Support your Local Sierra Club

Your local El Paso Group of the Sierra Club asks for a moment of your time to hear a new message, a message of renewal and redirection.

Only a year ago we were asking for help to reduce out huge legal fee debt for fighting TxDot’s “overblown” plan for Transmountain Road. Before that it was a plea for help to fight the reopening of ASARCO. While you responded generously with donations ranging from $10 to $5000, the average was about $20, not enough to make a dent in our $50,000 legal bill. It was ultimately the generosity of Lowerre, Frederick et al, who stopped sending us bills, that is allowing us to move forward with our renewal.
Now, with your votes, we have a new Executive Committee team and a new sense of direction. The defensive battles, which fatigued us and sapped our treasury, have given way to a determination to work on offense, developing inspirational new initiatives.

A few of these ideas are: National Monument status for Otero Mesa (which includes Alamo Mountain), returning the Mexican Wolf to its former territory in Big Bend, more renewable energy for El Paso, rainwater harvesting for El Paso homes, and a glass recycling program for our city.

We realize that many of us Sierrans work locally in single-issue groups on specific areas of our environment. Thank you for your support of those worthy causes. But won’t you help us do some things in the name of the Sierra Club? SC is challenged to “cover the waterfront” of environmental causes. With your contributions and participation we can do almost anything.

But your yearly $39 membership fee is not enough to help us brave those new environmental frontiers! We need your ideas. We need your contributions. If you can’t give time, why not give money, directly to the El Paso Group, for use in El Paso?

Please be generous. This is our only local funding appeal for 2014. Let’s think in three or four digits! Perhaps we can raise that $20 average?

Thank you,

Laurence Gibson, Chair
El Paso Group
Rio Grande Chapter
Sierra Club
915 309-5419

The eighth annual 2014 Franklin Mountains Poppies Fest on Castner Range

Saturday, March 29, 2014 from 11:00 am to 3:00 pm at the El Paso Museum of Archaeology at 4301 Transmountain Road.

The Poppies Fest Committee welcomes everyone to this free family fun day which features a
program of nature walks, educational exhibits and demonstrations by local environmental
organizations and wildlife displays include a live socialized wolf from the Wild Spirit Wolf
Sanctuary and Houdini the Harris Hawk from the El Paso Zoo at 11:00 am. A children’s activity center will offer a variety of arts and crafts led by local community members including Girl Scouts. Local performing groups will provide music and dance. Local vendors will be offering original and hand-made merchandise for sale. Lunch and snacks can be purchased from food vendors on-site.

Free parking will be off-site with handicapped accessible shuttle bus service provided from 9:30 am to 4:30 pm, funded by the City of El Paso Museums and Cultural Affairs Department.

The Poppies Fest celebrates the marvelous open space in Northeast El Paso where the 15 acre grounds of the El Paso Museum of Archaeology are surrounded by the 7,000+ acre Castner Range, a former artillery range known for its unique cultural, geologic and biologic features. If the rain and weather cooperate, it is most known for its beautiful and vast display of Mexican Gold Poppies in the spring.

Information: Marilyn Guida, 915-755-4332, guidamr@elpasotexas.go

Happy New Year from the Franklin Mountains State Park

All of us here at Franklin Mountains State Park wish everyone a Happy New Year and look forward to seeing many of you out in the park and on the trails throughout the year.  We had a great start with about 70 people and 20 dogs enjoying a beautiful New Year’s Day for our “First Day Hike” up to Mundys Gap.  Our first Women’s Hike of 2014 also saw a record setting 35 ladies on January 5th as we set out on the Maze Trail!  We have many more hikes and programs coming to you over the course of the year; below, take a peek at the upcoming events through the end of March:

