Judge allows wild horse roundup in Nevada

Mustang advocates claim use of helicopters to corral animals is inhumane

Associated Press

WASHINGTON - The Obama administration said Wednesday it is going forward with a contentious plan to round up about 2,500 wild horses in Nevada.

A spokeswoman for Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said herds in the Calico Mountains Complex in northwestern Nevada are overpopulated and need to be reduced to protect the horses and the rangelands that support them.

"The current population in the five Calico herd management areas is three times what the range can handle, so this gather will ensure high-quality habitat for the wild horse and burros and other wildlife while protecting the public rangeland from overuse," said spokeswoman Kendra Barkoff.

She called the dispute over the roundup "yet another clarion call to develop and implement a long-term solution to the challenges we face concerning wild horses and burros on our public lands."

The Interior Department announcement came after a federal judge on Wednesday denied a request to block the roundup, saying opponents had failed to demonstrate that removal of the horses would violate federal law.

Mustang management

U.S. District Judge Paul Friedman said the agency is obligated under a 1971 law to carefully manage wild horse herds to prevent overpopulation.

The mustang roundup planned for Monday would be one of the largest in Nevada in recent years. Officials plan to use helicopters to force the horses into holding pens before placing them for adoption or sending them to long-term holding corrals in the Midwest.

The roundup is part of the land management agency's overall strategy to remove more than 10,000 mustangs from public lands across the West and ship them to greener pastures in the Midwest and East. The Bureau of Land Management estimates about half of the nearly 37,000 wild mustangs live in Nevada, with others concentrated in Arizona, California, Oregon, Utah and Wyoming.

Another 32,000 horses and burros are cared for in corrals and pastures in Kansas, Oklahoma and South Dakota.

Contentious issue

Mustang advocates had sued to block the roundup, saying that use of the helicopters is inhumane because some of the animals are traumatized, injured or killed. Opponents also contend that the bureau is grossly inflating horse numbers to justify their removal from the range.

The lawsuit says wild horses are an integral part of the natural ecosystem and should remain on rangeland throughout the West rather than be herded into long-term holding pens.

A state wildlife agency sided with federal land managers, arguing in court papers last week that the mustangs have "severely degraded" the range and adversely affect Bighorn sheep and other wildlife that compete for scarce water resources in the drought-plagued region.

Friedman sided with roundup opponents in one aspect of his 25-page ruling. He said federal officials likely were violating federal law by stockpiling tens of thousands of horses in long-term holding facilities in the Midwest. The judge invited both sides to offer more legal arguments on the issue but said Congress ultimately may have to get involved.

Since the bureau has no money to euthanize the horses and no authority to hold them in a long-term facility, "it would face an inescapable conundrum" in conducting the roundup, Friedman said. The dispute is best solved by Congress, he added.

William Spriggs, a lawyer who argued against the roundup on behalf of California-based In Defense of Animals, said he was disappointed that Friedman allowed the roundup to go forward, but added: "I'm elated the judge at least bought one of our arguments."

Spriggs said President Barack Obama should issue a "holiday reprieve" for the mustangs and block the Nevada roundup until the legality of the long-term holding facilities is decided.

"The BLM's policy of stockpiling tens of thousands of horses in the Midwest — off their rightful Western ranges — is contrary to law, the intent of Congress and the will of the American people," Spriggs said.

Solar Shutdown: Feinstein to Block Energy Projects

The Foundary
The Heritage Foundation

We need to transform to a new, clean energy economy but we can’t build solar panels in the Mojave Desert if California Senator Diane Feinstein has anything to say about it:

Senator Dianne Feinstein introduced legislation in Congress on Monday to protect a million acres of the Mojave Desert in California by scuttling some 13 big solar plants and wind farms planned for the region.

But before the bill to create two new Mojave national monuments has even had its first hearing, the California Democrat has largely achieved her aim. Regardless of the legislation’s fate, her opposition means that few if any power plants are likely to be built in the monument area, a complication in California’s effort to achieve its aggressive goals for renewable energy.

Developers of the projects have already postponed several proposals or abandoned them entirely. The California agency charged with planning a renewable energy transmission grid has rerouted proposed power lines to avoid the monument.”

Years of subsidies and tax credits haven’t helped wind and solar projects compete with more reliable sources of energy. Solar power supplies less than one percent of the country’s electricity demand; wind does slightly better. That’s not necessarily a red flag to stop building more, but it is indicative of how far we have to go and how costly it would be “transform to a clean energy economy” as President Obama said in his remarks to the delegation at the United Nations climate change conference in Copenhagen.

If the private businesses deem it in their interest to pursue renewable energy projects (without federal help), they should be able to do so. But where these projects may be the most economically viable, such as the Mojave Desert, the government is shutting them down.

Robert F. Kennedy Jr., environmentalist and a partner with a venture capital firm invested in solar, told the New York Times, “This is arguably the best solar land in the world, and Senator Feinstein shouldn’t be allowed to take this land off the table without a proper and scientific environmental review.”

This is not the first time, nor will it be the last, the renewable projects have either been thwarted or put on hold because of self-interested in politicians. Cape Wind spent millions in litigation costs, delays and regulatory hurdles in attempting to build a 130-turbine offshore project in the Nantucket Sound that Senator Ted Kennedy long opposed despite the turbines being barely visible from the horizon.

The Mojave Desert situation is slightly different because Sen. Feinstein says, “the lands were purchased with nearly $45 million in private funds and $18 million in federal funds and donated to the federal government for the purpose of conservation, and that commitment must be upheld. Period.” But if an environmental group wants to preserve these lands, they shouldn’t rely on the taxpayer to fund the purchase nor fund the conservation of the land. In fact, many environmental groups do just that. Private property rights make it possible for the Nature Conservancy and Ducks Unlimited to protect habitat by purchasing land and establishing wildlife preserves.’

Nantucket and the Mojave Desert aren’t unique. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s Project No Project shows that the “Not in My Back Yard” crowd is everywhere. It’s not just anti-oil and anti-coal, it’s anti-energy and anti-development.

Even with subsidies, tax breaks and mandates, shifting our energy away from fossil fuels towards renewable energy will be a prohibitively costly and difficult task. Senator Feinstein is about to make it that much more difficult.

Legislation would set pair of national monuments

JOE NELSON
San Bernardino Sun

Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) on Monday introduced legislation that would establish two new national monuments in the Mojave Desert and set aside nearly 1.5 million acres of public land for preservation.

The California Desert Protection Act of 2010, if passed, would create the Mojave Trails National Monument, which would protect about 941,000 acres, including 266,000 acres of former railroad easements, along historic Route 66 between Ludlow and Needles.

In addition, it would establish the Sand to Snow National Monument, which would encompass 134,000 acres of land from the desert floor in the Coachella Valley to the peak of Mount San Gorgonio.

Feinstein's bill would help protect crucial wildlife corridors for the desert tortoise and bighorn sheep and shimmering desert landscape.

"Our desert parks are places of remarkable beauty, rich cultural history, and profound ecological importance," said Michael Cipra, program manager for the National Parks Conservation Association.

The bill builds off Feinstein's 1994 legislation that set aside 7 million acres of desert land and established Death Valley and Joshua Tree national parks and the Mojave National Preserve.

The new legislation would add nearly 74,000 acres of new land to the national parks and the national preserve. It would also designate as wilderness about 250,000 acres of public land near the Army's training center at Fort Irwin.

The bill also designates as permanent four off highway vehicle (OHV) areas. At the Johnson Valley OHV area near Twentynine Palms, the Marines have agreed to consider an option for base expansion that would allow for an exclusive military use area, an exclusive OHV area and a joint use area.

Dan Smuts, senior deputy regional director for the The Wilderness Society, said the sweeping legislation would protect an area nearly twice the size of Yosemite National Park, and would designate nearly 76 miles of waterways as wild and scenic rivers. They include the Deep Creek and Whitewater River near the San Bernardino National Forest and the Amargosa River and Surprise Canyon Creek near Death Valley National Park.

The second part of Feinstein's bill is geared toward the streamlining of the federal permitting process for renewable energy projects. It would, among other things, expedite the application process for solar development on private lands and require the Bureau of Land Management, the Forest Service and the military to complete environmental impact statements on their programs to develop renewable energy on the lands they oversee.

Shannon Eddy, spokeswoman for the Sacramento-based Large Scale Solar Association, said she had not yet reviewed Feinstein's proposed legislation and therefore could not comment.

James Conkle, founder of the Route 66 Alliance, said the bill will likely increase the amount of tourism on Route 66 from Needles to Barstow and breathe new life into sleepy desert pass-throughs like Amboy, Essex, Ludlow and Goffs. It could revitalize business and spur the re-opening of gas stations, motels and restaurants.

