On the cover North Coast Journal

COVER STORY  |  IN THE NEWS   |  ARTBEAT
TALK OF THE TABLE  |  THE HUM  |  CALENDAR

August 3, 2006


Here are all the letters from friends, family and colleagues, unedited and in the order in which they were received between June 31 and Aug. 1, 2006.

A memorial service will be held Sunday, Aug. 13, in the Kate Buchanan Room at Humboldt State University. In lieu of flowers, Tim's family requests donations to the Northcoast Environmental Center.

Info: www.necandeconews.to.

 

The letters:

 

We are deeply saddened and shocked at the death of Tim McKay. His tireless efforts and determination made a difference in improving the quality of all of our lives. Always steadfast of purpose, Tim became an icon of an environmental movement that will never give up the fight for a better future.

Tim carried a heavy load of responsibility. He would not have it any other way. In a world where environmental losses are encountered more often than gains, Tim's sheer force of will and power of presence kept the light burning. Yet, despite Tim's power, there was a deep gentleness of spirit, as evidenced by his love of birds, flowers and children.

Without Tim, those of us who share his passion are going to have to work a little harder to carry on. But we will do this gladly, because every time we see a clean beach, a wild healthy river, clean air over our precious wild places, or the joy of a child learning the names of wildflowers, we can say "Thank you, Tim."

— Dwain Goforth and Suzy Rudofker
Kelseyville, California


Tim McKay was one of the modern pioneers of protecting our precious redwood forests and our overall northcoast environment. He was unafraid to hang out with Earth First!ers or members of the timber industry and opened his doors to all at the Northcoast Environmental Center. My only regret is that I did not take him up on his invitation to speak on our victorious civil rights lawsuit against the FBI on his radio show on KHSU, which normally doesn't have Earth First!ers on the air. He was not afraid to buck the status quo of the environmental movement, the public airwaves or the larger body politic. He is a hero.

Tim was a rock, an institution, a reminder to us that we be unafraid to be who we are in tackling controversial issues and that we keep our hearts open to those who are different from us. He spoke at the first Earth First! rally I ever organized in Humboldt County and remained a friend to our cause to the end. He was a big man, but mostly in heart and mind. Humboldt without Tim will feel emptier, but it is a fuller place because he graced us with his presence. Let's replace the statue of McKinley with that of Tim McKay and rename the whole thing: McKay Plaza. It's got a ring to it and we can even keep the first three letters! Bless you Tim on your journey.

— Darryl Cherney
Earth First!


If it wasn't for Tim and Lucille Vinyard I would not be doing the work I am today.

Tim was one of the people I most looked up to when I got started in this work as a volunteer for Redwood Alliance, the NEC and the Sierra Club in 1979. His intelligence and effectiveness was only matched by his openness and welcoming encouragement to new activists. I valued his friendship tremendously. This is an enormous loss for the Northcoast, California and the country. He was absolutely ferocious when it came to the Northcoast.

On lease sale 53 he all let it all hang out. A friend who was working as a maid in a Eureka hotel cleaned a room Doug Bosco had stayed in and found a copy of Econews with an article Tim had written underlined and annotated all over the place by a clearly angry Congressman. On California Wilderness protection he was wonderful at creating an identity for places few had ever heard about. The Siskiyou Mountain Resources Council, which he helped start, created a constituency for the Siskiyou that led to thousands of acres of amazing wilderness getting protected that may never have made it to the legislative finish line. Tim introduced me to another activist named Sam Camp who wanted to lead an urgent campaign to protect the King Range as wilderness. That was sometime around 1983. The group Tim brought together helped turn out hundreds of people for wilderness hearings before the BLM in Eureka and even Honeydew. It is a testament to Tim's tenacity and encouragement that the King Range wilderness was part of the northern California bill that passed the House a week or so ago, and which with any luck at all will land on the President's desk before long (It passed the Senate earlier this year.) For my money they can name it after Tim McKay and it wouldn't hurt my feelings one bit.

Tim helped organize a demonstration near the G-O road right before the court decision was rendered that stopped the project. We had around 100 or more people camped out there expecting the worst because the judge had called Native American religious leaders "witch doctors" after the government argued their case. We planned to block the bulldozers we expected would immediately begin punching the road through to completion. We left after a week because it was clear that the court's decision would be delayed. After our coalition of Native Americans and environmentalists had a chance to testify, the Judge (The Honorable Stanley Weigel) ruled with us on virtually every point, including Native American religious freedom. Eventually the Supreme Court overruled the religions freedom issues. The fight Tim led on this was ferocious, intelligent (covering a range of water, public lands and religious speech issues) intense (Tim and others prodded our lawyers to court instead of settling the case) involved sophisticated coalition building (fishermen, tribes, etc.), and integrated nationwide media work (National Book Award winner Peter Matthiessen contributed an essay: "Stop the G-O Road" from Audubon, January 1979). Tim did not do this alone - that was not his style - but this fight exemplified his leadership characteristics and strategic skills.

No one loved the Northcoast more or fought for it harder. God, I will miss him!

— Carl Zichella


Regional Staff Director, Sierra Club, California Nevada Hawaii Regional Office, Sacramento

What struck me as much as anything about Tim was his passion for history-what happened that got us to where we are. He had this wonderful overview that wastinged with melancholy, sometimes with humour, and sometimes with indignation. He was so deeply interested in the paths of people and the paths of nature and where they connected. His own vision and strength, in turn, became a nexus, where so many of us connected with each other and more importantly, with world around us. Thank you, Tim.

— Fred and Joyce Neighbor


McKay was a big man with boundless energy who had a huge impact on the North Coast and even the world. Working in his giant shadow for more than 30 years at what was essentially the Tim McKay Environmental Center, I drew inspirationas did almost everyone he touchedfrom his diligence, patience, energy and deep concern for the natural world.

Unlike me, he also showed great tolerance for the foibles of the human speciesand even for his many detractors, who viewed him as the personification of their resentments. He had a broad back for a reason.

Others will comment on the considerable breadth of his knowledge, his tireless energy, his endless compiling of data (from his rain gauge to his bird list), his vast network of contacts, his ability to galvanize public opinion, and his everlasting passion for the cause. "Persistence is victory," he would say, citing the need for "endless pressure endlessly applied." And he proved it, always showing up at meeting after meeting and hearing after hearing, however remote, as well as in his countless articles and radio programs.

But what I marveled at the most was how, in the midst of his mad and constant multi-tasking, he could always take the time to spend a half-hour with someone who just wandered into the center in quest of some answers or referrals. He was a wonderful teacher, full of information that would enliven a subject and stimulate action.

Personally, what I will remember, too, is our enduring friendship, forged not only in our common cause but in such activities as our regular Wednesday night poker game, the Snail Darters softball team and the joy we had in each other's children. I am happy to have known such a powerful person who proved, for decades, that one person can indeed make a difference.

Sid Dominitz,
editor of the ECONEWS for 30 years, until a few months ago.


Tim McKay was an extremely nice person and an inspiration to budding activists. When I joined Western Ancient Forest Campaign in 1992, Tim was a founding board member. He made a newcomer like me feel very welcome with his kind words, positive outlook and patience with dumb questions. The Northcoast is a better place thanks to the efforts of idealists like Tim.

Steve Holmer,
DC-based forest activist who worked with Tim since 1992.


It is with great sadness that the Seventh Generation Fund responds to the information received this morning, that our very beloved friend, longtime ally for environmental justice, and trusted colleague, Tim McKay, has suddenly passed away.

Men such as Tim are few and far in between. His presence of mind and spirit was a consistent and powerful force for environmental and social justice in Humboldt County, and the ripples of his impressive effect in those arenas were felt well beyond our redwood coast. Rarely does a movement have such a consistently strong and dedicated person, who is also such a kind and gentle spirit we were truly blessed and honored to know him, to work with him, to stand with him many times.

Tim was more than a friend to our organization, he was a trusted and longtime companion. We knew Tim and we knew he would make sure that the concerns of Native peoples would not be disenfranchised or marginalized. Tim would call us and he would consult with us. He heard us when no one else would care to. Tim would include Native voices at all levels of the dialogue. We laughed with him, we sat in meetings with him, we emailed back and forth and we spoke on the phone. We often tuned into his radio program on KHSU and will forever associate the line from the opening music for the show, "They paved paradise to put in a parking lot...," with Tim and his work for the natural world.

Upon sight, even across a crowded room, we knew we were not alone in our struggles if Tim was there too. He was a big mountain of a man with a gentleness that was also strong and patient. Tim stood with Native peoples for the salmon and the health of Native cultures and rivers. We trusted and appreciated him. We know in our work that we are now much poorer for having lost him, not only for the work we are still engaged in for the environmental health and justice of our region and Native communities, but for the void we will not be able to fill, that only Tim fills in our memories.

Our sincerest condolences go out to Tim's children, his partner Michelle, the NEC an organization he led so well and to the many communities of peoples and places that he touched with his vision and work. May we all find peace in this sudden and tragic change in our lives and know that solace is found because his work and life positively impacted thousands of lives: forests, rivers, fish, birds, peoples, cultures.

I can imagine Tim at Stone Lagoon, birding and enjoying the North Coast he worked so hard to protect. I imagine his spirit on the wings of the birds he loved, gracing the wind, and reminding us all that whenever the wind touches our faces that Tim remains with us, and that his impact on our lives and the ecosystem to which he committed himself so completely will also endure.

