Trash washed up along the shoreline of Damon Slough

Here at Save The Bay, we have been excitedly planning our clean-up at Damon Slough this Saturday. Located in Oakland’s Martin Luther King Jr. Shoreline, Damon Slough was the winner of our annual Bay Trash Hot Spots contest in 2011, beating out other trash-clogged waterways like San Jose’s Guadalupe River and Pulgas Creek in San Mateo County.

Those who visit this piece of the East Bay shoreline know that Damon Slough needs all the help it can get. This waterway is a challenging but hardly unique Bay Area landmark. With litter from the nearby Oakland Coliseum complex, a flea market and surrounding streets draining into this waterway, this sensitive slough is often inundated with trash.

All around our heavily built-out urban landscape, there are channelized and buried creeks and sloughs, where historically water would flow from the hills towards San Francisco Bay. Working at Save The Bay, I have become much more attuned to these often obscure yet interesting parts of our region’s neglected geography. The Oakland Museum of California has a great Creek Mapping Project that can help you find the buried creek in your neighborhood.

Here are some of the things we all can do to help reduce pollution in the Bay:

• Reduce the amount of trash we generate and make sure our trash doesn’t end up in the Bay. Switch to reusable bags, recycle wherever possible and compost.

• Advocate for tougher policies and regulations to reduce trash flowing to the Bay. Sign Save The Bay’s online petition calling on Bay Area mayors and city councils to pass legislation to target commonly littered items such as single-use bags and Styrofoam food ware.

• Volunteer for one of Save The Bay’s monthly cleanup and restoration events.

- Stephen Knight, Political Director

Facing a Redwood City council vote to terminate the massive “Saltworks” housing project, the developers hurriedly withdrew their pending application. This is a huge milestone and tribute to everyone who has worked to prevent the ponds from being paved, so they can be restored to tidal marsh habitat.

I’ve been involved in some big shoreline development battles, and studied the history of many more that Save The Bay has fought over the last five decades. It is common for developers to believe at the outset they can win permission to build in the Bay where others have failed. Once they are stopped, they often are willing to sell their property for conservation – that’s been the story from Bair Island in Redwood City to Cullinan Ranch near Vallejo.

I shared this history when I met with DMB and Cargill executives years ago, but they were dismissive. So they spent five years and tens of millions of dollars pummeling Redwood City residents with mail, phone calls and newspaper ads; lobbying the Bay Conservation and Development Commission (BCDC) to disregard sea level rise; trying to buy favor with campaign contributions and donations; attacking Save The Bay and local residents.

The results?

• The developers’ PR campaign backfired, making them and their project more unpopular than ever. The last public poll showed Redwood City voters oppose the project by more than 2-1. More than 200 elected officials from the Bay Area officially oppose development on these salt ponds, as do Redwood City’s neighbors. Hundreds of residents joined together in a new community organization, Redwood City Neighbors United, to fight Cargill’s development, and over a dozen labor unions opposed the plan.
• Lobbying to blow up BCDC’s climate change policies failed – the Commission enacted them last year, echoing California’s state policy discouraging development on restorable areas vulnerable to sea level rise, like the Cargill ponds.
• Pushing Redwood City to start a formal environmental impact study failed. The Saltworks review stalled at stage one, never answering the mountain of concerns residents and government agencies voiced in early comments. Now Redwood City Councilman Ian Bain and the city’s attorney publicly admit that the zoning does not permit development on these salt ponds.
• Redwood City residents are so united in their opposition that DMB and Cargill are widely seen as dividing the community, straining city staff, and distracting the City Council from a real priority – smart growth redevelopment downtown.

Save The Bay has renewed our efforts to convince Cargill and DMB not to spend more millions trying to fill in the Bay, but to change course and donate or sell these ponds so they can be fully restored. Restoring the site would help our region meet the scientifically established goal of 100,000 acres of healthy wetlands around San Francisco Bay – benefitting people and wildlife. It also would build on the opportunity that U.S. Senator Dianne Feinstein and business leaders recently highlighted to protect our communities from flood risks by restoring Bay wetlands.

The San Francisco Chronicle concluded two years ago:

“There’s no good reason for Redwood City to continue entertaining a project so fraught with environmental and fiscal risk.”

and San Jose Mercury News added:

“Controversies like this take a public toll in dollars, including staff time at public agencies, and in civic energy. The region would be better off if Redwood City just dropped it.”

