San Francisco Baykeeper

Learn about our new algae monitoring program—and our field investigator's deep love of phytoplankton—in this great interview with KCBS Radio: https://www.audacy.com/podcast/kcbs-radio-on-demand-011f4/episodes/local-scientists-are-investigating-an-algal-bloom-poisoning-thousands-of-fish-20e02

via Audacy

Thanks so much to Obsidian Wine Co. for hosting the Rosé for the Bay Sail this weekend aboard the beautiful Schooner Freda B! 🥂

Learn more about the Rosé for the Bay and how it helps support our work defending the Bay: https://baykeeper.org/update/rose-for-the-bay/

Plastic bag waste to landfills has actually *increased* in California since the state passed its bag ban 😡

But as the Los Angeles Times Opinion points out, this is a fixable problem. We're supporting Assemblymember Rebecca Bauer-Kahan's and Senator Catherine Blakespear's to close plastic bag ban loopholes:

Editorial: Yes, California must ban plastic grocery bags — again California’s ban on single-use plastic grocery bags worked. But it inadvertently created a new plastic problem — those supposedly reusable and recyclable thicker bags that simply replaced the thinner versions.

Starting this September, a new FEMA rule ushers in an era of more climate-resilient bridges and buildings, requiring federally funded construction projects to be built to withstand floods. https://buff.ly/3LA5iiW

Photo: evening_tao from FreePik

FEMA Federal Emergency Management Agency
San Francisco Baykeeper

Our science director Jon Rosenfield first petitioned to have the Bay’s imperiled longfin smelt protected in 1992. Now, years later, this tiny silver fish is finally getting federal protection in SF Bay 🐟

“I’m glad that the federal government has finally done what it’s responsible for doing, which is acknowledging that longfin smelt are endangered and working to protect them based on the best available science,” as Rosenfield told the Chronicle

Tiny inhabitant of San Francisco Bay gets federal protection after decades of lobbying Environmentalist says SF Bay ecosystem “disappearing before our eyes” — but there’s a sliver of hope

The Bay’s longfin smelt population has tragically declined by more than 99% since the 1980s. We and our allies have been fighting for years to get this fish the protections it needs to survive.

And now, the hard work paid off! As of this month, longfin smelt are protected under the US Endangered Species Act 🐟

Big thanks to our partners at The Bay Institute Golden State Salmon Association Defenders of Wildlife Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen's Associations Institute for Fisheries Resources

Making Waves at 35: Protecting the Bay’s Fish and Flows - San Francisco Baykeeper In celebration of our 35th year of defending San Francisco Bay, each month we’re sharing significant victories that we've won together. And we’re highlighting how these wins are still making waves today! Protecting the Bay’s Fish and Flows For decades, state and federal agencies have been taki...

📢ACTION ALERT! Radius Recycling (the conveniently rebranded Schnitzer Steel) is at it again — and we need YOUR VOICE to stop this polluter and its cronies from fast-tracking deeply problematic legislation through the state senate.

Sponsored by California’s major metal shredders, SB 1234 would effectively strip agencies of their ability to regulate the industry and unscientifically redefine many of the industry’s toxic emissions as non-hazardous. We can’t let that happen!

👉 Send a letter now to the bill’s sponsor, Senator Ben Allen: bit.ly/stopSB1234

He needs to hear from as many of us as possible to stop this bill and give our communities a fighting chance at a healthy future. Check out woeip.org/schnitzer-fire for more background.

Great articles from KneeDeep Times about sea level rise and climate change action 🌊

Some well-earned accountability for Radius (aka Schnitzer Steel) in Oakland!

The company's been indicted for recklessly handling hazardous waste, which led to the Aug. 9 2023 fire that spewed a plume of dark smoke over Oakland and other parts of the Bay Area.

"DA Price alleges the company and its employees destroyed and concealed evidence and violated several other environmental laws."

The Oaklandside Alameda County District Attorney's Office

West Oakland metal recycling company charged in 2023 scrap fire District Attorney Pamela Price hit Radius Recycling and 2 employees with criminal charges for alleged recklessness, conspiracy, and concealing evidence.

The Bay’s white sturgeon—huge, slow-to-reproduce “living fossils” that have hardly changed over their approximately 200 million years on Earth—are now facing such peril that the state has closed fishing for them while it considers listing the fish as a threatened species, as Guananí Gómez-Van Cortright writes in Bay Nature magazine.

"There is a very strong connection between increasing water development and decline of the white sturgeon," as our science director Jon Rosenfield said. "We need to fix these problems, and if we don’t, we should consider these fish as harbingers of worse outcomes to come from unsustainable water management in California."

Restore the Delta The Bay Institute California Sportfishing Protection Alliance

California May List Ancient, Iconic White Sturgeon as Threatened - Bay Nature They've survived 200 million years without changing much. Now they may be facing extinction in the San Francisco Bay Area.

The Bay Area's first proposed carbon dumping scheme aims to drill an injection well near the Montezuma wetlands, across Suisun Bay from Pittsburg & Antioch.

The transport of dangerously compressed CO2 from fossil fuel facilities would ultimately expand the lifespan of these toxic facilities & put communities at risk.