On behalf of the Seventh Generation Fund board and staff, and our family of Indigenous grassroots projects throughout the Americas, I extend our hand of friendship and support to the NEC as it moves through this time of mourning and adjustment. Our thoughts are with you all, and our hearts share your sorrow. As we face a future without Tim's physical presence amongst us, we know he is with us in spirit and we will remember to hold the gifts he gave us over these many years. We are richer for having known Tim and we wish him peace as he travels on to the spirit world, where I am certain he will be embraced by the ancestors and enjoy foreverlasting life.

— Tia Oros Peters
Executive Director, Seventh Generation Fund for Indian Development,
Arcata, Calif.


Yesterday while returning home from a camping trip on the Klamath River,, I thought of how Tim McKay must have felt when they put up the Siskiyou Wilderness boundary sign.He more than anyone was responsible for the establishment of theSiskiyou wilderness. Sunday night I learned of his passing.

I was there with Tim and 300 others when we thought we had to blockade the (Gasquest Orleans (GO) road in 1981. The Supreme Court stopped the GO road and the Siskiyou Wilderness became law.I spent a lot of hours in from the the Coop and at the County fairs on letter writing campagains for the Siskiyou wilderness.pushed for the Siskiyous relentlessly and we logged some DC trips in the process.

Of source there was the Redwood National Park expansion, wild and scenic rivers, USFS Northwest Forest Plan. ...

He was a friend, mentor and tireless advocate of nature and I will miss him

— Mark Andre
Director Environmental Services; past NEC President
City of Arcata


I used to look at birds and think of dinosaurs, the current thinking that the former evolved from the latter.

Hearing about the passing of my friend Tim McKay, a regular poker player and an avid birder, I will never look at birds the same again. Whenever I see a pileated woodpecker perched in the oak outside my house or spot the bright orange western tanager in the persimmon in my front yard or see a Cooper's hawk the last bird Tim saw in this world floating overhead, I'll think of him. He's soaring with the hawks now.

— Mark Dondero, Orleans, CA


Tim was my counter consience during my career with the Forest Service. I could always count on getting the real picture from Tim when I couldn't get it from the Forest Service. It's really too bad the bureaucrats didn't listen closer we would be better off and they wouldn't be justtheir shadows.

— Jill Dondero,
Orleans, CA


Tim was indeed a caring individual. He was a force in trying to protect Humboldt Bay. He participated in the design of studies to better understand the natural resources of the bay. He sometimes took a hard line in discussions about mariculture, industry and activities that he thought might have impacts on the bay's resources. However, he kept and open mind and would give his casual shoulder shrug and a smile if someone had a reasonable argument. He was always polite and a gentleman in our discussions. He was a great believer in the decommissioning of dams. Although he has been a force for the removal of the Klamath Dams and protecting the integrity of the river, he was also a strong ally for fish in the Eel River's Potter Valley diversion discussions.

There was never a free pass for an agency, bureaucrat or elected official if they failed to protect forests, oceans or rivers. He will be missed.

— Jimmy Smith,
Humboldt County Supervisor


I met Tim while serving on the Arcata City Council. When he needed me to lobby on environmental issues, I did.

— Alex Stillman


Tim was very influential in getting me involved in environmental work, and gave me great advice on how to be effective.

Like so many people, I had a strong appreciation for wilderness and the natural world, but I had never become involved or taken an active role in any environmental issues. That changed when my wife and I received a letter in the mail one day, notifying us that a timber harvest plan was being prepared on the steep hillside immediately behind our house in Sunny Brae. We were not simply opposed to logging, but we did have some real concerns about how this logging plan could affect our lives, our house, and our neighborhood.

One of the first things I did was to take this letter down to the Northcoast Environmental Center. I figured that I would walk in and show them the letter, and that they would jump into action and say "What? A timber harvest plan? Here in Arcata? Don't worry, you just go on home and we'll take care of everything."

Of course, that is not what happened. Instead, Tim McKay sat me down and said "Here's what you need to do." From that very first sentence he made it clear that dealing with this issue, as with so many others, would depend upon people like me getting active and getting involved in the process. Tim told me to figure out what my concerns really were, and what I really wanted to accomplish. I shouldn't just try to stop the logging outright if the cutting of trees was not the real issue. If my concern was landsliding and erosion, then I should deal with that. If my concern was noise, nuisance, or logging trucks, then I should deal with those things. Be honest about your goals, and pursue them truthfully.

Tim explained how the timber harvest plan review process works and who the players are. He told me to "engage the process," and work with the agencies and the timber company. Being effective depends upon having good information, and other people will always be your best source. Tim helped me recognize that all of the people on the different sides of an issue are, first and foremost, people, and should be treated with common courtesy and respect. Besides, you limit your own effectiveness if nobody will take your calls.

Tim also cautioned me not to expect easy, overnight solutions, but to be persistent. As the Sunny Brae THP heated up, my wife asked me at one point how much time this whole effort would take. Looking at the Forest Practice Rules, I answered "It looks like the whole THP review process should take about 4 weeks." Instead, it took 2 long years. Tim's advice stuck with me through that whole time, and stays with me today: Get involved and understand the process. Identify your concerns, be honest about your goals, and work towards solutions. Do your research. Deal with people as people. And mostly, be persistent! I believe that Tim's advice was part of the reason that the Sunnybrae/Arcata Neighborhood Alliance was able to be so effective, and to achieve a goal even greater than what we set out to do.

Later, as I began to work alongside Tim through the Healthy Humboldt Coalition, I came to really appreciate his wisdom and the perspective he brought to bear from 30 years of experience.

I also came to enjoy his sense of humor. When I would see him at the NEC, I would sometimes joke "Haven't you finished saving the environment yet?" "Almost." He'd reply. "I might have to work a little late today."

— Mark Lovelace,
President of the Humboldt Watershed Council and
Director of the Sunnybrae/Arcata Neighborhood Alliance


I can't even remember where or when in the early 1970's I first met Tim McKay. It hardly mattersit seems I've known him all my life.

And over the years Tim has roped me into every conceivable environmentalist activity, from the pure pleasures of birding and native plant gardening to the grueling political stuff of letters, meetings, booth-sitting and signature collecting. Not to mention ECONEWS.

So many things have changed as a result of the efforts of the Northcoast Environmental Center over the yearsboth through Tim's direct and indirect influence. But two endeavors stand out for me. The first is the big September beach cleanup (which has been adopted worldwide) that we will again do next month. And the other is the enormously emotional GO Road battle. In dramatically different ways these events have opened people's eyes to the fragility of our local ecosystems. But in very similar ways they have united diverse groups for the common goal of protecting what belongs to all of us.

But it never has been_one_thing_for Tim. He was always voraciously seeking out information to squirrel away for the next battle. (Another activist believes that Tim should be cremated with his files because it will take an army to sort them out.) It was the continuous nature of the work, never self-satisfied with "winning" and never discouraged by "losing", but having the willingness to go on and on and on, out of pure love that made Tim great. It was not one specific environmental battle or even the outcome of that one battle that mattered. What mattered was that when everything burned to the ground he didn't miss a beat. Tim and the others just re-created what had been destroyed and planned for even more.

I can only think of that Bertold Brecht quoteand I'm sure I will not be the only one who will think of it with regard to Tim:

There are men who struggle for a day, and they are good.
thre are others who struggle for a year, and they are better.
There are some who struggle for many years, and they are much better.
But there are those who struggle all their livesand these are the indispensible ones.

— Carol Moné Pressnall
Trinidad, CA


Tim McKay brought his intense focus almost all his energy for the past 35 years to elevating the importance we as a society place on wilderness, on public lands as habitat, on the value our rivers and streams and oceans and the life they sustain, on how we live our lives in this place, this small part of the planet he referred to as the Klamath-Siskiyou. I feel incredibly fortunate to have known him as my co-worker and friend for nearly three decades.

He connected people, across all our social divides, to have a continuous dialog in our region about environment. Tim talked with everybody, from our elected officials to folks who wandered in off the street, and heard what they had to say. Under his leadership and persistent guidance, we've seen environment go from a marginalized issue far from the public agenda, to a central theme in our public discourse. It's a testament to his success that the North Coast has provided leadership to the state, the nation and the world, and those leaders carry a message that was very close to Tim's heart: this planet is our home, and we must treat it with respect.

He often summarized his political philosophy with the simple phrase, "endless pressure, endlessly applied." He moved issues that were mountains, slowly but surely. I hope we can maintain his persistence, so that we may live to see a free-flowing Klamath, free of dams that have brought the salmon in that huge river system close to extinction, so that we may find our way to a sustainable future, and so that we may expose and tumble the tyrants in our midst. These things Tim would have us do.

Citizenship, participation in the process, and faith in democratic institutions were core to Tim's philosophy. He was there, as a engaged participant in an incredible array of community activities, political campaigns, get-out-the-vote drives, lobbying efforts to change our laws, as well as lawsuits to enforce laws and block the forces of greed from their unfettered exploitation of natural systems for short-term economic gain.

Tim's passing is a tremendous loss, since he was a connector: he had a vast, encylopedic knowledge of conservation and politics and people that he carried with him, and he shared it generously. He always thought of himself as a historian, and continuously collected bits of information that all fit the big picture, the ecology of everything and everyone connected to and dependent upon everything and everyone else. When fire consumed the Northcoast Environmental Center in 2001, it took the news clippings and books Tim had collected over more than 20 years. He immediately started back in to salvaging what he could, and rebuilding the collection with new material.

He was a loving parent, a gentle teacher, a good friend. He was the kind of guy who would leave plenty of apples on the old tree for the birds. He affected my life profoundly, by setting an example of how one person's commitment and persistence really can make a difference in the world. He showed that through collective action we can work wonders, and keep hope alive for a world where all our children and their children for generations to come — may live in harmony with each other and with the thin biosphere that supports life in all its diversity.

