Last Largest Unprotected Ancient Redwood Forest In the World Now Being Logged: Community Appeals to Pacific Lumber President Robert Manne
A group of concerned local citizens and environmental groups have written to Pacific Lumber asking the company to suspend logging in an ancient forest until the community can raise the funds to buy a grove they consider priceless. (read more)


North Coast Earth First!
The Fern Gully tree-village is still up and running, as we move through the summer of 2005. Fern Gully, located in the Freshwater Creek watershed, is home to several old-growth redwoods, endangered plants and animals, and several tree-sitters. The spirit of non-violent civil disobedience and direct action lives on! (read more)


Judge to Strike Down Maxxam's Logging Plan: EPIC Victory Close at Hand

	Headwaters Forest Photo: Dean Rimmerman

"This is extortion!" exclaimed Cecelia Lanman, former Programs Director of EPIC, in February 1999. She was quickly escorted from the California State Capitol, and the legislature called its first vote on the infamous Headwaters Deal. It failed. After missing its legal deadline to pass the bill, the legislature "stopped the clock" at midnight, and Maxxam Corporation's lobbyists scurried to the hallways to secure the additional votes it needed. A second vote passed the Headwaters Deal into law, seeming to seal the fate of more than 210,000 acres of land. (read more)


Holding Vigil in an Ancient Redwood

Remedy in an Ancient Redwood named Jerry Photo: The Source

TIMBER WAR ESCALATES (read more)


Pacific Lumber violates court order to cease logging operations
On August 29, 2002, the California Superior Court issued a ?stay? on all Pacific Lumber logging operations that are authorized under the infamous Headwaters Deal, finding the ruling necessary to ?serve the public interest?in careful management of natural resources such as forests, wildlife habitat, and wildlife.? (read more)


Gypsy Grove Logged by Pacific Lumber
Earth First! activists reported that some time between the second anniversary of Gypsy's death on September 17 and Hallow'een, PL logged the area known as Gypsy Grove, the grove of unharmed ancient trees nearest to the place where Gypsy died. "Branches are piled up and the grove is stumps" said Shunka. "It was like a knife in the guts" to discover the destruction, which may have taken place when Gypsy's legal team was conducting depositions of PL loggers who were present when the activist was killed. (read more)


Timber Harvest Plan Updates
Rainbow Ridge (read more)


A Final Push for Debt for Nature

For six years, the Rose Foundation has worked with other activists to save Headwaters Forest through a Debt for Nature land swap. Debt for Nature means resolving hundreds of millions in pending federal claims against Maxxam in exchange for public title to ancient redwoods and other sensitive habitat in the Headwaters Forest area. Rose has researched and documented the factual and legal basis for FDIC and Treasury Department suits against Maxxam and CEO Charles Hurwitz. The suits seek $800+ million restitution for the failure and taxpayer bailout of Maxxam/Hurwitz? Texas Savings and Loan. Maxxam credits Rose with catalyzing the suits. We also led shareholder campaigns for four years to reform Maxxam?s corporate governance and forest management practices. In the most recent campaign (which Maxxam presented as ?a referendum on Debt For Nature?), 80% of the shares outside of Hurwitz? control voted for our resolutions, and almost 50% voted to toss out Maxxam?s Board in favor of our candidates. (read more)


Pacific Law Seeks Justice for Maxxam Victims

We believe that the only way to challenge someone as shrewd and determined as Hurwitz is to systematically track the complex legal and financial system he has created. Drawing on the collective knowledge of the firm?s attorneys and a group of community organizers who have signed on as apprentice attorneys, Pacific Law is litigating a series of lawsuits against Maxxam based on traditional doctrines of common law and free market principles. In the same way that litigation has forced the tobacco industry to begin to pay for its damage to society, our lawsuits have the potential to recover large punitive awards and to alter the way corporate irresponsibility has been accepted as the norm in business management. (read more)


North Coast Earth First! Week of Resistance
On the North Coast, it can feel like we?re stepping back in time. Clearcuts continue to grow, Coho runs diminish and Governor Gray Davis, who has received over $300,000 from the timber industry, continues to stymie meaningful reform of the state?s forestry rules. In response to a system that listens to campaign contributions over public will, North Coast Earth First! organized a Week of Resistance Action Camp to come out of the shadow cast by the Headwaters Deal. (read more)