Supervisor Brad Mitzelfelt, whose district spans most of the High Desert, is concerned about the economic impacts the two proposed national monuments can have on the mining industry in the desert.

He embraces the legislation in how it protects OHV areas and other types of recreation like rock collecting and horseback riding and how it aims to harness future renewable energy projects.

"If this legislation passes, it will be a significant step toward drawing the line where remaining development in the Mojave Desert can occur and where it can't," said Mitzelfelt. "I fear legislation like this may be necessary because of the influx of renewable energy plants."

Route 66 -- immortalized, but mortal

National Park Service provides funding to document California's portion of the Mother Road as a step toward preservation of the cultural touchstone.

By Martha Groves
Los Angeles Times

It was, John Steinbeck wrote in "The Grapes of Wrath," the "Mother Road" of Dust Bowl sharecroppers heading to the promised land of California. It was where George Maharis and Martin Milner got their 1960s kicks in a Corvette and the highway that brought families to Disneyland and the original McDonald's in San Bernardino.

Immortalized in countless novels, songs and movies, Route 66 was the 2,400-mile road along which adventure seekers meandered from Chicago to the Pacific Coast, bedding down in tepee motels and eating at greasy spoons.

Of the eight states through which Route 66 passed -- the others are Illinois, Missouri, Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas, New Mexico and Arizona -- California is the only one that has not done a cultural survey of the highway.

The California Preservation Foundation and the National Park Service said Monday they want to change that. With $65,000 in funding from the park service, the foundation plans to hire a consultant to document the state's portion of the Route 66 corridor.

Cindy Heitzman, executive director of the California Preservation Foundation, said an official with the National Park Service Route 66 Corridor Preservation Program broached the subject of a survey in July, and the groups formed a partnership.

"We were the holdout," Heitzman said, "and this was a wonderful opportunity to complete the survey."

James M. Conkle, a Route 66 aficionado and activist, said he and others had been promoting the idea of a survey for years. A full survey could cost as much as $650,000, he said.

"It's not fully funded, but it's at least a start," said Conkle, chairman of the Route 66 Alliance, one of several nonprofit groups seeking to promote awareness and preservation of the legendary highway.

The foundation has been meeting with a stakeholders committee that includes representatives from federal and state agencies as well as several Route 66 nonprofit groups, including the Route 66 Alliance and the California Route 66 Preservation Foundation.

The consultant will travel the Route 66 corridor from the Arizona border at Topock to Santa Monica and catalog the different roadside properties, such as diners, motels and attractions, and identify historic themes and key periods of significance.

A 1931 AAA guide indicated that California had 332 miles of U.S. Highway 66 from Needles to Los Angeles, though the road was later extended to Santa Monica. Along the way, the highway passes through Mojave Desert ghost towns and miles of urban sprawl.

The highway, rendered unnecessary by the interstate highway system, was decommissioned in the mid-1980s and much of the living history of Route 66 has vanished as the road has been broadened into suburban thoroughfares.

Still, groups have sprung up to preserve the highway and its history, one with deep connections with the American psyche.

As "roadie" Michael Wallis wrote in his 1990 book "Route 66: The Mother Road": "Route 66 is Steinbeck and Will Rogers and Woody Guthrie and Merle Haggard and Dorothea Lange and Mickey Mantle and Jack Kerouac. It's thousands of waitresses, service station attendants, fry cooks, truckers, grease monkeys, hustlers, state cops, wrecker drivers and motel clerks. . . . It's yesterday, today and tomorrow. Truly a road of phantoms and dreams, 66 is the romance of traveling the open highway."

A chief goal for the consultant will be to complete at least one nomination for the National Register of Historic Places, said Jennifer Gates, field services director for the California Preservation Foundation and manager of the Route 66 project.

A number of California Route 66 attractions are already listed in the National Register. They include the Aztec Hotel in Monrovia, the Broadway theater and commercial district in downtown Los Angeles and the Colorado Street Bridge in Pasadena.

Feinstein introduces proposed desert legislation in Senate

By JESSICA CEJNAR
Desert Dispatch

WASHINGTON D.C. • U.S. Senator Dianne Feinstein introduced legislation Monday that would establish a national monument along an area of Route 66 near Ludlow, add land to the Mojave National Preserve and change the permitting process for renewable energy projects located on public land.

The California Desert Protection Act of 2010 would create two national monuments — the Mojave Trails National Monument and the Sand to Snow National Monument. According to Feinstein’s office, it would add land to Death Valley and Joshua Tree National Parks as well as add 30,000 acres to Mojave National Preserve. It would also designate 250,000 acres of land managed by the Bureau of Land Management near Fort Irwin as wilderness. The bill would also address off-highway vehicle usage, and change the permitting process for renewable energy projects.

The Mojave Trails National Monument consists of 940,000 acres of land along Route 66 near Ludlow, according to Feinstein’s office. The BLM would be given the authority to conserve the monument lands, but also to maintain existing recreational uses, including hunting, camping, horseback riding and motorized travel on open roads and trails.

“What’s really interesting about the (Mojave Trails) is it would effectively create a wildlife corridor between Joshua Tree National Park and the Mojave National Preserve,” said David Lamfrom, the Barstow representative for the National Parks Conservation Association. “It would be really significant for the health of these ecosystems.”

Feinstein’s bill would also require the BLM to establish offices focused specifically on renewable energy development. It would set strict guidelines for developers to conduct environmental reviews and ensure connection to the power grid. The bill would also require the BLM, Forest Service and military to complete environmental impact statements on renewable energy programs located within their jurisdiction.

The Sand to Snow National Monument would encompass 134,000 acres of land from the Coachella Valley to Mount San Gorgonio.

Legislation introduced to create national monuments in the Inland area

David Danelski
The Press-Enterprise

Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-California, is introducing legislation today that would create two national monuments and protect more than a million acres of public land in San Bernardino and Riverside counties, her office announced.

"I strongly believe that conservation, renewable energy development and recreation can and must co-exist in the California Desert," Feinstein said in a news release. "This legislation strikes a careful balance between these sometimes competing concerns."

The bill would create the 941,000-acre Mojave Trails National Monument, encompassing dry lakes and other land on both sides of Interstate 40 between Joshua Tree National Park and the Mojave National Preserve, in eastern San Bernardino County.

Another 134,000 acres would become the Sand to Snow National Monument, stretching from the floor on the Coachella Valley to the top of San Gorgonio Peak. It would include the Big Morongo and Whitewater canyons as well as the Pipes Canyon and Mission Creek preserves.

It also would add 41,000 acres to Death Valley National Park, 30,000 acres to the Mojave National Preserve and 2,900 acres to Joshua Tree National Park.

Desert Vistas vs. Solar Power

The solar developer BrightSource Energy has canceled one solar-energy project in the Mojave Desert, above, but is proceeding with several others. (Reed Saxon/Associated Press)

By TODD WOODY
New York Times

AMBOY, Calif. — Senator Dianne Feinstein introduced legislation in Congress on Monday to protect a million acres of the Mojave Desert in California by scuttling some 13 big solar plants and wind farms planned for the region.

But before the bill to create two new Mojave national monuments has even had its first hearing, the California Democrat has largely achieved her aim. Regardless of the legislation’s fate, her opposition means that few if any power plants are likely to be built in the monument area, a complication in California’s effort to achieve its aggressive goals for renewable energy.

Developers of the projects have already postponed several proposals or abandoned them entirely. The California agency charged with planning a renewable energy transmission grid has rerouted proposed power lines to avoid the monument.

“The very existence of the monument proposal has certainly chilled development within its boundaries,” said Karen Douglas, chairwoman of the California Energy Commission.

For Mrs. Feinstein, creation of the Mojave national monuments would make good on a promise by the government a decade ago to protect desert land donated by an environmental group that had acquired the property from the Catellus Development Corporation.

“The Catellus lands were purchased with nearly $45 million in private funds and $18 million in federal funds and donated to the federal government for the purpose of conservation, and that commitment must be upheld. Period,” Mrs. Feinstein said in a statement.

The federal government made a competing commitment in 2005, though, when President George W. Bush ordered that renewable energy production be accelerated on public lands, including the Catellus holdings. The Obama administration is trying to balance conservation demands with its goal of radically increasing solar and wind generation by identifying areas suitable for large-scale projects across the West.

Mrs. Feinstein heads the Senate subcommittee that oversees the budget of the Interior Department, giving her substantial clout over that agency, which manages the government’s landholdings. Her intervention in the Mojave means it will be more difficult for California utilities to achieve a goal, set by the state, of obtaining a third of their electricity from renewable sources by 2020; projects in the monument area could have supplied a substantial portion of that power.

