Eugene weekly., July 01, 2004, Page 12, Image 12

grassroots group, a business and the city. The
Greenway Committee provides most of the
volunteers, the Lane County Fair Board pro-
vides irrigation and some of the plants for the
project, and the Eugene Stream Team
donates additional plant material.
The most important factor for the success
of the project, says Fair Board Managing
Director Warren Wong, is volunteerism. Last
November, about a dozen community mem-
bers came out for the first planting of the
creek’s north bank. Fair Board staff planted
trees to protect the native plants and shade
the creek while adding aesthetic value by
blocking the back side of the fairground from
neighbors. Volunteers from the neighbor-
hood, the Eugene Stream Team, and Looking
Glass Youth and Family Services removed
blackberries and planted native species.
“This has, frankly, been a dream of mine
for a long time,” says Belcher, who is a GIS
data services specialist for the Forest Service
as well as a Eugene planning commissioner.
“It’s an incredible opportunity to bring the
environment to downtown. We’re actually
starting to do something about it instead of
just talking about it. I’m jazzed.”
HENDRICKS PARK
John Moriarty and Ginny Alfriend can’t
walk through Hendricks Park without stop-
ping every few yards to pull up weeds.
“Once you get to know these invasive plants,
you’ll never enjoy a guilt-free walk through
the woods,” jokes Moriarty, his hands full of
a weed called Herb Robert (or, as he affec-
tionately refers to it, “Stinky Bob”).
“You become obsessive,” adds Alfriend,
piling up fistfuls of ivy along a sun-dappled
park trail. “We have some serious problems
here, and they’re just getting worse.”
tion programs.
Duckett claims that local efforts have pre-
served the genes of more than 90 native
plants. “We’ve started a groundswell in the
Willamette Valley in working with native
prairie and upland species,” he says. “We
have probably the most aggressive native
seed program in the state.”
But Pringle cites the Chamber of
Commerce and developers as the groups
most actively opposing restoration projects.
“They have a very different view, which is,
‘How can I make as much money as possi-
ble?’” Industry isn’t the only group to
blame, adds Pringle. Citizens who say they
care, but do nothing to volunteer, are also
responsible for ecological degradation in
Eugene. “People who aren’t part of the solu-
tion are part of the problem right now,” he
says.
HOPE FROM DESPAIR
MOUNT PISGAH
organization. The city contracts crew mem-
bers from the Walama Restoration Project
and the Northwest Youth Corps to clear inva-
sive species from the forest floor, and FHP
volunteers contribute to the effort. In just
three years, volunteers and crew members
have cleared 16 acres of ivy, encouraging the
growth of native plants. “There wouldn’t be
a forest management plan unless there had
been citizen activism driving the effort,” says
Moriarty. “And the city reacted to it really
well.”
Public education seems to be making a
difference. Little piles of ivy on the sides of
restore the landscape to its pre-development
integrity. Lorna Baldwin, Eugene Stream
Team’s environmental volunteer coordinator,
acknowledges that restoration is probably a
misnomer. “When you say ‘restore,’ restore
to what?” she asks, deadpan.
Nothing short of a mass exodus from
Eugene, coupled with the tearing up of roads
and houses and intensive ecological rehabili-
tation, could restore the area’s native habitats
in all their integrity. Rather than reverting
Eugene open spaces to their historical states,
local restoration projects are primarily edu-
cational. They involve community members
On June 20, the most recent volunteer day
at the FBP nursery, FBP Stewardship
Assistant Hal Hushbeck stood alone in the
nursery under the bright sun, waiting in vain
for volunteers. Hushbeck, a 58-year-old
environmentalist whose shaggy gray hair
frames a handsome, sun-bronzed face, waf-
fles between cynicism and hope.
“The effectiveness of restoration in the
long run is dependent upon the community’s
willingness to sustain it — either with money
or with volunteers — in relation to everything
else that needs to be done,” he says. “You have
to recognize that any restoration is a demon-
stration project that has little chance of being
applied across the whole society.”
Restoration sets a hopeful example when
people show up, says Hushbeck, and some-
Rather than reverting Eugene open spaces to their historical states,
local restoration projects are primarily educational.
Moriarty, the forest management coordi-
nator, and Alfriend, the acting-in-capacity
gardener, are paid by the city of Eugene to
oversee the ecological management of
Hendricks Park. The 80-acre park — the old-
est public space in the city, founded in 1905
— used to be a stretch of prairie and savan-
na, historically maintained with intentional
fires set by Kalapuya Native Americans. But
nearly a decade of fire suppression and near-
by development allowed Douglas fir trees
and English ivy to take over the forest, chok-
ing out the native oaks and prairie vegeta-
tion. The gravity of the situation incited the
city to action.
