November 5th 1998

November 5, 1998

Dr. Hillary Adams, President
North Greenwood Community Association, Inc.
P.O. Box 11
Elk, CA 95432

Dear Dr. Adams,

Thanks for your letter dated October 17, 1998, regarding your conversation with Bill Stone. I will try to clarify any uncertainty that may still remain in your mind about this plan.

With respect to roads, the plan is consistent with our stated objectives of attempting to utilize roads that are away from stream zones, moving to mid slope and ridge top roads.To that end, one road inside a stream zone will not be used for harvesting and will be retired (after work is done to remove culverts and otherwise storm-proof the area as much as possible, balanced with minimizing disturbance necessary to accomplish this). The use of a second stream zone road will be minimized by not using most of the road which lies within the stream zone and through the construction of a small segment of new road that will create access to an existing mid slope road.

There are two landings that will be used that each have a small amount of area that are within 75 feet of a stream. For that portion of each of these lands that are 15-20 feet inside the stream zone, we will either 1) fence off the area 15-20 feet inside the stream zone and therefore not use that portion of the landing, followed by replanting the fenced off portion of the landing next year, or 2) rock that portion of the landing 15-20 feet inside the stream zone to allow use of the area without creating the threat of sediment for the adjacent stream. The choice between the two options will be made at the time of harvest, based on the time of the year harvested and on site conditions.

As for the ecological characteristics of the area, both we and the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection evaluated this area for Late Succession Forest Stands. We do not believe the area can be considered to be a Late Succession Forest Stand. CDF agreed, in stating "The large trees within the plan area are too scattered to qualify for any late Succession Forest Stand units."

We are managing significant portions of our property to create and manage Late Seral stands. This is most often being done in areas adjacent to streams. This plan contains no harvesting in defined buffers adjacent to class II streams, and is consistent with our objectives to create late seral stands.

To summarize, this plan represents a light harvest, with improvements to our road system that will help reduce sediment, and no harvesting adjacent to the class II streams. On balance, we consider this plan to be sensitive to the habitat that we value on our landscape. If you have any additional questions regarding this plan, please give Bill or myself a call and we can discuss it in further detail.

Sincerely,

Sandy Dean
President
 
Letter from Dr. Hillary Adams