— Andy Alm
Arcata, CA


As I recall, I first laid eyes on Tim McKay in the offices occupied by the student government at Humboldt State College sometime during the 1967-68 academic term. He didn't look all that much different from a lot of the male students in the resources programs then bearded, wearing "field clothes" most of the time although he was a pretty large person even then. What was different about Tim was that he straightaway said that the most important issue for him in student affairs, as in life, was the environment. At the time my own coalescing environmental values were not sharply focused, and the clarity of Tim's expression of personal values has turned out, in hindsight, to have been a significant factor in crystallizing my value system around Aldo Leopold's "land ethic."

The NEC came into being after I left Humboldt County for grad school in 1970. I know that from the outset the NEC focused on federal lands, particularly the four National Forests (NF) in northwestern California, and on the agencies that manage them, particularly the USDA Forest Service. This focus was already well developed when I returned to Humboldt County at the end of the 70s. In the early 1980s the NEC's, and Tim's, focus on federal lands led to our mutual involvement in the "spotted owl wars" that eventually led to the Northwest Forest Plan.

There was a relatively small group of northern California conservationists working actively on federal land issues at the time, including Susie Van Kirk of the Sierra Club, Felice Pace of the Marble Mountains Audubon Society, forester Greg Blomstrom, and a bare handful of others (at the time I was the Conservation Chair of the Redwood Region Audubon Society). The NEC was the focal center of our involvement, and Tim was the central focus at the NEC.

In the middle 1980s only three National Forests in the country lacked Land Management Plans, and all three were in northwestern California. When Six Rivers NF resumed its planning process in the middle 80s, the NEC convened a group of interested people to develop a "conservationist" plan alternative. By this time the impacts of federal and management on "old-growth" forests, and on a few wildlife species that were understood scientifically to be associated with conditions that occur in these largely unlogged forestlands, had already become a significant conservation and environmental concern. In addition there were growing indications that a regional or landscape-scale focus was necessary for a variety of ecosystem elements.

The NEC's draft "Green Forest Plan" was submitted to Six Rivers NF in early 1987. It addressed old-growth related wildlife species, regional ecological processes and habitat distributions, biological diversity, fisheries habitat concerns related to declining catches in the region, and several other concerns that were also beginning to show up in parts of Oregon and Washington that shared similar forest ecosystems. This approach was also somewhat new for the NEC, but thereafter an "ecosystem management" focus was common in what we were all doing on federal land issues.

On opportunity to regionalize this approach presented itself in the summer of 1987 when a fire broke out in the Happy Camp Ranger District of Klamath NF. The fire burned for many weeks, ultimately growing to more than 250,000 acres. Of course, the Klamath NF wanted to start the "salvage" as soon as the ground cooled, and looked for ways to streamline that process, such as cutting corners on required National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) reviews. To a person we all thought that this was illegal, but we couldn't find a large environmental organization to carry the suit for us. So, with the assistance of Dave Krueger, a federally admitted lawyer who had never filed a NEPA case, the NEC sued the Forest Service.

The King Fire lawsuit was a significant event for the Klamath bioregion, for the Forest Service, and for all of us who were involved (particularly for Tim, Susie, Dave, Greg, geologist Jude Wait, and me). We spent a lot of time initially looking at burned areas (see accompanying photo), and we learned a lot about fire behavior and fire ecology. We didn't always agree, internally, about what we should ask the Forest Service to do, but we universally agreed that the maintenance of ecosystem processes had to be the primary goal of the Service's land management. So we talked, we read, and we learned.

The Forest Service soon realized that the NEC would win the suit, and agreed to our settlement terms. These included many months of discussions and study sessions with Forest Service technical staff in Happy Camp or Yreka (and a long weekend "retreat" in Medford with several prominent conservation scientists) involving the NEC team, as well as a number of wildlife and conservation-oriented scientists from the Forest Service and from several universities. Ultimately these discussions were instrumental in changing the Klamath NF's overall land management approach, and the Klamath NF Land Management Plan adopted in 1995 included landscape-based conservation biology as a core element.

In the early 1990s the Forest Service crafted and adopted the Northwest Forest Plan to protect old-growth forest ecosystem elements in a regional context. When the Six Rivers NF Land Management Plan was finally adopted in 1995, it was compatible with the Northwest Forest Plan. Some elements of it bore (to my mind) a striking resemblance to parts of the "Green Forest Plan" proposed by the NEC nearly a decade earlier. Yes, Tim McKay was one of the public members of the team who met with the Six Rivers planners to craft the Plan.

Chad Roberts, a consulting conservation ecologist in Davis, the conservation chair of the Yolo Audubon Society, and a former conservation chair of the Redwood Region Audubon Society for more than a decade (mid-1980s to the mid-1990s).

Today, as I took my morning walk on Trinidad Beach and collected litter, my practice took on new meaning. I know that Tim left a deep impression on us as individuals and our region. His impact is immeasurable, but has surely changed our daily habits for now and in the future. We can keep him alive in our hearts by our action to enhance our environment.

— Julie Fulkerson,
Trinidad


Tim MacKay was a big, beautiful bear of a man. He was as comfortable in the natural world as he was in the world of politics. If ever there was a man at home in his own skin it was Tim.

Walked into the NEC for the first time some 33 years ago and felt immediately assured and supported by Timmy urge to do something for the environment. Over the years,kindled and supported that urge in countless others, both young and old.

Timus in so many valiant efforts. He never seemed discouraged by the forces against us. He knew when to find common ground and when to just keep fighting. There is a huge hole in the world where he was.

only hope that his spirit stays with the NEC and helps to guide it through the hard times and the good times ahead.

— Dowdall
Veteran Volunteer


The thing I always liked about Tim was that he epitomized the spontaneous and often ragtag early days of the environmental movement on the north coast.

Idealism was not just a word then, it was our way of life, and for Tim, I don't think that this belief system ever faltered.

I think we mostly thought we were going to change the world a lot faster than has turned out to be the case, and a certain amount of blind faith in constructive social change arose from that shared personal hope and optimism.

Nothing could stop the wisdom of the planet from manifesting itself in the form of a positive political outcome when enough local folks were willing to fight to save a place.

The odds were good that it would ultimately be saved, no matter how large or how powerful the adversary. If not saved every time, then more times than not.

Back when half the oil companies on earth, former Interior Secretaries James Watt and Donald Hodel, and even, for a time, our former First Congressional District congressman thought it would be a good idea to drill offshore from, say, Trinidad Bay, Tim was always out there in his leadership role willing to work day and night to turn out the troops for a giant public hearing to stop the rigs.

There are a lot of miles of the Lost Coast that were not "lost" and are still unsullied, a lot of big trees still standing, and a lot of places that today remain intact because of victories directly attributable to Tim's efforts.

In recent years, I remember talking to Tim on my cell phone from somewhere down along the Avenue of the Giants, the morning after the Northcoast Environmental Center burned down.

He was, naturally, still quite shocked to lose the place, but he clearly knew it was not about the buiding, and he was amazingly optimistic and already evolving a plan to rebuild.

After talking to him on the phone, I sent a check as soon as I got home.

I sit here today in Washington, DC, watching the modern-day vandals and Visigoths now in charge of the US Congress trying their hardest to dismantle our quarter-century of protection from the oil companies along the northern California coast, and I think that the best tribute to Tim's memory is obviously to redouble our commitment to protecting the places, critters, and people he worked so hard to protect.

We all, I have come to think, need to spend more time enjoying that which we have worked to preserve.

I remember reading once about an ancient Tibetan religion that said that your last thought at the moment of passing was how you would spend eternity.

Since none of us can ever know the time of our passing, such a philosophy has always seemed pretty smart to me.

It was very sad to wake up this morning to the word about Tim, but amidst the sorrow, I was glad inside to hear that he was birding.

— Richard Charter
July 31, 2006
Capitol Hill


For me, Tim was at first a lucky break in the weather of my post-college career, though in the end, he was much more.

Whereas most newspaper employers discounted me as too inexperienced to know anything about anything, and in my heart I worried that they might be right, Tim hired me to run the ECONEWS at the green age of 22, fresh from journalism school. For more than thirty years, Tim has gotten behind young people like me and given us a nudge in the right direction, often even walking with us for a while.

In the last week that I knew Tim, I badgered him for articles long overdue that month. It was a dance we both knew too well. Good-humored as ever, he asked for a little faith from his editor. I mustered as much faith as I could.

To trust Tim on faith was simply doing justice to a human who treated members of the next generation as peers, not just as children who wouldn't understand or couldn't learn to handle life's harsher realities.

We also shared a deep respect for pristine places like the Smith and Salmon Rivers and once pristine places, now troubled, such as the Klamath and Eel Rivers. Our urge to defend those places united us in the never-ending fight for ecological integrity.

Tim McKay was a genius with a generous spirit and an unfathomable knowledge and wisdom about complex environmental issues. My time as his mentee and colleague was too short, but I can already see that the connections he cultivated with young people will bear out his life's work through the ebbs and flows of environmental organizing for generations to come.

We will remember him by working together to sustain his vision and by keeping a close eye on the birds that fly by.

In awe and gratitude,

— Erica Terence


As a child growing up in Westhaven Tim McKay has always been a fixture in my life and my community. I knew him not only as the voice of the Econews Report (he just had to be famoushe was on the radio and everything) but also as friend. His activism helped lead me toward an expansive environmental consciousness that served to pull me towards water governance in college.

