"Save Headwaters Now! Save Headwaters Now!" Alongside a rural highway opposite one of Pacific Lumber's giant mills, nearly 8,000 voices raised in unison chanted the will of the people. On a flatbed truck serving as a stage, a glittering array of speakers and performers rallied the crowd. Bonnie Raitt, Casey Neill, Starhawk, Sierra Club President Adam Wehrbach, and two dozen other local religious leaders, environmental activists, movement minstrels and restoration advocates sang, spoke and prayed. It was truly a sight to behold: the largest forest protest, and one of the most significant civil disobedience actions of any kind, in the history of the United States.
Nevertheless, Maxxam/Pacific Lumber (PL) is presently ripping ancient fallen trees out of the lush, pristine redwood groves of Headwaters Forest. Years of grassroots resistance in the woods, streets and courtrooms reached a pivotal moment on October 7, when salvage logging tore through the heart of All Species Grove. The smoke has not yet cleared, and the last unprotected redwood wilderness on Earth hangs in the balance.
Back in July, Earth First!, the Environmental Protection Information Center (EPIC) and others hatched plans for a massive September 15 rally. This was the day that marked the end of marbled murrelet-nesting season and the beginning of habitat-destruction season. As the date drew near, organizers were overwhelmed by the incredible depth of public support for preservation of this wilderness. Phones rang day and night at environmental offices up and down the North Coast as people from as far away as Florida geared up for a trip to Carlotta, a tiny mill town in the heart of Humboldt County. Pacific Lumber president and Maxxam toadie John Campbell deepened public outrage with threats to begin salvage logging in the ancient groves on September 16.
While Earth First!ers and others held a series of increasingly tense meetings about the rally with public officials, overfed cops and PL lackeys, a truly illustrious cadre of crooks and compromisers including Maxxam honcho Charles Hurwitz, California Senator Dianne Feinstein and Deputy Secretary of the Interior John Garamendi assembled in a Washington back room. Apparently terrified by the power of a truly massive demonstration, they emerged September 14 to announce a vague two-week moratorium on salvage operations, and Feinstein muscled her way onto radio and television stations to urge people not to come to Carlotta.
The moratorium failed to dissuade anyone and people came to Carlotta in droves. Making their way through an incredible deluge of Humboldt County rain, almost 8,000 people gathered in front of PL's Carlotta mill and rallied for hours before marching to a gate on the main haul road into Headwaters Forest. As the daylight dwindled, Judi Bari, Darryl Cherney, Jello Biafra and countless others sang and spoke to the crowd as one by one, 1,033 people crossed PL's property line in ritual civil disobedience. Long after dark, the bewildered riot cops ran out of plastic cuffs and tickets and failed to even cite the last 150 line-crossers. Hundreds of activists streamed into base camp, glowing with the power of this monstrous action.
The next two weeks sparkled with tension as well as spectacular direct action. As the sun rose on September 16, a coordinated series of actions shut down every gate leading into the 60,000-acre Headwaters complex. Most remained closed all day. Lockdowns, blockades and tree sits continued, slowing previously approved clearcut plans in the residual old growth adjacent to Owl Creek Grove and along the northern boundary of Headwaters Grove.
Meanwhile, negotiations resumed in Washington. Hopes for an injunction against salvage operations dimmed as hearings on EPIC's federal lawsuit were pushed back beyond the end of the moratorium. Then, on the morning of September 28, Feinstein, Garamendi and Hurwitz grinned in front of the television cameras and announced the fruit of their long hours of labor: yet another moratorium, covering only two of Headwaters' six ancient groves, and contingent upon an absolute nightmare of a final "deal." While the politicians and media proclaimed that Headwaters had been saved and environmentalists' concerns had been met--Feinstein even called it a "win-win" situation, confirming that the forest would lose--activists picked through the agreement, discovering a horde of devils in every detail.
The "deal" is no deal at all. True to his money-grubbing, swindling ways, Hurwitz merely agreed not to salvage log Headwaters Grove or the adjacent Elkhead Springs Grove for a maximum of 10 months. The area north of Headwaters Grove--a biologically critical buffer zone put on the map and the negotiating table by a grueling year-long direct action campaign--was also thrown in as part of a complicated land transfer between PL, Elk River Timber and the feds. Hurwitz would pocket $380 million in cash and as-yet- unidentified "surplus" federal land, and agree to suspend (not dismiss) his idiotic "takings" lawsuit against the government, in which Maxxam made the feeble argument that enforcement of the Endangered Species Act constitutes confiscation of private property.
As if paying off this corporate weasel at the taxpayer's expense one more time weren't enough of an insult, the groveling agencies must expedite approval of a multi-species federal Habitat Conservation Plan (HCP) and state Sustained Yield Plan. Implemented by Ronald Reagan as a way to weaken the ESA by making compliance voluntary, HCP's allow corporations to kill endangered species on part of their land in exchange for protecting habitat elsewhere. PL would receive an "incidental take" permit, protected for all time against new biological information by a "No Surprises" clause, which would allow them to devastate the homes of coho salmon, marbled murrelets, spotted owls and a host of other creatures not yet federally identified as endangered. Four pristine groves--All Species, Owl Creek, Allen Creek and Shaw Creek--are not even mentioned in the agreement.
