Vallejo Times-Herald: New legislation aims to increase San Pablo Bay National Wildlife Refuge by 5,658 acres
By Thomas Gase
On Friday U.S. Senator Alex Padilla (D-Calif.), Chair of the Senate Environment and Public Works Subcommittee on Fisheries, Water, and Wildlife, and U.S. Representative John Garamendi (D-Calif.-08) introduced legislation to expand the San Pablo Bay National Wildlife Refuge by approximately 5,658 acres.
The expansion aims to include adjacent baylands owned by the State of California and nonprofit Sonoma Land Trust, with parcels in Solano, Marin and Sonoma counties. Representatives Jared Huffman (D-Calif.-02) and Mike Thompson (D-Calif.-04) are cosponsoring the bill in the House of Representatives.
Padilla secured millions of dollars to support San Pablo Bay. Padilla announced $1.64 million for San Pablo Bay and Mare Island Strait to perform preliminary channel assessments in order to maintain the Mare Island Strait’s authorized width and depth, and to ensure a safe and navigable waterway for current and future economic development of Mare Island and the City of Vallejo.
“The San Pablo Bay National Wildlife Refuge hosts a rich wetland ecosystem and offers numerous recreational activities,” said Padilla. “Expanding the refuge’s boundary by over 5,500 acres would both protect Northern California tidal marshes to support wildlife and advance California’s ambitious conservation goals.”
The $2.3 million he secured in 2023 and 2024 appropriations packages for the Hamilton Airfields Wetlands Restoration project aims to help restore tidal and seasonal wetlands at the former Army airfield on San Pablo Bay in the city of Novato.
“Conserving California’s special places has been a lifelong passion throughout my tenure in the state legislature, as Deputy Secretary of the Interior to President Clinton, and now as a member of Congress representing Solano County. San Pablo Bay is one of those special places,” Garamendi said. “Our bill will help to restore the saltmarshes in San Pablo Bay for future generations. Expanding the National Wildlife Refuge is part of my ongoing work in Congress to support the redevelopment of historic Mare Island for Bay Area residents and visitors alike, while revitalizing its shipbuilding industry.”
The San Pablo Bay National Wildlife Refuge Expansion Act would also direct the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to enter into cooperative agreements with state agencies, like California’s Department of Fish and Wildlife, to manage the federal National Wildlife Refuge and nearby state conservation lands within the San Pablo Bay watershed. As with all National Wildlife Refuges, the legislation ensures that federally owned land within the expanded San Pablo Bay National Wildlife Refuge boundary remain open to the public for outdoor recreation, including hunting and fishing where permitted.
The bill would not affect private land ownership or local land use decisions in any way and prohibits the use of eminent domain by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to expand the National Wildlife Refuge.
The San Pablo Bay National Wildlife Refuge currently encompasses 24,390 acres, much of which is over water. The proposed 5,658-acre expansion aims to increase the National Wildlife Refuge’s acreage by more than 23 percent, supporting President Biden’s “America the Beautiful” National Conservation Goal to protect and conserve at least 30 percent of the lands and waters in the United States by 2030 and Governor Newsom’s similar conservation goal for California.
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