In a coalition with over 210 public health, environmental, and environmental justice organizations, MBCA has signed a letter to members of the California legislature with deep concern about the proposed fall ballot initiative 25-0023A1. Proposed by the California Chamber of Commerce in November 2025, it has been cleared for circulation and is in the petition signature collection phase (due June 24). The coalition letter asks all state legislators to publicly oppose the initiative. It would “fundamentally undermine the public health and environmental protections provided under the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA), upon which our state has relied for over half a century. ” Below are the six main points of concern. Detailed explanations can be found in the letter.

1. Reverses CEQA's Foundational Principle to Protect the Environment and Overrides Other Laws
2. Applies to a Sweeping Range of Consequential Projects
3. Undermines Recent Legislative Efforts
4. Strips Agencies of Tools to Protect Communities and the Environment
5. Increases Agencies’ Litigation Exposure While Undercutting CEQA’s Enforcement
6. Shifts Long-Term Costs onto Public Agencies and Taxpayers

Miriam Seger, MBCA's landscape gardening guru, is featured in an article in the Palm Springs Life magazine this month. Miriam's expertise and effective teaching style can be experienced in MBCA's series of instructional videos produced by Board member Stacy Doolittle and filmed by local videographer Cole Gibson. Segments focus on Deep Watering, Planting Hacks, and a Fall Planting Guide, each containing easy-to-follow demonstrations with detailed and entertaining advice. Miriam has also contributed a related series of easily readable content that enhances the videos, with Desert-Wise Planting and Desert-Wise Watering advice and photos.

You can view the entire Annual Meeting and Greywater presentation via our YouTube Channel. The Introduction to Greywater Irrigation Systems presentation by keynote speaker Nicholas Holmes begins at 1:07:28 in the video, but we encourage viewers to start at the beginning for the presentations on MBCA's issues and programs that precede the Keynote presentation. Below is a timestamp list for all segments of the presentation.

MBCA Annual Meeting, January 24, 2026
Timestamps
   00:08  Welcome and Thank-Yous - MBCA President Steve Bardwell
   04:16  Announcements by meeting participants
              -Desert Video Astronomers
              -Chromium 6 petition
              -Candidate petition
              -Giant Rock Cleanup
              -29 Palms Solar Farm petition
   09:50  Introduction of 2026 MBCA Board of Directors
   12:35  Overview of recent and current MBCA Issues - Steve Bardwell
              -Annual Desert-Wise Living Landscape Tour April 19
              -Water issues
              -Dark night skies
              -Scholarships
              -8^th Grade Field Trips
              -Inland Deserts Working Group/CA 30x30 Climate Change Program
              -Candidate Forum this fall
   18:16  Morongo Basin Development Projects (with PowerPoint slides) - Steve
                   Bardwell
   31:06  Habitat Connectivity (PPT) – Steve Bardwell
   38:59  Education – 8^th Grade Field Trips (video) – Janet Johnston
   46:42  Housing (PPT) – Janet Johnston
1:06:14  Break
1:07:28  Keynote Presentation – An Introduction to Greywater Irrigation
                  Systems, Nicholas Holmes
2:00:30  Question and Answer session
2:14:29  End of Program

 

After hearing three hours of public comment, the San Bernardino County Supervisors unanimously denied the appeal of the Planning Commission's approval of the Lovemore Ranch housing project. The appeal was filed by MBCA and supported by the Joshua Tree Village Neighbors group and others. Public comments were almost entirely in support of the appeal. You can view the entire hearing by clicking "video" on the April 8 line of the list of Supervisor meetings at this page; timestamps for various stages of the appeal are shown below. Read or listen to the Z107.7 radio report here.

Appeal Item #42 begins at 30:40
   32:05 – Mark Wardlaw, head of Land Use Services, responds to MBCA’s appeal specifics.
   44:40 – Begin presentation by appellant (MBCA and Joshua Tree Village Neighbors)
1:00:36 – Begin presentation by project proponent (Lovemore Ranch)
1:13:13 – Begin public comment at San Bernardino Location
1:47:11 – Begin public comment at Joshua Tree Community Center
2:27:15 – RECESS
2:43:00 – Restart public comment at Joshua Tree Community Center
3:06:00 – Final comments from project proponent (Lovemore Ranch)
3:15:09 – Final comments from appellant (MBCA and JTVN)
3:21:52 – Board Chair Dawn Rowe begins questions to Staff
3:33:50 – Chair Rowe asks County Counsel about State Housing Affordability Act
3:35:12 – Chair Rowe asks for Supervisor Questions
3:44:25 – Public Hearing is Closed and Supervisors vote to deny the appeal.

Local Joshua Tree residents alerted MBCA about receiving a notice from the County about a proposed housing project in their neighborhood. Recipients were offered the opportunity to comment on a Tentative Tract map application to subdivide about 18.5 undeveloped acres into 64 parcels of "minimal impact" homes. MBCA's comments highlight the lack of information on the project and insufficient time window for providing comments. We question any claims concerning sustainability and responsible growth and development. Also addressed is the lack of progress on encouraging affordable housing after acknowledgment by the Supervisors of the ill-effects of a surfeit of STRs in Joshua Tree. We emphasize this is a project requiring analysis under CEQA for impacts due to aesthetics, flooding, flora, traffic, and wastewater.

Among its many programs to create and build community among veterans, service members, and civilians, Mil-Tree has a program teaching how to create vegetable gardens in the desert, with group instruction and activities twice a week. The demonstration garden is based at the Joshua Tree Retreat Center. This video highlights the development of the gardens.

MBCA was among 14 Inland Empire non-profit groups supporting a comment letter concerned with the Rio Vista Specific Plan for the Riverside County City of Jurupa. The Plan includes a warehouse and other industrial development that, in addition to air quality, water, and urban heat impacts, would endanger the over 13,000 year old Jurupa oak, among the oldest living things on the planet. The letter contains extensive analysis of problems with the plan and offers two alternatives. Read this Los Angeles Times article for more background.

This January 25 column in the Los Angeles Times updates the status of the Cadiz Water project and provides a good overview of its decades-long attempts to "mine" water from the Mojave Desert. MBCA has frequently provided public comments and joined group comments against the project, most recently in August 2023. While the pipeline approval we opposed was granted, the column points out that "Last month (December 2023) the agency reissued the approval for Cadiz to acquire the gas pipeline, but not to convert it for water." (our emphasis)