• Mon., January 20:  11:00 a.m. MLK Day Volunteer Celebration – Potluck & Service Project
• Saturday., February 1 :  “12 Hours of Old El Paso” - Mountain Bike Race
• Sun., February 2:  7:00 a.m. – Peak Fitness Hike – Ron Coleman Trail (carpooling necessary)
• Sun., February 9:  9:00 a.m. – Sweetheart Hike – Aztec Caves
• Sat., February 22:  9:00 a.m. – Womens Only hike – Lower Sunset
• Sat., March 1 : 7:30 a.m. “Green Tea at the Peak” – N. Franklin Peak
• Sun., March 2:  9:00 a.m. “Bark in the Park” hike
• Sat., March 15:  9:00 a.m.  St. Patty’s Beginner’s MTB ride
• Sun., March 16:  8:00 a.m.  Jack Rabbit Foot Race
• Thurs., March 20:  10:00 a.m. “Spring Fever Hike” - West Cottonwood Springs

Must have reservation to participate. For more information:  (915) 566-6441
or visit:  http://www.tpwd.state.tx.us/state-parks/franklin-mountains/park_events

WHAT TO BRING:

For Hikes:  Water, snacks, sturdy hiking shoes/boots, hiking stick, camera, and binoculars!
For Bike rides:  Functional mountain bike, cycling helmet, drinking water and eye protection (sunglasses). We highly recommend that each participant also bring flat repair materials (extra inner tube, plastic tire levers, handheld bicycle pump, etc.), snacks, cycling gloves, cycling shorts, sunscreen, and a backpack or hydration pack (i.e. Camelbak).

If you are interested in being added to the email list to receive the monthly park event flyers, please contact:  Adrianna.weickhardt@tpwd.texas.gov

The Franklin Mountains / Big Bend Connection

by Rick LoBello

Many of you are aware of the change.org petition I created in December to gather support for
convincing the National Park Service to stop plans to build a new Fossil Bone Exhibit in a largely
undeveloped area of the park.  I want to thank all of you for your help and if you have not signed
yet I have an Take Action Page set up at www.iloveparks.com.   Please check it out.  I also want to thank the El Paso Times and KFOX for running stories on this effort.  

I have never written about any connection between the Franklin Mountains and Big Bend and
now is as good a time as any. We are connected to the Big Bend region by many mountain ranges where animals such as mountain lions in the Franklins could very well be connected genetically to lions living in Big bend mountain ranges.  The same can be said about genetic connections to lions living in mountain ranges to the north, west, and south.  Other wide ranging animals such as raptors like the Golden Eagle could also have genetic conditions.  The Franklin Mountain desert ecology has many obvious plant connections as well. When we encourage our friends to visit Big Bend and get involved with conservation issues in the area, we are also encouraging people in El Paso to become active as conservation advocates. Therefore there is a Franklin Mountains Big Bend Connection.

We should be more involved with this area and encourage Big Bend conservation advocates to
support Franklin Mountain conservation efforts too.

Organizations like the Chihuahuan Desert Research Institute (www.cdri.org) have encouraged
scientists and conservationists to work together in this region for years and the Department of the
Interior is working on implementing a new Desert Landscape Conservation Cooperative in the
southwest that includes not only our area and the Bend Bend, but the entire desert region (http://www.usbr.gov/dlcc/).

2014 will be another challenging year for the Franklin Mountains Wilderness Coalition.  I wish
everyone involved in FMWC all the best and would be happy to work with anyone who wants to
help improve the FMWC facebook presence and the website at www.franklinmountains.org.

The Franklin mountain State Park hosts 2nd Annual Happy Tails N’ Trails Event for El Paso Outdoorsy Animal Lovers

Franklin Mountains State Park has been busy this year. In the past few months the park has been affected by heavy rain falls that reshaped the landscapes; staff members have obtained and continue to earn certifications and training and our rangers have been involved with both locally and nationally recognized search and rescue efforts.

High rainfall amounts in September brought flash flooding to a variety of areas within the park resulting in trail and signage damage. However, the outdoors community ultimately answered the call and assisted the park rangers by doing both individual volunteer trail repairs as well as joined us on our “National Make A Difference” day for which we hosted a specific trail rebuilding project for the Mundy’s Gap trail. The focus was on the section which saw an annihilation of the bridge and narrow pathway.

Avid hikers who frequent the park weekly shared their accolades with staff members and remarked on the caliber of work and repair of that section of trail. We are very grateful to all of the volunteers who were a part of the concerted efforts of providing some much needed TLC to our park.

