Former US Congressmen Pete McCloskey works to protect Richardson Grove.

It’s been one week since EPIC and our allies filed a lawsuit challenging the Caltrans plan to widen Highway 101 through Richardson Grove State Park. In addition, we established the Richardson Grove Legal Fund, and made a fundraising challenge to our supporters to match donations and raise $5000 in one week.

We have seen great success through the announcement of the lawsuit through favorable and extensive media coverage across the state of California. In addition, thanks to supporters like you, we have surpassed our kick-off goal of $5000!

Of course, a lawsuit and state wide campaign depend on continued donations. We sincerely appreciate the support and look forward to continue to provide high quality advocacy work in defense of the Humboldt County and the old growth redwoods in Richardson Grove State Park. If you haven’t already pledged your support, please take a moment and join the effort.

I also encourage you to take a look at the legal challenge that we wrote with our co-plaintiffs and incredible team of first-rate attorneys.  The well-crafted words in the complaint layout 14 points to review, the first of which lays out the issue: This is a case of Trees vs Trucks.

In addition to the legal advocacy, we have been busy reaching out in every way possible to build our public campaign. We celebrated with the local community at the Southern Humboldt Arts and Music Festival, and took the message to the Fairfax Festival, with a booth at Ecofest. These adventures returned almost 1000 signed opposition postcards to the Governor, and the material support of selling over 100 Save Richardson Grove t-shirts to supporters.

Lastly, this week we hosted an unconventional format on Tuesday, during KMUD’s Environment Show. During the show, we heard live in the studio from Joanne Rand, Bud Rogers, Jan Bramlett and Jefferson Parsons. These dedicated activists sang songs they had written specifically to support the Save Richardson Grove campaign.

During the show we made a call out to musicians, artists, poets, performers and the like, who want to join in the movement to protect this important place by contributing their important skills to the campaign. To join in this effort and make a creative contribution to the larger campaign, please write kerul @wildcalifornia.org.

Of course, this is only the beginning. If we are to succeed in providing real protection for the ancient trees in Richardson Grove State Park and the long term sustainability of Humboldt County, we must take these seeds and plant them. We are looking into the future to several large, public events, including coordinating with Tree Spirit Project photographer Jack Gescheidt in his effort to organize a photograph, host a large gathering with exciting special guest musicians, and more.

Right now, we are busy preparing activist toolkits for satellite organizers to use to garner support for the campaign across California. We plan to include postcards, colorful brochures, stickers, posters and other materials in the packets. Please write epic@wildcalifornia.org to request yours!

Ongoing funding will be needed to see this campaign through, so the trees are safely protected. If you have not already, you can still help by pledging your support. Again, thanks to all of the donations our supporters have sent in, these are the folks who made it possible to take the first step to filing this lawsuit.

Now that EPIC has sent out our press release the story has hit the headlines.  You can view and share various articles by clicking here.  Feel free to check them out and leave comments letting them know how you feel about the project.

Thanks for the amazing work everyone!

Kerul Dyer

Save Richardson Grove Campaign coordinator

This entry was posted on Wednesday, June 23rd, 2010 at 5:13 pm and is filed under Blog. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.