It’s not only the federal government that’s undergoing a purge of experienced, dedicated workers. It appears to be happening in the San Francisco Bay Chapter of the Sierra Club as well, as the interests of mountain bike enthusiasts continue to clash with the club’s established environmental policies.
[1]On February 10, the chapter’s recently elected Executive Committee (ExCom) removed a slew of longtime environmentalists—without giving any reason—from chapter committees working on certain issues.
The East Bay Public Lands Committee, which monitors policies such as vegetation management [2], trails [3], and planning for regional parks and EBMUD watershed lands, was one victim of the purge. Three of those removed are from Alameda.
The ExCom traditionally appoints members to committees who have a broad knowledge of the subject matter and commitment to local environmental issues, and then gathers advice from them before taking positions or formulating chapter policy. The Bay Chapter then advocates for these positions and endorses candidates who support them.
As previously reported in the Alameda Post [4], for over a year the mountain bike lobby has been trying to take over the Bay Chapter by flooding meetings and seeking voting privileges for themselves. So the committees sought and were waiting on guidance and criteria from the ExCom on how to manage the sudden influx of single-issue people wanting to vote.
[5]A former Sierra Club leader in San Francisco sounded the alarm about the Bay Chapter in a commentary [6] penned a year ago. “It is remarkably easy to take over and replace leadership at the local level of the club,” wrote Barry Hermanson referring to the tiny fraction of members who vote in Club elections. “This has enormous consequences as the change in [Club] endorsements redefines who is and is not an environmentalist.”
The off-road cyclists aim to legalize mountain biking on many of the narrow trails in regional parks and watershed lands that are now reserved for hikers and equestrians, and to build more connector bike trails potentially through sensitive habitat, because narrower trails offer a more challenging riding experience. They also want to see construction of specialized bike-only downhill flow trails designed for maintaining speed through turns. There are currently some 800 miles of multi-use trails in the regional park system designated for mountain bike riding. Their lobbying efforts will now be advanced under the Sierra Club’s banner to influence voters and policy decisions of public agencies.
“This type of seizure of Club Committees is a threat to the Club as a whole—a blueprint for other special interests,” Alameda resident Patricia Lamborn told the Alameda Post after she was removed from the Public Lands Committee.
The February 10 meeting agenda did not mention that the ExCom was considering removing longstanding voting members from committees. A few of the voting members who had been allowed to remain on the Public Lands Committee resigned in protest.
[7]“I will not remain on the committee to give it a veneer of legitimacy or a patina of environmental advocacy,” wrote Norman La Force, Chair of the Public Lands Committee, in his resignation letter. “The decision to remove all but a few token members of the Public Lands Committee and to install a supermajority voting bloc of mountain bikers has turned the Public Lands Committee and the Sierra Club Chapter into an echo chamber for the mountain bike lobby.”
As other letters of resignation began arriving on the desks of chapter leaders, the newly appointed mountain bike members were springing into action. On February 11, the new Public Lands Committee began seeking the Bay Chapter’s support for allowing more mountain bike access on EBMUD’s watershed land, going against a settled compromise on trail access reached among environmental groups [8], mountain bikers, and the agency in 2018, which they now want to revisit.
This latest initiative comes after a public records request revealed that two of the bike advocates offered the East Bay Regional Park District a $1 million donation in a quid pro quo agreement [9] contingent upon the agency planning, permitting, and approving the construction of a downhill mountain bike flow trail [10] proposed by bike advocates in 2021 in Wildcat Canyon Regional Park.
William Yragui, another ousted member who chairs the Bay Chapter’s Activities Committee and a leader of the Mission Peak Conservancy [11], told the Alameda Post, “When those willing to sacrifice habitat for recreation take over as policymakers, club membership and the environment loses.”
Contributing writer Richard Bangert posts stories and photos about environmental issues on his blog Alameda Point Environmental Report [12]. His writing is collected at AlamedaPost.com/Richard-Bangert [13].
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