Save the Shipley Nature Center

NATURAL PERSPECTIVES

The annual budget now being drafted by Huntington Beach officials

is going to be a dreadful one. Major cuts are expected in all

departments. One of the proposed cuts is the city’s beloved Shipley

Nature Center. The proposal on the table now is to simply close the

door, padlock the gate, and shut it down completely.

Why is anything like this even being discussed? Once again, the

problem for municipalities and counties is state government. The

staggering state budget deficit has caused state government to draw

upon revenues that previously went to local government. Now our local

government “shares the pain” with the state government. Budget cuts

are the inevitable result.

Who’s at fault? The state legislators who voted for deregulation

of the electric power industry and threw California into chaos are

responsible. Catering to the energy giants has come back to bite us

again.

Unfortunately, local government is different from state or federal

government. Everything that local government does has some direct

benefit to our community. Unlike state government, we have no fat to

cut such as a million-dollar-per-year board to regulate dry cleaners.

When our town’s budget faces cuts, those cuts have to come from true

service-providing functions like police, fire, libraries and -- yes

-- Shipley Nature Center.

The sad thing is that the cost of operating the nature center is

mostly the salary of the city’s only full-time park ranger. His name

is Dave Winkler. He’s not just some anonymous statistic in a

computer-generated budget document. He’s a real, flesh-and-blood

person with a family and a long history -- more than 20 years -- of

service to the city.

What is it that he’s done for us all these years? For one thing,

he virtually single-handedly designed and laid out the plantings of

the nature center. He knows just about every individual tree in the

18-acre center. Over the years, he has led hundreds of tours through

the grounds of center, introducing nature to tens of thousands of

youngsters and college students.

Of even broader benefit to the community are his patrols of

Central Park. When he’s not giving tours, he drives around the miles

of park roads, providing an official presence in an area where

trouble does occur from time to time. Huntington Central Park is

mostly a safe, peaceful place for the public. One reason for that is

the presence of Ranger Winkler.

Besides the full-time ranger, the nature center budget includes

funds for some part-time staff and about $15,000 in supplies and

other costs associated with the small interpretive building inside

the fenced Shipley Nature Center. The current budget proposes

eliminating all of that to yield a cut of $116,955 per year.

This proposed cut would mean closing and locking the gates of the

Nature Center. This couldn’t come at a worse moment.

The city has recently embarked on a program of major improvements

to the center. Non-native vegetation in the form of giant reed

(Arundo donax), as well as tamarisk and other water-sucking plants,

had gradually taken over large areas within the center, as they have

many other places in Southern California.

The city recently hired contractors to remove much of this

vegetation. This has left several acres of ground bare. However, new

trees are going in during the fall planting season, which has just

started.

Ranger Winkler has coordinated a campaign of volunteers to tend

these areas and keep them weed-free until the newly planted native

trees can get successfully rooted. Closing the gates of the center

now will throw this major project into disarray and may make it

necessary to do much of this work over again. We’d end up spending

more in the long run than we would save now.

Shipley is operated under the auspices of the Community Services

Department. This department runs city parks, manages the lifeguard

program, and does a host of less obvious functions for the city.

Leaders of the department have a long record of creativity in

solving problems. In particular, they have found ways to charge fees

for city programs so that many of their functions pay their own way.

Charging fees for the tours at Shipley Nature Center could help to

defray its operating costs and ease the burden on taxpayers.

The late former Mayor Don Shipley worked long and hard to leave

the members of this community the fine nature center that bears his

name. Generations of children have learned to appreciate their

natural environment there. Untold numbers of people have enjoyed a

brief respite from their harried lives as they strolled under the

sycamores and pines, delighting in the splash of a mud slider or the

flit of a butterfly. Don’t let the Nature Center fall victim to

budget cuts.

* VIC LEIPZIG PhD and LOU MURRAY PhD are Huntington Beach

residents and environmentalists. They can be reached at

vicleipzig@aol.com.