When I received an email from him, while I was in Scotland, excited about the tribal protests of Scottish Power and asking if I would take pictures, I had no way to know the influence he would have on my life in the next years. I obliged an old friend and when I returned home with a Masters in International Water Law and very few job prospects it took Tim very little time to convince me to start volunteering on Klamath River issues. He quickly immersed me in thick of the TMDL hearings, the PacifiCorp relicensing of the Klamath dams, protests, tabling. The depth of his knowledge on the issues was incredible and the confidence that he had in me was an honor.

In January he recommended that College of the Redwoods hire me as an adjunct Professor in environmental ethics and while I had doubts about my ability to take on the class, Tim never did. I found that I have a true passion for teaching and I will forever be indebted to Tim who as a mentor provided more inspiration and wisdom for me than I knew. His legacy in our community will be felt in many waysone is in the encouragement, inspiration and support he gave to me and so many other young people searching for their place in the environmental movement. His spirit and dedication will live on through our actions and deeds.

— Anna Schulz


I first met Tim McKay in 1987 when I was 19 years old and starting my first semester at College of the Redwoods. Being an outdoorsy type from Mendocino County, I had a passionate calling to do something useful for North Coast conservation, but I didn't really know where to start. I'd heard of the NEC and Tim through Econews and, like a lot of people before me, I just dropped in one day and got into a long conversation with Tim about our National Forests and BLM lands. His sense of humor, dedication and encyclopedic knowledge had me hooked. In short order I was volunteering at the NEC and came to revere Tim almost like a father. There must have been hundreds of people like me, young, old, and in between, who were inspired by Tim's example. Nineteen years later, in no small part due to Tim's early influence, I'm still trying to do something useful for conservation.

I last spoke to Tim on July 27. He called to express his joy over the progress of Representative Mike Thompson's wilderness bill, which will hopefully be signed into law soon. He was particularly thrilled that much of the Blue Creek watershedan important tributary of the Klamath Riverwould receive wilderness protection.

True to form, he ended the call by reminding me that while the wilderness bill is a tremendous step forward, "We still have a long way to go" to protect the North Coast's wild lands. He was not a man to rest on his laurels, or to tolerate such behavior in people like me.

I will miss him very much.

— Ryan Henson
Policy Director
California Wilderness Coalition


I remember Tim from the days the NEC shared space with a backpacking and bicycling shop. The first Econews I saw was not a newspaper, but was more of a mimeo sheet.

Many people will think of Tim as an activist, but this is not how I valued him. He was an administrator when we badly needed administration. He not only put together the NEC, he held it together, and in a world of hippies, students, and other unemployed idealists this was invaluable. It was key to establishing the strength and integrity of the environmental movement on the North Coast. my point of view he also helped establish the environmental groups in southern Humboldt County. This is because the high-handed NEC solicited funds down here claiming they were our environmental group, yet we, not they, were doing all the work on our issues. Such a challenge could not go unanswered, and it is part of the reason I incorporated EPIC. Recently when EPIC moved to Eureka I asked Tim how he felt about the turn-about. He was not too happy!

Of course, we all admire and respect Tim deeply, and have long worked well with him. And if I say his successor will have big shoes to fill, most folks will realize this is not at all a joke.

— The man who walks in the woods,
Ettersburg, 31 July 2006


Tim McKay was a tireless champion of the environment. For 35 years he educated, litigated and pleaded on behalf of the natural world. His efforts sprung from his deep love of the birds, fish, reptiles, trees, rivers, oceans and people of this lovely portion of our beleaguered planet we call home. Often opposed by corporate interests with much more power and money, Tim persevered with amazing humor and grace. As we experience killer heat waves, raging wild fires, fish die offs and melting ice caps, his prescience is clear. The North Coast has lost an incredible advocate and a wonderful human being.

— Damon Maguire
McKinleyville


My children I havelot ofmemories ofThanksgivings other occasionsTim. We also hiked the Trinity Alps the Marble Mountains with "Mountain Man Tim" where he could name all the various trees and plants.wouldtake the same trail back down the mountain but rather made his own trail through the brush trees. He is aloss to our community will be greatly missed!

— Karole Ely


When Tim called me late this past Friday afternoon, he chided me for being out of the office early (though it was well into the Eureka rush half-hour). And I had to give him credit. He'd called to compare notes on one of the latest Forest Service atrocities. The Six Rivers national forest had just gone ahead and built that road into the Underwood roadless area that we'd opposed for years. There was lightning, you see, and a fire, so it was an emergency. But the environmental analysis they'd stalled so long that would be out next week, for certain, they said (and so it is). So now we have a nice, fat, pointless EIS, and a new road for SPI to use, and a half-dozen bulldozers in the roadless area. Sweet.

All the same, it was good to be talking to Tim about it. If nothing else, it let us be annoyed with the Forest Service instead of each other. Again, you have to give the man his due more than two decades of being annoyed by EPIC staffers, and he was still putting it out there, even after I'd annoyed him only the week before (by being less annoyed than Tim, at a different minor atrocity go figure).

So we talked about fires and fish, and the unseemly necessity of using tragedies like this to illuminate the destruction, too often invisible, that rushes around us. Well, okay, we didn't actually talk about it like that. But the man knew a thing or two about tragedy and publicity. That iconic photograph of the 2002 Klamath Fish Kill. The bumpersticker you know the one "Save the Klamath Salmon" with the river and mountain border, the one that has become the bioregion's unofficial flag.

We didn't talk much about the just-passed North Coast Wilderness bill just then, and I wish I'd made him say more. I know he was especially pleased to get the additions to the Siskiyou Wilderness. And we should give the man his due that's the McKay wilderness, up there to Blue Creek, around Bear Basin Butte.

So there you have it. A force of and for nature, an activist to the end. We'll need a baker's dozen to replace him. Have you signed the petition?

— Scott Greacen
Public Lands Coordinator
EPIC - the environmental protection information center


I first met Tim McKay many years ago at the old NEC office in Arcata. I had long been concerned about the Klamath River's declining water quality and quantity. Having done a fair amount of investigation and observation of the Klamath system, I saw a need for change, but frankly, short of stealing a fighter jet and bombing the Klamath and Trinity dams, I had no clue on how to improve the river. Many people in Humboldt County and most people in the rest of the country had never heard of the Klamath River and were unconcerned with its problems.

I had heard of Tim McKay and the NEC, but at that time I was a part time logger and did not think much of environmentalists. Since I was not doing well getting the public or the government interested in the Klamath problems, I decided to try the NEC.

I remember my first visit to the old NEC office well. Walking in the front door one was immediately struck with a musty, moldy smell. The front room had randomly placed books, clothes and knickknacks for sale. There were large piles of free new and old papers, some dating back to John Muir. There were files full of old papers and journals and randomly placed books-all contributing to the moldy smell. Strange looking people were randomly moving around. Connie Stewart was running around gesturing wildly and talking rapidly. Tim's office in the back room was even more disorganized with huge piles of paper, clippings, books and other long lost treasures piled to the ceiling. Tim was a large, full bearded man who seemed disconnected and not very interested in my detailed (possibly long and boring) Klamath analysis and graphs. The only being in the NEC who seemed to know what he was doing was Tim's dog who was quietly sleeping in the back room. This was the epicenter of the local environmental movement; feared by loggers, developers, etc. My initial impression was that this group was too disorganized to take out the trash let alone cure the Klamath River problems.

Was I ever wrong about Tim and the NEC. In the ensuing years, Tim and I became good friends, and although we disagreed at times, we spent many hours taking guests up the Klamath River and traveling to water meetings. We shared a devotion to the Klamath River. Tim was very bright; he remembered and understood everything I ever told him. He was able to enlist the aid and interest of many people from all walks of life in Klamath issues. I watched in awe as he worked his magic to raise the level of public awareness of the Klamath problems. He commanded respect and admiration from most he came in contact with. He worked tirelessly on finding solutions and bringing diverse groups together to accept those solutions. Tim was a very modest man and would be uncomfortable with these tributes. He would especially be embarrassed by being compared to Harry Truman but he exemplifies my favorite Truman saying: "It is amazing what you can accomplish if you do not care who gets the credit." Tim has done more to help the Klamath River than any person I know and I will miss him.

— Denver Nelson


I approached Tim five or six years back as a naïve, woefully under-informed reporter in over my head on a complicated environmental story. "I don't want to be quoted," he told me off the bat, when I corralled him at the NEC office. After patiently offering background, and giving concise answers to my questions about some fine point of environmental law, he handed me a file: a comprehensive collection of magazine stories, newspaper clippings, pamphlets, government reports and the like, all on that particular subject. "You should find what you need in here," he told me, then returned to the stack of newspapers he'd been reading. He was, as always, working on an ever growing library with cabinets and shelf after shelf filled with paper-stuffed files in the NEC office on 9th Street, archives on everything from abortion, agribusiness and air pollution to waterfowl and water quality.

In the summer of 2001 almost all of those files burned in a conflagration that consumed the whole building. (See Journal cover story, "Up in Smoke: The Arcata Fire," August 2, 2001.) The day after the fire I found Tim and his right hand man Sid Dominitz poking around in the ashes. With firemen were still dousing the last of the embers, Tim and Sid had pulled a charred but still intact file cabinet from the rubble. Tim was obviously in shock, a fair portion of his life had gone into amassing the library that had just gone up in smoke, all those words blowing in the wind, nevertheless he was looking forward, sure some of the contents of that cabinet could be salvaged, that the center could be rebuilt. I saw at that moment that the papers were just a small part of the dream he'd helped build: a center focused on respect for the environment. I knew the phoenix would shake off the ashes and fly again, that the dream would live on just as it will now that Tim is gone. The big man may have died Sunday, but his work will go on.

