{"id":1509,"date":"2015-07-16T11:58:34","date_gmt":"2015-07-16T18:58:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.venturacountytrails.org\/WP\/?p=1509"},"modified":"2022-07-31T18:31:43","modified_gmt":"2022-08-01T01:31:43","slug":"santa-susana-field-lab-petition-for-national-monument","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/venturacountytrails.org\/WP\/2015\/07\/16\/santa-susana-field-lab-petition-for-national-monument\/","title":{"rendered":"Santa Susana Field Lab Petition for National Monument"},"content":{"rendered":"

A movement asking President Barack Obama to designate a portion of the Santa Susana Field Laboratory as a national monument has the attention of NASA, which has deferred the impending demolition of a historic rocket test stand at the site in the hills above Simi Valley<\/span> and the San Fernando Valley<\/span>.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Source of this article, The Thousand Oaks Acorn, July 16, 2015<\/a><\/p>\n

A petition, \u201cDesignate Santa Susana Field Laboratory as a National Monument,\u201d created in March by West Hills<\/span> activist Christina Walsh, has garnered 1,264 signatures online through change.org. Walsh said she\u2019s collected at least another 450 handwritten postcards and a total of nearly 2,000 have been sent to the White House<\/span>.<\/p>\n

\"ON<\/a>

ON HOLD\u2014The Coca area rocket test stand at the Santa Susana Field Lab was slated for demolition as part of the toxic cleanup of the site in the hills between Simi and the San Fernando Valley. But the takedown has been deferred while NASA looks into an online petition asking President Barack Obama to designate the federal government\u2019s portion of the field lab as a national monument.<\/p><\/div>\n

Walsh and her supporters hope to preserve the remaining rocket test stands on the federal government\u2019s 450-acre portion of the field lab, as well as the Burro Flats Cave, which contains paintings by the area\u2019s first inhabitants, the Chumash, made thousands of years ago.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re trying to prevent the birth of the space race from being destroyed,\u201d Walsh said earlier this year. \u201cThis is a unique site because it was here that Native Americans looked up at the sky and made cave paintings of the stars. It\u2019s also where we launched rockets into space.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Alfa test area, for example, which operated from 1955 to 2006, includes the oldest stand used for rocket engine testing and supported the first unmanned spaceflight program, Mercury, in 1961.<\/p>\n

The government\u2019s portion of the field lab, which is managed by NASA, represents about 20 percent of the SSFL, while the remaining 80 percent belongs to Boeing.<\/p>\n

Choosing “All of the Above” The 2008 Energy flow diagram for the US (Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory) shows the dominance of fossil energy (bottom three flows) in the US energy use system. <\/span><\/p>\n

Walsh told the Acorn she was elated when she heard NASA was looking into the national monument idea.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was great news,\u201d she said. \u201cAnd the fact (NASA) reached out to the appropriate executive branches was actually a surprise for me, but I\u2019d like to think it shows that they\u2019re taking this very seriously.\u201d<\/p>\n

Last month, NASA administrator Charles Bolden Jr. informed the Santa Ynez<\/span> band of Chumash Indians\u2014the group monitoring the property\u2019s natural resources during cleanup of the site\u2014that the administration was considering moving forward with the monument designation process.<\/p>\n

In April, the tribe requested federal protection of the property because it is considered a \u201cspiritual crossroads of the Chumash, Fernandeno\/Tatviam and Gabrieleno\/ Tongva,\u201d Tribal Chair Vincent Armenta wrote in a letter to NASA.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe believe . . . any demolition of the rocket test stands, especially Coca, (should) be deferred for as long as possible so as to maximize its chances of being protected as an integral part of any SSFL National Monument,\u201d Armenta wrote.<\/p>\n

The Coca test stand site supported the Apollo program in the 1960s and was used to test the space shuttle\u2019s main engines in the 1970s and \u201980s.<\/p>\n

In Bolden\u2019s response letter last month, he said he was unable to take an official position on the matter but that he recognizes the \u201cunique features and sacred status of the property.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIn preparation for remediation of the site . . . our staff at Marshall Space Flight Center are actively proceeding with the demolition for on-site structures,\u201d Bolden wrote. \u201cHowever, I have instructed them to defer demolition of the historical rocket testing stands for as long as possible without impacting overall cleanup responsibilities.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A movement asking President Barack Obama to designate a portion of the Santa Susana Field Laboratory as a national monument has the attention of NASA, which has deferred the impending demolition of a historic rocket test stand at the site in the hills above Simi Valley and the San Fernando […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,20,40,12,25,44],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1509","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-environment","category-health","category-history","category-los-angeles","category-pollution","category-simi-valley"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/venturacountytrails.org\/WP\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1509","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/venturacountytrails.org\/WP\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/venturacountytrails.org\/WP\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/venturacountytrails.org\/WP\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/venturacountytrails.org\/WP\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1509"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/venturacountytrails.org\/WP\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1509\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3527,"href":"https:\/\/venturacountytrails.org\/WP\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1509\/revisions\/3527"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/venturacountytrails.org\/WP\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1509"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/venturacountytrails.org\/WP\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1509"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/venturacountytrails.org\/WP\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1509"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}