“This is arguably the best solar land in the world, and Senator Feinstein shouldn’t be allowed to take this land off the table without a proper and scientific environmental review,” said Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the environmentalist and a partner with a venture capital firm that invested in a solar developer called BrightSource Energy. In September, BrightSource canceled a large project in the monument area.

Union officials, power industry executives, regulators and some environmentalists have also expressed concern about the impact of the monument legislation, but few would speak publicly for fear of antagonizing one of California’s most powerful politicians.

The debate over the monument encapsulates a rising tension between two goals held by environmental groups: preservation of wild lands and ambitious efforts to combat global warming.

Not only is the desert land some of the sunniest in the country, and thus suitable for large-scale power production, it is also some of the most scenic territory in the West. The Mojave lands have sweeping vistas of an ancient landscape that is home to desert tortoises, bighorn sheep, fringe-toed lizards and other rare animals and plants.

As conflicts over building solar farms in the Mojave escalated earlier this year, Mrs. Feinstein trekked to the desert in April. The senator’s caravan, including the heads of two of the nation’s largest utilities, top energy regulators and a group of environmentalists, bumped along a dirt track and pulled up to a wind-whipped tent. Inside, executives with a Goldman Sachs-owned developer waited to make their case for building two multibillion-dollar solar power plants.

The presentation over, the entourage rolled on to the next solar project site to hear the developer’s pitch. Mrs. Feinstein gave the developers a hearing but was not moved by their arguments, according to five people present on the tour. The senator seemed concerned about the visual effect of huge solar farms on Route 66, the highway that runs through the Mojave, they said.

“When we attended the onsite desert meeting with Senator Feinstein, it was clear she was very serious about this,” said Gary Palo, vice president for development with Cogentrix Energy, a solar developer owned by Goldman Sachs. “It would make no sense for us politically or practically to go forward with those projects.”

Another project, a huge 12,000-acre solar farm by Tessera Solar, was canceled last week, and the company cited Mrs. Feinstein’s opposition.

Steven L. Kline, chief sustainability officer for Pacific Gas and Electric, called the proposed monument “prime territory” for solar development and noted that the loss of the planned solar projects would hurt his company’s efforts to comply with state renewable energy mandates. The utility was planning a solar farm in the monument area.

“In the near term, it would have a very substantial impact,” he said, emphasizing that in principle, P.G.& E. supports Mrs. Feinstein’s efforts to preserve sensitive desert lands. “Over time those projects will be built somewhere else and we’ll have benefits of the power.”

Mrs. Feinstein has long championed desert preservation, sponsoring legislation in 1994 that created Death Valley and Joshua Tree national parks and the Mojave National Preserve. Five years later, she pushed for federal money to help acquire nearly 500,000 acres owned by Catellus.

A small Southern California environmental group, the Wildlands Conservancy, had negotiated the acquisition of the Catellus property and raised tens of millions of dollars for its purchase from a major benefactor, the financier David Gelbaum, a former hedge fund manager turned philanthropist.

The Catellus holdings consist of hundreds of small parcels that form a checkerboard across the Mojave.

“The whole objective was to preserve the core of the Mojave Desert,” said David Myers, executive director of the Wildlands Conservancy. “To a large extent this land is the connective tissue that holds the desert together.”

When Mr. Myers became aware that solar and wind developers had applied to lease federal land that included the former Catellus holdings, he contacted the senator.

The legislation to protect a million acres of desert land would include 266,000 acres of the former Catellus lands. (The balance of the half-million acres of Catellus property is already protected, in various ways.) The proposed renewable energy projects would have occupied about 30,000 acres of Catellus land, according to the Bureau of Land Management.

“If all this solar development took place in the Mojave, the higher you climb the more industrialized the vistas would look,” Mr. Myers said recently as he walked past bighorn sheep tracks and scrambled up a peak overlooking the Trilobite Wilderness Area.

Mr. Myers stresses that he is not against large-scale solar power plants but prefers that they be concentrated on already disturbed farmlands. In recent months, he said, he has worked with solar developers to find alternative sites.

On Thursday, Mrs. Feinstein introduced legislation to provide a 30 percent tax credit to developers that consolidate degraded private land for solar projects. She followed that on Monday with the legislation to create the 941,00-acre Mojave Trails National Monument and the 134,00-acre Sand to Snow National Monument.

“I strongly believe that conservation, renewable energy development and recreation can and must co-exist in the California desert,” Mrs. Feinstein said in a statement. “This legislation strikes a careful balance between these sometimes competing concerns.”

Developers and environmentalists say Mrs. Feinstein has modified the monument legislation to address some of their issues. The 2.5 million acres set aside in a draft version of the monument act has been shrunk to around one million acres, allowing at least two projects to proceed. The bill also includes provisions designed to accelerate approval of renewable energy projects on federal land.

That is not likely to mollify monument opponents, including unions that were anticipating the creation of thousands of construction jobs.

“Unfortunately, Senator Feinstein wants to wall off a large part of the desert based on historical land ownership rather than science,” said Marc D. Joseph, a lawyer for California Unions for Reliable Energy. “It seems the wrong approach to where solar should go and where it shouldn’t go.”

But John White, executive director of the Center for Energy Efficiency and Renewable Technologies in Sacramento, said the monument legislation would put so much land off limits for development that it might actually spur a more vigorous state and federal effort to compensate by creating renewable energy zones. “The problem is,” he said, “if you take a million acres off the table, what are you going to replace it with?”

Feinstein to introduce legislation to establish 2 national monuments in Mojave Desert

The protected areas would encompass 1 million acres containing wildlife, extinct volcanoes, sand dunes and ancient petroglyphs. The senator says the bill could be enacted in late 2010.

By Louis Sahagun
Los Angeles Times


Reporting from Barstow - Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) says she plans to introduce legislation today to establish two national monuments on roughly 1 million acres of Mojave Desert outback that is home to bighorn sheep and desert tortoises, extinct volcanoes, sand dunes and ancient petroglyphs.

Its centerpiece, Mojave Trails National Monument, would prohibit development on 941,000 acres of federal land and former railroad company property along a 105-mile stretch of old Route 66, between Ludlow and Needles.

The smaller Sand to Snow National Monument, about 45 miles east of Riverside, would cover about 134,000 acres of federal land between Joshua Tree National Park and the San Bernardino National Forest in San Bernardino and Riverside counties. Its diverse habitats range from desert scrub to yellow pine forests 9,000 feet above sea level.

The legislation, which had been delayed by efforts to resolve conflicts among environmentalists, off-roaders and renewable energy interests, would also designate 250,000 acres of public land near the Army's training center at Ft. Irwin as wilderness; add 41,000 acres to the southern boundary of Death Valley National Park and add 2,900 acres to northern portions of Joshua Tree National Park.

In addition, it would designate as permanent five existing off-highway vehicle areas in San Bernardino County covering 314,000 acres.

Feinstein, author of the 1994 California Desert Protection Act, vowed to make the legislation a priority. "In the best-case scenario, this legislation could be approved by late 2010," she said in an interview.

"This magnificent land and its lonely beauty are a significant part of our history, and we shouldn't give it up," Feinstein said, adding that private donors helped acquire the former railroad parcels "with the belief they would be protected from development. We have an obligation to keep them that way."

The railroad land was purchased between 1999 and 2003 with $45 million in private donations collected by the nonprofit Wildlands Conservancy and $18 million in federal funds, then donated to the Department of the Interior.

The Bureau of Land Management is reviewing 130 applications for solar and wind-energy development in the California desert, covering more than 1 million acres of public land.

At least 19 renewable-energy projects have been suggested within the boundaries of the proposed Mojave Trails monument, according to Feinstein, who has discussed her concerns with Interior Secretary Ken Salazar.

Feinstein's legislation would assist companies with projects currently proposed inside monument boundaries in relocating to federal energy zones being developed elsewhere. It would also permit construction of transmission lines within existing utility rights of way to facilitate the transfer of renewable energy generated in the Southern California desert and adjacent states.

Some congressional Republicans accused Feinstein of engaging in a not-in-my-back-yard campaign when her plans for legislation restricting renewable energy projects in California deserts surfaced earlier this year.

The senator countered that she "strongly" supports such projects, but only if they are built on "suitable" lands.

In an effort to avoid conflicts, BrightSource Energy Inc. and Stirling Energy Systems recently scrapped plans to build massive solar and wind farms on a panoramic stretch of the proposed Mojave Trails monument known as Sleeping Beauty Valley.

"We had a project within what we understand to be the boundaries of the monument, but we recently decided to withdraw it," said Sean Gallagher, Stirling's vice president of marketing strategies and regulatory issues. "We're trying to be respectful of what Sen. Feinstein has been doing in that area of the desert."

Environmentalists, hunters and off-road vehicle enthusiasts expressed support for Feinstein's legislation.