— Bob Doran,
staff writer, North Coast Journal


My life crossed paths with Tim's even before I arrived on Arcata's shore. My friend John, who lived in Arcata, knew I was interested in and involved with environmental issues, so he mailed copies of the Econews Report to me. I was intrigued by the breadth and depth of Tim's writing ability of the wide variety of environmental issues he reported on. It helped inspire me to decide to come to Humboldt County to check out the environmental activist scene in July of 1991, a year after the renowned Redwood Summer.

I met Tim formally when I was working as a volunteer at the old ACAT public access TV studio in the Judo Hut and he started delivering videos to the station on a wide variety of environmental activism topics to be slotted into the station's TV programming schedule. It was then that I started visiting the NEC and familiarizing myself with the myriad local actions going on around the bioregion.

I had been volunteering as the recording engineer for the old "Native Voices" KHSU radio program, and, around 1997, serendipitously was asked by Katie Whiteside to become the engineer for Tim's long-running "Econews Report." I jumped at the chance to work with him and to become intimately kept up-to-date weekly, on local, regional, and world issues.

Tim had an incredible ability to get at the gist of the interviewee's topic with questions, comments and humor that totally amazed me and inspired me. He had a mile-long knowledge of any topic mentioned and could interpret it successfully for his listeners' edification. I'll especially miss his wry sense of humor, such as when he would tellguest to "stand by" at the beginning of the recording session while we "ran the digits," whichwould jokingly saynow technologically superceded "rolling the tape." Or when he would quote his daughter Laurel's favorite slogan asking, "Why aren't we rioting?" at some outrageous government decision.

Many of his radio programs have been archived and dozens are available for listening on the NEC website: www.yourNEC.org.

— Fred,
KHSU volunteer, engineer for KHSU's Econews Report.


I arrived in Arcata in the spring of 1973 to attend Humboldt State College - I didn't know a soul....as I walked down from the collegehome dorms towards town the first evening I was in Arcata, I passed a rambling home on the corner next to the freeway, logging trucks whizzing by, and saw a beautiful garden, a funny dog and a fellow sitting on the front porch who said "Good evening young lady". So began our 30+ year friendship that spanned the start of the environmental center, the recycling center, Butler Valley Dam, 5th District supervisorial races, G-O Road, Econews deadlines, our children growing up, the NEC burning down and the plans for a new, modern, appropriate home for the NEC. I'll never forget my struggle to decide whether I should move from Humboldt County to Washington, DC - I knew Tim had incredible opportunities to come here and do his environmental work in the nation's capitol. His perspective on why he should stay and why I should go is a conversation I've thought of many times these past 6 years I've been gone. He taught me the importance of being strong and clear when the fight got tough, the value of a sense of humor and the power of knowing the facts. His passion for knowledge, for the simple beauty of the outdoors and the incredible pleasure of sighting everything from a plover to a river otter to a giant redwood is what I will always treasure and remember of Tim.........

— Kate M Krebs,
Executive Director, National Recycling Coalition, Inc.,
Washington, DC


I first met Tim McKay when reapportionment brought me to the North Coast to run for State Senate in 1993. I set up meetings with key community leaders in the county, individuals from across the political spectrum that represented business, local government, education, timber, fishing, and of course, the environment. I had been advised: you did not come to the North Coast to talk about resource issues without sitting down with Tim McKay at the Northcoast Environmental Center. It was a good meeting; Tim helped pull together a group and we met in the old NEC office, in the back room, piled high with newspapers, documents and stacks of Eco News.

He checked me out with a wary eye as we discussed a number of issues: from the coastline to the health of the rivers to his view on timber management on private and public lands. He was well informed, had opinions and a breadth of knowledge that I admired. We definitely connected on wildlife issues: habitat protection for birds and waterfowl. Tim was well known for his love of birding, his expertise as a bona fide Audubon member. In fact, I think it was at a California Waterfowl Dinner that Tim won the door prize a very nice Remington 870 12-gauge shotgun. Whenever we met after that, I always kidded him about that shotgun; did he take it birding or had he finally taken up hunting? He took the good-natured jabbing and gave it back with humor.

Tim was a loyal allay but he was also a very dedicated adversary. I often checked in for his take on resource issues. Most of the time, we found ourselves on the same side. Nevertheless, there were occasions when we disagreed. I supported salvage logging after the Megram Fire on the Six Rivers National Forest. Tim did not. He was not pleased and tried to convince me otherwise. I have books he gave me on historic fire management to prove it.

But we forged a fierce alliance when it came to the state of the Klamath River. After three Cabinet Secretaries came out to open the canal gates and after the Bush administration's Klamath water plan failed and the fish started dying by the tens of thousands, we mobilized action. We worked together. Tim was a visionary. From day one, he understood how the imperiled Klamath would affect the resource and impact the local economy. He led the effort to keep up the pressure and he was a key actor in efforts to restore the Klamath.

We are going to miss him. Tim was my friend and I will miss him.

— Congressman Mike Thompson


First and last, Tim McKay was my friend; always loyal, frequently rough edged and curmudgeonly, but almost always he could make me laugh.

My first memory of Tim was in 1967 (the Summer of Love), when I passed through Arcata as a teenager. There weren't too many environmentalists, progressives or even Democrats in Arcata in those days. Even the students at Humboldt State College back then were mostly conservative. The "hippies" lived in a big house by the old stoplight at 17th Street and Highway 101. I remember it as "The Brown House", although others remember it as "The Gray House".

But it's where I met Tim McKay and John Wooley and other friends who I still know today. Even then they were cooking up ways to get young people involved in the political process to try and make the world a better place. Both Tim and John ran and were elected in the late sixties to lead the student government. No doubt a sign of things to come.

A few years later when I returned to Arcata to attend college (HSC was not yet officially a University), and during the following thirty-seven years, I got to know Tim as a tireless and dedicated activist fighting for our beloved northcoast environment.

In 1972 I remember going to a little office on the first floor of the Arcata Hotel to sign up for the children's crusade to remove Richard Nixon from office with an anti Viet Nam War candidate named Senator George McGovern. There was Tim helping to coordinate our grassroots effort. While we lost that election in a nationwide landslide and we only got rid of Nixon through impeachment, lessons learned locally helped us the following year to defeat the proposed Butler Valley dam at the ballot box, and win many election to come.

The friendships born at the Brown House later spawned the softball team that came to be known as the Northcoast Environmental Center Snail Darters. Tim named the team after that indomitable little fish that stopped a dam in Tennessee. And Tim was the stalwart on a team that mostly just liked to have a good time playing ball, and even let a token politician with questionable softball skills swing the bat (me).

I was present at the birth of the Northcoast Environmental Center as the first Executive Director, but in its early stages it could best be described as having great unfulfilled potential. It was only under Tim's thirty five years of leadership that NEC became what it is today: a nationally recognized and locally vital resource that has constantly brought us back to seeing activism for protecting the environment through the prism of good information and good science.

Tim was a passionate warrior for the fish, the mountains, the rivers and the forests of our beloved northcoast. But lessons learned in the political process taught him to believe that advocacy well grounded in facts will best carry forward what we first know in our hearts to be true.

He was also tenacious. When he made a commitment to something; a friendship, a heartfelt cause, a beloved place or an endangered species, he never relented or let go of that commitment. Every time I talked to Tim I knew I could count on him to express that passion and long term commitment.

But most of all, Tim was my friend and that just can't be replaced.

— Wes Chesbro


I first met Tim in 1991. I was living in Los Angeles and was just becoming involved with national forest protection issues. I don't remember exactly how it came about but I went to Washington DC to lobby during one of those really super big lobby trips. Jim Jontz was in Congress and the Ancient Forest Protection Act had just been introduced. During that week, I met Connie Stewart we became fast friends. It was Connie who ultimately invited me to join the board of American Lands Alliance some years later. We still laugh to this day because we were both vegetarians when we started that lobby week but wound up gustily eating cheeseburgers by the end. We were so frazzled with Jontz urging us on to "go to meetings, more meetings, visit more offices."

Sometime that summer, Tim was having a party and I went up to Arcata to visit Connie and see the forests. That was when I met Tim and Sid. It was very hot and I remember talking to Tim in his backyard. He was sharing his philosophy with me about forest issues. His view was that if the US stopped logging federal forests, then the cut would just move to other countries where there were no environmental laws or very weak ones at best. I hadn't considered that perspective before. In fact, Tim had views on many issues that I hadn't considered before.

Tim was a founding member of WAFC the Western Ancient Forest Campaign. We now go by the name of American Lands Alliance and I am the executive Director. We owe a great many thanks to Tim and the other founding board members who banded together and stood up in Washington DC for the Ancient Forests of the Pacific Northwest and the local groups who work everyday to protect them.

I stayed in touch with Tim all these years. He amazed me because he was always on top of so many issues. He never hesitated to help with the Northern California delegation in any way he could when national forests were concerned. I was a guest on his radio show several times. He worked late, and I would phone him from DC and we would talk about a lot of things from global warming to local politics to his kids.

It is hard to lose a friend.

— Randi Spivak,
Executive Director, American Lands Alliance
Washington, DC


Tim.

Have dealt w/him many times on a number of different levels. As a resident of Arcata. As a councilperson there. As a field representative for Assemblyman Dan Hauser. As a Humboldter...just a citizen on the street. As a friend. As an environmentally conscience friend.

