Enewsletter for September 2020

Earlier this month, Baykeeper Staff Attorney Nicole Sasaki, along with pro bono lawyers, made legal arguments to uphold Clean Water Act protections for the Redwood City salt ponds before the District Court.

The legal action stems from a bizarre case of make believe by the Trump Administration. Trump’s EPA has decided that the Redwood City salt ponds are not water but land.

The ponds used to be Bay waters, and if the surrounding human-made levees were removed, the area would return to its natural marshy state. EPA’s decision is a thinly veiled attempt to allow the ponds’ behemoth corporate owner, Cargill, to bypass Clean Water Act safeguards and pave over the area. The multinational corporation has long been eyeing a lucrative deal to develop this part of the shoreline. If this decision goes forward, it will set a harmful legal precedent for other parts of the Bay, including salt ponds in Newark. 

Baykeeper and our partners Save The Bay, Citizens’ Committee to Complete the Refuge, and Committee for Green Foothills, along with the California Attorney General’s office, argued in court that the salt ponds—and the wetlands they are destined to become—have a right to Clean Water Act protections. The judge is expected to make a ruling in the coming months.

Separately, we worked with coalition partners to release a statement calling for comprehensive planning for climate change in Redwood City, which included calls to protect the salt ponds in order to buffer the shoreline from sea level rise. 

Read more about the Redwood City salt ponds case. 

Photo of salt ponds by Robb Most, thanks to LightHawk Conservation Flying

Several years ago, the owner of a small tidal wetland island in the North Bay, named Point Buckler, drained and bulldozed the area to build a luxury sporting and hunting resort. Point Buckler is part of Suisun Marsh, an important habitat area for native wildlife, including Chinook salmon and river otters. The owner’s illegal levee also blocked fish passage and destroyed critical vegetation.

It’s a crime to destroy a wetland without extensive permits and environmental review. But when regulators fined the owner for knowingly breaking the law, he claimed his rights were being violated.

A long legal battle ensued. Over the years, Baykeeper frequently provided testimony to protect the wetlands at Point Buckler. More than 85 percent of historic Bay-Delta wetlands have already been lost; it’s essential to protect what few remain by holding violators accountable to the Clean Water Act.

So we were pleased when a federal judge recently ruled that the owner broke the law by destroying Point Buckler’s tidal wetlands—and that he’s responsible for fixing the damage, to the extent possible.

While Point Buckler may never fully return to its natural marshy state, and the owner may continue to fight, we are relieved that justice has been served for now. 

Pictured, top: a river otter in the North Bay, by Matt Knoth, Flickr/CC.

Below: Aerial imagery of Point Buckler as marshland (left) and after being bulldozed (right).

Every year, we hold a big Coastal Cleanup Day event in September to target the flood of trash polluting the Bay. Last year, our 70 volunteers removed more than 400 pounds of waste from the Bay’s shore in just a couple of hours.

Unfortunately, due to COVID-19, we can’t gather in groups to share the experience together again this year. So we’re asking our supporters to commit to organizing their own cleanups with members of their pandemic bubbles all across the Bay throughout the month. This effort is even more important now as single-use items like masks and takeout containers accumulate in increasing quantities in streets, storm drains, parks, and shoreline areas. We need you to help us track and remove this polluting waste.

Our aim is for Baykeeper volunteers to hold 50 cleanups in the month of September—and thanks to our incredible supporters, we’ve already received pledges for 30 cleanups! Help us meet (and exceed!) our goal and hold your own cleanup—however small—in your corner of the Bay. Storm drains, parks, and city streets all connect to the Bay, and are excellent locations for a cleanup if you can’t get to a shoreline area.

Visit our website to pledge to hold a cleanup of your own, and get complete instructions on how to organize a safe cleanup for your household. 

Pictured, below: PPE waste cleaned up by Baykeeper volunteer Eric Hoover

A form of “forever” chemicals—polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS)—are found in everything from carpeting to non-stick cooking pans to cosmetics. They never break down, are harmful even at low levels, and have been linked to reproductive, immune, and developmental issues, as well as cancer.

Because PFAS don't break down, they persist in water bodies, including San Francisco Bay, as well as in plants and animal tissues, and even in the air. Nearly every American has detectable levels of PFAS in their bloodstream.

The good news is that PFAS may now be phased out in firefighting foam, to the significant benefit of the health of firefighters, wildlife, water quality, and people across the state. 

State legislation SB 1044 phases out PFAS in firefighting foam, and requires a transition to effective non-PFAS alternatives that are already in use in other parts of the country. The bill passed the state legislature and is now on Governor Newsom’s desk awaiting signature.

Led by our partners at Clean Water Action, Baykeeper and many other health and environmental organizations enthusiastically supported the bill, which was co-sponsored by the California Professional Firefighters. We hope this new bill will become a law and the first step to entirely phasing out this toxic and pervasive contaminant in California.

Baykeeper field investigator, Cole Burchiel, recently patrolled the Richmond harbor using our new drone, Osprey (pictured, above).

As the newest addition to the Baykeeper investigation team, Osprey surveyed this heavily industrialized area that includes the Levin coal terminal, Sims metal recycling, and an area contaminated by companies like Bayer, Stauffer Chemicals, and Zeneca (now AstraZeneca). Over a period of nearly 100 years, these corporations contaminated shoreline areas and groundwater with arsenic, mercury, and volatile organic compounds, all of which still exists in the area to this day. This toxic site lies north of a stretch of beautiful tidal wetlands, which Osprey captured in the image below. 

The high-quality imagery captured by Osprey has already been used to support our advocacy to defend this region, and will continue to produce invaluable evidence to help us fight for the Bay. A big thanks to our partners at Autonomous Imagery for the drone donation and for the help to expand our investigative capacity in such a significant way!