We’re averting our eyes from an environmental disaster in plain sight. Let’s give a damn
The American River Parkway once was a constant focus for me as The Bee’s columnist. I wrote a half dozen columns about it in 2015 alone. All were written with great urgency, and yet, all those words in all those columns published in the last 10 years solved absolutely nothing.
The epidemic of constant fires and environmental devastation to the lower half of the American River Parkway has continued unabated, a disaster in plain sight. It’s been the proverbial slow-motion train wreck, except it’s so much more than an accident of circumstance.
We’re driving Sacramento’s great urban forest off the rails. We’re methodically destroying our natural resource, one steeped in Sacramento history. And I think I stopped writing about the parkway with great frequency in recent years because Sacramento doesn’t seem to give a damn about the devastation.
In 2015, I wrote this: “If urban fires were occurring in any other densely populated area besides the lower stretch of the American River Parkway, it would be a big story. Politicians would be demanding answers, particularly if the fires were suspected to be caused by humans .... But (once) you invoke the word ‘homeless’ in Sacramento, an army of advocates ... effectively scares a liberal community into silence. Even those of us in the media dance around the issue. You can’t talk about the cause of (fires) without someone calling you callous or insensitive.”
Here’s what Bee colleagues report now: “The fire at Bushy Lake points to a troubling rise in fires caused by homeless people in the parkway. The fires associated with homeless camps are a growing statewide problem that firefighters warn is only going to get more dangerous as California and the Sacramento region enter one of the driest fire seasons in modern history.”
Different year, the same story. It’s been the same story for a long time, and we’re not just talking about fires there.
In 2019, we learned the river water on the parkway is polluted with human feces.
If a Sacramento business were causing this much environmental damage to a natural resource like the parkway, would people be silent? They wouldn’t. But Sacramento’s liberal hypocrisy stifles serious discussion about the environmental damage being done here because the damage largely is a consequence of homelessness.
The city and the county are trying to create more homeless shelter capacity so that more homeless people can be moved out of places such as the parkway.
But that’s not enough. Someone needs to sue the county of Sacramento for the pollution and environmental destruction being caused every day on the American River Parkway. That’s what environmental activists in San Diego County are doing. They’ve taken county officials to court about greenhouse gas emissions, for example, and won.
To be fair, it’s not as if the county has done nothing. In 2010, only 12 park rangers covered 15,000 acres of parkland. The number of rangers has tripled since then, mostly through the efforts of Sacramento County Supervisor Phil Serna.
But the devastation to the parkway has continued because the rangers can’t move homeless people. A 2018 federal court decision said it’s unconstitutional to move homeless people if you have no place to put them.
There is no place to put them until the city and county create the space. And even then, some on the parkway might still refuse. No one likes law enforcement sweeps of encampments, but on the parkway, they often result in arrests. Take a walk on the parkway, but watch out for the needles and the pit bulls.
I’ve been covering this for 10 years, and it hasn’t changed. I’m sorry if you don’t want to hear it, but it’s still true.
So sue the county to pressure the creation of homeless shelter capacity. Move people off the parkway while it can still be saved. Give a damn about this.
This story was originally published June 23, 2021 at 5:00 AM.
