The fight to preserve Mare Island
I recently had the privilege to visit Mare Island Preserve and become acquainted with a place I had previously only seen from afar, crossing the bridge. I was taken with the natural beauty, natural and historical significance, unique geographic location, and recent history of community advocacy that this place holds. What an amazing story, and an amazing opportunity we have right now to do something truly great for the city of Vallejo and future generations of Bay Area residents. I hope every single city council member will throw their complete support behind protecting all open space on Mare Island for wildlife and the community, and reinstate the Mare Island Heritage Trust as caretakers of Mare Island Preserve.
There are only rare tracts of undeveloped shoreline that can still be preserved for the health of the bay and the health and wellness of Bay Area residents who can spend time in these places. Mare Island Preserve is one of them. At Mare Island we find precious wildland, including a blue heron rookery, mixed with U.S. history. It is a wonderful, unique outdoor classroom for our young people.
Unlike the Public Works Department which is unequipped to run a park, the Mare Island Heritage Trust grew out of decades of community organizers working together with great intention, transparency, dedication, vision, and volunteer involvement to do something great for the community. This is a shining example of what a community of dedicated, passionate people can do with and for one another and their city when they come together and act in alignment with sustainability during a moment when we are all forced to think about the future of our world and how we live protecting as much as possible the precious-beyonddollars natural habitat that remains.
Developers should not be tasked with leading the community input process about what happens to Mare Island because of their bias towards certain final outcomes that profit developers, not the needs of the natural and human community. We must clamor for a different mechanism fully removed from the control and management of the developers to actively involve the community in the Specific Plan Update process and other decisions about the future of the Mare Island Preserve. This is only democratically fair in order for the process to be truly transparent and accountable to the community.