Musician Bonnie Raitt wasn’t singing the blues in
California Sept. 15 when she was arrested with 896 others for acts
of civil disobedience – trespassing onto Pacific Lumber Co.
property and chaining themselves to mill gates. Their mission was
saving the Headwaters grove, the world’s largest ancient redwood
forest in private ownership.
An estimated 4,000
people descended on the mill town of Carlotta for northern
California’s biggest forest rally since the “Redwood Summer” of
protests in 1990. Meanwhile, timber workers who stand to lose their
jobs staged a much smaller rally 30 miles away.
Pacific Lumber had planned to cut dead trees
Sept. 16, but an 11th-hour deal brokered by California Sen. Dianne
Feinstein will keep the chain saws at bay while negotiations over a
forest buyout continue. State and federal officials are still
haggling over terms and price with Charles Hurwitz, a Texan who
bought the timber company in 1985. The deal could include swapping
surplus state or federal land – perhaps even Treasure Island in San
Francisco Bay – in exchange for the 3,000-acre Headwaters grove and
a 1,700-acre buffer zone.
* James
Bruggers
This article appeared in the print edition of the magazine with the headline Redwood summer roars back.
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