Yes, he could be agreeable. He could be cantankerous. Yet, he had a point of view and was willing to tell you what it was... That is what life is all about. How many of us really....and I mean really....know how to communicate? Whether it is to our spouses, our family, our fellow employees, our friends...whoever. We have trouble with that...don't we? Especially when the issue/topic is controversial. Well, Tim didn't. He has always been able to 'speak the words' whenever necessary/appropriate. He was courteous. Not too rude. A loveable hunk of humanity.

God bless, Tim. I look forward to his quips when I see him again... He was a good fellow and now Heaven is his home. I hope I am good enough to get there.

— Steve Leiker


There are so many fronts on which Tim was committed to putting the environment first. Most probably knew of his work on the Klamath fishery and others on forestry andissues but not many are aware of his efforts to make the NEC's newbe the most environmentallyand politically correcton the northcoast. Tim heard about the "green" or "sustainable" or "high-performance" buildings being designed under the LEED guidelines and knew right away that the NEC's buildingto use that system. The system creates a beautiful indoor space that is healthier for the inhabitants while using local or sustainable building materials, uses less energy and water and produces less waste. Even though the building would cost more he was committed to seeing it get built. When an underground tank surfaced at the site he took it in stride and said, "we must practice what we preach" and ordered the work done to get the site cleaned up. Tim was a leader and a visionary.

We'll miss you Tim.

— Steve Salzman


This truly is a sad day. I'm at a loss for words. The three of you guys impacted my life in more ways then you can know. I remember the first time walking into the old office. Amazed at the history, and massive amount of environmental literature, I felt extremely lucky that I had been given the opportunity to work with the NEC. Why and how a Federal program put me in this position I will never understand, but as you know sometimes things happen that are out of our hands. Today is exactly one of those days. The cast of characters that surrounded Tim and the NEC have been apart of more of my life stories then you can imagine. I feel privileged to have had the opportunity to be apart of the NEC family. What a unique experience those years were. They will last a lifetime and can never be lost.

As far as inspiration; the energy, endurance, and persistence, to work day in and day out, taught me the true meaning of sacrifice. Tim's life work protecting the Northwest has had affects in all areas of the environmental movement. Not a semester has gone by in my studies at Vermont Law School without some mention of the Kalamath River, the Redwoods, or the state of our Oceans and Marine Ecosystems. His work, whether present in today's natural resource practices, is having a significant affect on the environmental legal profession. The Kalamath is now the number one water law case in the United States; all eyes are on his work and dedication.

I will always be thankful that I had the opportunity to share a piece of my life with Tim McKay and the NEC. Today my thoughts and prayer are with his family and friends.

Sincerely,

— Joshua Gorman


Remembrances of Tim

I first met Tim 33 years ago, while I was a student at HSU working toward my teaching credential. I was spending time with one of his room mates, Siddig Kilkenny at the time. I remember being amazed at all he knew even back then, about all of the plants and birds of the area. We started to spend time together, to go backpacking into the local wilderness areas and birding here and in Del Norte County. He saved up his money from working part time as a janitor for Stanton's restaurants so we could have surf and turf at the old Merryman's restaurant for my 21st birthday in 1973.

He was really into taking photos, a love he passed on to our daughter Laurel, and he had thought of doing a dark room in our house in Arcata, the infamous "C Street" house. He documented all of our aspects of our lives together; from trips to the southwest for an incredible flower season in 1978 and to China in the fall of 1979 when we went on the first "natural history tour" with the Audubon society, to the birth of our 2 kids, Laurel and Forrest and their years growing up.

Birding what a fitting activity for him to have been doing when he died it was certainly one of his main enjoyments in life. We predicated on numerous Christmas bird counts (he as the birder, I was the number keeper) even going on ones in Orange County when we were out of town for the holidays. We also participated in Birdathons, where we would sleep in the green Datsun station wagon (which was a car that we got from my folks) and get up in the dark to start owling up above Smith River and end up in Arcata at the redwood forest for varied thrushes at dusk. I remember when I was pregnant with Laurel, and I made he and Gary Lester stop at the Ship-A-Shore for breakfast, a big no-no on a birdathon because it takes precious time away from the "big day". Tim was one the one who first saw the common grackle in Arcata (for a new county record) from our yard and I actually saw him fall off of the front porch of the C street house in excitement when he focused his binoculars on the bird and realized what it was! The word went out amongst birders and within a matter of what seemed like just moments, folks were there to add the bird to their "life" lists. Tim, like all other birders had quite a life list. He would, like any hard core birder, go out of town for a species that he didn't have on his life list yet, such as the kingbird we went to see in Oakland so he could add it.

He was arrested once in Arcata for "turkey at large". He had not paid his ticket/fine for our ducks and turkey getting out of the yard at C street (that was in the days when Arcata actually had a "dog catcher" ) and the Arcata PD actually came on a Friday night and arrested him for that. Fortunately I had cash for some reason, and I was able to bail him out. I remember hearing him yelling at the Arcata PD "Why are you arresting me for my turkey??? Why aren't you finding the guy who stole my power saw?"

In 1976, after living together for a few years and getting married, we left behind the C Street house and we bought the house in Westhaven on 8th Ave. Tim lived in that house until he died. I go into that house now and I can hardly remember living there for 14 years. That our son Forrest was "accidentally" born there, Forrest having decided that he was going to be born now! But I see curtains that I made, the addition that we did, the tree that we planted when Forrest was born, the furniture that I had used as a changing table for the kids, many photos of my kids over varying years and the molding outside of Laurel's bedroom where we measured the kids as they were growing up. I see the apple mint that I mistakenly planted in the yard that still to this day running rampant. The greenhouse that we added to the back of the house and the old apple tree on which we always had to leave some apples, for the birds of course!

I could go on and on about the memories, mostly good. The work we did on getting the Siskiyous's declared wilderness, the NEC plant sale that we started and did for many years, the moving of the NEC into its own building (which we thought at the time we could never use all of that space!) and watching the NEC grow into the amazing organization that it is today, thanks to Tim's hard work. But of course the most important thing to me from Tim was our kids; Laurel and Forrest who have grow up to be truly wonderful, kind and caring individuals.

— Chris Jenican Beresford


In Memory Of Tim McKay - A Larger Than Life Conservation Warrior

I first ran into Tim McKay in a barn in the Illinois Valley 8 years ago where we were meeting as the Klamath-Siskiyou Alliance - a hodgepodge of national and local conservation groups banding together to save this remarkable place. Tim's larger than life persona and his commitment to conservation were part of his grizzly appearance, but deep down inside, I would come to know the man as a kindred spirit with a vision for a better world. Tim's professional life was guided by a noble cause, however, there just wasn't enough time in one person's life to save the many threatened acres, rivers, and salmon even with Tim working tirelessly and passionately. Because of Tim, every time I see salmon breaching a rapid on the Klamath or marvel in the wonders of a cobra lily in some northern California roadless area, I will remember the unstoppable Tim McKay and why we still have the few untrammeled places he fought so hard to protect.

The last time I saw Tim was two years ago at a Mike Thompson field hearing on the Klamath in Arcata. He was excited about how close we were to bringing back the salmon runs on the Klamath and he walked the halls with celebrity status and the notoriety he had deserved. Later, we had a beer at his house and talked about nationalizing Klamath restoration and passing the North Coast Wilderness Act. Tim marveled not in his many accomplishments but the places that still needed protection including his favorite Blue Creek. This sacred Yurok site and the last repudiated account of the California grizzly bear should be Tim's monument to his life-long dedication as codified by the North Coast Wilderness Act. Tim's grizzly persona and the last grizzly location would be a perfect and honorable ending to his life and a reminder that his work will continue as long as there are California activists to follow in his larger-than-life footsteps. Here's to Tim McKay "heaven is a roadless area" your work goes on!

— Dominick A. DellaSala, Ph.D.
Executive Director Conservation Science Policy Programs National Center for Conservation Science Policy
(and Tim's friend!)


I had the honor and privilege to work with Tim on the creation of the Smith River National Recreation Area back in 1990. For years, efforts had been made to protect the Smith River from logging its undammed waters provided habitat for some of the best salmon and steelhead runs in California, but plans to log in the steep canyons of the Smith threatened these fisheries, along with the scenic and recreational values that make the Smith River a special place.

In 1990, the Forest Service proposed developing a national recreation area for the Smith River area. Their proposal was minimal in nature, with little protection offered against logging, mining or other forms of development. The Sierra Club, Smith River Alliance and Northcoast Environmental Center decided to improve the bill, and enlisted the support of Rep. Doug Bosco as their champion.

When it came time to map the proposed protected areas, expansions of the Siskiyou Wilderness, and additions to the Wild and Scenic River System, a small group of us sat down over beers and burritos in the Mexican Restaurant across the street from the Northcoast Environmental Center with a map of the Six Rivers National Forest. Tim was at his best that day. Drawing on his almost encyclopedic knowledge of the forest, Tim took a black felt marker and drew bold lines around the unfragmented watersheds still remaining in the Smith River, added the G-O Road to the Siskiyou Wilderness with a few additional lines, and in the end identified over 300,000 acres for inclusion in the proposed National Recreation Area.

Tim's lines on the map became the basis for the version of the Smith River National Recreation Area Act that Rep. Bosco moved through the House, and Sen. Alan Cranston pushed through the Senate. The bill passed both houses during the last hours of the 101st Congress, with the lines on the map and the additions to the Wilderness and Wild and Scenic Rivers systems substantially the same as the lines drawn by Tim. The map still sits in a vault in Washington, D.C., refererenced by the statute that created and implemented the Smith River National Recreation Area, and part of Tim's legacy to the North Coast.

