Public Lands Advocacy

Northwestern California’s public lands include some of the wildest and most spectacular landscapes in North America. Together the complex of national forests, national, state, and county parks, lands managed by other federal and state agencies, and rivers protected under both state and federal Wild and Scenic Rivers Acts in this corner of California should offer significant protection to the region’s unique endowment of species and ecosystems. EPIC works to ensure that these lands are managed to maximize their benefits for conservation.

Some of the environmental issues affecting public lands include timber sales, wildfire suppression, salvage logging, grazing, mining, and illegal water diversions. EPIC staff and volunteers go out into field and monitor what is happening on the ground. Because our public lands are so vast, it is imperative that people get involved in their own wild backyards and monitor and advocate for wild places that are threatened by destructive practices.

EPIC also comments on every timber sale proposed on Northwest California's four national forests totaling more than five million acres: Klamath National Forest, Shasta-Trinity National Forest, Six Rivers National Forest, and Mendocino National Forest.

Groundtruthing & Timber Sale Monitoring

Groundtruthing is an important tool used to monitor logging projects and other industrial activities on public lands. The information gained from groundtruthing allows EPIC to provide the public with the information needed to understand and engage in decisions affecting public forest lands, waters and wildlife. Information from on-the-ground monitoring also helps EPIC challenge bad logging projects, destructive grazing and other Forest Service actions that degrade the environment.

If you are going out into the field, it is important to be prepared with information and tools that will be needed to conduct an accurate assessment of timber sale activities. EPIC has developed a one-page Guide to Groundtruthing form to help folks prepare for and implement field monitoring. For a more extensive guide for timber sale monitoring, download the Bark Groundtruthing Trainings, an excellent resource for citizens to use for surveying a particular area for timber sales.

EPIC Guide to Groundtruthing

Bark Groundtruthing Guide

Bark Groundtruthing Survey

Document What You See In The Field: Get Avenza Maps

Avenza Maps is a mobile application that uses satellite technology to geo-reference photos you take, so you don’t need cell reception to use it. You can download project maps that are proposed by agencies and personally GPS reference photos and notes on that map through Avenza Maps.

If you have a smart phone or tablet, download the Avenza Maps Application and upload the project map in question. Go to the National Forest that you are interested in, click on the "Land and Resources Management" tab on the left side, and scroll down to locate current projects and download project maps. For example, the Klamath National Forest has project maps here.

Where to Visit: Northwest California’s Public Lands

U.S. Forest Service