📣 TAKE ACTION! Join our friends at Food & Water Watch on 7/31 to learn more and sign up to petition in your community!

CA: No CCS in the Bay! Montezuma 101 and Petition Training · Food & Water Watch The Montezuma NorCal Carbon Sequestration Hub is a proposal to build the Bay Area's first carbon dumping scheme — or what industry calls a carbon capture and storage (CCS) project. The project aims to drill an injection well near the Montezuma wetlands, across Suisun Bay from Pittsburg & Antioch. ...

Point Molate has been called "the most beautiful part of SF Bay no one's ever heard of" -- and now it's going to be a park!

Spread the word; we want more people to visit this special place

S.F. Bay waterfront site once slated for 1,200 homes will be turned into park after yearslong fights Following years of legal battles, a scenic shoreline property at Point Molate in Richmond is expected to become a nature park.

Great guide from KQED about how to protect yourself and your dog from harmful algae blooms, which are becoming increasingly common in the Bay.

If you spot an algae bloom, reach out to our pollution hotline: 1-800-KEEP-Bay or baykeeper.org/hotline

https://www.kqed.org/science/1993633/algal-blooms-love-heat-waves-when-is-bay-area-swimming-dangerous-for-humans-and-pets

Algal Blooms Love Heat Waves. When Is Bay Area Swimming Dangerous for Humans and Pets? | KQED As California continues to experience heat waves this summer, officials warn people about harmful algal blooms in lakes, rivers and streams that “can pose a threat to people and pets.”

The simultaneous declines of multiple fish species across the ecosystem—including white sturgeon, Delta smelt, and Chinook salmon—suggest a common threat, and that, as our science director Jon Rosenfield says in this excellent feature in Maven, relates to water 💧

FEATURE: A bigger, older fish gasping for more water: White sturgeon slipping away By Alastair Bland Another fish native to the San Francisco Bay estuary may be joining the queue filing toward extinction. That’s the fear of a coalitio

Baykeeper science director Jon Rosenfield called the new regulations to upgrade infrastructure and control harmful algae a long overdue first step: "We just went through two summers of the bay turning a biblical color of red," Rosenfield said.

P**p and p*e cause algae blooms in S.F. Bay. Water agencies may spend $11 billion to fix the problem The Bay Area’s aging wastewater facilities need major upgrades to help prevent harmful algal blooms. The total cost is estimated at $11 billion.

The plastic industry claims that their new, thicker bags are exempt from the state's plastic bag ban, but most are neither reused nor recycled statewide.

Now, two bills in the legislature will close this loophole: Catherine Blakespear's SB 1053 and Assemblymember Rebecca Bauer-Kahan AB 2236.

If passed, this legislation would prohibit plastic bags from being provided at grocery checkout lanes and ensure plastic film bags are no longer considered “reusable", as Laura Deehan at Environment California and Fiona Hines at CALPIRG write in this great op-ed.

Opinion: Close ‘reusable’ loopholes in California’s plastic bag ban Plastic industry claims that their new, thicker bags are exempt, but most are neither reused nor recycled statewide.

Traditional fireworks can contaminate waterways through falling debris or by falling off boats, as Baykeeper Attorney Nicole Sasaki told the San José Spotlight.

"Tech can't save us, but maybe it can help with fireworks pollution," she said of the new drone show planned for the Fourth of July in Sunnyvale 🎆

Sunnyvale drone show replaces fireworks on Fourth of July - San José Spotlight In the heart of Silicon Valley and the middle of a heat wave, one city is hoping to use new technologies to emulate a classic Fourth of July tradition.

Action alert! 📣 This week, we have two kinds of pollution we need your help keeping an eye out for in the Bay. If you see signs of fireworks pollution (photo 1) OR of red tides (photo 2), please reach out to our pollution hotline: https://baykeeper.org/report-pollution/

Fireworks photo courtesy of our friends at Shark Stewards and red tide thanks to tipster Benjamin Feingold

One of the biggest threats to the Bay is out of sight along its floor--where private companies have been mining sand for over a century.

Sand is a limited natural resource that's being removed from the Bay faster than it's replenished. Mining it unsustainably means there will be less sand to support native creatures, like Dungeness crab, and to shore up areas with severe erosion, like Ocean Beach, increasing the area's vulnerability to sea level rise.

Read more about the importance of the Bay's sand--and what we're doing to protect it--in our update, below!

Photo of Ocean Beach SF from Baykeeper aerial patrol by Robb Most with thanks to LightHawk

Making Waves at 35: Protecting the Bay’s Bottom - San Francisco Baykeeper In celebration of our 35th year of defending San Francisco Bay, each month we’re sharing significant victories that we’ve won together. And we’re highlighting how these wins are still making waves today! Protecting the Bay’s Sand and Sediment One of the biggest threats to the health of San F...

Spoiler alert: the treasure is Bay mud!

Is There Treasure At the Bottom Of San Francisco Bay? | KQED At the bottom of San Francisco Bay and near the Golden Gate Bridge lie dozens of shipwrecks, but their “treasure” isn't conventional.

