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David Mattocks, SBC President, left, and Tina Terrell, Sequoia National Forest Supervisor, add to a list of investment ideas for the region. Terrell came from Porterville, Calif., to a regional conference at Gar Woods in Carnelian Bay to understand what our area wants in forest management. photo by Mayumi Elegado/Moonshine Ink |
CommentsYes, We Can
Report outlines current trends in the Sierra Nevada, says we can become sustainable
Published: September 17, 2007by Mayumi Elegado
The Sierra Business Council (SBC) believes the Sierra Nevada has a fighting chance to become a sustainable region, despite being under significant pressures. Those ‘pressures’ are not news to any local – explosive population growth, the gobbling up of land and other natural resources, leaky economy – but perhaps having real data to look at and ideas of how to overcome the issues will engender inspiration and hope.
In July, SBC released a report, “The State of the Sierra,” which discussed key findings from crunching a decade’s worth of data, pulled from more than 100 sources. At center stage is the rapid population growth in the region, which is expected to exceed one million by 2020, nearly doubling the population in 1990. In fact the Sierra grew twice as fast as the rest of California and faster than SBC had predicted in previous publications. And there’s more, these numbers account for full-time residents only, not the growing “shadow population” of visitors and second homeowners.
Population growth is the driving force for huge amounts of change in the region – homes need to be built, roads must connect the homes, jobs need to be created, and open space is devoured. Therefore it is “the starting point” from which to understand all trends, challenges, and opportunities in the Sierra Nevada, says the SBC report. But one has to remember that, as in nature, everything is related.
The report, and indeed much of SBC’s work, is based on the concept of a triple bottom line – that wealth is not just a measure of money, but is comprised of social, natural, and financial capital. The State of the Sierra is divided into sections along these three forms of wealth. Its authors investigate the trends in each, but constantly venture into discussions of all three areas, revealing as they do so that the different forms of capital cannot be isolated or studied separately.
For example, consider the interesting term, “equity refugees” mentioned in the report. Equity refugees are urban residents who find their city-life too expensive, so they sell their homes and move to the Sierra Nevada. Their presence elevates the cost of living here, so long-term residents sell their homes and move to less expensive areas. And the “equity refugee” cycle continues. Meanwhile, typical development for equity refugees in the Sierra Nevada is rural sprawl with large-acre parcels that gobbles up open space. As this open space disappears, so does the reason many people move and visit here, which would be disastrous for the heavily tourist-based economies across the region.
It’s the perfect example of how all forms of capital interrelate: People (social capital) affect a change on the landscape (natural capital). If we lose this natural capital, then the money (financial capital) will disappear too.
The report asserts that problems can be opportunities and that collaboration will be key. The Sierra Nevada stands in a unique place because it is very valuable to California; the region supplies about 60 percent of California’s usable fresh water and exports an enormous amount of electricity to California’s urban areas. Plus, sierra forests are valuable not only for their timber, but as some of the world’s most productive carbon sequestering lands, The region can use the tremendous value of its natural resources for leverage in legislative halls and to pry open the pockets of philanthropic givers.
“The Sierra Nevada affords some of the most compelling and pressing charitable investments in the nation,” the report says.
Another idea: link the varied natural and cultural resources to tourism to create a “heritage economy.” “Heritage economies” tie the three forms of capital together by channeling tourist dollars (financial capital) to ward improving natural and social capital.
“By investing in and developing products that tell a community story and enhance natural, cultural, historic, and recreational resources, the economies and thereby the communities of the Sierra Nevada will succeed,” the report says.
“I believe tourism is a great way to let others know how special your place is,” said Steven Poncelet, SBC Vice President of Operations & Development. “We believe at SBC that we can change the world one dollar at a time.”
The report, 50 pages long, looks at many more trends – regional wages are far below California average, housing prices are far above state average, school enrollment is on a decline and more. It outlines many more possible solutions – actively pursuing biomass industry, diversifying housing stock, ‘buy local’ campaigns and more.
But it’s too much to encapsulate here. As part of the social capital, each person concerned about developing a sustainable future for the Sierra Nevada should pick up this report.
“If any rural mountainous region has access to the resources to plan for change, it is the Sierra Nevada region,” the report says.
Yes we can.
See the State of the Sierra report online, sbcouncil.org.
Regional Conferences
The Sierra Business Council (SBC) held regional conferences highlighting the State of the Sierra report in early July. The conferences held in different communities, eight in total, brought people together in a room to discuss the report and to brainstorm ideas on how to improve the report and the region as a whole. While many of the trends outlined in the report are obvious to locals, it helped people to have hard data to examine.
“I think it gave them context to evaluate what they believed,” said Steve Poncelet, SBC Vice President of Operations & Development. “It’s a step toward progress, giving people an opportunity to create a plan on how to manage sustainable growth.”
Overwhelmingly, most attendees wanted to see data based on the community level or zip code level, as opposed to the current emphasis on county level. SBC agrees, but says it is cost-prohibitive to get more “granular data.”
Other areas that attendees suggested SBC include in future reports: local health care capacity and leakage to urban areas, commuter miles, high-speed bandwidth coverage, an economic value for natural resources, and civic engagement and local giving.
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