BACH’s Mission Statement

The mission of the Bay Area Coalition for Headwaters (BACH) is to educate and build support in the Bay Area and other urban areas for the preservation of a biologically viable redwood forest. BACH connects local environmentalists with forest activists to preserve the old growth redwood ecosystems, with real solutions for forest workers and communities.

As the rapid destruction of the redwood forest in Humboldt County accelerated after the Maxxam takeover of Pacific Lumber in 1985, it became apparent that greater outreach was needed for forest defense. In 1993, the Bay Area Coalition for Headwaters (BACH) was formed to educate, activate, and mobilize people in the San Francisco Bay Area. BACH was established as a volunteer-driven grassroots project under the sponsorship of the Ecology Center in Berkeley.

What We Do

BACH works in collaboration with grassroots activists and organizations in Northern California who use diverse tactics and strategies to advocate for ecologically sound solutions for the forest ecosystems of California’s north coast.

To fulfill our goals of public education, advocacy and action, BACH’s work includes:

• Media outreach campaigns and activist media trainings
• Activist meetings with films and speakers
• Email action alerts
• Presentations at events and schools
• Informational tabling in the community
• Mobilization for local and regional rallies and participation in public agency process
• Maintenance of informational files and a video loan library on issues of forest preservation campaigns

Since its formation as an adhoc unfunded group, the Bay Area Coalition for Headwaters grew to play a pivotal role in the protracted struggle to save the last vestiges of the verdant coastal redwood forest—which once stretched unbroken from Big Sur to the Oregon border—from desecration by industrial logging practices. BACH’s grassroots organizing focuses on public education and activation, media and outreach campaigns, and creating links between the urban population and the forests.

The Bay Area Coalition for Headwaters has kept its sights set on the Headwaters Forest area, as other organization have come and gone from the campaign landscape. As the lead advocacy organization working with the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) in the long planning process for the portion of Headwaters Forest that achieved protection via the 1999 Headwaters Deal, BACH has been a key player in the process to secure a biologically sound Management Plan for the Headwaters Forest Reserve, now public land overseen by the BLM and state Dept. of Fish and Game.

Though BACH opposed the environmentally disastrous parts of the Headwaters Deal, the transfer of the largest grove of ancient redwoods on the corporate chopping block to public hands, and development of an ecologically sound management plan is a direct result of BACH’s advocacy.

BACH’s principal project areas are:

• Forest Monitoring and Public Education
• Media and Public Relations
• Information Dissemination for Action
• Activist Training and Grassroots Advocacy