Bold, knowledgeable and alert to possibilities to protect the Northcoast's environment those features stand out in my mind as I think of Tim and his marker, and the mark he made on the Northcoast during his many years as an activist and leader.

— Jim Owens
The Brainerd Foundation


I first met Tim in 1986, on my way to KHSU-FM where we both volunteered. I normally wore my hair in corn rows but all of my braids were out and I had my hair up in the biggest afro ever seen on the North Coast.

Apparently it made an impression, because Tim often told the story of watching me make my way across campus that day.

Tim was up at the station to record ECONEWS Report, which is the longest running public affairs show on KHSU-FM. Tim would show up at the station with a bag full of clippings and read into the microphone all of the environmental news that affected the Klamath-Siskiyou Bioregion that he could fit into a half hour.

For almost twenty years, once a week North Coast residents could tune in to hear Tim's deep melodic voice ranting on issues on concerns with the passion of an embedded war reporter.

About two years after first meeting Tim, I applied for the job as Office Manager at the Northcoast Environmental Center. I would love to tell you that Tim, who had been the center's Director of eighteen years, hired me because of my impressive resume. The real reason I was picked was because in High School I organized blood drives and Tim had always wanted to give blood but never had taken the time. He became an avid donor for the rest of his life.

My 20-hour a week job was simply to recruit enough volunteers to keep the doors open six days a week, run the small retail and organize a couple of blood drives a year. Over the years as other staff left I picked up their jobs and eventually the NEC became my full-time gig. When asked I would described my role at the NEC as, "I'm Mom and Tim is Dad."

If you walked into the NEC to see Tim, the first image was him sitting behind his desk towering with paper and canvas bags filled with newspapers laying at his feet. To Tim, anything less than clutter would have looked unproductive.

Everyday he would read newspaper after newspaper with a yellow highlighter in hand, marking stories related to the environment. Scores of volunteers would then cut out the clippings and neatly fold them and leave them in piles on his desk. Tim would sit in his chair and shift through them with an intense look on his face. He would put them into stacks, rubber band them together and put a post it note on the top. You could bring up a topic and Tim would immediately say, "last week there was a story. . ." and start rifling through stacks of clippings and within a minute or two would find the article.

Tim read everything. He was the Klamath-Siskiyou Bioregion's environmental historian.

Some of my favorite memories of working at the NEC were jumping in Tim's car with its famous "ECOLOVE" license plate and driving around the bioregion listening to Tim tell stories that gave importance to every feature of the landscape.

At NEC, Tim created a place where just about every personality was welcome. I used to compare the NEC to the eco-version of the T.V. show "Cheers." We had our regularsfolks that would stop by everyday on the way to the post office or the Co-op. Sometimes they would stay a couple of minutes, but sometimes they would get sucked in for hours.

Most of the time the NEC was a happy place to hang out and talk about life. Except for at the end of month. That is when we were putting together our newsletter, the ECONEWS, and Tim's articles were always late. Tim turned procrastination into an art! Word would spread though out the communityDon't call and don't go into to see Tim. But some unexpected young activist would always innocently come in and Tim would take a half-hour to talk.

I remember once going to Tim to complain about a well known homeless environmental activist that I thought was spending too much time hanging around the center. Tim's response was to give the guy a key and tell him he could stay on the couch as long as he cleaned the floors and the bathrooms. Over the years many other homeless activist would sleep on the couch.

The thing I will be forever grateful to Tim for is his support for the things I did outside of my work at NEC. In 1996, I was elected to the Arcata City Council and occasionally an NEC donor would go to Tim to complain about a vote I made at a council meeting. Some longtime donors even pulled there support. Tim would just give me a hug, shrug it off and tell me to keep doing what I was doing.

Tim also got a lot of pleasure asking people who would come in to see me on city business, "Are you a member?" What ever donations we lost due to my tenure on the council, Tim sure made up from asking that question. One community member gave the NEC a $1,000 donation for unlimited access.

I was 23 when I first started work at the NEC and stayed on for 14 years.

Nowadays you can go anywhere in the region unafraid to call yourself an environmentalist. But it wasn't like that when I went to work at the NEC.

Tim had all 4 lug nuts on his car loosened, there were death threats andwhat disturbed him the mosthis kids were harassed at school. You couldn't find a kind word in a local newspaper about Tim. He had a target on his back everyday.

What Tim stood for that seemed so unreasonable back then is wholeheartedly accepted as just the way it is now. We have Tim to thank for that.

The Klamath-Siskiyou Bioregion's environmental historian whose own life history was too short.

— Connie Stewart


Tim McKay was a very dear friend, and I am sad to see him leave this earth that he loved so much so abrubtly. His passion for nature and environmental protection will live on in all who new him, and serve to inspire us to step up our own activisem and connection to nature.

I first met Tim in 1975 while working with the Friends of Del Norte, a group that I have chaired off and on for most of the past 30 years. While at HSU we worked on many issues together, mostly related to forest management and protection of our regions watersheds. It was ten years of working for the Siskiyou Wilderness that cemented our friendship. Tim, ex-wife Chris, Greg Bloomstrom, and others started Save our Siskiyou's, which became the Siskiyou Mountains Resources Council. A few visits to this amazing wilderness empowered us to work relentlessly for its Wilderness status, granted in 1984. Tim deserves major credit for making this happen, using his role as director of the NEC to create several publications on the Siskiyous and to get the word out thousands of people who all helped make it happen. I'll never forget the huge stack of hundreds of pages of documentation to support our testimony that Tim put together for me to deliver in Wasington DC at the Subcommittee for Public Lands Wilderness hearings, and putting together maps with Tim to share at those hearings. Tim was passionate about stopping the GO Road, which threatened to divide off the Blue Creek portion of the wilderness. He helped to organize Native American leaders such as spiritual leader Charlie Tom , which was key to stopping road construction through holy grounds. I'll never forget the joy in Time's heart when we were able to gather in a large circle at the roads end near the wilderness boundary, after passage of the Smith River National Recreation Area Act once and for all settled this issue and made the road corridor wilderness.

Tim loved to share the story of our backpack trip to Rattlesnake Meadows on the side of Preston Peak, where we rondezvoued one summer. I had stopped by to see Ted Souza in Gasquet on the way in, and Ted gave me a freshly caught salmon to carry in. Was Tim ever surprised when I pulled a 10 pound fish out of my backpack for dinner! Tim's ability to go to the Siskiyou's was later compromised by debilitating arthritis in his feet. In a way I was his surrogate wilderness traveler, as we shared a passion for viewing slide shows of my explorations of our beloved Siskiyous. We talked of some day horsepacking him back to Rattlesnake meadows to share another meal. I will forever carry Tim's love of these mountains with me as I walk.

Tim loved to visit our home and gardens on the South Fork Smith River. He loved to joke about my obsession for collecting rocks for building projects and rock borders. I was the brunt of a lot of jokes and we shared a lot of laughfter over this. Tim loved to see people passionate about any kind of natural connection. I think it made his huge heart grow bigger. He always left with a few of his own rocks to put in his garden, and thought I should bring some for the NEC auction.

Upon learning of Timmy's sudden death yesterday morning, and after a lot of tears and phone calls, I spent time with Tim gathering rocks on a large bar on the other side of the river. I have been building a small retaining wall in front of the house to create space for a rock fire pit. Tim and Michelle were going to come up and stay a few days while Tim recuperated from prostate surgery. I wanted to have a place for us to enjoy a campfire on the edge of the wilderness. I decided to select some rocks in honor of Tim to place in the wall/bench and fire pit. I found a small heart shaped rock several inches wide, but it seemed too small to represent Tim's huge heart. Beyond Tim's well known activism, he was a warm, loving, giving soul. If only we all had Tim's ability to share that love for so many things, for so many people. Of course I found a larger heart rock, one made of our sparse granite with quartz intrusions that must have tumbled down from the Siskiyous. It will be place in our wall to honor Tim.

Tim was always about putting the message out there, and one of the ways he did it was with bumper stickers. He loved plastering "Ecolove", his car, with messages, and when the back end was full he began covering the car top carrier. I had just purchased some stickers at the Solar Living Center, and decided that as another act to honor Tim, I should place yet another sticker on my car, which I did. We will all honor Tim with our words and our love, but he would want nothing more than for all of us to step up our commitment to act for change, for building sustainable communities, to honor all living things and protect our watersheds and our planet.

And of course, we all know Tim for his undying passion for the

Econews, the NEC and the new building. We should honor Tim with an outpouring of donations to build the new Tim McKay Center for the Environment as soon as possible. Let's make this happen to honor Tim's work and all who are associated with the NEC. Let's buy enough bricks to build it, now, and create a legacy that we can all participate in and continue to be part of. Tim deserves nothing less.

— Joe Gillespie


Tim had one of the best environmental minds, hearts and souls of anybody I have ever worked with. The Redwoods trees, the Klamath, the northcoast, his friends and colleagues will miss him.

peace

— Tom Campbell
Guacamole Fund


A Scientist's Perspective on Tim McKay's Legacy

I have known Tim from the time we first moved back to Northern California in the early 80's as a Forest Service scientist. From the first, I really appreciated all that he brought to many issues. To me, I feel strongly that his uniqueness and strength lay in his science-based approach to environmentalism. While mild hyperbole was occasionally among his weapons, he was always careful to base his positions, and those of NEC, upon the solid foundation of good science. He sought reliable information, and found that the strength of environmentalism, and the justness of its cause, was such that he didn't need to resort to exaggeration!

I will greatly miss his gentle strength, good humor, consistency, and leadership.

