I am hard at work on the newsletter for our tenth anniversary, and I spent most of yesterday writing the origin story of Worth A Dam. As nothing else seems to be happening in the beaver world at the moment, I thought you might enjoy it.
It was certainly unusual to have beavers in the middle of town, as our city suddenly did in 2007. Maybe if nothing else had happened that’s all it would have been; a passing interest that eventually – passed. But when the city announced that flat-tailed residents would have to be eliminated people started talking: to their neighbors, to each other, to their representatives, and to the media.
Eventually the city was forced to hold a meeting to discuss the beavers’ fate. There were too many people interested to fit into city hall and the forum was moved to the High School Auditorium. Some 200 people showed up – coming from uptown, downtown, and out-of-town. There were representatives from the Sierra Club, the Human Society, local news and a documentary filmmaker. The vast majority overwhelmingly demanded that the city solve the flooding risk without harming the beavers.
Faced with such vocal public support, the city council agreed to form a subcommittee to study the issue further. I was thrilled to be invited aboard the task force which consisted of council members, creek professionals, beaver supporters and concerned property owners. We had 90 days to address the pros and cons of possibly living with beavers in an urban stream. We quickly recommended hiring Skip Lisle to install a flow device that would prevent possible flooding.
The success of that first big meeting originally left me with euphoric hopes for a positive outcome. I was surprised to learn that even after we succeeded in persuading the city to hire Skip and even though his device worked entirely as promised, there was still uncertainty about the beavers fate. Addressing the real (and imagined) concerns in the subcommittee soon made me realize that the fight was a long way from over. It was Skip Lisle who initially suggested that a nonprofit might be necessary to advocate for the beavers and direct funding over time. After watching the acrimony of those meetings even after flooding was averted with his help, I could see he was right.
In choosing a name for the organization I remember thinking that the struggle was too bitter for something benign like “Friends of Martinez Beavers” or “Wildlife Protectors”. It seemed the name needed to be something snappy with a little feisty backbone to get us thru the long struggle that lie ahead.
Thus “Worth A Dam” was born.
And the rest, as they say, is history.
