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Butte Environmental Council urges Chico to invest in water, urban canopy and habitat protection
Summary
At the March 19 workshop, the executive director of the Butte Environmental Council asked the council to prioritize funding for water, urban canopy, soils and groundwater-dependent ecosystems and highlighted local salmon runs and regional conservation partnerships as reasons to invest.
Patricia Hieronymus, executive director of the Butte Environmental Council, used the March 19 strategic-planning workshop public-comment period to urge the Chico City Council to prioritize investments in water, urban canopy and habitat protection.
Hieronymus told the council she grew up in Oroville and has returned to lead the local nonprofit. She described recent briefings and field visits with Audubon California and The Nature Conservancy examining inter-basin modeling and groundwater-dependent ecosystems. “I implore you to spend as much as you can investing in what makes Chico special in Butte County,” she said, calling out the city’s tributaries and “one of the last spring run Chinook salmon runs here at Butte Creek.”
She asked council members to consider the municipal budget as a vehicle to fund urban-tree canopy, watershed protection and groundwater-dependent habitat restoration, arguing these are foundational to the community’s long-term resilience and local identity.
Ending: Hieronymus’s remarks were presented as public comment for the strategic-planning process; the issues she raised appear among the workshop’s objectives (wildfire and flood resilience, urban-forest health) and will be available for staff and the consultant to consider in drafting the plan and budget proposals.