Clearly, the message hasn’t gotten through yet and Cargill and DMB continue to favor profits over the health of the Bay. So please share the latest update and ask your friends to join you in signing the petition telling Cargill: Don’t Pave My Bay!

- David Lewis

Invasive species like mustard threaten the health of the Bay.

It was a hot Saturday morning and my fellow field staff Jon and I were busy preparing for a full public program on Cinco de Mayo.  As we drove out onto the levee at Eden Landing Ecological Preserve we notice how well all of the California native plants were doing.  “Wow! Look at that Marsh Gumplant!”, I exclaimed with proud amazement.  With a little tender love and care from the many volunteers who helped sow and grow these wonderfully important plants, we were able to plant over 36,000 plants all around the Bay this year.

Spring has sprung here in the San Francisco Bay Area, reminding us at Save The Bay that with the hot weather and sun comes a new season for restoration. It’s Weeding Season!  Not only are our native plants blooming but so are a few plants that are non-native and in many cases invasive the tidal salt marsh.

As I begin to explain the restoration project to the group of eager volunteers, questions begin to pop up about why we are killing these plants.  Often I hear things like “These plants look nice”, “Where and how did these plants get here?”, and “Don’t animals use these invasive plants as habitat?”

Non-native invasive plants come from somewhere else because of human activity:

“When plants that evolved in one region of the globe are moved by humans to another region, a few of them flourish, crowding out native vegetation and the wildlife that feeds on it… These invasive plants have a competitive advantage because they are no longer controlled by their natural predators, and can quickly spread out of control.”  (California Invasive Plant Council)

The tidal salt marshes that ring the Bay are a prime candidate for non-native species.  All of the sites have changed significantly over the past 200 years.  As soon as humans began migrating here in large numbers, we began to drastically alter the salt marsh landscape.  Levees and dikes were created to drain the marshes for agriculture.  Cities were built and harbors were dredged in our marshes.  These interactions greatly affected the way the salt marshes functioned and brought loads of non-native invasive plants to the area.

Volunteers bask in their accomplishment of ridding Eden Landing Ecological Preserve of a mountain of invasive mustard plants.

Many of these plants are a common sight in the supermarket, such as fennel, mustard, radish, and oats.  They were first brought here by farmers looking to sow their crops on the land created when the salt marshes were drained.  Many other plants came by ships coming to port and inadvertently brought exotic seeds with them.  Invasive plants can significantly degrade wildlife habitat and are the second-greatest threat to endangered species, after habitat destruction.

As I explain these facts to the volunteers, they begin to get the big picture of our restoration process.

That Saturday morning the levees were covered in a thick wall of mustard.  But, by the end of the program everyone one of us felt a sense of accomplishment.  The wall of mustard threatening to spread its seed across our newly installed native plants was no more. Now the volunteers stood on what they affectionately dubbed “Mustard Mountain” all ready to be composted!

Come learn more about invasive plants. Volunteer during weeding season!

- Jack States, Restoration Projects Team Leader

In addition to hearing residents’ opposition to this misguided development plan,  Redwood City’s City Council banned Styrofoam at Monday night’s meeting. Save The Bay continues to fight for strong policies to stop plastic trash from polluting our waterways. This is vital work, as scientists announced that plastic trash in the Pacific Ocean has increased a hundredfold since the 1970s.  Save The Bay’s Allison Chan urged San Jose to ban polystyrene, a call that was echoed in the Huffington Post. All this, plus a settlement reached in 2009 San Francisco Bay oil spill. And Alameda Navy base has become an endangered bird haven. Read on!

Palo Alto Daily News 5/8/2012
Even after Redwood City Saltworks project is withdrawn, furor continues
Even though developer DMB Pacific Ventures formally withdrew its controversial Saltworks application last week, about two dozen people showed up at the Redwood City City Council meeting Monday night to give their two cents’ worth about the project, and then some.”We are united in our opposition to the Saltworks project no matter how it is ultimately configured,” said Nancy Arbuckle, a member of Redwood City Neighbors United, which has drawn the battle lines against any development of the former Cargill salt flats east of Highway 101, just south of Seaport Boulevard.
Read more >> 
More news coverage on the death of the 50/50 plan >>

Redwood City Patch 5/8/2012
Styrofoam Ban to Begin in 2013
In a growing regional effort to reduce the use of non-biodegradable products, the city council voted last night to prohibit businesses from using single-use disposal styrofoam products starting January 2013.
Read more>>