Elden Hughes, an honorary vice president of the Sierra Club, described it as "good news -- and darned important because it means this land would never be built on or fenced off."

James Conkle, founder of the Route 66 Alliance, which seeks to protect the historic route linking Chicago with Southern California, said the bill would "open up the desert to more travelers, sparking interest in fascinating, out-of-the-way places like Ludlow, Amboy and Essex."

Megan Grossglass, spokeswoman for the Off-Road Business Assn., was more cautious in her appraisal. Her group "has not had a chance to fully analyze the bill," she said, "so we cannot give it our endorsement, but we are supportive of the balanced approach it seems to take."

Mojave Trail, a four-hour drive from Los Angeles, includes such environmentally sensitive areas as Afton Canyon, a four-mile ribbon of green wetlands wedged between weathered rock walls, and Amboy Crater, a dormant volcano.

Then there is Sleeping Beauty Valley, a 150-square-mile expanse roughly 60 miles east of Barstow. It contains bighorn sheep, a newly discovered species of lupine that features showy purple blossoms in the spring, and unusually dark lizards that appear to have genetically adapted to the volcanic terrain.

During a tour of the area Sunday, David Myers, executive director of the Wildlands Conservancy, scrambled up a rocky hill at the base of a row of snaggletoothed mountains freckled with clumps of brittlebush.

"Heroic country, isn't it?" he said. "Just a few months ago, there were plans to cover this entire landscape with solar and wind farms. Instead, with this legislation, we are striking a balance with the insatiable demands of population growth."

1,000 skilled laborers to get work building new solar plant

Environmentalists to get $1 million per tortoise

Joe Nelson
San Bernardino Sun

About 1,000 skilled laborers from across San Bernardino County will be recruited to work on the world's largest solar complex near the Nevada border under a labor agreement ratified Thursday between the builder and California labor unions.

BrightSource Energy and Bechtel Corp., both located in the Bay Area, have teamed up to develop and build the Ivanpah Solar Electricity Generating System in the Ivanpah dry lake bed, east of the 15 Freeway and north of the Mojave National Preserve, about five miles southwest of Primm, Nev.

Construction of the 440-megawatt complex, which officials say will nearly double the amount of commercial solar electricity produced in the U.S., is slated to begin in late spring or early summer 2010 and wrap up in mid-2012.

It will be the first major solar project in California in two decades.

The solar complex will generate an estimated $400 million in local and state tax revenues over the plant's 30-year life cycle, and $250 million in construction wages from 2010 to 2012, BrightSource spokesman Keely Wachs said.

"There's going to be a big boom here. There's going to be a lot of economic benefits," Wachs said.

On Thursday, Bechtel entered into the labor agreement with the Riverside & San Bernardino Counties Building and Construction Trades Council and the State Building and Construction Trades Council of California (SBCTC).

"This project is a great example of how the new green technology is now providing real jobs for thousands of workers," said SBCTC President Robert Balgenorth in a statement.
William Perez, executive secretary/business manager for the Riverside and San Bernardino Counties Building and Construction Trades Council in Riverside, said the agreement will pull skilled laborers from across the county.

Laborers will be dispatched out of San Bernardino, Victorville and Barstow, carpenters and millwrights out of Ontario, electricians out of San Bernardino and Victorville, teamsters and boilermakers out of Bloomington, cement masons and pipefitters out of Colton, ironworkers out of San Bernardino and operating engineers and surveyors out of Redlands, Perez said.

"Everybody going out there would be referred out of those hiring halls," Perez said.

But first, Bechtel must complete the permitting process through the California Energy Commission and Bureau of Land Management.

The project also needs to clear some environmental hurdles. Public hearings on the draft environmental impact study began this week.

Wildlife biologists found 25 desert tortoises during the study. BrightSource will pay more than $25 million to mitigate the impact on desert tortoise habitat. The 25 tortoises will be relocated to land next to the project site, Wachs said.

BrightSource claims there are no endangered species on the project site and that the 4,000-acre swath of open desert is flat and needs no grading. The only grading needed, Wachs said, will be for roads and the plant's power block.

"We feel that we have a very thoughtful mitigation strategy in place that will serve as a model for other projects that follow," Wachs said of the environmental study.

But not everyone is thrilled with the project.

San Bernardino County Supervisor Brad Mitzelfelt, whose district includes most of the High Desert region, opposes the project because he feels it has too severe an impact on the environment and will benefit Las Vegas's economy more than San Bernardino County's.

"The natural labor pool for that area is the greater Las Vegas metropolitan area, and I don't think that's something can be changed, but I do think it can be offset by this labor agreement ... " Mitzelfelt said. "I haven't seen the agreement, so I don't know how binding it is and how effective it may be."

He questioned the number of desert tortoises found during the environmental study.

"It is very difficult to find 25 tortoises. They're a threatened species. In my opinion, that's a lot of tortoises," Mitzelfelt said.

Having to set aside 12,000 acres of land for tortoise habitat mitigation could affect other proposed projects for the Mojave Desert, which may have a hard time finding land of their own for mitigation purposes if so much has already been chewed up by BrightSource, Mitzelfelt said.

The county supervisor also has concerns about visual impacts. Seven 459-foot-high power towers are planned for the complex, each crowned with a 60-foot-high boiler that will glow bright white throughout the day.

"We're talking about seven 459-foot towers, the top 60 feet of which will glow like giant lightbulbs and you've got millions of cars driving past those," Mitzelfelt said. "They're probably going to be the tallest structures in the whole county."

By comparison, the Morongo Casino Resort and Spa in Cabazon is about 300-feet tall, said Andrew Silva, Mitzelfelt's field representative.

Mitzelfelt said about 90 percent of the power generated from Ivanpah will serve the San Francisco Bay Area, not San Bernardino County.

"It's not a benefit to our region. It's a benefit to the state, perhaps," Mitzelfelt said.

Plaque part of 'Clampers' philosophy

Route 66
Part 6 of an ongoing series

By Claudia Heller
Pasadena Star-News

The Honorable and Ancient Order of E. Clampus Vitus, Platrix Chapter has dedicated a plaque honoring the Ross Field, U.S. Army Balloon School, which once stood on land that later became a portion of Route 66. (Alan Heller)

E Clampus Vitus.

Just the sound of it is intimidating, conjuring up visions of a horrible disease or perhaps a fraternity of enlightened scientists.

Neither apply. It is a men's organization with dual personalities whose members wear red shirts and funny hats. Some "Clampers" call it a historical drinking society, while others dub it a drinking historical society.

But whatever its secret purpose, it is a name you will find all along California's Route 66. If you see an historical plaque along the Route, it was probably the work of ECV.

One of the recent plaques erected on the Mother Road is located on the Elks Lodge Building on Route 66 (Huntington Drive) and Santa Anita in Arcadia, and is dedicated to the Ross Field U.S. Army Balloon School. Built in 1918, the school served as the training grounds for cadets to learn to observe enemy activity from hot air balloons. During construction, the workers lived in Lucky Baldwin's racing horse stables.

The school trained 60-man ground crews responsible for raising and lowering the balloons, and two-man observation crews. It remained viable until the end of World War I in 1919.

The "Clamper" plaque was dedicated on Sept. 6, 2008, by ECV Platrix Chapter No. 2 of the Ancient & Honorable Order of E. Clampus Vitus and the Arcadia Elks Lodge No. 2025.

Not far from Route 66, on Aug. 9 this year the Clampers dedicated a plaque honoring the Adams Pack Station located at Chantry Flats in Big Santa Anita Canyon. In 1936, J.P. Steele obtained a special permit to operate a pack station and store at Chantry Flats, an enterprise that flourished until the great floods of 1938 washed much of it away along with 200 cabins in the area. Steele sold what was left after the floods. Although the station changed hands several times, it continued to operate, making it the only remaining packing station in Southern California.

On Aug. 13, 1995, the Clampers erected a plaque in Sierra Madre at Hermosa and Carter avenues honoring the town's wistaria vine, "the world's largest blossoming plant."

On Route 66 in Daggett, near Barstow, you will find an ECV Billy Holcomb Chapter plaque dedicated to the Daggett Garage which "began life in the 1880s at the borax town of Marion." It was later moved to Daggett, where it housed an auto repair shop on the National Old Trails Highway.

Plaques appear along Route 66 from Chicago to the "End of the Route" plaque in Santa Monica. We have many visionaries to thank for providing permanent historical notes which remain long after the remnant has decayed or disappeared. These one-page history books may be found along many roads, most notably on The Mother Road and its environs. Near where Santa Monica Boulevard dead ends at Ocean Boulevard, a brass plaque marks the official end of Route 66, and refers to it as the "Will Rogers Highway," one of the many names the famed highway has been called.

