Amador - Calaveras Consensus Group

Items of Interest for May 15th Meeting

Brandon Sanders — Tue, 14 May 2013 14:49:37 +0000

There have been a couple submittals for blog posting which are listed below:

STUDY: Financing Woody Biomass Clusters: Barriers, Opportunities and Potential Models for the Western U.S.

http://www.dovetailinc.org/reportsview/2013/responsible-materials/padam-zoetp/financing-woody-biomass-clusters-barriers-opportu

WEBINAR: Effectiveness and longevity of fuel treatments in coniferous forests across California

CFSC spring 2013 webinars flier

Materials for Review in Advance of May 15th Meeting

Brandon Sanders — Fri, 10 May 2013 17:27:57 +0000

Callecat Ecological Restoration: Implement restoration actions to protect, increase, and perpetuate old forests and wildlife habitat; reduce the threat to communities from wildfires; reintroduce fire into fire-adpated ecosystems; reduce the degradation of watersheds and aquatic resources; and, provide employment and commodities to the local community; Amador Ranger District

Callecat Ecological Restoration Project Submission Form 2013

Forest Creek Roadwork/Watershed Improvments: Repair hydrologically connected segments of Forest Service Road 7N30, above Forest Creek; Calaveras Ranger District

Forest Creek Roadwork_Cornerstone Project Submission Form 2013

Mokelumne River Crossing Watershed Improvement: Removal of large culvert and associated fill material at crossing the South Fork of the Mokelumne River on Forest Road 6N64; Calaveras Ranger District

Mokelumne crossing Removal_Cornerstone Project Submission Form 2013

San Domingo Trail Maintenance: Perform required trail maintenance to enhance the approach to and departure from San Domingo Creek; Calaveras Ranger District

San Domingo Maintenance_Cornerstone Project Submission Form 2013

The planning committee is suggesting ACCG concurrence with the planning and/or implementation of these Cornerstone projects. The planning committee will also circulate a Letter of Support for the Ramsey Burn Forest Salvage project.

Ramsey Burn Forest Salvage – Concurrence with Draft Decision Memo: Letter of Support for the Proposed Action/ Draft Decision Memo; Calaveras Ranger District

Scoping comment letter

ACCG Meeting on May 15th in West Point

Brandon Sanders — Fri, 10 May 2013 14:29:26 +0000

The next full ACCG meeting will take place next Wednesday, May 15^th. The meeting will begin at 9:30am at the West Point Veterans Hall located on the corner of Highway 26 and Bald Mountain Road in West Point, CA.

The agenda for Wednesday’s meeting is attached. Also attached is an RFP from the National Forest Foundation which will be discussed as part of the meeting.

May 2013 ACCG Meeting Agenda

NFF RFP

Two National Forest Foundation Workshops Next Week

Brandon Sanders — Wed, 08 May 2013 17:26:45 +0000

Who’s Afraid of the Big Bad Desired Conditions? CFLRP Five Year Reporting

Monday, May 13, 2013 | 2:00-4:00 p.m. Eastern Daylight Time

Who’s afraid of the big bad desired conditions? Not us! You’re invited to join the Collaborative Forest Landscape Restoration Program Monitoring Network and National Forest Foundation in this upcoming webinar on developing desired conditions and ecological and indicators.

Here’s why this is important: In order to fulfill the requirements of the Omnibus Public Land Management Act of 2009, which established the Collaborative Forest Landscape Restoration (CFLR) program, the USDA Forest Service must submit a 5-year report to Congress that assesses whether, and to what extent, the program is fulfilling its purposes. In 2011, the National Forest Foundation facilitated a meeting with Forest Service staff and agency partners to develop a suite of national indicators for the 5-year report. The result of this meeting was five draft indicators covering the purposes of the Act, including one covering ecological impacts.

