SYRCL Successes — A Look Back at 2024

2024 was another impactful and successful year for the South Yuba River Citizens League. All of SYRCL’s departments contributed to furthering our mission to protect and preserve the Yuba watershed.

• Our Watershed Science department continued to implement and monitor massive restoration projects from the lower Yuba to the headwater meadows to the forest that surrounds it.
• Our Education department continued to grow, bringing interactive and engaging environmental science experiences to an even greater number of our area’s youth.
• Our Outreach department continued to engage our community through events like the Cleanup and River Ambassadors, while spreading the word far and wide about the importance of river safety and river etiquette.
• SYRCL’s 2024 Wild & Scenic Film Festival was a smashing success, inspiring activism through film and experiences.
• Finally, our Policy department continued to be a voice for the watershed by engaging with policy makers on a local and state level while also educating the community on important issues affecting the Yuba River, salmon, and our environment.

Featured below are some of the highlights from 2024:

January

Salmon Return Numbers: November/December 2023 — The numbers from the last fall-run of Chinook salmon came in, and we were cautiously optimistic.

SYRCL Volunteers Complete the 23rd Year of River Monitoring —
– 37 sites across the North, Middle, South, and Lower Yuba River
– 51 active volunteers accumulated 886 volunteer hours
– 1500 recorded water quality parameter measurements

February

SYRCL’s 2024 Wild & Scenic Film Festival is an Incredible Success — From February 15-19, the 22nd annual Wild & Scenic Film Festival was held in Nevada City and Grass Valley. The festival offered a wide variety of award-winning films, including those about nature, community activism, adventure, conservation, water, energy, wildlife, and environmental justice. Along with its impressive slate of films, the festival brought an array of exciting non-film programming and special events for festival attendees to experience, learn from, and enjoy. Our 2025 Festival promises to be even better!

Proactive Action is Key to Balancing Future Water Demands with Supply — SYRCL and our partners continue working through a tangle of water issues which stretch from the highest reaches of the Yuba River all the way to the Golden Gate Bridge. This issue promises to impact how Yuba water flows into the Bay-Delta system which will have a notable impact on the health of the Yuba watershed’s ecology, especially for salmon.

March

CCKA Advocacy Day: SYRCL’s Impactful Dialogue with Key California Decision Makers — Aaron Zettler-Mann, SYRCL’s Executive Director, and Traci Sheehan, SYRCL’s Policy Director, represented SYRCL at the California Coastkeeper Alliance’s (CCKA) annual Advocacy Day, engaging in meaningful conversations with key state-level decision-makers and agencies.

SYRCL’s Quiz Night was a Rollicking Success — Twenty-one teams competed during our annual fundraising event for our Environmentalist of the Year Scholarship Award.

Vault Toilet at the Golden Quartz Picnic Site — Thanks to funding secured from Nevada Country through their Outdoor Visitor Safety Fund grant program, SYRCL and the Forest Service were able to install a new, state-of-the-art, accessible vault toilet at the picnic site, replacing the old one.

April

Upper Long Bar Restoration Pre-Project Monitoring — The Upper Long Bar Habitat Restoration Project’s goal is to improve the productivity, complexity, and diversity of anadromous salmonid rearing habitat within the Upper Long Bar area. These actions prioritize increased quantity and quality of juvenile Chinook salmon and steelhead rearing and over-summer habitat.

Celebrating SYRCL’s State of the Yuba 2024 — Over 100 community members came out to hear from our team about the condition of the river, SYRCL’s vision for the future, education and volunteer opportunities, current projects, challenges, recent successes, and more ways to get involved.

SYRCL’s Executive Director makes comments at the State Water Resources Control Board Workshop — Aaron Zettler-Mann, SYRCL’s Executive Director, gave public comments at the State Water Resources Control Board as part of its 3-part Public Workshop on the Proposed Voluntary Agreements related to the Sacramento/Delta Update to the Water Quality Control Plan for the San Francisco Bay/Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta Estuary.

May

Upper Long Bar Pre-Project Vegetation Monitoring — SYRCL staff (and dogs!) conducted vegetation surveys at Upper Long Bar to collect data on plant community composition before construction that is anticipated for summer 2025. These data will establish a baseline to help us determine how cover and community may shift after implementation.

Haskell Peak Meadows: Implementation Year Two and RFB Release — We are excited to continue working to restore these critical habitats!