San Jose Mercury News 5/9/2012
Scientists find hundredfold increase in plastic trash in Pacific Ocean since 1970s
The amount of plastic in the ocean area known as the “Great Pacific Garbage Patch” has increased a hundredfold since the early 1970s, according to a new study, and the alarming findings could pressure California and other coastal states to do more to reduce plastic trash.
Read more >> 

San Jose Mercury News 5/4/2012
May 5 Readers’ letters: Polystyrene foam is worse than plastic bags
Thank you for giving attention to the plastic problem in our oceans (“Silicon Valley must do its part to reduce plastic in oceans,” Editorial, May 1) and the role Silicon Valley cities should play in the solution. The city of San Jose should not only support a regional plastic bag ban, but also address another plastic product polluting our waterways — polystyrene foam. The council’s decision to prohibit its use at city facilities does not address the ubiquitous use of this unrecyclable product throughout San Jose. Polystyrene foam is easily broken and littered, and difficult to clean up. Save The Bay strongly supports bans throughout the bay. And as other cities in the county move forward with bans, San Jose should be a leader, not a follower.
Read more >>

Huffington Post Green 5/9/2012
Plastic Money: Under the Influence of Styrofoam
There are leaders in San Jose who can put pencil to paper and give us technological wonders to enhance our world tomorrow but who lack the vision to see how banning Styrofoam can enrich our world today.
Read more >>

San Jose Mercury News 5/8/2012
Settlement reached in 2009 San Francisco Bay oil spill
The owner and operator of the Dubai Star, an oil tanker that spilled 422 gallons of thick, black bunker fuel into San Francisco Bay in 2009, will pay $1.96 million to settle the case with state and local authorities.
Read more >>

San Francisco Chronicle 5/6/2012
Alameda Navy base now a much-sought wildlife Eden
California least terns are small and endangered, but they’re not afraid of mayhem. After all, they nest on airport runways.
Read more >> 

Bikers enjoy our beautiful shoreline bike paths. dansullivanimages.com

It’s Bike to Work week, so the Save The Bay wonks thought it would be a great opportunity to talk about one of our favorite long-term projects, and how we can work together to increase the number of shoreline bike and walking paths around the Bay, as well as expanding access to thousands of acres of public land.

Of course, we’re talking about the San Francisco Bay Restoration Authority, and in particular, their mandate for “improvement of public access to the coast, and protection, restoration, and enhancement of habitats…corridors…scenic areas, and other open-space resources.”  As we’ve mentioned in previous blog posts here and here, Save The Bay is working hard to ensure that the Restoration Authority can move forward with increasing revenues for the restoration, protection, and expansion of access to roughly 35,000 acres of historic tidal marsh that have been cut off from Bay waters since the early 1900’s.

Today, there are over 310 miles of Bay Trail open and accessible to bicyclists, with nearly 200 miles still to be competed.  Over the coming months, we’ll be sharing exciting news about our work to restore this critical habitat for the benefit of fish, wildlife, and those crazy critters who use two wheels to enjoy our incredible Bay shoreline.

- Patrick Band, Policy Associate

Golden Gate Bridge is still looking great at 75. dansullivanimages.com

Guess who’s turning 75 Memorial Day Weekend?  It’s our very own Golden Gate Bridge! Come celebrate the 75^th anniversary of San Francisco Bay’s own national landmark, at the Golden Gate Bridge Festival on Sunday May 27, 2012. The festival takes place along the San Francisco waterfront from Fort Point to Pier 39.

Save The Bay will join NBC Bay Area for anniversary celebrations at Crissy Field. Enjoy the view and festivities during this day of family-friendly fun. Stop by our booth to take a photo with one of our Bay Creatures or apply a temporary tattoo!

Stick around for a spectacular fireworks show at 9:30pm, highlighting the beauty of the bridge and the Bay.

What: Golden Gate Bridge Festival

Where: Crissy Field, San Francisco

When: Sunday May 27, 2012

More info: http://goldengatebridge75.org/celebrate/golden-gate-festival.html

Looking to celebrate and avoid the crowds? Although the official festival takes place all day Sunday, many of the exhibitors – including Save The Bay – will be set up on Saturday May 26th. Come visit us at Crissy Field either day!

