About a dozen people showed up last week to hear the details about USFS plans for massive, unprecedented herbicide applications and logging in the Feather River watershed, and to organize and demand a halt to this assault on nature.
Following our presentation, there was a Q&A session and group discussion. There was unanimous agreement that the USFS is out of control, that its activities are threatening (rather than protecting) local communities, and that local governments and residents need to unite and demand an immediate halt to mass forest herbicide application, and if it goes forward, to establish buffer zones around communities where herbicides and mechanical logging are prohibited (as the USFS North Forks project has done for one home and the associated spring in Genesee Valley).
We discussed how “compromising” with a worldview that treats the living Earth as products to be extracted, and the natural world as an enemy, is a non-starter. Conflict can be healthy, though sometimes difficult in small communities. By avoiding conflict, and trying to make “everyone get along” this means a continuation of the dysfunctional status quo that puts communities at risk.
Upcoming community meetings will be held in Quincy and Chester, details to come…