Great piece from National Geographic about the members of the Dolphin Club San Francisco, who have been braving the waters of the Bay for over a century - featuring longtime Baykeeper board member Diane Walton!

Where to wild swim in San Francisco with the Dolphin Club Members of the historic Dolphin Club have been braving the waters of the San Francisco Bay for over a century. Now, regulars and travellers alike come together against the backdrop of the Golden Gate Bridge to reap the benefits of a bracing dip.

"Mother Nature gave us two good years in a row," Baykeeper science director Jon Rosenfield said of conditions for endangered Chinook salmon and steelhead trout. "We need to rebuild the population that was decimated during the last few drought years."

Instead, agencies are making decisions that continue to harm native fishes 😡

Read more from Alastair Bland at the North Bay Bohemian ⤵️

Chinook Salmon in Hot Water | Bohemian | Sonoma & Napa Counties There may not be tumbleweed blowing through the salty streets of California’s coastal marinas, but the collapse of the state’s Chinook salmon runs has reduced many ports to ghost towns.  At Bodega Bay, Sausalito and other seaside harbors, fishing boats that once targeted the coveted fish have b...

While the climate crisis looms on the horizon, some corporations are using this existential threat as an opportunity to do more harm than good.

A new for-profit project in Solano county is being billed as a "carbon capture" project. But the Montezuma NorCal Carbon Sequestration Hub is actually a carbon-dumping plan that poses significant threats to public health & the environment.

We're working with a coalition of groups to stop the plan and urge officials to invest in real solutions instead.

Check out this op-ed from our friends at Food & Water Watch to learn more: https://www.eastbaytimes.com/2024/02/08/opinion-carbon-capture-in-montezuma-wetlands-is-a-dangerous-investment/

Center for Biological Diversity Asian Pacific Environmental Network (APEN) 350ContraCosta Sunflower Alliance Communities For A Better Environment Climate Action California Oil and Gas Action Network

Photo of a carbon pipeline by Carbon Capture Facts

To honor and celebrate on 6/19 commemorating the ending of slavery in the US, the National Park Service is offering free entrance to more than 400 of its parks. The East Bay Regional Park District will also honor Juneteenth by waiving fees for parks for entry, parking, dogs, horses, boat launching or fishing.

Learn more: https://www.kqed.org/news/11990187/where-to-find-free-national-park-entry-on-juneteenth

Note that the Baykeeper office will be closed for Juneteenth!

Where to Find Free National Park Entry on Juneteenth | KQED To honor and celebrate Juneteenth, the National Parks Service is offering free entrance to more than 400 of its parks in the U.S., including the ones located in and around the Bay Area.

New win for the Bay! 📣

The Phillips 66 oil refinery recently tried to stop treating its wastewater to remove toxic selenium from its discharges into the Bay. But that plan failed.

We urged the Water Board to require selenium treatment until there’s definitive proof that the refinery is no longer polluting the Bay with the contaminant—and they agreed!

Learn more in our June enewsletter: https://baykeeper.org/enews/enewsletter-for-june-2024/

Illustration of a Sacramento splittail suffering from spinal deformities caused by selenium exposure by Fiorella Ikeue Illustration in collaboration with Baykeeper

Check out these beautiful illustrations of Bay fish from Fiorella Ikeue Illustration! 🐟

We recently launched a new community science program to monitor in SF Bay in collaboration with our partners at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) & the San Francisco Estuary Institute / Aquatic Science Center!

We're training community volunteers to detect the spread of harmful algae in the Bay earlier and more precisely. It's part of Baykeeper’s long-term strategy to reduce red tides in the Bay.

Learn more: https://baykeeper.org/enews/enewsletter-for-june-2024/

Photos: Robb Most

ENEWSLETTER FOR JUNE 2024 - San Francisco Baykeeper Turning the Tides on Harmful Algae SFPUC Broke the Law and Now It’s Undermining It Too Oil Refinery’s Selenium Shenanigans Carbon Dumping in Disguise Celebrate the Bay You Love on 9/29! Turning the Tides on Harmful Algae Last week, we launched a community science program to monitor harmful algae...

Research shows that marsh restoration can play a role in reducing flood risk in the Bay pretty substantially, as KneeDeep Times reports 🌊

Marshes Could Save Bay Area Half a Billion Dollars in Floods – KneeDeep Times UCSC scientist Rae Taylor-Burns has assigned marsh restoration projects a dollar value in terms of human assets protected from climate change driven flooding.

Egrets, large and small, are nesting at Alameda's Bay Farm Island (and all over the Bay Area).

Egrets can often be seen foraging together at Crab Cove, Crown Beach, the Elsie Roemer Bird Sanctuary, and Martin Luther King Jr. Regional Shoreline, as Rick Lewis writes for the Alameda Post.

Have you caught a glimpse of these elegant creatures?

Egrets, Large and Small, Nesting in Alameda On Bay Farm Island, a new generation of great egrets and snowy egrets are being raised side-by-side in a phenomenon known as 'colonial nesting.' Rick Lewis shares photos of the youngsters and gives tips for distinguishing the species.