Check out this photo of the packed meeting and a roundup of the news coverage:

The Almanac 5/8/2012
Saltworks drops off the drawing board: Redwood City salt pond development may return in smaller form
Environmental activists rejoiced after developer DMB Associates announced last week that the controversial Saltworks project has dropped off the drawing board, at least for now.
Read more >>

Palo Alto Daily News 5/8/2012
Even after Redwood City Saltworks project is withdrawn, furor continues
Even though developer DMB Pacific Ventures formally withdrew its controversial Saltworks application last week, about two dozen people showed up at the Redwood City City Council meeting Monday night to give their two cents’ worth about the project, and then some.”We are united in our opposition to the Saltworks project no matter how it is ultimately configured,” said Nancy Arbuckle, a member of Redwood City Neighbors United, which has drawn the battle lines against any development of the former Cargill salt flats east of Highway 101, just south of Seaport Boulevard.
Read more >>

Redwood City Patch 5/8/2012
Developer Promises More ‘Confined’ Development
Opposition groups don’t want any future development on the Saltworks site, while others pushed for an advisory vote to gauge public opinion.
Many residents were dissatisfied with the developer’s plan to build a more contained development than the original proposal and asked the city council Monday night to deny any future application.
Read more >>

San Mateo Daily Journal 5/8/2012
Saltworks plans off the table
The Redwood City Council last night agreed by default to shelve the Saltworks development plan stalled for three years without a project description necessary to complete the application and finish environmental reviews of the controversial proposal.
Read more >>

Yesterday afternoon, it was announced that the Redwood City City Council will consider a recommendation to terminate Cargill/DMB’s massive bay fill development, which has been languishing for over a year. Rather than wait until Monday night for the Council to officially deny their proposal, Cargill/DMB said they will withdraw it.

This victory is a tribute to relentless campaign efforts by Save The Bay, our 40,000 members and supporters in Redwood City and throughout the region, and our many allies who have stood with us for the past several years as we have fought to stop the filling of San Francisco Bay. Thank you!!

However this fight is still far from over.

Unfortunately, DMB stated they still plan to submit a revised version of this inappropriate and unprecedented bay fill project. As Save The Bay’s Executive Director David Lewis told the San Mateo Daily Journal yesterday, Cargill and DMB still “just don’t get it.”

Rather than continue spending tens of millions of dollars attempting to fill in our Bay, we encourage Cargill to seize this opportunity to instead donate or sell these ponds to the public for full restoration, and not to submit any further proposals to develop this key piece of San Francisco Bay.

Redwood City’s restorable salt ponds are a critically important piece of the Bay. Restoring the site would help us meet the scientifically established goal of 100,000 acres of healthy wetlands around San Francisco Bay – benefiting both people and wildlife.

While the fight is far from over, this is a victory that must be celebrated!

Please share this good news with your network and ask them to join you in signing the petition telling Cargill: Don’t Pave My Bay! We have momentum and we are winning the battle, but we still need all of your support to make sure that this key piece of the Bay is saved for good!

Volunteers set a new record this planting season!

The numbers have been tallied and we are please to announce the total numbers of native plants installed by SAVE THE BAY VOLUNTEERS for 2011-12 planting season is:

9804 at the Martin Luther King Jr Shoreline in Oakland
411 in Mill Valley at Bothin Marsh
5461 at the Palo Alto Baylands
4284 in East Palo Alto at the Faber Laumeister Marsh,
3757 at the Ravenswood Ponds in Menlo Park
6345 at Eden Landing Ecological Reserve in Hayward

for a grand total of…

33, 670 plants!!

Thank you, Save The Bay volunteers – that is the MOST plants that our Community-based Restoration program has EVER installed in one planting season!

Along with the plantings that volunteers installed, and additional 5000 plants were invested into the ground at other sites along the San Francisco Bay shoreline!

We planted thirty-two varieties of native species this season, including: Yarrow, Sagebrush, Mugwort, California Aster, Coyote Bush, Saltgrass, Seaside Arrowgrass, Blue Wild Rye, California Buckwheat, California Poppy, Western Goldenrod, Red Fescue, California Sea Lavender, Sticky Monkey Flower, Purple Needle grass, Beeplant and Blue-eyed grass.

With the 50,000 lbs of weeds removed in 2011 and the addition of almost 39,000 native plants in the ecotone, the California Clapper Rail and Salt Marsh Harvest Mice are bound to have posh new homes.

All in all, planting this many plants doesn’t mean 100% survivorship though. Consider the harsh conditions the plants have to adapt to: bitter cold tidal impacts, blistery winds and pelting rains, super salty waters and hyper saline soils, and that’s just in the winter months! Then, add the hot summertime sun on the salt ponds and top that with a drought… its a miracle the plants survive! But they sure do!

