PLEASE, LEAVE GABILAN WILDLIFE SANCTUARY ALONE! 🌿 Save Gabilan Wildlife Sanctuary Creek – Before It’s Gone Forever! A founding family of Salinas, the Sherwood's, donated the Gabilan Creek Wildlife Sanctuary to the city of Salinas via a conservation easement with one sacred condition: that it be preserved forever.   But today, forever is under attack? We, the people of Salinas, raise our voices in outrage and love for our community. The Gabilan Wildlife Sanctuary Creek is not just land — it is a living, breathing heritage. It was gifted to us by the Sherwood Family, one of Salinas’ founding families, with one sacred condition: that it be preserved forever.   But today, forever is under attack.  
💔 A Sacred Gift Betrayed! For generations, the creek thrived on its own — peaceful, lush, shaded like a green cathedral, alive with wildlife and clean waters. It was our sanctuary — a place of safety, serenity, and natural wonder. Then, in the name of maintenance, the city brought in bulldozers, tractors, and masticators — not caretakers, but destroyers. Heritage trees, hundreds of years old, were cut down in the name of maintaining the creek.  The creek did not need major destruction; it thrives and takes care of it selves with little interference.   The undergrowth that sheltered birds and amphibians was torn away. The ground was ripped open, leaving deep wounds that invited a flood of invasive weeds to take over.  This happened within the last four to five years.  The city did not preserve the sanctuary. They ravaged it.  
🔥 Danger Is Not in the Trees — It’s in Neglect! Now they call the sanctuary “dangerous.” Not because of nature — but because of their own failures. Encampments have turned the creek into a dumping ground. Fires ignite weekly. Trash, feces, and needles poison the water. Joggers, bikers, and students no longer feel safe. Crimes in nearby neighborhoods have surged — thefts, assaults, overdoses, violence, homicides, threats against women and children, men exposing themselves, screaming, yelling, and fighting regularly, etc., etc.  They have watchdogs, so no one comes near.   It's disastrous and a shame! If the police admit it is not safe to enter, how can families be asked to live beside it? This is not the sanctuary’s fault. It is the City’s refusal to act with wisdom, compassion, and responsibility. ✊ What We Demand! We will not sit quietly while this sanctuary — this gift of forever — is destroyed before our eyes. We demand that the City of Salinas: STOP the destruction immediately. No more bulldozers, no more clear-cutting, no more excuses. RESTORE the sanctuary. Bring in real arborists who heal trees instead of butchering them. Restore habitat, don’t erase it. PROTECT public safety. Remove encampments from this fragile ecosystem and enforce conservation law. HELP the unhoused with real solutions. Housing, treatment, and care — not endless cycles of displacement that solve nothing. HONOR the conservation easement. This land was entrusted to us in good faith. Breaking that trust is a betrayal of our history, our environment, and our children’s future. Why this Matters: A creek like Gabilan cannot be built, bought, or replaced. Once gone, it is gone forever. In Europe, places like this are cherished as linear parks — ribbons of life weaving through cities. Here in Salinas, we have been blessed with such a treasure, and we are letting it slip through our fingers. This is about more than a sanctuary. It is about who we are as a community. Do we stand by while bulldozers erase our natural heritage? Do we shrug as our children lose safe places to walk, bike, and dream? Or do we rise to say: “Not here. Not now. Not ever.”  
📢 Add Your Voice! The Gabilan Wildlife Sanctuary Creek belongs to all of us — and it is worth fighting for. Sign this petition. Share it. Demand action. Together, we can force the city to remember its promise, restore what has been destroyed, and protect this sanctuary forever.  🌿 LEAVE GABILAN WILDLIFE SANCTUARY CREEK ALONE! 🌿
Protect it. Restore it. Respect it. Now.