Guidance for the ecological indicator, which will assess the ecological outcomes of the CFLRP projects, was released by Deputy Chief Leslie Weldon in 2012. As part of the guidance, project collaboratives must develop desired conditions that are specific to their collaborative group and the landscape and they are working on. This webinar will highlight three CFLR projects where collaborative members have been hard at work developing desired conditions and monitoring indicators to address the national indicators for wildlife, fire, and invasive species. Participants will hear about the design and development process, and see examples, from representatives of the Dinkey Landscape Restoration Project, Uncompahgre Plateau Project, and Selway-Middle Fork Clearwater Project. There will be time to delve into the details, ask questions, and share experiences.

Click here to RSVP for this peer learning session on CFLRP Five Year Reporting

Evaluation and Adaptation in Collaborative Resource Management – A New Sourcebook

Tuesday, May 14th, 2013 | 12:00 p.m.- 2:00 p.m. Eastern Daylight Time

We hope you can join us for a discussion about a newly-published sourcebook, Closing the Feedback Lo op: Evaluation and Adaptation in Collaborative Resource Management. The sourcebook explores strategies and tools that collaborative groups use to systematically evaluate their work and adapt plans and management actions based on what they have learned. Presenters will share examples from the field, and we will discuss process tools from nine rapid assessments that are described in the sourcebook. This session builds on a previous peer learning session (May 4, 2012), held during the sourcebook’s development. We invite you to join the discussion, share other examples and discuss opportunities for integrating shared learning, systematic evaluation, and adaptive change into collaborative resource management.

The sourcebook was developed by Ann Moote in coordination with a project team of the following organizations: Ecological Restoration Institute, Forest Guild, National Forest Foundation, USFS Ecosystem Services and National Partnership Office, Watershed Research and Training Center, and Sustainable Northwest.

Click here to RSVP for the upcoming session on Evaluation and Adaptation

National Forest Foundation Announces 2013 California Capacity-Building Grant Opportunity

Brandon Sanders — Tue, 07 May 2013 15:14:34 +0000

In partnership with the U.S. Forest Service Pacific Southwest Region, the National Forest Foundation is pleased to announce a new funding program to benefit the National Forests of California and the communities that depend on them.

The Community Capacity and Land Stewardship (CCLS) grant program will provide grants of $5,000 to $24,000 to enable community-based organizations and collaborative groups to increase their capacity to facilitate and/or implement watershed or landscape-level restoration projects. Ancillary goals of the program are to build capacity to help meet other objectives associated with the creation of living-wage jobs that contribute to the economic sustainability of communities. Grants will be awarded for a period of one year.

Work may take place on or off of California National Forests Lands, but there must be a clear, direct benefit to their watersheds. Organizations are not required to match CCLS award funds, but are encouraged to leverage additional private and local, state, or governmental resources to show broad support for the project.

Proposals are due on or before July 1, 2013 and must be received hard-copy.

For more information, visit http://nationalforests.org/conserve/grantprograms/capacitybuilding/ccls

Ramsey Project Tour on Wednesday

Brandon Sanders — Mon, 06 May 2013 17:58:03 +0000

Attached is the agenda for our May 8^th, Planning Workgroup Meeting.

ACCG Planning Committee Meeting May 8, 2013 Agenda

The meeting will start at 09:00 AM at the Calaveras Ranger District in Hathaway Pines, and progress to our Ramsey Fire Salvage project area.

For the field trip, please bring the following:

Brown Bag Lunch
Water
Hiking boots
Sunscreen
Bug Repellent
Good Spirits

Please contact Kendal Young at the Calaveras Ranger District with questions.

USFWS Proposing New ESA Protections and Critical Habitat Designations

Brandon Sanders — Thu, 25 Apr 2013 22:08:44 +0000

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (Service) is proposing to list the Sierra Nevada yellow-legged frog and the northern distinct population segment of the mountain yellow-legged frog as endangered and the Yosemite toad as threatened under the Endangered Species Act (ESA).

The Service is also proposing to designate critical habitat for these three amphibian species in California: 1,105,400 acres across 16 counties for the Sierra Nevada yellow-legged frog, 221,498 acres across two counties for the mountain yellow-legged frog, and 750,926 acres across seven counties for the Yosemite toad.