California State Board sets aside NID’s Water Quality Certification — By setting aside the water quality certifications, the Board essentially rescinded the certifications (also known as “401s”) for the Nevada Irrigation District (NID) who owns and has a license to operate the Yuba Bear Hydroelectric Project.

Celebrating the Completion of the South Yuba River Trail Markers Project — SYRCL collaborated with Nevada County and various landowners to develop a comprehensive mile marker system and install signage from the town of Washington to Bridgeport Crossing within the South Yuba State Park. This initiative not only enhances wayfinding capabilities for new visitors but also aims to reduce response times for emergency services and ensure compliance with land use regulations.

SYRCL Delivers Public Comment on the Nevada County Recreation and Resiliency Master Plan — SYRCL wholeheartedly supports the Nevada County Recreation Resiliency Plan. This plan, the first of its kind, is a testament to our community’s commitment to sustainable recreation and the preservation of our natural resources.

CPUC Rejects PG&E’s Proposal to Transfer Hydroelectric Assets to New Subsidiary — The CPUC rejected PG&E’s proposal. They found that PG&E failed to show that the proposed transaction meets even the minimal public interest standard. The CPUC stated that the proposed transaction would result in additional costs, which would contribute to rate increases, with no evidence of offsetting rate savings.

June

Foothill Yellow-Legged Frog Survey — The SYRCL Watershed Science team had the pleasure of accompanying the US Forest Service Wildlife crew on a search for this near-threatened species. The goal of the day was to find and, if necessary, re-locate the egg masses of the Foothill Yellow-Legged Frog.

Creating River Stewards: Monitoring Water Quality of Public Lands 2024 — Each Spring, SYRCL’s Education Department and the Tahoe National Forest offer Creating River Stewards: Monitoring Water Quality of Public Lands for 9th through 12th grade students. During this program, area high school students are trained in water quality monitoring practices, collecting water quality data, analyzing and interpreting the data they collect, and learning ways to become stewards of the Yuba River.

Yuba Forest Network’s First Field Tour — SYRCL’s Forest Conservation Project Manager, Anne Marie Holt, led participants on a field tour in Nevada City to learn more about fuels reduction treatment on private property with Kipchoge Spencer and the Hoyt-Purdon Fuel Reduction and Prescribed Fire Project with Melissa Grim from American Rivers.

SYRCL’s Wild For The Yuba — SYRCL held its Wild for the Yuba event at the Schrammsberg Estate in Nevada City. This annual SYRCL fundraiser raises money for its scholarship fund and outdoor Education and Outreach Programs, like River Ambassadors and the Yuba River Cleanup.

July

Phase 2 of Habitat Construction at Rose Bar Began –The Rose Bar spawning habitat project began in water restoration work, placing spawning gravel in the Yuba River at Rose Bar. The new spawning riffles are made up of sorted gravel and cobble from on-site, which are anchored in place with larger rock. We also lowered the floodplain adjacent to the spawning riffles for rearing habitat.

SYRCL’s 2024 Youth and Outdoor Leadership Opportunity (YOLO) was a success — This program is an immersive FREE citizen science expedition that focuses on getting students out to field sites to work with SYRCL staff and learn about the role that restoration is playing in our watershed. This summer, students worked in Loney meadow where they helped with vital restoration and monitoring tasks.

The Narrows Hydroelectric Project and Englebright Dam: SYRCL joins Agencies and YWA on a site visit — A dedicated team from SYRCL had the opportunity to join the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), state agencies, and the Yuba Water Agency (YWA) on a site visit to the Narrows 1 powerhouse.

August

Yuba Salmon Study Community Outreach Events — Coordinated by SYRCL, the Yuba Salmon Study working group held community outreach events on how the rotary screw trap trials went in the North Yuba River and what pilot studies will occur this fall.

SYRCL Hosts Two Successful Earthwatch – Girls In Science Expeditions — Each summer, SYRCL partners with the Earthwatch Institute and Tahoe National Forest (TNF) to host a field science expedition for high school students interested in STEAM careers. This summer, SYRCL hosted two teams focused on Restoring Sierra Meadows: The Source of California’s Water. Thirteen students from throughout California joined our science and education teams to assist with monitoring work in Loney Meadow and Van Norden Meadow.

September

SYRCL releases its 2024 – 2029 Strategic Plan — SYRCL’s Strategic Plan, United for the Yuba, maps our vision and guides our work for the next five years.

