The Compost: Climate change vs. Indigenous culture - OCRegister

The Compost: Climate change vs. Indigenous culture - Orange County Register

Welcome to The Compost, a weekly newsletter on key environmental news impacting Southern California. Subscribe now to get it in your inbox! In today’s edition…

As I was scanning through AllTrails reviews for the lovely Three Sisters Falls trek near Julian, in the Cleveland National Forest, one post caught my eye.

A woman mentioned seeing someone just after her on the trail destroy several large flowering yucca “with what looked like a machete. It was heartbreaking, it’s rare to see this plant blossoming. I hope this is not common…” Sure enough, when I hiked the trail a couple of days later, I saw multiple yucca stalks with their tops lopped off at shoulder height.

I honestly might not have paid much attention if I hadn’t gotten an invitation just a few days earlier to cover an intertribal Yucca Harvest Festival on the San Manuel Band of Mission Indians’ reservation near Highland on April 29.

In preparing for the story, I’d learned how it can take 10 years for one yucca plant to bloom. I’d also learned how significant flowering yucca is to many Indigenous cultures in Southern California and beyond. And I’d learned how the plant is being threatened, both by non-Native people and by impacts of climate change.

Of course, yucca is far from the only resource sacred to Indigenous people that’s facing similar threats.

In the Temescal Valley, my colleague Jeff Horseman has been writing about how the Pechanga Band of Luiseño Indians is pushing back against Robertson’s Ready Mix plans to expand an aggregate mine from 135 to 792 acres. The tribe asked county supervisors to make the company go through a planning review process, with tribal Chairman Mark Macarro saying they have “numerous known cultural resources within and adjacent to the proposed” area.

My friend and former colleague Deep Barath wrote a beautiful story for the Associated Press about how warming waters, industrial pollution and hydroelectric projects are impacting the health of the Columbia River and the millennia-old spiritual traditions that hold Native communities in British Columbia and the Pacific Northwest together.

Efforts to address the climate crisis also too often end up disproportionately harming Native communities. Grist, which has an entire section of its website dedicated to the intersection of climate and Indigenous affairs, has done excellent work documenting how the push to mine minerals such as lithium and copper for electric vehicle batteries is threatening lands sacred to Native people. And colleague Conrad Swanson has been documenting how tribes have been left out of discussions about access to Colorado River water that flows through their ancestral lands in the midst of unprecedented drought.

On the other hand, I talked with San Manuel leaders about how tribes are, finally, being asked by some non-Native folks for advice on sustainably managing ecosystems that are being hammered by climate change. Danielle Venton recently wrote for KQED, for example, about how long-standing tribal views on wildfire are now guiding some fire management strategies.

This dynamic does remind me a bit of a cringeworthy thing that happened in the wake of George Floyd’s murder, when likely well-meaning White people turned to Black friends for advice on how to be anti-rascist. Should non-Native people really be asking our Native neighbors to be responsible for telling us how to repair a world that we stole and set on fire?

When I posed that question to Laurena Bolden, a tribal council member with San Manuel, she said her people do feel responsible as first inhabitants of this land to ensure it remains healthy no matter what came before. So Bolden said they’re proud to share their knowledge with anyone who wants to learn.

“The more education we can push out, especially to others in the Inland Empire, it helps everybody be sustainable together.”

We do, indeed, have much to learn.

— By Brooke Staggs, environment reporter

🚆 TRANSPORT

No more diesel trucks: California just passed the first mandate in the world to ban new diesel trucks by 2036 and require a switch to zero-emission big rigs, garbage trucks, delivery trucks and other medium and heavy-duty vehicles by 2042. State regulators and environmental groups are celebrating the move, while some trucking and industry groups are expressing concerns about costs and timing. We’ve got Nadia Lopez’s story for CalMatters here. …READ MORE…

- A complication: Voice of San Diego dug in on what the rule might mean for cross-border trade, since Mexico “lacks zero-emission trucks, charging stations, regulations and programs to incentivize and fund such changes.”

Bye to diesel trains, too: California also just passed the most ambitious train emissions rules in the country, banning engines more than 23 years old by 2030, increasing use of zero-emissions technology to transport freight and banning many trains from idling longer than 30 minutes. Here’s Sophie Austin tale for the Associated Press. …READ MORE…

High-speed rail primer: How much has been spent on the state’s planned high-speed rail line from the Bay Area to Southern California? What’s actually been built to date, and how much is left to go? Our Kurt Snibbe dug in with a series of useful graphics. …READ MORE…

Rail service interrupted again: Another landslide issue has interrupted rail service along the coast in south Orange County. Erika Ritchie is following how a historic landmark building dropped 20 feet on Thursday, while Jeff Gritchen captured dramatic before-and-after shots. . ..READ MORE…