— Dr. C. John Ralph
U.S. Forest Service, Redwood Sciences Laboratory,
Arcata


Me, Tim, and the Springers

To a good friend and colleague in these changing times. Tim it's way beyond words for me to express how I feel. It was only yesterday that we were on a call together working on the details for removing those blasted Klamath Dams and finally Bring the Salmon Home. As far as a specific time for remembering, it was all a time to remember when I think of the timber sale hikes, meetings with the agencies and industry on logging, fires, fish, rivers, herbicides, weeds, communities, add infinitum. One of the events that l was when we did the cooperative Spring Chinook Salmon snorkel dives in the Salmon River in 1996. I thought I'ld remember us and the wild "Springers" because you understood how the Spring Chinook only in the Klamath, due to lack of stock recognition and species management only in the Klamath. I've picked this story because similar to your passing over to the higher grounds so it seems goes the way of the wild Spring Chinook runs from the Klamath/Trinity Basin who are disappearing with less than a couple hundred left where there used to be hundreds of thousands.

It was Wednesday July 23rd, 2006 and you'ld just come in with your old green Datsun from the coast the night before and camped with us on the Salmon River. We ate breakfast, held our cooperative daily planning and safety meeting with everyone, got our gear together and headed out to our reach assignment. We swam, walked, and slid down the headwaters in our reach in the Upper South Fork, one of twenty two that the other teams were surveying simultaneously, was 3 miles of winding pools and riffles. We swam through one of the riffles into a deep pool above Blindhorse Creek and counted 13 adult "springers" and four summer steelhead circling the below and trying to avoid us.

I remember you saying how inspired it made you to see these wild animals still here over time and on the face of the earth. At the end of the day we left the river, went to dinner, sang songs and told stories with all the participants around the campfire about our experiences, knowledge and how we're going to help "fix" the world and bring the Spring Salmon back.

Now you've gone back to the Maker, to the place where we've all come from and go to,

eventually. You can rest assured, old friend, that we will carry on the good fight, the dams will come down, the salmon will come back, the rivers will run clean, and the people will realize how to remember that ecological thinking is being responsible, responsible living is being ecological., people we've got to see, how to set yourself free.

Some of the things I can reassure you with is that I'm going to re-up my lifetime membership to Econews, hand out 1,000 "Un Dam the Klamath" bumper stickers this year, help Erica and staff put out Econews, go with Sid to Wednesday night poker, get the new NEC building up, and say to myself in hard times working on socio/enviro issues, "What would Tim say about this?" Power to the People - Peace on Earth = Healthy Enviornment and oh yeah- and Wild Spring Chinook Forever.

— Salmon River - Petey Brucker


Uncle Tim, Big Mac and Tim were some of the names I used for this special man over the 33 years of our friendship. Each name addressed a different aspect of our relationship; and conjures up a different facet of this remarkable individual.

We met as young "eco-zealots," a label that we wore proudly, particularly in those early years when Humboldt county could fairly be described as living behind the redwood curtain.

In January 1975, we were hired simultaneously to lead the still fledgling Northcoast Environmentql Center. While I remained only twenty months, Tim stayed 31 years and through his persistence, creativity and boundless dedication established the NEC as a respected, effective voice for environmentql protection. He, himself, became a near legend due not only to his longevity in his leadership role but equally his breadth of interests, knowledge, and relationships that together elevated him to almost a renaissance man.

In retrospect I can now understand how my various names for him simply reflect his complexity. Uncle Tim made time for a multitude of individuals whom he befriended over the years. Big Mac was his tougher side, such as when he would threaten to sit on me during our occasional differences in environmental priorities or strategy. He could be intimidating; he knew it but he exercised his imposing physical presence with humor.

Writing this after being four months in Italy provides the perspective to genuinely appreciate Tim's renaissance qualities. He would be the first to scoff; indeed dismiss, such an epithet as hyperbole. But it is not. Simply recall Tim's insatiable intellectual interests, as reflected in his house bulging with books ranging from botany to history to various philosophies and of course his beloved native plants and birds. Throw in his diverse areas of endeavor from native plant nurseries, annual birdathon, NEC library, Snail Darters softball team that helped humanize relations between the "ecofreaks and timber beasties," his monthly EcoNews column that often provided insightful analysis and occasional diatribes that stimulated one's thinking, his weekly Eco Radio; and the list goes on. One sweet song aptly notes that one's worth is measured by the love that you leave behind. By this criteria, Tim was an incredibly valuable leader of the environmenal movement, an unforgettable character and a damn fine man.

— John Amodio


We have to bring the dams down.

Tim Mckay was my friend and fellow NEC'er for the last 30 plus years. I really don't want to write this tribute to Tim, because writing it is somehow an acceptance that he is gone and I am just not ready to accept that Tim isn't just a phone call away or still sitting at his desk at the NEC. He really was a "BIG GUY" on so many levels in so many ways. Big on devotion, intellect, love of the natural world, birds, insects, plants and politics.

For so many of us the NEC and Tim Mckay are synonymous and inseparable. In the 25 years I spent as a Board member and Board President of the Northcoast Environmental Center we fought and won many battles . In my mind the battles in the 1970's to stop the construction of the GO road in the Siskiyou Mountains and the establishment of the Siskiyou Wilderness in Six Rivers National Forest was where the real prowess of Tim Mckay as an influential force in managing the public lands became obvious. From that point on The Northcoast Environmental Center and Tim Mckay were the focal point for those of us who were fighting to stop the liquidation of our publically owned forests.

Of course being the Board " El Presidante" ,as I used to be called , to an organization run by Tim Mckay was at times excruciatingly difficult. Most of the time his view of the future of the NEC and mine were the same, but we at times had to agree to disagree and go birding together to remind us of what was really important. But I loved the "Big Guy" unconditionally and the NEC to this day remains one of the most influential institutions ever created by a bunch of hippies in the 70's.

At this point in writing this the tears are streaming down my face and I want desperately to renew my commitment to the work that Tim and all of us cared so deeply about.

I want to see the NEC carry on, I want to see that new NEC building built.

But most of all I want to see the dams on the Klamath River torn down. The real tribute that we owe Tim and future generations is to see the Klamath run free. I want to be there when we unveil the sign that dedicates the remains of the Iron Gate Dam on the banks of the Klamath the river to the memory of Tim Mckay.

— Scott Sway,
Bayside


It was with great sadness that we read of the passing of Tim McKay. He was, in many ways, one of the "old guard" environmental activists going back to the days before Redwood National Park was created. He never wavered in his beliefs, and would argue passionately for those beliefs at every opportunity. As one of his acquaintances said to us this morning, "Tim was a man who would stand up in front of a group of people who hated everything he believed in, and he'd ague his point of view. Even if he didn't convince them, he would earn their respect". His contributions to the environment and to our community will be greatly missed.

With Sadness,

— John Graves
J.Garland Communications


I heard the sad news of Tim McKay's' passing earlier today. As you can imagine, I was stunned. Ever since the days when we worked to save the Siskiyou's (still not saved, but getting closer. The wilderness of the Siskiyou, if connected and properly managed, would be a park as large as Yellowstone) I have been proud to call Tim friend and comrade.

Tim's contribution cannot be underestimated. Without him there would be no Siskiyou Wilderness, and his constant push helped bring about the NRA act in the Smith River, even though that was never his choice (Curse Don Clausen to Hell!). He believed that change was possible when others such as myself failed to believe, and eventually his optimism won me over. Remember, he was the original plaintiff in "Spotted Owl vs. United States of America". It's HARD to beat the government - you really have to believe that you have right on your side.

Tim is the person who gets credit for that small piece of optimism I have - the piece of me that keeps me fighting even when a positive outcome seems impossible. A Siskiyou Wilderness seemed impossible, let alone stopping the GO road with five miles to completion. I leave you with this saying of Tim's' that I try to always remember, words I've tried to live by, to whit;

"You're a winner until you lose."

It sums up his devil-take-the-hindmost, gamble the farm, and don't leave the table until you've won all you can, attitude toward life. He went out a winner.

Besides which, he named the Blue Puma sleeping bag! That's another story from another life.

— Gordon Bonser


Losing a Legendary Figure

The volunteers, board and staff of EPIC are greatly saddened to learn of the death of Tim McKay, the Executive Director of the Northcoast Environmental Center (NEC). It is a great blow to the community of Northwest California to lose this amazing person who was so important in the ongoing history of environmental defense here in the Klamath-Siskiyou region.

Tim was a major advocate for a healthy environment on the North Coast since the inception of the modern environmental movement in the 1970s. His longevity on the front lines is astounding in work that can be so mentally and spiritually taxing as holding off ecological disaster from industrial decimation. In addition to the monthly ECONEWS paper and the weekly ECONEWS Report radio show he produced, Tim and the NEC helped lead the campaign to expand Redwood National Park by 48,000 acres, battled the fish killing Klamath River dams, and stood up for the plants and critters of our region- both great and small- that keep the entire miraculous community of life humming along. Tim inspired, motivated and empowered countless activists, including myself, to defend our home on the planet.

Tim will be greatly missed as a keystone member of the community. I am personally going to miss his calm, determined presence at the many public meetings he attended, his mellow but impassioned voice on the radio and his unwavering guardianship of the natural world. We are all diminished by his loss.

— Larry Evans
Executive Director
EPIC — The Environmental Protection Information Center

TOP


COVER STORY  |  IN THE NEWS   |  ARTBEAT
TALK OF THE TABLE  |  THE HUM  |  CALENDAR

Comments? Write a letter!

North Coast Journal banner

© Copyright 2006, North Coast Journal, Inc.