That’s a Wrap: SYRCL’s 2024 River Ambassadors — In collaboration with California State Parks, SYRCL’s River Ambassadors program was established to ensure the South Yuba River remains clean, vibrant, and safe for everyone. Now in its thirteenth season, the program continues to make a significant impact by being a front-line source for safety education and stewardship throughout the “river season”.

NID Withdraws Centennial Dam Proposal After SYRCL’s Long Opposition — On September 25th, the Nevada Irrigation District voted on the future of their proposed Centennial Dam project, a $1 billion project that SYRCL and the community has opposed since 2017.

SYRCL’s 27th Annual Yuba River Cleanup A Success — SYRCL would like to thank the 500+ volunteers who donated more than 1,500 hours to help remove trash from nearly 80 miles of the Yuba watershed.

October

SYRCL’s Wild & Scenic Film Festival Releases 2025 Official Festival Artwork and Announces Judges for its 2025 Art Exhibition — Each year, the festival commissions an artist to create the official artwork that represents the annual theme. For the 2025 Festival, the art was created by artist Nick Wroblewski, a Midwest based printmaker of hand cut woodblocks.

SYRCL Awarded $156,000 in Grant Funding from the Sierra Meadows Partnership Block Grant — This project will advance meadow restoration on the North Yuba Landscape Resilience Project (NYLRP) through meadow assessment and prioritization of at least 1,750 acres of meadow habitat, resulting in a pipeline of 500 acres of high priority meadow habitat selected for restoration planning.

Field Tours on the North Yuba: Highlighting Collaborative Successes and Landscape Goals — SYRCL Watershed Science staff joined landscape restoration partners for two field tours on the North Yuba River watershed. Led by the Tahoe National Forest and Blue Forest respectively, the field tours showcased forest restoration treatments taking place as part of the North Yuba Landscape Resilience Project.

November

Haskell Peak Meadows Restoration Project: Second and Largest Year of Implementation Completed this September — SYRCL, in partnership with the Tahoe National Forest, completed the second year of project implementation on 229 acres of meadow, fen, and meadow edge habitat within five high priority meadows in the North Yuba Watershed: Haskell Headwaters Fen, Chapman Saddle Meadow, West Church Meadow, Freeman Meadow, and Bear Trap Meadow.

Yuba Forest Network Field Tour at Sugar Bowl Ski Resort — The Yuba Forest Network is a central networking hub to connect resources and practitioners across the Yuba and Bear River watersheds. The Yuba Forest Network hosted a field tour at Sugar Bowl Ski Resort on October 21. This tour showcased the current and future forest health projects at the headwaters of the South Yuba River. Katya Christian, Sugar Bowl’s Sustainability Manager, guided the group through the property and led the discussion on the different terrain, treatments, and considerations for the landscape.

Third Implementation Season at Van Norden Complete — Actions in the 2024 field season focused on adaptive management and treating the surrounding forest including the installation of eight beaver dam analogs (BDAs) in the Lytton West Swale, maintenance on existing BDAs in Castle Creek, and reinforcing an upstream section of the channel fill with live sod plugs and vegetation.

SYRCL Welcomes Two New AmeriCorps to the Team for 2024 – 2025 — SYRCL welcomes Fiona Litton — River Monitoring Coordinator and Riley Endries — Restoration Coordinator

December

The Association for Environmental and Outdoor Education selects Monique Streit, SYRCL’s Education Director, as their Northern Environmental Educator of the Year — Each year, the Association for Environmental and Outdoor Education (AEOE) selects two Environmental Educators of the Year – one in northern California and one in southern California – for their outstanding contributions to the field of environmental and outdoor education. Educators are nominated by their peers and are selected by AEOE’s awards committee. As their Northern Environmental Educator of the Year, this year the AEOE chose SYRCL’s Education Director, Monique Streit.

Wrapping Up Salmon Expeditions: The Crucial Role of Environmental Education for Students — This year, we took a total of 2,239 students and community members from 37 different schools onto the Lower Yuba this season, making it the program’s largest year yet!

SYRCL’s WILD & SCENIC FILM FESTIVAL UNVEILS 2025 OFFICIAL SELECTIONS — SYRCL unveiled the full lineup for its 2025 Wild & Scenic Film Festival. Taking place February 13-17, 2025, in Grass Valley and Nevada City, CA, the 23rd annual film festival will feature over 100 environmental and adventure films including:

14 world premieres
7 U.S. premieres
4 West Coast premieres
7 California premieres