Now we can add five new Route 66 sites to our list: (12) The U.S. Army Balloon School; (13) The Adams Pack Station; (14) The Sierra Madre Wisteria Vine; (15) The Daggett Garage; and (16) the official end of Route 66.

Judge asked to block wild horse roundup in Nevada

June 28, 2002 File Photo. A helicopter used by the Bureau of Land Management rounds up wild horses near Cold Creek, Nev. Federal officials plan to use helicopters to force the horses into holding pens before placing them for adoption or sending them to long-term holding corrals in the Midwest. (AP Photo/Joe Cavaretta)

By MATTHEW DALY
Associated Press

WASHINGTON – An animal protection group asked a federal judge Wednesday to block a plan to round up about 2,500 wild horses to remove them from a Nevada range.

The mustang roundup planned for Dec. 28 would be one of the largest in Nevada in recent years. Federal officials plan to use helicopters to force the horses into holding pens before placing them for adoption or sending them to long-term holding corrals in the Midwest.

Mustang advocates say use of the helicopters is inhumane because some of the animals are traumatized, injured or killed.

The roundup is part of the Bureau of Land Management's overall strategy to remove thousands of mustangs from public lands across the West to protect wild horse herds and the rangelands that support them. The bureau estimates about half of the nearly 37,000 wild mustangs live in Nevada, with others concentrated in Arizona, California, Oregon, Utah and Wyoming.

Another 32,000 horses and burros are cared for in corrals and pastures in Kansas, Oklahoma and South Dakota.

A lawyer for In Defense of Animals, a California-based group that advocates on behalf of animal protection, called the roundup plan illegal.

"The BLM's policy of mass removal and stockpiling of horses was never authorized by Congress when it protected these iconic animals in 1971 as an important part of our national heritage," said William Spriggs, a Washington lawyer who argued against the roundup plan in court Wednesday.

In Defense of Animals and wildlife biologist Craig Downer sued the BLM last month to block the Nevada roundup. Terri Farley, a Nevada author whose books about wild horses target young readers, joined the lawsuit Monday.

Erik Petersen, a Justice Department lawyer who represents the BLM, said the roundup is needed because more than 3,100 horses and burros crowd the Calico Mountain Complex in northwestern Nevada — about five times as many horses as the land can handle.

The 1971 law requires removal of excess horses to ensure they are treated humanely, Petersen said. Removing the animals also will help preserve the "endangered and rapidly disappearing" rangeland where they live, Petersen said.

Interior Secretary Ken Salazar announced the mustang roundups in October as part of a new management plan he said would avoid the need to kill any wild horses. Interior Department officials had warned last year that slaughtering some of the 69,000 wild horses and burros under federal control might be necessary to combat rising costs of maintaining them.

Salazar said the current program is not sustainable for the animals, the environment or taxpayers.

The BLM's wild horse program cost about $50 million this year and is expected to rise to at least $85 million by 2012 if the program is not changed, officials said.

Spriggs, the lawyer for In Defense of Animals, said the BLM has only itself to blame for the high costs. At least two-thirds of the costs for wild horses are for long-term storage facilities in the Midwest that he said were nothing more than warehouses.

U.S. District Judge Paul Friedman said he would rule on the case before Christmas.

BLM approves Nevada wild horse roundup

Wild horses after a roundup at the Caliente Complex near Panaca, Nev. on October 5, 2009. The BLM says as many as 25,000 of the horses need to be removed from public lands because of suffering due to a lack of forage. (AP Photo/Bureau of Land Management, Ben Noyes, File)

By SANDRA CHEREB
Associated Press

CARSON CITY, Nev. — The Bureau of Land Management approved the removal of 2,500 wild horses from the range near Reno on Monday as opposition grows to what would be one of the largest mustang roundups in Nevada in recent years.

A federal judge in Washington, D.C., is to hear arguments Wednesday in a lawsuit filed to block the roundup planned for later this month.

The gather is part of the BLM's overall strategy to remove thousands of mustangs from public lands around the West and ship them to greener pastures in the East. The BLM estimates about half of the 36,600 wild mustangs live in Nevada. It wants to reduce the overall population to what it considers an "appropriate management level" of 26,600.

In its decision involving the 2,500 Nevada horses, the BLM said removal of the mustangs is needed to bring population numbers down in the Calico Mountains Complex to prevent habitat deterioration.

The agency estimates that more than 3,000 mustangs roam the five herd management areas near the Black Rock Desert that make up the complex. It wants to reduce the population to about 570 by removing horses and treating others with birth control.

BLM spokeswoman JoLynn Worley said the agency in 2000 set what it deemed to be appropriate horse populations for areas in Nevada, and has been working since to achieve those goals. In 2002, about 2,200 horses were taken each from the Calico area and another area near Elko. Smaller gathers have been ongoing.

Horses taken from the range would be placed for adoption or sent to long-term holding corrals, which now hold about as many wild horses as left in the wild.

Mustang advocates counter the planned gather using helicopters is illegal because some of the animals are traumatized, injured or killed.

U.S. District Judge Paul Friedman in Washington, D.C., is scheduled to hear arguments Wednesday on a motion to stop the gather. The suit was filed in November by California-based In Defense of Animals and wildlife biologist Craig Downer. Terri Farley, a Nevada author whose books about wild horses target young readers, joined the lawsuit Monday.

"If we allow the BLM to continue to ignore the will of Congress and the America people, then soon there will be no horses left to preserve," Farley said in a written statement.

Horse advocates said the roundup violates the Wild Free Roaming Horse and Burro Act, which Congress passed in 1971 to protect wild horses and burros as "living symbols of the historic and pioneer spirit of the West."

In 2008, the BLM said it would have to consider euthanizing wild horses because of escalating numbers and the cost of caring for them in long-term holding facilities. But earlier this year, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said the agency instead would pursue shipping horses to pastures and holding corrals in the Midwest and East.

Horse advocates call that proposal unnecessary and inhumane. During a hearing last week, they urged the BLM's National Wild Horse and Burro Advisory Board to press for a moratorium on roundups until an independent audit of mustang numbers can be conducted.

Judge rules against landmark 2003 state water pact

If the tentative ruling is upheld, the agreement aimed at reducing California's reliance on Colorado River water would be voided.

By Bettina Boxall
Los Angeles Times

The Salton Sea, California's largest inland lake, is located in the Salton Sink, a natural below sea-level depression extending from Palm Springs, California, on the north to near the Gulf of California on the south. California's open-ended pledge to fund restoration was found to violate the state Constitution.

A state judge appears poised to throw out a landmark pact involving California's use of Colorado River water.

If upheld, Thursday's tentative ruling by a Sacramento County Superior Court judge would unravel a complex 2003 agreement that put the state on a timetable to reduce its reliance on the Colorado River.

Brokered by federal, state and regional officials, the deal also established a program of farm-to-city water sales that are playing a growing role in Southern California's water supply.

"It's very serious," said Jeffrey Kightlinger, general manager of the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California. "There will be appeals. It's going to be some time before we know what it all means and what the impact is."

Ironically, the action comes in a case in which Judge Roland L. Candee was asked to validate the agreement.

Examining the 13 contracts that make up the deal, Candee focused on those involving a state commitment to help fund restoration of the Salton Sea in Imperial County.

The judge concluded that the language amounted to a blank check in which the state was promising to fund restoration, even if it cost billions. Such an open-ended pledge, Candee found, violated the state Constitution.

"The court has no ability to sanction a way to contract around the Constitution," the 27-page ruling states. "It is clear to this court that if this contract language is validated, executive agencies of the state can contract for amounts well over the constitutional debt limit."

Concluding that all the agreements were linked, he invalidated the other contracts as well, even though he seemed to have no quibble with them.

"It certainly was not what we expected," said Kevin Kelley, spokesman for the Imperial Irrigation District, which launched the court action. "While it's clearly a cause for concern in the Imperial Valley, it's also of great concern to Southern California."

Candee set a Dec. 17 hearing for arguments on his tentative ruling, and water officials said this week's opinion was not the final word. "It is not the end of the story," said Dennis Cushman, assistant general manager of the San Diego County Water Authority. "The water is continuing to flow."

San Diego is one of the major beneficiaries of the 2003 agreement, which allows the water-rich Imperial district to sell some of its Colorado River supplies to the authority. Combined with another arrangement, the San Diego region this year is getting nearly a quarter of its supplies through transfers under the accord. Those water sales are scheduled to increase over the years.

The transfers and Salton Sea restoration are intended to help lessen California's dependence on the Colorado River.

For decades the state took more than its legal allotment in the form of surplus deliveries. It agreed to phase out that surplus use over a period of years to free up supplies for other states on the river.

