Art Hazelbrook, of Fort Hunter Liggett (U.S. Army Installation), was the speaker at the May meeting of the San Luis Obispo California Native Plant Society. Who would have thought that the Army would have an Environmental Division at this Army training center located in Monterey/San Luis Obispo Counties?
The policy 29-USAG FHL Environmental Management System requires "The conservation and preservation of cultural and natural resources". Several other requirement spell out this commitment to making the site as sustainable environmentally as possible. The cultural resources noted include especially those of indigenous Salinan people.
What might be surprising to some, is that this commitment appears to be real. Many projects have been undertaken to first understand the negative impacts, and then attempt to reverse or mitigate them. The environmentalists at Fort Hunter Liggett have considerable influence over where training exercises are held, and certainly over planned burns, new plantings of California native plants, and other reclamation efforts.
Many in the audience were impressed with what the environmentalists at Hunter Liggett are accomplishing in this U.S. Army training ground. It's nice to know this kind of work is going on, at times even under unexpected umbrellas.
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