Found this gem in my email this morning. It looks like to was written up on Voiceofsandiego.org

Our buddy "vernal pool frank" was the first to comment also...
Enjoy



Thought you might be interested in this article, three photos included in posted article, text in email text below,
http://www.voiceofsandiego.org/environm ... 3ce6c.html
Years of Broken Promises on Protected Land
Posted: Wednesday, March 7, 2012 4:00 pm, by Rob Davis
On the shrubby hillside below an undeveloped mesa south of Highway 56 and east of Black Mountain Road in San Diego, a city sign bellows a disregarded warning: ENDANGERED ANIMAL AND PLANT HABITAT AREA. NO TRESPASSING OR DUMPING.
On paper, hundreds of acres here in Del Mar Mesa are preserved and protected by the federal Endangered Species Act. Some of San Diego's rarest creatures live here. But in reality, that protection comes in little more than name only.
Garbage is strewn across the ground. Fresh bicycle tire tracks cut through San Diego's largest remaining concentration of vernal pools. The pools, flat indentations that are dry most of the year, trap winter rains and teem with life in the spring. Hundreds here are home to two endangered species at risk of extinction: the San Diego fairy shrimp and the San Diego mesa mint. They live on some of the city's most rarified land.
And they aren’t being protected as promised.
When the city, state and federal governments struck a heralded 1997 deal with local developers and environmentalists, they outlined what land San Diego would develop and preserve. In a region where development had pushed many species to the brink of extinction, the compromise promised homebuilders cheaper, streamlined permitting and environmentalists a coherent, well-managed system of protected land.
Fifteen years later, developers have reaped their benefits. The deal eliminated the need for lengthy state and federal approvals to kill endangered species. The city alone now grants those permits, which can save millions and easily cut four years off a large project, says Jim Whalen, a consultant for a group of developers that supported the plan.
But a key environmental promise has repeatedly been broken. Undeveloped land has been preserved — some 33,000 acres in San Diego alone — but has often festered and been forgotten.
When San Diego approved the deal, it promised within three years to find a long-term source of money to ensure the land was used right. So did San Diego County, which passed a similar deal. Money would establish trails for hiking, biking and horse-riding. It would restore habitat for rare species that had been destroyed by weeds, access roads and years of misuse. It would pay for biological studies to make sure the preserve system was working. Needs are estimated at $3 billion countywide over 40 years.
But 2000 went by. No money. Then in 2004, as the San Diego Association of Governments pushed voters to extend TransNet, a sales tax increase to pay for road and transit projects, it formally promised another initiative to raise money for habitat protection throughout the whole county by 2008. That deadline passed and Sandag delayed the measure until 2010. Then 2012.
Now, Sandag says it’ll put an initiative before voters in 2016, nearly 20 years after the money was first promised. Environmentalists have encouraged the recent delays. Sandag says the effort would fail today, that public education must first occur. But the organization has been saying that for five years and in the meantime hasn’t started public education.
“It is a huge challenge,” says Rob Rundle, principal planner at Sandag. “We want to position ourselves for the best time. We don't know that it will never pass, but we don't want to set ourselves up for failure by doing it when it won't pass.”
The result: Thousands of acres have been set aside in San Diego County often with little way for people to legally use them. Instead, land like Del Mar Mesa sits in limbo, accessed by those willing to ignore the No Trespassing signs and makeshift fencing, but not those who could give it the TLC it needs.
“The people who would love the place are blocked out,” says David Hogan, director of the Chaparral Conservancy, a local environmental nonprofit. “And the people who don’t care run amok.”
In Del Mar Mesa, north of Peñasquitos Canyon and west of Interstate 15, tiny trails once used by deer have been transformed into wide, eroded gullies. Shrubs have been cut down and trimmed back. Marijuana has been found growing. Dozens of bike trails cut through the sensitive land, up hillsides, across flat land, through the low-hanging canopy.
A chain-link fence surrounds the preserve. But it also has gaping holes in it, wide enough to walk or carry a bike through. One key section near neighboring homes is missing entirely. Another gap has been patched together by a single, precarious strand of wire.
State and city rangers sporadically patrol this area. But their occasional presence hasn’t dissuaded those who trash the land. Authorities just don’t have enough money to build the fences, trails and signs that are needed, Hogan says.
“Many of these places have awesome land managers on the ground,” he says. “Without effective funding, they’re scraping here and there to get fence posts to close a gap or wire to patch a fence.”
Despite the delays, Sandag does award $4 million annually to manage land throughout the county, which has transformed other abused land into success stories. It gave San Diego a $325,000 grant to install vehicle barriers on protected city land in Proctor Valley, near Chula Vista. That helped deter off-road vehicles and allowed illegal trails to return to nature after we identified the problem in a 2007 story.
Many in the environmental community say $4 million annually isn’t enough, but are content to wait until a ballot initiative has a chance to pass. If Sandag pushes an initiative now that fails, which polling says it undoubtedly will, the agency will have fulfilled its commitment. Then the money may never surface, says Michael Beck, San Diego director of the Endangered Habitats League.
“Whatever it takes to get to that golden ring is what we're pursuing,” he says. “Waiting longer to get there is bad, but it's not terrible.”
Complicating things further: Putting habitat funding alone in a ballot initiative would never pass. “Never in a million years," Beck says. Sandag thinks a successful effort would have to be big. Multi-billions big, with billions for habitat and billions more for transit, water quality and beach replenishment. Then it would have to actually be approved. The county has twice rejected tax increases for fire protection after people died in firestorms, though Sandag has twice won voter approval for road and transit spending.
But any broader effort could face competition for Sandag’s limited taxing authority. The agency is also being eyed by local leaders to go to voters to raise taxes for a Chargers stadium or a massive infrastructure repair program.
In the meantime, Del Mar Mesa gets trashed. Chris Zirkle, a city of San Diego parks official, says he knows about the problems there. But the city hopes within months to finish a plan for Del Mar Mesa that would outline where trails should go.
Then it will have to find the money, somewhere, to install them. Volunteer labor will be vital, Zirkle says.
Rob Davis is a senior reporter at voiceofsandiego.org. You can contact him directly at rob.davis@voiceofsandiego.org or 619.325.0529.

