of climate change because trees release the carbon they have stored throughout their lives, and in their absence carbon storage is reduced in the future.

The native plant movement has a death grip on our public lands in the San Francisco Bay Area.  Few would object to their advocacy if their projects were as constructive as they are destructive.  They are welcome to plant whatever they want, but they should not have the right to destroy everything that is non-native, particularly using pesticides, which is their preferred method.

I would like to believe that public policy is in our hands if we will participate in the political process.  It is becoming more difficult to believe in that ideal.  Please attend one of these meetings, if only to keep our democracy alive and well.