AB 2494 and JDSF Myths vs Facts

Fact: “While represented as a model of sustainable practices, throughout its history the forest’s health and productivity has been overstated and many environmental harms, downplayed, or ignored outright. This, together with incomplete or otherwise faulty accounting, has led to inflated claims of forest health, and carbon storage. Activities occurring in JDSF also often elevate the risk of destructive wildfire and compromise water quality, with environmental impacts including degrading the habitat of endangered salmon, which are still barely returning following their decimation in earlier eras of logging…Social and cultural harms are often a corollary of greenwashing, as is the case of logging-related damage to archaeological sites and impeding current-day tribal use of the landscape. These issues underpin a far more widespread concern, as Cal Fire is the entity that approves all timber harvest plans throughout the state. Given decades of inertia and conflict with the public and independent experts, the attainment of improved practices would likely require institutional and legislative reforms.” (Mills and O’Brien 2025)

Fact: This bill eliminates the requirement for commercial logging in Demonstration State Forests (put in place in the 1940s). The current law requires State Forests to achieve "maximum sustained production" of timber products, "while giving consideration to values relating to, among other values, recreation, watershed, and wildlife". The bill updates the definition of management for the 21st Century. Here is how the new definition of management reads in the bill:

a) Management means the handling of forest vegetation and soils within state forests, including, but not limited to, demonstration state forests, for biodiversity conservation and wildfire resilience, while supporting durable onsite carbon storage and sequestration, climate mitigation and resiliency goals, equitable forest access, wildlife and fish habitat, recreation opportunities, and compatible research efforts.

(b)Timber harvesting consistent with the definition in subdivision (a) is permissible.

Cal Fire can be held accountable if they don't comply with the new definition of management, which is why the timber industry is fighting so hard to stop this bill.

Logging isn’t the only issue addressed with this bill. One of the core improvements in this bill is the inclusion of language as follows: “(d) It is the policy of the state to respect California Native American tribal sovereignty and to seek opportunities for co-management and integration of local indigenous traditional ecological knowledge in forest management.”

Fact:  This bill does not stop logging in the forest; it retains logging jobs and creates new restoration jobs. A new study finds that restoration-based forest management can create more than 5-times as many direct jobs (e.g. fallers, logging truck drivers), as do today's forest practices – and within the same budget. In addition, the study finds that restoration-based forest management could provide more than 3-times as many total jobs (the combination of direct jobs, plus others such as mechanics, or cooks and waiters providing breakfast to loggers). (Mills 2026) Demonstration Forests represent only 1% of logging industry jobs. Changes in policy for Demonstration Forests do not make a great impact on the overall logging industry.

Fact: This bill provides more secure funding for the current jobs in JDSF. (See “MYTH # 5” below.) This bill does not change current personnel positions.

Fact: In contrast to relying on a volatile timber market, this bill allows for a stable funding source supporting the long-term success of the Demonstration State Forest system. AB 2494 would allow the Demonstration State Forest system to receive funding from the Timber Regulation and Forest Restoration Fund, a 1% tax on all wood products. Any income generated by the Demonstration Forests would go back into that Fund. 

A recent study by Nobel prize-winning environmental analyst Evan Mills found that this bill would stabilize funding of the demonstration state forest system, which routinely operates at a deficit. 

Fact: Much of the timber harvested for restoration purposes would be merchantable, and treating only 3% of the forest each year would generate as much harvest (and thus timber tax).  Moreover, this bill is expected to bring a significant increase in county revenue through ecotourism. In Mendocino County tourism provides nearly 20-times more jobs than logging. Currently, JDSF’s forest maps are deficient, trail signs dilapidated, campgrounds closed and information scarce. Industrial logging routinely limits access, and visual blight discourages recreation. By making recreation a priority instead of an afterthought, this bill could help to create a better visitor experience and in turn, an increase in tourist dollars.

Fact: This bill will increase wildfire resiliency. One of the primary purposes of this bill is to decrease fire risk, such as seen in JDSF when 3000 acres burned in 2008. The bill adds wildfire resilience to the goals of the Demonstration State Forests for the first time and will allow timber harvest to be used as one tool to achieve fire-resilient forests. This bill is supported by the Mendocino Fire District and will improve fire safety in the forest and surrounding neighborhoods.