The pact also called for the state to help pick up the tab for restoration of the Salton Sea, an important stop for migrating waterfowl that is fed by irrigation runoff. The water transfers will eventually decrease that runoff, raising the salinity of the sea and compounding its environmental problems.

Hunters now in environmentalists' sights

Jim Matthews http://www.outdoornewsservice.com/
San Bernardino Sun

Telling the Department of Fish and Game and the Fish and Game Commission they'd sue them if they didn't get their way, a collection of environmental groups has petitioned the commission to close the Mojave National Preserve to hunting much of the year under the specious guise of protecting endangered desert tortoises.

Ironically, even the National Park Service hasn't asked the state to do any special closures because their scientists recognize hunting is not an issue in the protection of tortoises.

The 11-page petition asks all hunting and gun possession be curtailed between Feb. 1 and Aug. 31 in the preserve, and hunting of cottontail rabbits, jackrabbits and predators be eliminated. Night hunting with lights also would be banned.

The petitioners list three reasons for the necessity of the changes.

First, they cite reports that say 15 percent of tortoises found dead were killed by gunshot. Second, they suggest hunters leaving carcasses and trash in hunting areas increases the raven population, and ravens perhaps are the biggest known predator on tortoises. Last, they suggest road use by hunters is a problem because many tortoises are killed on roads.

All three arguments are, in fact, wrong or the facts are misrepresented.

First, the studies on tortoise mortality showed about 15 percent of tortoise shells (mislabled carcasses by the petition) have signs of gunshot, but there was no forensic analysis to determine if the bullet holes in the carcasses were the cause of death or made postmortem.
Target shooting still was allowed in all the areas where these studies were done and one scenario is that plinkers found the shells and used them for target practice. This is correlated by mortality studies in remote areas, where hunting is more likely to take place, in which few shells had bullet holes.

Second, the petition pointed out desert tortoise populations have declined in the Preserve, although that data is sketchy. Even if taken at its face value, the number of hunters in the area has actually declined in the same period, so increases in raven populations and their predation cannot be blamed on hunters.

The National Park Service has been improving roads, facilities, and non-hunting visitation in the preserve, and the increase in ravens and other scavenging predators that also eat tortoises, is far more likely a result of other human uses in the desert that increase trash.

Last, the petition blames hunters' road use as a factor in tortoise mortality, even though they are more likely to be aware of tortoises and less likely to run one over than a tourist. The petition said in one study, 40 percent of tortoises found dead (again, we're talking about shells or pieces of shells, not fresh carcasses) were killed by gunshot or vehicles, even though there was no way to be sure gunshot or vehicles actually caused the tortoise death.

While there's no question tortoises are killed on roads, especially paved roads with vehicles whizzing along at 50 mph to 80 mph, the evidence of actual mortality caused by humans is very small.

Cliff McDonald, a long-time Needles hunter and conservationist who has battled to keep man-made wildlife water in the desert, points out that the Desert Tortoise Council Advisory Board, one of the groups involved in filing the petition, said in 2001 direct human mortalities represent only 3 percent of tortoise deaths (and that was assuming the inflated mortality speculated to be caused by vehicles and gunshots).

The effort to ban predator hunting on the preserve will probably have a negative impact on tortoises because a number of studies have show that coyotes and grey foxes are the only predators that target older tortoises, not needing to break open the shells to kill and eat the reptile. By stopping the hunting of these animals, their populations will increase and even more mature tortoises will be eaten.

Some other things puzzle me.

If these issues were so critical to the survival of the tortoise, why didn't the petitioners ask the Commission to ban hunting in all the desert tortoise range? Why didn't they ask the National Park Service and Bureau of Land Management to close all roads and ban OHV use on public lands from February through September when tortoises are most active above ground? Why didn't they ask for caps on visitation to be set during these periods to reduce trash to keep raven numbers in check?

They didn't do any of these things. They targeted hunters.

The petition was filed with the Fish and Game Commission on Nov. 19 by the Center for Biological Diversity, in conjunction with the California/Nevada Desert Subcommittee of the Sierra Club, the National Parks and Conservation Association, Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER), the Desert Tortoise Council, and Defenders of Wildlife. That same day, management staff in the DFG offices in Sacramento were told they would be sued if the Commission didn't approve their petition.

The petition is certainly not about protecting tortoises because there are far more important issues that could and should be addressed than any hunter-caused mortality.

This is an anti-hunting petition, pure and simple. If the groups involved were concerned about tortoises they would be working diligently to get the federal government to allow the "take" or killing or ravens, which have increased more than 1,000 percent in our deserts

What can be said with absolutely certainty is that hunting today in the Mojave National Preserve is not a factor in any downward tortoise population trend.

Cut off, Goffs a study of Route's past

Route 66

By Claudia Heller
Pasadena Star-News

The 1914 Goffs Schoolhouse has been renovated and now houses a museum. (Alan Heller / Correspondent)

Part 5 of an ongoing series

We are about to visit an extremely significant Route 66 town, despite the fact that it has been expelled from the famous highway.

On our trip on Route 66, we leave the California border town of Needles and head for my personal favorite.

At first glance there isn't much left of the little town of Goffs, that is until you drive under the sign that reads "Study the Past." On the other side you will emerge into a different world to find a treasure which is under the tender care of the Mojave Desert Heritage and Cultural Association (MDHCA).

A related organization, The Friends of the Old Mojave Road, is dedicated to preserving a 138-mile trail once traversed by pioneers. This road was abandoned when railroads and more modern roads displaced it. Today the Mojave Road winds through the East Mojave Preserve in much the same dusty, bumpy and sometimes barely passable condition as it was in the 1860s.

Goffs became an important railroad stop because it is where steam engines could replenish their water supply.

The National Old Trails Road was established in 1912 (also called the ocean-to-ocean highway) and in 1926 it was designated as the first national highway system for automobiles and renamed Route 66. Several years later Route 66 was realigned to bypass Goffs when an eight-mile shortcut was carved through the Piute Mountains, skipping Goffs altogether.

Abandoned, Goffs' main landmark, a 1914 mission-style schoolhouse, fell into disrepair.

As fate would have it, a lone man, Dennis Casebier, set out to save Goffs and recapture its fading history. Today the MDHCA, under Casebier's direction, has renovated the schoolhouse to its former glory and established a museum within its walls. It was placed on the National Register of Historic Places by the Federal Government.

The Goffs Library, a replica of the historic Goffs Santa Fe Railway Depot, 1902-1956.
(Alan Heller / Correspondent)

Unlike many Route 66 towns in the area, Goffs is not waning. To the contrary. A recent addition to the Cultural Center is the Library, a replica of the historic Goffs Santa Fe Railway Depot (1902-1956). Within its walls is the massive Mojave Desert Archives.

"There is no assemblage anywhere of material relating to the history of the Mojave Desert like the collections that exist at Goffs," Casebier said.

Visitors to the 75-acre Goffs Cultural Center will find hundreds of artifacts rescued from the area's rich history such as an Atlantic & Pacific Railway box car, a small courthouse which served the Amboy-Ludlow Judicial District in the 1940s, a Fraser-Chalmers 10-stamp mill, a Gilmore gasoline pump, and a miners cannon subject to a variety of claims regarding its origin.

Visitors are welcome at the Cultural Center on certain days or by appointment. For directions and more information call (760) 733-4482 or e-mail goffs@eastmojave.net.

On this, our fifth trip to areas of interest on the historic mother highway, we have now added three more sites to our list: (9 ) The Goffs Cultural Center; (10) The Renovated 1914 Goffs School House; and (11) The Old Mojave Road.

Hoover Dam Bypass Nears Completion

THE WIDER VIEW: Taking shape, the new bridge at the Hoover Dam

UC Santa Barbara
Geography Department News

The construction of the Hoover Dam (once called Boulder Dam) began in 1930 and was completed in 1936—two years ahead of schedule and well under budget. Apart from the latter facts constituting an engineering miracle in their own right, the Hoover Dam is considered one of the Top 10 Construction Achievements of the 20th Century. It used enough concrete to build a road from New York to San Francisco and it still attracts over 7 million visitors a year. Now a National Historic Landmark, “Hoover Dam is the highest concrete dam in the Western Hemisphere, standing at more than 725 feet above the Colorado River. With 17 generators producing 4 billion kilowatts of electricity a year, it also is one of the country's largest hydroelectric power facilities. Operation and maintenance of the facility are solely supported by revenue from power sales”.

The Hoover Dam was built in order to prevent flooding of the Colorado River, to provide water for agriculture in California and Arizona, and to generate massive amounts of hydroelectric energy. A major secondary benefit was the creation of Lake Mead which is 110 miles long and took six years to fill: “This boating, sailing, fishing and house-boating paradise attracts over 10 million visitors a year. Lake Mead covers 550 miles of majestic shoreline and 247 square miles of area which is twice the size of Rhode Island. Its capacity of 1 1/4 trillion cubic feet of water would cover the entire state of Pennsylvania one foot deep” (more here).