The 2nd Annual Happy Tails n’ Happy Trails event on November 2nd  was a tail waggin' success. This adoption fair/doggie play day in the park saw almost 50 dogs including 6 dogs that are up for adoption from the Animal Rescue League. One of the highlights of the day was that Bender, one of the adoption
dogs, may have gotten a new forever home!

Over 35 people came out with their pooches big and small to enjoy a beautiful day out in the Franklin Mountains State Park. With ranger led presentations on hiking safety, free dog obedience courses and training tips, free treats, ranger led "Bark in the Park" hike, raffles and much more, everyone gained some valuable information and prizes and left with wonderful memories. Thanks to all of the organizations who joined us for the event and offered prizes for the raffle.

The park events schedule is available on: The TPWD calendar of events under Franklin Mountains State Park; the Franklin Mountains SP Facebook page; the El Paso Hikers Group on Meetup.com; and in the El Paso Scene.

Upcoming events to look forward to in December include: Christmas Hikes to the Mines, Womens Only hikes, Peak Fitness challenge hikes, and more. Remember New Years is just around the corner, too, and we’ll be hosting our popular New Years Day hike again on January 1st.

We look forward to seeing you out on the trails!

Volunteer Coordinator Positions Now Open for the 2014 Poppies Fest

The Poppies Fest is a celebration of not only the beautiful poppies that bloom in Northeast El Paso in the spring, but also the wonderful open landscape and views of the Franklin Mountains in the Northeast.  Currently this land is being kept in its natural state because it is part of the Fort Bliss Castner Range – but that might not last forever.

The Poppies Fest is a reminder to our community to work together to keep the beautiful open views and natural habitat of Castner Range - now and forever.

The Poppies Fest date will be sometime in either March or April 2014. It takes place on the grounds of the El Paso Museum of Archaeology.  Volunteer and be part of the decision on the date and the plans for this great community event. The following positions are available:

 - Transportation Coordinator
 - Parking Coordinator
 - Exhibitor/Vendor Coordinator
 - Social Media Coordinator
 - Volunteer Coordinator
 - Recycling & Trash Coordinator

If you can make a commitment to take on one of these volunteer coordinator positions, or if you want to volunteer for the event in some other way, please contact Marilyn Guida at GuidaMR@elpasotexas.gov or by calling 915-755-4332.

Public Meetings for Projects that have Important Implications for Rio Bosque Wetlands Park

In May, the Texas Department of Transportation began its Border Highway East Study, intended to look at transportation improvements along the border in southeast El Paso County.  The most significant facility being looked at in this study is a proposed new highway extending from the Zaragoza International Port of Entry to the Tornillo-Guadalupe International Port of Entry.

Initially, four alternative alignments have been presented for this highway.  They are displayed on the attached “BHE Constraints north” map.  Immediately east of Rio Bosque Wetlands Park, all four alignments are identical:  They parallel the Riverside Canal on the opposite side of the canal from the park. 

From the inception of the wetlands project at Rio Bosque, one of our main goals has been to establish a new entrance to the park from Socorro Road.  It would be at the park’s southeast corner, where the visitor center is located.  The planned new entrance would provide direct, convenient access off Socorro Road and directly link Rio Bosque with the Mission Trail.  Over the past several years, working in coordination with El Paso County Water Improvement District #1, we have been finalizing plans for the new entrance.  It would include:

• A short entrance road from Socorro Road
• Parking area
• New footbridge crossing the Riverside Canal, and
• Walkways leading from the parking area to the footbridge and from the footbridge to the park’s   existing Bosque Trail and visitor center. 

The four alternative alignments for the highway all go right through the area proposed for this new entrance.

The upcoming meetings will be in an open-house, come-and-go format.  You’ll have a chance to view the maps, discuss the study with project planners, and offer you views, ideas and concerns. 

Tues. 19 November (

4 p.m. – 7 p.m.)

Socorro High School Cafeteria

10150 Alameda Ave., Socorro, TX

or

Wed. 20 November (4 p.m. – 7 p.m.)

Rio Valle Women’s Club

521 Mike Maros, Fabens, TX 

View the map here.