In 2000, the city’s Public Works
Department released the Hendricks Park
Forest Management Plan, which called for
the removal of invasive vegetation
throughout the park and a shift toward an
oak-pine ecosystem. The plan inspired a
group of neighbors to form a nonprofit cor-
poration called Friends of Hendricks Park
(FHP).
“When people started learning about the
forest management plan, it spurred people to
become involved,” says Fred Austin, a
founding member and treasurer of FHP.
About 250 households, most of them neigh-
boring the park, are dues-paying members of
the organization. FHP collaborates with the
city, operating in tandem with municipal
employees like Alfriend and Moriarty. FHP
is the primary sponsor of a native plant gar-
den, but the city matches funds raised by the
12 JULY 1, 2004
the trail indicate that concerned park users
have been pulling out invasive plants. “It
takes everybody being involved,” says
Alfriend. “After we started educating people
about ivy removal, ivy started disappearing
from lawns all over town. It has effects
beyond the borders of Hendricks Park.”
The headway made by volunteers and
crew members is encouraging, but restora-
tion in Hendricks is a continuous effort, and
the forest will never be as healthy as it was a
century ago. Fragmentation breaks up
wildlife habitat and makes it difficult for a
self-sustaining ecosystem to establish. “It’s
not really an intact forest,” says Moriarty.
“It’s nothing but edge, really. Our efforts are
management, not control. We don’t have any
illusions that one day it’ll be perfect.”
A delighted dog scampers up to Moriarty,
tail wagging. It has no leash — an illegal
offense in Hendricks. The dog’s owner, see-
ing Moriarty and Alfriend, turns around and
walks briskly away. “You’re under arrest!”
Moriarty jokingly tells the dog.
Alfriend smiles. “Here we are in the mid-
dle of town, and it’s quiet,” she says with a
sigh. “I think it’s important to have this kind of
sanctuary. It’s nice to go to a place where the
loudest things are the birds and the wind.”
RESOUNDING ISSUES
The term “restoration” suggests a return
to a state of the past — and yet none of the
restoration efforts summarized here can
and link diverse groups with common goals,
demonstrating what can be done within the
limitations of our urban environment.
Pringle is trying to make an example of
his work along the Amazon. “I’m not just
sticking plants in the ground; I’m doing an
installation,” he says. “I have constraints, but
within those constraints, I’m trying to create
something very beautiful here. I believe in
my heart that a nice, peaceful setting has a lot
of health and mental benefits. If we make the
choice to destroy the whole place, at least we
should at least see the beauty first.”
Pringle laments that Eugene’s restoration
efforts lag behind those of other Oregon
cities. “We have this green reputation, but
when people from out of town come in and
see the Amazon, they think we’re not walk-
ing the walk,” says Pringle. “Eugene has
drifted toward being a larger Springfield.
After Ashland, Corvallis, and Portland, I
think we’re running about fourth in terms of
communities wanting livability.”
The city of Eugene’s natural resource
manager, Scott Duckett, disagrees. “To be
quite honest, Eugene serves as a model for
most of those communities in terms of
restoration projects,” he says. For example,
in mid-June Eugene hosted the Willamette
Restoration Initiative, during which munici-
pal employees from all over Oregon came to
Eugene to learn from our local successes in
natural restoration. Duckett says that
Portland city staff members often contact the
municipal Eugene staff for advice on restora-
times as many as 20 volunteers attend FBP’s
volunteer events. But when nobody comes,
he says, “you rationalize it. It’s a brain-fry in
the summer, and in the winter it can be diffi-
cult to get up in the dark and go to work.”
Restoration labor isn’t easy. “It saps a lot
of strength. It’s a lot of physical work,” says
Hushbeck, absently scratching a muscular
forearm with cracked fingernails. Seeing the
destruction of local habitats also discourages
Hushbeck. “We’re ruining more than we’re
actually repairing,” he says. “That’s where
that despair or cynicism comes in.”
Despite its frustrations, local restoration
work has undeniable rewards. It involves
community members and students, it edu-
cates people about native and invasive
species, and it raises the personal investment
in our local natural heritage. Successful proj-
ects send the message that restoration work
makes a difference in terms of local aesthet-
ics and wildlife habitat. They also boost the
local economy by investing in irrigation
equipment rentals, landscape maintenance
supplies, and garden suppliers. Nonprofit
nurseries build a local seed base that
preserve genetic variations unique to Lane
County.
And, says Hushbeck, working with natu-
ral elements is good for inner peace. “People
feel real clear about this work in that it’s hon-
est, valuable outdoor work,” he says.
“Volunteering builds a community mindset
that everyone has a responsibility. That’s the
faith that we’re working on.”
ew