Precursor Step
To ensure that projects proposed herein are allowable under the conservation easement held by the Mendocino Land Trust (MLT) on PG&E properties along and near the upper Eel River, PG&E and MLT should review, and renegotiate, if necessary, the conservation easement. While preventing industrial development using a conservation easement is a worthy goal, many stakeholders have expressed concerns that the MLT’s conservation easement will limit restoration, recreation enhancements, and other much needed work both in the Lake Pillsbury footprint and elsewhere. We found strong—though not universal—community support for the recommendation that PG&E work with the MLT and others as needed to ensure that the conservation easement will not hamper restoration work, long-term monitoring, projects such as the development of an alternative water source to meet firefighting needs, trails development or the relocation of campgrounds.
Photo courtesy of EcoFlight
Five First Things to Happen if the Dams were Removed
If the removal of the dams should come to pass, impacts of proposed Eel River dam removals to Lake County and other local communities will be multiple, significant, and complex. PG&E has an opportunity and, we believe, an obligation to mitigate these impacts by carefully reviewing this Vision Statement and working to enact its mitigation measures.
The process yielded 45 individual projects and mitigation ideas detailed herein, some of which would require early implementation to allow for other proposals to be achieved. The first five most urgent steps for addressing community concerns would be (in no particular priority order):
Improving roads.
- Mendocino County Road 240/Lake County Road 301 and Elk Mountain Road (U.S. Forest Service Road M1/Lake County Road 301) need improvement for both public access and so that they can serve as more reliable evacuation routes during wildfires
- Improving existing roads and OHV trails to ensure that salmon, steelhead, and lamprey can reclaim historic habitat.
- Improvements to the two most popular ingress and egress routes to the Pillsbury basin would help mitigate adverse economic impacts to Lake County
The completion and implementation of a fire management plan.
- PG&E works again with the U.S. Forest Service to fund the completion and implementation of a fire management plan such as the one developed for the Klamath River dam removal effort.
- In 2021, PG&E funded the U.S. Forest Service’ Mendocino National Forest Prescribed Fire and Fuels Management Strategy Environmental Assessment under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) that was approved by the agency on April 25, 2024 (please see https://www.fs.usda.gov/project/?project=59722).
The construction of alternative water sources for fire suppression purposes, as a recreation resource, and to benefit tule elk and other wildlife.
- The development of a pond or another new source of water that is large and deep enough and with sufficient clearance to allow heavy-lift helicopters to draw water during a fire.
- Ensuring that the replacement water source for fire suppression and other needs also serves recreational purposes such as swimming, fishing, picnicking, flatwater boating, wildlife viewing, and other activities.
- Exploring is how the replacement emergency water sources referenced above under both fire resilience and recreation could benefit tule elk and other wildlife.
Improving emergency communications.
- PG&E explores ways to create backup communication methods using satellite-based phone networks.
- Hull Mountain north of Lake Pillsbury or Big Signal Peak to the west could potentially serve as cellular antennae sites after appropriate Tribal consultation and environmental review by the U.S. Forest Service.
The completion of a recreation management plan for the region.
- PG&E works with the U.S. Forest Service to fund the completion and implementation of a recreation management plan under NEPA for the Eel River watershed above Cape Horn Dam.
These projects are described in more detail in the report.