The bad news is that the creation of the dam destroyed the estuarine ecosystem of the Colorado River delta and imperiled many species of plants and animals which had adapted to the flooding of the river. Furthermore, the original two lane road remains the only access over the river, has dangerous hairpin bends, and suffers from periodic rockslides and massive congestion; and, in our post 9/11 times, the easy access to the Hoover Dam presents a serious security risk. “To provide much more highway capacity, and better safety, the new Hoover Dam Bypass is scheduled to be completed in 2010 and it will divert the U.S. 93 traffic 1,500 ft (460 m) downstream from the dam. The bypass will include a composite steel and concrete arch bridge, tentatively named the Mike O'Callaghan-Pat Tillman Memorial Bridge. Once the bypass is completed, through traffic will no longer be allowed across Hoover Dam...Because of the (9/11) attack, the Hoover Dam Bypass project was expedited. Traffic across Hoover Dam is presently restricted. Some types of vehicles are inspected prior to crossing the dam while semi-trailer trucks, buses carrying luggage, and enclosed-box trucks over 40 feet (12 m) long are not allowed on the dam at all. That traffic is diverted south to a Colorado River bridge at Laughlin, Nevada” (more here).

The Hoover Dam Bypass is a twin-rib concrete arch slated for completion in late 2010. At a cost of $240 million, the 2,000 foot bridge is part of a larger project, namely, a 3.5-mile corridor that begins in Clark County, Nevada, crosses the Colorado River about 1,500 feet downstream of the Hoover Dam, and ends in Mohave County, Arizona, providing a major link between Phoenix and Las Vegas. The bridge project will entail the removal and embankment of over three and a half million cubic yards of earth, the bridge itself will be made from two hundred and forty three million tons of concrete, and sixteen million pounds of steel will have been used to reinforce the concrete.

Design work for the Hoover Bypass Project began in August 2001, and over twelve hundred people have been involved in its construction. “A Project Management Team (PMT) was developed to oversee the design and construction of the project. The PMT has representation from each of the major project stakeholders including the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA), the States of Arizona and Nevada, the Bureau of Reclamation (BOR), the Western Area Power Administration (WAPA) and the National Park Service (NPS). Central Federal Lands Highway Division (CFLHD) will act in the lead management role for all elements of project procurement, design and construction. CFLHD awarded a contract to HDR Engineering, Inc. to provide design and construction support services for the Hoover Bypass Project. An integrated team of professionals from HDR Engineering, T.Y. Lin International, Sverdrup Civil, Inc. and several supporting subconsultants make up the consultant team, collectively known as the Hoover Support Team”. I'll bet you anything that a lot of those folks had a background in Geography.

Ansel Adams: Looking across water to dam, "Boulder (Hoover) Dam, 1941," Colorado, 1941 (79-AA-B01) (Wikipedia)

Abandoned mines pose threats

OPINION

U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein
San Bernardino Sun

On Nov. 1, a 30-year-old woman was exploring an abandoned mine with family members in Kern County. The woman had entered a dark, underground tunnel when the ground gave way and she fell at least 50 feet to her death.

Dangerous abandoned mines like Tungsten Peak, where this tragedy occurred, litter the California landscape. There are 47,000 statewide and 500,000 across the western states. Many have ceased operations a century ago and the owners or responsible parties are long gone.

The Department of the Interior has published a list of recent fatalities related to abandoned mines. Victims range from a 13-year old girl who fell into a shaft while driving an all terrain vehicle to a Vietnam Veteran whose truck tipped into a mine pit. Throughout the United States, at least 37 deaths occurred between the years 1999 and 2007. In the past two years, eight accidents at abandoned mine sites were reported in California.

It's time for Congress to develop a comprehensive strategy to deal with the safety and public health problems of these abandoned mines.

Earlier this year, I introduced legislation to pay for the cleanup of abandoned mines, with fees and royalties paid by the hardrock mining industry. This consistent source of funding could help pay for basic safety measures, including the installation of warning signs, safety nets and fencing, as well as the cleanup of toxic chemicals that leech into waterways.

The scope of this abandoned mine problem is enormous and cleanup programs are underfunded. The California Department of Conservation estimates that California alone needs $4 billion.

The tunnels, shafts, and dilapidated structures of abandoned mines can be found in popular public recreation areas and near roads and highways. Historical mines attract exploration, which all too often produces deadly results.

In addition to these dangerous physical hazards, thousands of sites pose an environmental threat. Most historic mines operated before modern environmental laws were enacted and often contain harmful substances like mercury, chromium, cyanide and asbestos that can pollute drinking water, crops and fish.

To date, 17 watersheds in California have been impacted by toxic runoff.

In particular, California leads the nation in the number of abandoned mercury mines. A recent Associated Press article reported that there are as many as 550 old mercury mines, and only 10 have been cleaned up to date. Runoff from the mines continues to contaminate downstream environments and contributes to the problem of unsafe mercury levels in fish.

According to a UC Davis researcher, fish in the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta region contain mercury levels considered to be unsafe by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. At least 100,000 California anglers and their families are at risk of mercury contamination.

It's clear that these abandoned mines pose a threat to public health and safety - and they must be cleaned up.

Unlike the coal industry, however, the metal mining industry does not pay to clean up its legacy of abandoned mines.

The bill I've introduced would create a new limited reclamation fee (of 0.3 percent) on the gross value of all hardrock mineral mining on federal, state, tribal, local and private lands.

The legislation would also establish an 8 percent royalty on new mining operations located on federal lands, and a 4 percent royalty for existing operations.

The bill would set spending priorities for the cleanup fund based on the severity of risk to public health and safety and the impact on natural resources. This will ensure that the abandoned mines that pose the greatest risk will be addressed first.

Finally, the bill would direct the secretary of the Interior to create an inventory of abandoned mines on all federal, state, tribal, local and private land. Unless we have a clear picture of the scope of the problem, we can't fully address it.

A July 2008 report from the Interior Department's Inspector General found that public health and safety have been compromised. The study concluded that program mismanagement and perennial funding shortfalls at federal agencies has impeded cleanup efforts.

Congress must move swiftly to address this issue before more environmental harm, injuries or death occur - so I will be working closely with my colleagues to ensure that a cleanup fund for abandoned hardrock mines is included in any comprehensive mining reform legislation or otherwise legislatively established.

Sen. Dianne Feinstein represents California in the U.S. Senate.

Owens Lake as solar power plant?

The DWP seeks to build a 660-acre pilot project on the dry lake bed -- and avoid doing an environmental impact report.

A solar array could mitigate dust at Owens Lake. Currently to help fight dust, the DWP regularly floods the dry lake bed, which attracts birds -- and bird-watchers, as above. (Brian Vander Brug / Los Angeles Times / April 18, 2009)

By Phil Willon
Los Angeles Times

Nearly a century after Los Angeles drained Owens Lake by diverting its water to the Los Angeles Aqueduct, the city now hopes to generate solar energy on the dusty salt flats it left behind.

The Department of Water and Power's board of commissioners Tuesday unanimously approved a renewable energy pilot project that would cover 616 acres of lake bed with solar arrays -- a possible precursor to a mammoth solar farm that could cover thousands of acres.

City utility officials hope that, along with generating power for L.A., the solar panels would reduce the fierce dust storms that rise from the dry lake bed. To comply with federal clean air standards, the DWP must control the dust that has plagued the Owens Valley for decades. Its efforts are part of a $500-million dust mitigation plan.

The solar project still must win approval from the California State Lands Commission, and that may be a difficult task. The commission's executive officer Tuesday said he had serious concerns about the size of the "demonstration" project and the DWP's plans to seek an exemption from a state environmental impact review.

Well aware of the nasty residue left by L.A.'s water grab in the early 1900s, city officials have taken special care to sell the idea to Owens Valley residents. So much water was pumped away from the valley that, afterward, many farmers and ranchers couldn't scratch out a living.

Interim DWP General Manager S. David Freeman traveled to Inyo County before Thanksgiving to meet with local government officials, environmental groups, ranchers and other residents in an effort to sell the solar proposal.

"It's really interesting and exciting, to say the least," said Inyo County Administrative Officer Kevin Carunchio. "Generally, the county has been looking at the potential for renewable energy projects to generate economic activity and fill the county coffers, since mining has been regulated out of business."

To help win over environmentalists, Freeman promised that the DWP would continue its program to flood portions of the lake bed with water to help control dust; the project currently uses enough water to supply 60,000 families. That shallow, ankle-deep flooding has created critical habitat for tens of thousands of migrating waterfowl and shorebirds.