Fact: This bill allows the management to officially prioritize research instead of commercial logging. This means more resources and focus on research in the forest, with renewed emphasis on 21st-century issues such as restoration, fire-resilience, climate change, and biodiversity.

Fact: The JAG won’t be impacted by the bill aside from empowering it to carry out the new mandate. This bill does not make any changes to personnel or management structure; it only updates the priorities and goals of the forest. 

Fact: The JAG does not have power to make changes to the goals and priorities in JDSF. The bill is necessary because the JAG has demonstrated that it is an inadequate forum to implement statewide changes to an outdated legislative mandate. 

In 2008, when The Campaign to Restore Jackson State Forest settled a lawsuit with Cal Fire, they formed the JAG, consisting of members from every JDSF-related interest group with the goal of allowing public input and influence in the management of JDSF. After five years of work by the JAG, a new plan for managing JDSF was created, by consensus. The Board of Forestry stripped away the bulk of the consensus plan through devastating amendments. The Jackson Advisory Group is just that: an advisory group. It's a great way for locals to get information and provide input relating to the JDSF, but it's not enough for bringing real change to our demonstration forests.

Fact: Carbon cannot be stored in wood products as effectively as it can in living redwood trees, which also store additional carbon in each year they are alive. More than half of a tree’s carbon is mobilized soon after cutting, as limbs and needles decay, increasing to two-thirds through the milling process. According to peer-reviewed scientific publications, only about 15% of the carbon ends up in lumber after subtracting emissions from processing and transport. Many items constructed with redwood (fences, decks, etc.) don’t last nearly long enough to be given credit for meaningful carbon storage. Meanwhile, industries manufacturing other building materials are steadily moving towards net-zero emissions.

Fact: JDSF is storing 10% of the carbon it was storing before logging. The current mandate of "maximum sustainable yield” ensures that it will not grow beyond its current storing capacity. With climate change this number will decrease as forest growth slows. With changes in policy and time JDSF has the potential to someday sequester approaching 150 million tons CO2.

Fact: As documented, the Eastern 40% of the forest was clearcut by the state after taking possession. Some or all growth was removed in at least two other Demonstration State Forests (Boggs and Latour).

Fact: Residents have the right to demand, “Not in my backyard!” when it comes to: 

1. Wildfire-prone clear cuts, slash piles or dense patches of small, flammable trees and invasive plants less than a mile from homes and schools, created by legacy logging in JDSF and in dire need of restoration.

2. The continued use of hack and squirt to kill tan oak trees, which endangers the public through increased fire risk and health concerns. Mendocino County residents banned the use of this practice in 2016 from ballot measure V, but it is still used in JDSF on the basis of their claim that they operate as a “farm” rather than as a “forest.”

3. Destruction of tribal lands, sacred sites and historical sites and landscapes within JDSF.

Fact: JDSF is located in unceded ancestral Northern Pomo and Coast Yuki territory. Governor Newsom has stated, “Co-governance and co-management agreements are important tools for the State to acknowledge and address the historical displacement and dislocation of tribal nations from their ancestral lands, waters, and lifeways.” The Tribal Cogovernance and Comanagement of Ancestral Lands and Waters Act “encourages the California Natural Resources Agency and its departments to enter into meaningful co-management and co-governance agreements for the management of natural resources.” It also acknowledges that "California's Native Americans have always been the stewards of California's land and waters” and that "California's Native Americans have distinct cultural, spiritual, environmental, economic, and public health interests, and hold indigenous traditional knowledge relating to natural systems in California.”

More than 10 tribes support this bill, including the Intertribal Sinkyone Wilderness Council, which is demonstrating its distinct knowledge on the Sinkyone Wilderness Area.  

Tribal elder, activist, and former chairwoman of the Intertribal Sinkyone Wilderness Council, Priscilla Hunter has stated, “The Jackson State Forest managers define sustainability in a manner completely at odds with our indigenous world view. “Sustainability” to them means being able to cut down redwood trees that can live for thousands of years and replant them in order to keep cutting the trees every few decades. The primary motivation for their sustainability model is money and job creation, not for forest health.  In their rush to cut redwood trees, they fail to honor the vital life-giving force of forests that are the very lungs of Mother Earth. Our view of a sustainable forest is a forest that sustains our culture, values and way of life, not one that is managed in order to be cut for profit.”