EV car show: Reporter Steve Scauzillo and photographer Andy Holzman take you inside the second annual EV car show at California State Northridge. Test drives were popular, though many visitors said the prices put the vehicles out of reach. …READ MORE…

Inside EV factories: With the race to produce more EVs domestically in full swing, Nadia Lopez with CalMatters looked at how automakers are ramping up production and what challenges they face. …READ MORE…

⚡ ENERGIZE

Lithium Valley advances: In the fall, I wrote a primer on efforts to produce geothermal energy while also extracting lithium needed for EV batteries from the mineral-rich brine boiling deep underground near the shores of the Salton Sea. Recently, photographer Jeff Gritchen, his drone and I got to spend time with one of three companies working to crack the code on this process. They’re actually starting to tear down the optimization plant we just toured so they can start building one of the world’s first commercial-scale geothermal lithium extraction plants in the world. …READ MORE…

Progress: Gov. Gavin Newsom touted the progress the state has made toward weaning itself off of fossil fuels and creating jobs for low-income communities during his tour of World Energy renewable fuels facility in Paramount on Monday. Our Teresa Liu has the tale. …READ MORE…

- Stats to know: Fifty-five manufacturers in the zero emission vehicle sector have chosen to build headquarters in California, per Newsom, and there are six times more green energy jobs here than fossil fuels jobs.

Solar incentives face challenge: The fate of California’s wildly successful rooftop solar incentives will be decided in court, Sammy Roth with the Los Angeles Times reports, after three environmental groups filed a lawsuit saying the state’s utilities commission acted illegally when it slashed compensation payments for power generated by solar panels. …READ MORE…

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🛡️ PROTECT

River sanctuary: San Fernando Valley residents and nonprofits want leaders to do more to protect and restore the Sepulveda Basin, an 8-mile oasis along the Los Angeles River. The area has primarily been used for flood management and water storage. But advocates say with some help, it can be a sanctuary for biodiversity, recreation and culture. Contributor Delilah Brumer has the story. …READ MORE…

Black bear tagged: A male black bear spotted last month in the western Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area near Malibu just became the first bear in these parts to be captured by officials and fitted with a radio collar for tracking, our Steve Scauzillo reports. …READ MORE…

Wildfire season warning: Record-setting snow and rain have left vegetation flush with moisture, prompting the state’s fire chief to predict that wildfires will not break out with regularity this year until about 45 days later than normal. But our Brian Rokos reports now is the time for residents to prepare for the inevitable, as those green hills dry out. …READ MORE…

Warmer waters, bad news: Washington Port reporters Scott Dance and Brady Dennis take a look at what a rapid surge in global ocean temperatures in recent months means. A transition to the climate pattern known as El Niño is likely forming, researchers say, which in the past has triggered ecological disasters and deadly weather extremes. …READ MORE…

🖋️ REGULATE

Phasing out single-use goods: As of Monday, restaurants and food facilities in unincorporated areas of Los Angeles County must provide only recyclable or compostable food ware under a new ordinance aimed at reducing waste and fossil fuels. The ordinance also requires restaurants to use reusable food service ware for dine-in customers, and it prohibits the sale or rental of single-use coolers, packaging and pool toys. …READ MORE…

Smaller buffer bill advances: A bill seeking a 1,000-foot buffer between new Inland Empire warehouses of 100,000 square feet or more and homes stalled in the state legislature. But our Jeff Horseman reports that a proposal to create a 300-foot buffer for warehouses 400,000 square feet or more in Riverside and San Bernardino counties was OK’d by a key panel. …READ MORE…

Paid travel analyzed: CalMatters looked at which organizations are paying the most to send California legislatures on trips around the world. A group called the California Foundation on the Environment and the Economy — which is supported by a strange mix of major corporations, oil companies, environmental groups, construction trade unions, public utilities and water districts — topped the list, with trips often leading to new state bills. …READ MORE…

🦇 EXPLORE

To the bat cave!: Did you know there’s a cave system open for tours in a state park inside a national preserve in Southern California? And that there are millions of years of history here, from the time when lava filled this valley to when giant sloths lived in the caves to when American Indian tribes stored goods here to when a fascinating couple welcomed visitors with tall tales to when Oliver Stone vandalized the cave walls while filming “The Doors?”⁣ Check out this story by Maggie Downs on the awesome Mitchell Caverns, which I was also lucky enough to visit a few years back. …READ MORE…

💪 PITCH IN

Leaded soil brigade: For this week’s tip on how Southern Californians can help the environment… Does your community have lead in its soil? Grist made a handy tool with tips on how to find out and what to do if you discover your neighborhood is indeed a hotspot for leaded soil. A Santa Ana neighborhood we’ve reported on is featured. Check your zip code, take action and spread the word!

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