With overlapping areas, the total proposed critical habitat for the three amphibians is 1,831,820 acres. Most of the proposed critical habitat is on federal lands.

http://www.fws.gov/sacramento/outreach/2013/04-24/outreach_newsroom_2013-4-24.htm

NFF Webinar on May 13th

Brandon Sanders — Thu, 25 Apr 2013 18:05:03 +0000

Who’s Afraid of the Big Bad Desired Conditions? CFLRP Five Year Reporting

Monday, May 13, 2013 | 2:00-3:30 p.m. Eastern Daylight Time

Who’s afraid of the big bad desired conditions? Not us!

You’re invited to join the Collaborative Forest Landscape Restoration Program Monitoring Network and National Forest Foundation in this upcoming webinar on developing desired conditions and ecological and indicators.

In order to fulfill the requirements of the Omnibus Public Land Management Act of 2009, which established the Collaborative Forest Landscape Restoration (CFLR) program, the USDA Forest Service must submit a 5-year report to Congress that assesses whether, and to what extent, the program is fulfilling its purposes.

In 2011, the National Forest Foundation facilitated a meeting with Forest Service staff and agency partners to develop a suite of national indicators for the 5-year report. The result of this meeting was five draft indicators covering the purposes of the Act, including one covering ecological impacts. Guidance for the ecological indicator, which will assess the ecological outcomes of the CFLRP projects, was released by Deputy Chief Leslie Weldon in 2012.

As part of the guidance, project collaboratives must develop desired conditions that are specific to their collaborative group and the landscape and they are working on. This webinar will highlight three CFLR projects where collaborative members have been hard at work developing desired conditions and monitoring indicators to address the national indicators for wildlife, fire, and invasive species.

Participants will hear about the design and development process, and see examples, from representatives of the Dinkey Landscape Restoration Project, Uncompahgre Plateau Collaborative Forest Landscape Restoration Project, and Four Forests Restoration Initiative. There will be time to delve into the details, ask questions, and share experiences.

Click here to RSVP for this peer learning session on CFLRP Five Year Reporting

Callecat Project Notification of Decision Now Available

Brandon Sanders — Thu, 25 Apr 2013 17:46:05 +0000

Please see the link below containing a notification of decision from the Amador Ranger District:

Callecat Notification of Decision

Forest Service Seeking Comment on Ramsey Fire Salvage Project

Brandon Sanders — Mon, 22 Apr 2013 16:20:48 +0000

The Forest Service is seeking comments on the Ramsey Fire Salvage project which would remove fire damaged trees from a portion of the area burned in 2012. The draft Decision Memo is available for review at the Calaveras Ranger District; 5519 Highway 4; PO Box 500; Hathaway Pines, CA 95233; or, on-line at

http://fs.usda.gov/goto/stanislaus/projects.

The Forest Service will accept comments on this proposal for 30 days following publication of the opportunity to comment legal notice (April 17, 2013) which is the exclusive means for calculating the comment period.

Comments may be submitted to: Calaveras Ranger District; Attn: Ramsey; 5519 Highway 4; PO Box 500; Hathaway Pines, CA 95233. Comments may be submitted by FAX (209) 795-6849 or by hand-delivery to the Calaveras Ranger District office during business hours (M-F 8:00am to 4:30pm). Oral comments must be provided in person or via telephone (209) 795-1381, during business hours. Electronic comments, in common (.doc, .pdf, .rtf, .txt, etc.) formats, may be submitted to: comments-pacificsouthwest-stanislauscalaveras@fs.fed.us with Subject: Ramsey.

In accordance with the April24, 2006 U.S. District Court order (CV 03-119-M-DWM), only those who provide comments during the comment period are eligible to appeal (36 CFR 215).

For additional information, contact Karl Graves at the Calaveras Ranger District; or, call (209) 795-1381 ext. 338.

Ramsey Comment

Ramsey Draft DM