"In general we support that idea. This small test project is in an area of the lake that has some of the least value for wildlife. It's a good area to put a project, to see if you can make it work and fix the dust," said Mike Prather of the Eastern Sierra Audubon Society.

DWP Commissioner Jonathan Parfrey, who serves as director of the Green L.A. Institute, said Tuesday he was "really enthusiastic" about the proposal but counseled DWP executives to keep Owens Valley residents well informed.

"We need to maintain good relations with the environmentalists in the eastern Sierra in order to provide them really strong assurances of the limited scope of this particular project, and an ongoing . . . conversation with them about any expanded projects," he said.

Michael Webster, the DWP's assistant manager of system development and procurement, told the board of commissioners that the agency has tested solar arrays in wind tunnels and determined that the structures, if properly aligned, can work as effective dust control measures.

The pilot solar project would generate an estimated 50 megawatts by 2012, or about 0.5% of L.A.'s energy needs. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa has vowed to halt the use of coal-burning power plants by 2020 and -- that same year -- generate at least 40% of its energy from renewable resources.

The DWP estimates that the solar pilot project also could save 2,460 acre-feet of water a year -- worth $1.7 million -- because the solar arrays could be used to control dust in that portion of Owens Lake instead of flooding.

Because the State Lands Commission has oversight of the 100-square-mile Owens Lake, the DWP must convince the agency to lease the 616 acres for the pilot solar farm -- and, later, to grant leases for any expansion.

Paul Thayer, the state commission's executive officer, said the agency is willing to discuss "some sort of balance of habitat restoration and solar generation on the lake bed."

But he cautioned that a 616-acre solar farm would be among the largest in California, and DWP's efforts to avoid an environmental review could pose a major obstacle. "We think the project is much too ambitious now, particularly for that kind of environmental review," Thayer said, adding that a smaller project might be more acceptable.

Thayer said DWP officials estimate that Owens Lake has the potential to be developed into a large-scale solar farm: "They envision up into the gigawatt range . . . thousands of acres."

Snow, traffic and isolation can't stop CHP officer

Shupe patrols sparsely populated, heavily traveled northern border of county

By DAVID HELDRETH, staff writer
Desert Dispatch

California Highway Patrol officer Larry Shupe stands with his patrol vehicle Tuesday afternoon. Shupe is one of six officers that live and patrol the Mountain Pass area. (Staff Photo by David Heldreth)

MOUNTAIN PASS • Officer Larry Shupe has become the go-to man for people in Mountain Pass.

Shupe is one of six California Highway Patrol officers who are voluntarily assigned to patrol the Mountain Pass area from Halloran Summit Road to the Nevada state line. Shupe has spent the last 17 years living at the CHP residence post off of Bailey Road, 100 miles north of Barstow, or Sandy Valley, Nev. and working the Mountain Pass area.

Shupe’s years of experience in the area were tested during a snow storm that hit the Barstow area on Dec. 18 of 2008. Several motorists were trapped on Interstate 15 when it was closed for 18 hours due to two-foot snow drifts across the freeway in Mountain Pass. Shupe, who has the only four-wheel drive patrol vehicle, made several trips to take the stranded people between the freeway and the Moly Corporation Minerals mine on Bailey Road where a shelter was set up.

“The snow was coming down so bad you couldn’t see anywhere,” Shupe said. “I almost hit a few cars actually. After I found the first people I realized there was more than I could take so I promised them I would come back. I had to mark the spots with my GPS so that I could find them again.”

Shupe received a commendation from the CHP for his work that day. Cpt. Rick Linson said that Shupe often goes beyond the normal call of the job.

“When it gets that cold and people are stuck it can be dangerous,” Linson said. “His efforts may have saved lives that day. He is a great example to any officer.”

Shupe’s knowledge of the area was even useful when the Mojave National Preserve was created in 1994. He said he often had National Park Service rangers visiting him for directions and asking him to show them around the preserve during its first few years of existence.

Hiking and rural living are nothing new to Shupe. He grew up cattle farming in a rural area outside of Twin Falls, Idaho. He now lives in Sandy Valley, a town of 1,800 people about 15 miles west of Interstate 15.

“I kind of always lived out away from people all my life,” Shupe said. “When I got out of the academy I picked to come to Barstow. I’m bilingual so I got a bit more of a choice were I was located. I chose Barstow over a metropolitan area. I prefer the peace and quiet.”

Shupe’s preference has meant that a shopping trip or piano lesson for his kids requires a 50 mile trip to Las Vegas. Shupe’s three children who still live at home — he has five total — go to school in Sandy Valley, but he said that when he lived at the residence post his kids would take a bus 35 miles to Baker to attend school.

“If you get in your car to go somewhere you have to plan for a 100-mile round trip,” Shupe said. “You have to plan things a little bit more, but it works out. The kids didn’t really seem to notice it until they started getting to junior high school and high school and started getting driver’s licenses and things.”

Shupe said despite the drawbacks the post has its upsides, such as easy access to hiking, hunting and off-roading areas.

“After 21 years as an officer there isn’t a spot in the state I couldn’t get assigned to at one point,” Shupe said. “I want to be here and I take pride in my work here. When I first was moving people said I would miss the trees, lakes, snow and water, but over the years the area has grown on me. I think I became a desert rat. I go out hiking and explore the area often.”

One of a Kind

Westways cover artist Merv Corning enjoyed a long and varied career in California

By Matthew W. Roth
Westways



Merv Corning's watercolor painting, Wood Plank Road, appeared on the June 1975 cover of Westways.

Merv Corning (1926–2006) was a California original. Not just because he was born and raised in Santa Ana and spent his entire working life in the state. Not just because his most famous paintings, depicting World War I aviation and the stars of the National Football League, connect with California’s aircraft industry and its sporting heritage. And not just because his favorite leisure activity, riding his Harley-Davidson Softail, drew him, like millions of others, to the scenic roadways of the Golden State. Subtler, deeper factors inextricably linked Corning with California in the second half of the 20th century.

Merv Corning approached life with an unbridled sense of possibility. He had no formal training, yet he never wavered from his commitment to work as an artist. He started at age 13 as a helper at a Santa Ana sign shop, painting signs on the sides of buildings. The boss would rig a scaffold, apply a chalk outline, and leave Corning with a supply of paint and a small color original for guidance.

In long days on the scaffold, Corning resolved to become an artist. After serving in the merchant marine during World War II, he got a job producing pen-and-ink drawings for newspaper ads.

In a series of jobs at ad agencies and department stores, Corning learned illustration techniques, layout, copywriting, and other tasks connected with commercial art. He never forgot those lessons. “There’s a great purity to this art,” he said, recalling his days drawing for print ads. “You only had black and white to create dimension.”

In 1953, Corning joined Studio Artists Inc., a consortium of Los Angeles artists who provided commercial design services. In 1959, one client, Leach Corporation, asked for a series of paintings of World War I airplanes; over the next 11 years, Corning produced 43 paintings on that theme. They have been displayed at the Pentagon, acquired by the Air Force Archives, and reprinted countless times in aviation journals and general-interest publications.

Corning’s association with the National Football League began in 1967 and lasted for the rest of his life. He painted posters, program covers, and the Most Valuable Player portrait from each Super Bowl. In 1981, the National Portrait Gallery in Washington, D.C., hung his portrait of Johnny Unitas in a show on sports heroes, and the 1992 Super Bowl game program called him “football’s preeminent artist.”

Although most acclaimed for his work in military and macho themes, Corning’s keen observations of nature and his interest in the texture of everyday places reveal an empathy for life’s quiet moments, too. His ability to evoke the mood or feeling of a landscape attracted Westways to his art. His first cover, in October 1965, delivered on this promise; it depicts two fishermen at dawn, the sun illuminating far-off peaks, the nearby hills still in shadow. The 16 covers Westways commissioned from Corning all shimmer with immediacy, with the alchemy of a medium that can seduce us into thinking that we are in his pictures.

The Westways covers helped Corning develop a distinctive creative vision, and he left Studio Artists in 1968 to concentrate on his own art. Throughout an enormously productive career, Corning never lost focus on the job at hand—the current painting—and he took joy from his work. Though frequently invited to serve as a judge for juried shows, he disliked rejecting anyone, and the notes he left for other artists express his thoughts about his chosen field with a candid eloquence. This excerpt from one such note captures his belief about artists and their place in the world:

The very fact that we all are artists means we possess a sensitivity beyond most normal people, and for that we should be grateful. It’s not about winning or losing. It’s creating, and it is special, and we are special.

Merv Corning self-portrait 2000



Matthew W. Roth is the Auto Club’s historian. He would like to thank Tula Corning for access to her late husband’s archives.