Communities throughout our Morongo Basin have become sensitive to increasing encroachment from illegal pot farms, popular glamping developments, and refugees from the Los Angeles housing market. So when a contractor working for The Wildlands Conservancy recently expanded two sections of private road belonging to the conservancy for parking, an uprising ensued. Reporter Mike Lipsitz has more on this Facebook-fueled fiasco of misinformation…
Word spread that the newly graded area was to accommodate parking for throngs of glampers who’d be drawn to a new campground being developed off the Sawtooth loop trail. The truth is that the hiking and backpacking trail has seen a large COVID-related increase in visitors in the last year and The Wildlands Conservancy created the additional parking as a matter of public safety. Backcountry camping is the only kind permitted in the area.
Concerning county permits, Conservancy Executive Director Frazier Haney told Z107.7 News, “We had a careful process to determine what steps were necessary before we took action.”
Haney will meet with county land use services on Tuesday (April 27) to confirm their conclusions. And in answer to allegations that western Joshua trees were illegally transplanted during the grading, Haney admitted that a living,12-inch tree obscured under other foliage had been disturbed accidentally and required relocation.
Then he added, “Nobody has done more for the landscape around Pioneertown than The Wildlands Conservancy… and we are simply not going to be bullied.”
