Please mark your calendar to attend this public meeting!
April 22nd at the Sunset Community Center (Lawton @ 29th Avenue) 6pm - 8pm.

This is your chance to support a proposal to create a Wildlife Care Center at Lake Merced!

This meeting is being hosted by the Public Utilities Commission (PUC) who own the land around Lake Merced. The purpose is to gather public input on the master plan that is being created to increase recreational use and enhance the habitat around Lake Merced.

Several locations around the lake will be discussed, including the 13 acres that have been leased by the Rod and Gun Club for an outdoor shooting range for the past 80 years.

Three options are being offered for your comment at this location known as the John Muir Site:

1) Status Quo: Pacific Rod and Gun Club lease renewed. They continue to exclusively use 13 acres of the lake's western shore for trap and skeet shooting, and draw revenue from renting out the banquet room.

2) Reduced number of skeet and trap shoot ranges. Some boat storage. (possibly nature center and wildlife hospital also - though having a wildlife hospital at a gun range is not feasible.)

3) New use of these 13 acres to include:
* Nature Center to offer nature/ environmental education classes for all ages.
* Wildlife Care Center to provide care for resident and migratory wildlife. (SF does not have one!)
* Habitat enhancement - to increase biodiversity of wildlife, increase bird and butterfly viewing opportunities.
* Possibly a one -mile nature trail through botanical gardens of habitat plants -making the area more attractive for walking. (Community planting opportunity)
* Picnic areas in bird and butterfly gardens
* Meadow for volleyball, frisbee and other casual recreational use
* Boat storage and launch, and possibly seating for viewing sculling events.

A land use decision will be made based in large part on the public's desired use of the area.
SO - PLEASE SPEAK UP FOR A WILDLIFE - AND A WILDLIFE CARE CENTER!
Sunset Community Center  (Lawton@ 29th Avenue)  -  April 22nd, 2008 from 6pm -8pm

Please support the founding of the San Francisco Nature Center, a wildlife hospital and environmental education center by signing this petition.

Your information will not be sold, traded or shared in any manner other than indication of your support for this project.

We strongly encourage you to check out this new local wildlife film, San Francisco - Still Wild At Heart, "a compelling and lyrical one-hour film about the arrival of coyotes to San Francisco and urban America. The film pursues the coyote story across the national landscape - to New York City, Chicago, and rural West Marin County - to explore the impact of coyotes on our developed ecosystems, and the ways we can coexist with them safely. Through beautiful and original footage of city wildlife - quail, raccoons, opossums, herons, and escaped South American parrots - the film is an unabashed celebration of urban nature, nature, and its value an importance to our human communities."

To learn more about this wonderful film by local producer and editor, Melissa Peabody, and to purchase DVDs, visit the project website (or click here): www.stillwildatheart.com