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You never know what tomorrow will bring so go ride your EBike today or walk your pooch
Fear the Yeti
"Go ride your bike today, don't let the old man in.."

Mike

"Vernal pools" are of absolutely no interest to me.

Flame on.

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"New York City is a mismanaged carnival of stupidity that is desperate for revenue and anxious to criminalize behavior once thought benign."
--Alex Baldwin, unknowingly describing his socialist utopia.

Or me.

_________________
You never know what tomorrow will bring so go ride your EBike today or walk your pooch
Fear the Yeti
"Go ride your bike today, don't let the old man in.."

Mike

Or me...

In regards to the vernal pools on the fire/service road... Doesn't it get graded every couple of years? As in a 4+ ton machine with a metal blade smooths out any "pools"? If the shrimp and mint can come back from that they'll both out live our species.

Rod nailed all points in his comments, very well written.

i took a close look at one of the pools that is "roped off" with stones. There is a whole lot of little things swimming around. they looked like tadpoles i wonder if those were the fairy shrimp. they didnt look like shrimp. those pools really are teeming with life. what happens when the pool dries up? free food for the birds?

The idea of Petecting the natural vernal pools isn't bad, even if it is a cock of shit that the fairy shrimp is so endangered.

The problem is that zealots like "Frank" run around spouting off about every little mud puddle is a vernal now magically a vernal pool. Then he has the balls to come on every local forum and tell us that we are the sole problem and he's taking it upon himself to make sure everyone knows that.

After all those 6-8 inch deep two track ruts run through a 8-10 inch deep deep erode road that is a mud bog after a rain, according to frank those are bicycle ruts running through a vernal pool.

I think the guy has been off his med too long.

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+1 Well said.

I just read that article on-line. That was one big "bike" with four wheels that left those tracks.

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I do care about vernal pools. I think they are unique and worth saving. I may be in the minority here, but there I said it.

The sad part is that it is extremely trivial to protect these with just a little effort. Just create trails around the pools so that people can 1) access the pools for viewing the critters and plants in the pools and 2) get around them if they want to go past to get across a mesa.

There's a perfect example of this at San Diego Botanical gardens. The north end of the place is open space with a bridge over the vernal pools so that people can see them and get past them.

But the rock-stupid enviros will never agree to something so easily understood. They keep thinking that fencing off huge regions instead of simply rerouting trails is the solution. Dumb asses. This entire problem could have been solved back in 2008 with a few trail reroutes and some cooperation between government agencies. Instead we have fingerpointing and idiocy of fences and enforecement nightmares. Dumb asses.

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Velo Ergo Endo

I'm doing my part to maintain the area, as I have a vernal pool of my own just one mesa away from this purported "rarified land." Each summer season, the pool water is warmed and young human swimmers come to life therein. They even eat "mint" chocolate chip ice cream during the same season. It's miraculous and seasonal.

Done.

_________________
"New York City is a mismanaged carnival of stupidity that is desperate for revenue and anxious to criminalize behavior once thought benign."
--Alex Baldwin, unknowingly describing his socialist utopia.

I have two vernal pools at home. I flush it after every use. I am now an evironmentalist.

I mostly agree with Ohnooo except, just because one cares about the envir dose not make one stupid. I'll leave it at that. So he gets a half "thank post" for his not quite excellent post.

I don't know what I'd do without this area. Not a big fan of fairy shrimp (they're too small and get stuck in my teeth), but the mesa mint is a key ingredient for my mid-ride break of "Mira Mesa Mojitos." Please save the mint.

As for the garbage up there and the direct implication that it is the fault of those making the bike tracks, they've found us out, guys. Why, just the other day I saw someone on a singlespeed climbing Powerline with an old washing machine strapped to his back. He was most definitely taking it up to the mesa to dispose of it improperly. I know, because I was up there getting rid of my old couch.

That was not at all my intent, as I still identify myself as an environmentalist and I still support some environmental groups. Just not FoPQ anymore (I was a member for 18 years until 2008). The "Dumb Ass" comments are aimed straight at the set of environmental idiots that pawned this land off to the land managers as "pristine untouched mitigation lands" while there were immigrants polluting the place all to hell. And then blame the bikers for the trails that the immigrants made. Then blame the bikers for the trash all over the place when we were the ones that cleaned up the trash that the migrants left.

I believe that the environmental factions in DMM are just like the "win at all cost" presidential candidates we're all so very sick of by now. They do not care about whether their policies make sense. They just feel that they must win at all costs and keep everyone out of this "pristine" area forever and ever. But this area is completely surrounded by development and people are going to go there. A much saner method that protects the endangered species while allowing public access is required. The "fence it in and keep them out" method only works far away from civilization.

People generally will be law abiding when laws make sense. But when laws are based entirely upon greed or lies (both apply in DMM), then people will ignore them and become outlaws. Which is exactly where we are know.

I hope that helped and I can finally earn your "thanks".

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Velo Ergo Endo