Save The Bay’s Habitat Restoration Team is gearing up for our two-month long monitoring season.  We can demonstrate the survival of our plantings in year one and see how well they are growing over time. At the end of each monitoring season Save The Bay’s science team is able to analyze the data to make recommendations for the following year’s restoration plans.

Once again, CONGRATS and THANK YOU for a great 2011-12 planting season and please come join us to free the plantings from the weeds trying to invade our resilient seedlings!

- Laura Wainer, Senior Scientist/Restoration Projects Manager

Help protect the Bay from plastics pollution!

May is shaping up to be a busy month for cities and counties considering bans on plastic bags and Styrofoam.  Check out the round-up below for opportunities in your city or county to speak out against single-use plastics and for protecting the Bay from plastics pollution!

Can you make it to a meeting?  Please email me if you plan to attend and I’ll be happy to provide talking points for your public comment.  A good approach is to make one point about your personal experience dealing with plastic bag or Styrofoam litter in your community, and one point about why eliminating these products is necessary.

–

SAN MATEO COUNTY

San Mateo County is leading a regional effort to ban single-use plastic bags all over San Mateo and Santa Clara Counties.  Redwood City has not only decided to jump on the bag ban-wagon, it is also poised to ban Styrofoam food ware!  It’s a two-pointer for keeping plastics out of Redwood City waterways and the Bay.  See below for info on this week’s public input meeting and next week’s city council meeting:

Redwood City public input meeting (about plastic bags)

May 3^rd, 6pm

Redwood City Library, 1044 Middlefield Rd, Redwood City

More info here

Redwood City Council (hearing on a Styrofoam ban)

May 7^th, 7pm

City Hall, 1017 Middlefield Rd., Redwood City

Agenda will be posted here closer to the 7^th

–

SANTA CLARA COUNTY

Several months ago, the Santa Clara County Board of Supervisors voted in favor of moving forward with a ban on Styrofoam food containers in the unincorporated parts of Santa Clara County.  Acknowledging the litter problem caused by this unrecyclable, unsustainable material, the supervisors directed city staff to come back with a draft ordinance and environmental report ASAP.  Well, staff have made good time and are planning to present a report to the Housing, Land Use, Environment and Transportation Committee and a draft ordinance to the Board of Supervisors this month. Support a ban on Styrofoam food containers:

Santa Clara County Housing, Land Use, Environment and Transportation Committee

May 8^th, 10am

Board of Supervisors’ Chambers, 70 West Hedding St., San Jose

Agenda will be posted here closer to the 8^th

Santa Clara County Board of Supervisors

May 22^nd, 9am

Board of Supervisors’ Chambers, 70 West Hedding St., San Jose

Agenda will be posted here closer to the 22^nd

On the plastic bag front, cities all over San Mateo and Santa Clara Counties are holding public meetings to collected public input on a regional plastic bag ban that could stretch from South San Francisco, down the Peninsula to Milpitas.  Cities need to know that residents support moving forward with a ban!  If you, your family, or your friends live in Campbell or Milpitas, please attend one of these meetings and let them know that you support saying “so long” to single-use plastic bags:

Campbell public input meeting

May 2^nd, 6pm

Campbell Library, 77 Harrison Avenue, Campbell

More info here

Milpitas public input meeting

May 3^rd, 2pm

Barbara Lee Senior Center, 40 North Milpitas Blvd, Rm 140, Milpitas

More info here

–

SONOMA COUNTY

The Cities of Rohnert Park and Santa Rosa are discussing whether or not to join the regional effort to ban single-use plastic bags in Sonoma County.  The Sonoma County Waste Management Agency is leading the effort to develop a countywide ordinance, but every city in the county needs to be on board in order for them to move forward.  At this point, only Rohnert Park and Santa Rosa have yet to make a decision.  We highly encourage residents to attend the following meetings and urge these councils to support a countywide ban on wasteful and polluting single-use plastic bags:

Rohnert Park City Council

May 8^th, 5pm

130 Avram Avenue, Rohnert Park

Agenda will be posted here closer to the 8^th

Santa Rosa City Council

May 16^th, 4pm

City Hall, 100 Santa Rosa Avenue, Santa Rosa

Agenda will be posted here closer to the 16^th

- Allison Chan, Policy Associate