Sheriff’s public safety declaration saddens me

I don’t know — it must have been 30 or 40 years ago on a sunny June afternoon when a friend invited me to come over and check out the house she had just purchased right across the street from an elementary school. She was joyous about her new California bungalow from the 1920s with its humungous, shady front porch.

Ah, but come September and the beginning of the school year, her joy turned to blind outrage. Several hours a day kids played outdoors during recess. Yelling and screaming kids. She found it absolutely intolerable.

When she complained to me about the racket, I told her I found the sound of children playing a bit uplifting. I told her somehow their joy infected me. I told her I thought it was a happy noise.

But she kept on until she wore out my friendish desire to be understanding and compassionate.

I finally asked her exactly what she expected when she bought a house across the street from an elementary school. Did she really think the children would suddenly play as quietly as mice now that she lived across the street?

Now don’t get me wrong. I completely understand and appreciate the concerns of some Gold Run area residents regarding the presence of mountain lions in their “neighborhood.” But I have to ask — you bought a piece of property in a wild, largely undeveloped area near a creek and then you expect it to relinquish its wildness just because you’re on the scene now?

I know the person whose cameras recorded the images of the mountain lions circulating on the internet and raising all this concern. I’ve stood on that very patch of ground where the mountain lions were recorded.

Here’s what you don’t know and what the videos and photos can’t and don’t reveal — that little grassy area is actually the bank of Gold Run Creek.

Hearing about the presence of the mountain lions there a while back, another friend put more trail cameras on that property hoping to catch images of the lions. He said they leave Gold Run Creek at the house and then use the property’s dirt driveway to move back and forth from the wilderness that lies just across Gold Run Road. They are passing by, traversing at a convenient spot, traveling from one part of their range to another.

My wife and I live near the Diamond Mountain Golf Course — a distance of just a few hundred yards as the crow flies from where those videos were taken. She has set up her trail cameras, and she occasionally captures images of a mountain lion.

I understand and appreciate why Lassen County Sheriff John McGarva declared the lions are an “imminent threat to public safety.” That’s the job we elected him to do. I want him to look out for our welfare.

As McGarva wrote this morning, this public safety threat is actually the “potential for human-wildlife conflict.”

According to the California Department of Fish and Game, “Imminent threat means there is a likelihood of human injury based on the totality of the circumstances.”

I believe just like us, these mountain lions are God’s creation. I guess there’s a hope they may be captured and relocated, but I fear men with guns may take their lives for no reason other than someone’s unfortunate hysteria. For suspected “potential.” For potential “likelihood.”

I’m not the one to tell people how to live, but it seems to me all the Gold Run area residents need to do is recognize they live in mountain lion country, pay attention to their environment and their surroundings and then act accordingly. Problem solved.

And let’s not forget perhaps the most important part — the lions were here first. We moved into their habitat, not the other way around.

Click here to read the California Department of Fish and Game’s “Public safety wildlife guidelines 2072.”

According to that document, this is a Type Yellow Threat — “A report where the presence of the public safety wildlife is confirmed by a field investigation and the responding person (law enforcement officer or department employee) perceives the animal to be an imminent threat to public health or safety. Imminent threat means there is a likelihood of human injury based on the totality of the circumstances.”

I am grieving already because if it comes to that unfortunate eventuality — the killing of these beautiful animals for no reason other than “potential” or someone’s determination of “likelihood” — that truly pierces my soul.