Portrait of an activist

Karen Pearson: departing hero of north L.A. County.

Karen Pearson has an oak tree named after her. She also has an eponymous hillside trail, and more plaques for environmental service than you can shake a tail feather at. Her work in Santa Clarita, beginning in 1989, has made her one of Southern California's most committed and successful activists.

photo courtesy Santa Clarita Group In October 2005, Chapter activist Karen Pearson had a trail named after her in Placerita Canyon, an area she helped to preserve. Pearson is leaving the Chapter to be closer to her family in Colorado.

Yet Pearson, who will leave California shortly for Boulder, Colo.-and more time with her grandkids-is strikingly modest about her achievements, mentioning a host of others who supported her, and praising the efforts of the Sierra Club. She ought to know-she reinstituted the Santa Clarita Group in 1990 after it had been dormant for a year.

Pearson came to California in 1973 from St. Paul, Minn., seeking a more temperate climate and a new life. She had been in love with nature 'from the get-go. As a little girl, I would go and sit on a log and watch the sun filter through the leaves and the ferns unfurling. It was a magic kingdom to me.' Santa Clarita 'picked me,' she says. The stunning natural setting, which was still 'only an hour from theatre,' was perfect. She settled in.

But as the years went by, Pearson, like many Californians, became increasingly dismayed by the careless attitude business and government leaders displayed toward the environment. The proposal to build the largest dump in the world in nearby Elsmere Canyon was the last straw. Dismay turned to action.

She lobbied the Angeles Chapter of the Sierra Club to oppose the proposed dump, facing internal opposition from some who feared that it would result in the dump being built in the desert. 'It was a daunting task for a beginner,' Pearson admits. She spent more than 100 hours gathering information and coordinating the presentation to the Conservation Committee. This effort unearthed more than 30 endangered species candidates present in the area, and was coordinated with information from three earthquake experts and other authorities. This, the first written compilation of facts in support of saving Elsmere Canyon, was used as a foundation for opposition over and over during the course of the campaign. The massive amount of information convinced the Sierra Club to oppose the proposed dump.

But Pearson wasn't finished. The developers who proposed to build the dump had their fingers in many political pies, and 'they laughed at us,' said Pearson. So she began a drive that collected 10,000 signatures opposing the dump. She enlisted the help of photographers whose pictures graphically showed what would be lost. She lobbied Sen. Diane Feinstein, 'who was furious that the Forest Service had misled her about the area,' and Sen. Barbara Boxer, who responded by sponsoring the Boxer-McKeon bill to protect the area. She confronted then-state senator Pete Knight at a meeting in which the petitions opposing the dump hung behind him.

Most importantly, she did not give up. On Nov. 13, 1996, President Clinton signed into law the Omnibus Parks Bill, in which the land exchange that would have allowed Elsmere Canyon to become a dump was specifically denied. The Boxer-McKeon bill was included in this Omnibus Parks Bill package. Elsmere Canyon had been saved for future generations.

Since that time, Pearson has gone on to successful efforts to preserve both Placerita and Whitney canyons. The list of lobbying, letter-writing campaigns, and speaking she has done or organized to protect wild spaces goes on for pages. In April 2003, the Angeles Chapter of the Sierra Club presented her with the Weldon Heald Conservation Award, the highest award the Chapter gives for conservation efforts.

No one knows better than she that each success is followed by a fresh challenge. Pearson believes the Sierra Club must do more to engage young people and kids in its mission. 'The future of the Club hangs upon it,' she said. 'I'd love to see the ecology clubs, like we had in the '70s, start up again, and more family and picnic hikes for kids to learn about the critters and the land.'

Pearson's move to Boulder is by no means the end of her activism, she reported. 'Nature has been so good to me,' she said. 'I've always wanted to give back.'

There can be no doubt that she's made good on that promise.