This is a comment on District Ranger Daryl Hodges’s comments about Los Padres National Forest’s intended deforestation of the mountain environment above Goleta.
I sent a letter to the Independent in January describing how LPNF came to West Camino Cielo in November and masticated five acres of thriving chaparral without even notifying the community.
We only found out that it was LPNF when we confronted the one operator who was behind the devastation. Forest Supervisor Chris Stubbs wrote a rebuttal saying that they were only going to be masticating 175 acres, even though their own Decision Memo about the project says 198 acres will be treated. LPNF then had an informational meeting at the San Marcos Fire Station on February 22, and we were told that they were intending on deforesting maybe 600-700 acres?
Now we have the District Ranger making the case for the deforestation of 1,000 acres. That is a big increase. How can we trust Los Padres staff when we get this kind of conflicting information?
The massive deforestation will be from Highway 154 to Gaviota and will cause erosion and an unstoppable invasion of plant invasive species.
The transformation of our mountain environment will set the mountain up for invasive grass fires like Lahaina and Texas.