Every one of the nation's dozen or so currently implemented HCPs has resulted in a net loss of habitat, and over 300 HCPs are now in the planning stages. Pacific Lumber submitted a draft HCP for the marbled murrelet some time ago, claiming that existing redwood parks provided enough habitat to justify total liquidation of their old growth. Even US Fish & Wildlife officials laughed that plan out of existence, but they now face enormous political pressure to rubber-stamp whatever PL submits in the next 10 months. The corporate thugs at Maxxam are holding Headwaters and Elkhead Springs Groves hostage while trashing the other old-growth habitat that their HCP supposedly aims to protect. In this case, HCP stands for "Hurwitz Controls the Process."
As both John Campbell and proto-fascist North Coast Congressman Frank Riggs were forced to admit at a September 30 town meeting in Eureka, the agreement fails to permanently protect a single tree. Either Maxxam, PL or the feds can back out at any time with two weeks' notice, ending the salvage moratorium. Congressional and state legislative approval, both required to make the cash payoff and land trades happen, have been deferred until after the election. Nobody can claim with any shred of honesty that this agreement saves Headwaters.
The thin veil of Democratic Party disinformation stretched over the agreement by spin doctors for Feinstein and Garamendi began to unravel almost immediately. Further Earth First! rallies and actions, including the outrageous "bullshit and fluff" demo at the Eureka Democrats' campaign headquarters, spread EF!'s unqualified message far and wide: "No Deal!" In a wonderfully bizarre media coup, San Francisco's KGO radio, one of the most powerful AM stations on the West Coast, was successfully infiltrated by Earth First!. Judi Bari now calls in action reports almost daily, and two talk show hosts have mounted a month-long filibuster on the Headwaters issue, ensuring that listeners from British Columbia to Baja get a nightly dose of radicalism.
Unfortunately, news from the legal front has been mixed. EPIC's motions for a temporary restraining order and a preliminary injunction were both denied in federal court during the first week in October. The judge ruled that restrictions imposed on PL's salvage operations, which only allow PL to drag downed trees from the forest floor to existing roads, were sufficient to avoid damaging marbled murrelet habitat. With the slimmest chance of success, EPIC and the Sierra Club set their sights on October 8, when Pete Wilson's industry-dominated California Board of Forestry were to reconsider their September denial of emergency rules to stop the salvage logging.
In a stunning display of cluelessness, PL began dragging ancient trees out of All Species Grove on the day before the Board meeting. Suddenly, any remaining public illusions about the deal evaporated, and Feinstein and Garamendi spent the day stammering into the cameras with rotten egg on their faces. Facing a tide of public outrage, Feinstein and Garamendi sent strongly worded letters to the Board demanding adoption of emergency rules.
The Board met late into the evening while activists awaited their decision. The stunning news then emerged that the Board had voted tentatively to adopt part of the rules package, responding not to the incontrovertible ecological "emergency" but to the threat to public peace and the general welfare generated by protests and direct action.
About 150 Earth First!ers have gone to jail since September 15, actions continue on almost a daily basis, and Humboldt County is simply reeling from the blows. Congressman Riggs, whose favorite corporate constituent uses the Sheriff's department as a private security force, is now whining for federal aid.
Euphoria over the Board's apparent capitulation to direct action dissipated the next day, when the final rules package foundered on a technicality. Only four members of the nine-person Board voted for the rules package, violating a provision requiring a majority of the Board--not just those present--to legitimize a decision. However, one position on the Board is vacant, and two members recused themselves on dubious grounds, leaving a 4- 2 vote in favor of the rules ineffective. The Environmental Protection Information Center is exploring a legal challenge to this technicality.
That very morning, PL was caught red-handed cutting live, standing trees in All Species Grove, violating the court-ordered restrictions on their salvage operations. The habitually inept California Department of Forestry, which earlier claimed that monitoring of the operations was unimportant because PL's "best interests" were served by compliance, was forced to investigate the violation. They issued a 24-hour stop work order, met with PL for a gentle wrist-slapping session, and allowed logging to continue.
Public officials always act surprised when PL willfully disobeys the law and seem to suffer from amnesia regarding past crimes such as the illegal logging of Owl Creek over Thanksgiving weekend in 1992 and the unapproved "Death Road" slashed through the heart of Headwaters Grove in 1990. Earth First! exposed both of these travesties, and the "Ecotopia Department of Forestry (EDF)" continues to monitor and document the destruction in All Species Grove. In fact, the EDF issued its own "stop work order," in the form of a lockdown on yarding equipment that resulted in 22 arrests.
Salvage logging continues in the ancient groves, interrupted by woods actions and gate blockades. However, the federal judge who allowed these operations to go forward is now on notice concerning PL's violations, and another hearing is set for late October. The so- called Headwaters "deal" has been exposed as a total fraud, as major national media outlets air Earth First!ers' video footage of destruction in ancient forests.
The immense power and public pressure generated by Headwaters activists over the past few months is truly staggering. While legal experts craft paper monkeywrenches and media hounds hammer home our message, direct action on the front lines turns up the heat on compromising politicians and their robber baron pals. The Democratic Party hacks who handed Hurwitz his dream "deal" now know that the public will never accept it. Until every acre of this redwood wilderness achieves permanent protection, Earth First! direct action and organizing will continue in its defense. Like the song says, "We're not leaving till you're out of the forest!"
We desperately need your help to continue this campaign until late November when the autumn rains send the loggers home. Come join us! Call (707) 468-1660 for information.