Several years ago, the Richmond Progressive Alliance (RPA) highjacked the West Contra Costa Chapter of the Sierra Club and ran it as a wholly owned subsidiary under the control of Norman La Force. Back in the day, when I first joined the Sierra Club in the 1970s, it was about preserving wilderness and encouraging people to use and enjoy it. In recent years, particularly the Bay Area chapters, have transitioned to NIMBY organizations that oppose any development anywhere, particularly urban infill development. This is ironic because urban infill development actually preserves wildlands and agricultural lands by relieving development pressure on “greenfields” and making development more sustainable and energy efficient by utilizing existing resources and infrastructure.

The Sierra Club’s Mission Statement is:

• To explore, enjoy, and protect the wild places of the earth;
• To practice and promote the responsible use of the earth's ecosystems and resources;
• To educate and enlist humanity to protect and restore the quality of the natural and human environment; and to use all lawful means to carry out these objectives.

Not only is the West Contra Costa Chapter a NIMBY organization, but under the leadership of La Force who rules it like his private fiefdom, it has developed a peculiar concept of an urban park as something to simply exist but not to be used. La Force is an anti-access  activist who, “prefers parks behind fences, with no public access and he frequently sues the Park District to impose his personal preference that public parks be reserved for wildlife in which people are not welcome” (Click here for source).

The article below describes the current election for the San Francisco Bay Chapter Executive Committee, which includes West Contra Costa County Executive Committee. As in the past, the Richmond Progressive Alliance has offered its four candidates, Janet Johnson, Jamin Pursell, an incumbent on the committee; Sue Wilson, who was recently elected to Richmond City Council; and Hari Lamba. I note that, among other things, Hari Lamba describes himself as, “Chief Technical Officer (CTO) (being promoted from VP of Engineering Management) for CyberTran International Inc – innovative solar powered ultralight rail freight and transit solutions to transit and high-speed rail www.cybertran.com.” Cybertran, however,  is essentially defunct. See What’s Up With Cybertran? July 3, 2016.

The article describes the slate of new candidates, including Andrew Butt, Cortis Cooper, Ed Jerum and Jeff Royal, as not having “traditional environmental backgrounds” and “pro-development” which is simply inaccurate. These new candidates are more aligned with the core mission of the Sierra Club than the RPA candidates, who are aligned with Norman La Force.

Environmentalists vs. mountain bikers: Who will control local Sierra Club group?

Two mountain bikers tackle a steep hill in Wildcat Canyon Regional Park, where bikers would like to see expanded trail access. Credit: Dana Albert

Local environmentalists are upset about what they say is a concerted effort to infiltrate the west Contra Costa County Sierra Club’s executive leadership group with members who aren’t aligned with the club’s long-held stances on protecting wild spaces. 

The Sierra Club, a more than 130-year-old national organization founded by John Muir in California, is organized into chapters with regional groups run by executive committees of elected club members. The executive committees can endorse political candidates in local and state races and take positions on development projects, meaning they potentially can influence local elections. 

Starting Nov. 11, club members began voting for candidates seeking positions on the San Francisco Bay chapter’s executive committee, which includes the west Contra Costa County executive committee. The only other Bay Area environmental organization that endorses measures and candidates is the Bay Area League of Conservation Voters.

In recent months, a slate of candidates, some of whom are new to the Sierra Club and don’t have traditional environmental backgrounds, have sought seats on the west Contra Costa County executive committee. Many of the contenders are petition candidates, meaning they needed just 15 signatures from other Sierra Club members to get on the ballot. They include: Andrew Butt, a Richmond architect who unsuccessfully ran for Richmond City Council in 2022 and is the son of former mayor Tom Butt; Cortis Cooper, a retired Chevron engineer; Ed Jerum, a Richmond property manager and retired attorney; and Jeff Royal, a retired UC Berkeley research analyst. 


Richmond architect Andrew Butt’s Sierra Club candidate statement says: “I am eager to bring my passion for environmental advocacy, my experience in community  service, and my commitment to sustainable practices to the Sierra Club Western Contra Costa County Region Executive Committee. Together, we can work towards a more sustainable and environmentally conscious future for our region.” Courtesy Sierra Club

Four other candidates: Janet Johnson, Jamin Pursell, an incumbent on the committee; Sue Wilson, who was recently elected to Richmond City Council; and Hari Lamba, have more typical environmental bonafides and have been long involved in local environmental issues. (All candidates’ statements can be seen at here.) Wilson, Pursell and Johnson are members of the Richmond Progressive Alliance, a Richmond political organization that Tom Butt and Andrew Butt have been openly critical of in recent years.

In their policy statements, many of the petition candidates say they were motivated to run to expand trail access for mountain bikes. But critics say the move is a power grab meant to steer the environmental organization toward taking more pro-development stances on contentious land use issues. These potentially include: supporting the development of housing on the Zeneca property, a highly contaminated toxic site in south Richmond; and developing housing at Point Molate, a portion of which was recently acquired by the East Bay Regional Parks District.

“Sierra Club is one of the levers of power in the Bay Area that many people don’t recognize,” said Pursell, a member of the Sierra Club’s West Contra Costa Executive Committee. “This slate of pro-mountain biking candidates is being put together by Tom Butt and Peter Belden (a San Francisco housing advocate) in order to overthrow the political impact that Sierra Club has had. It’s well known that the Sierra Club has been in opposition to projects that Tom Butt favors.” 

Belden, who lives in San Francisco, is a housing and cycling advocate and a member of the Sierra Club San Francisco chapter’s political committee. He declined to speak to Richmondside. But emails to existing committee members shared with Richmondside show that Belden has continuously sought to shape the west county chapter’s election, stating that his goal is to oust existing West Contra Costa Executive Committee Chair Norman LaForce and embed someone who has more “pro-housing/transit” views.
LaForce is a longtime Bay Area environmental attorney who has led legal challenges to stop housing projects proposed for the Zeneca site and at Point Molate.

Mountain bikers want more access to East Bay park trails
That’s not to say that trail access for mountain bikers is not a legitimate issue. One recent project bikers have coalesced around is a proposed single track flow trail at Wildcat Canyon Regional Park, which stretches from Richmond to Kensington. Flow trails are specially designed trails with jumps and turns that bikers can race down without making a lot of stops. Opponents say they are dangerous to hikers, especially elderly people, who might not be able to quickly move out of the way, and can cause soil erosion.
“Nobody is against mountain biking,” said Pursell. “It’s about mountain bikes to the exclusion of all other things. If someone is walking along, they don’t have the space to step aside because these trails are very narrow.”

Mountain bikes are allowed in more than a dozen regional parks, but only two of them are in west Contra Costa County: Wildcat Canyon and Crockett Hills. And although most visitors to East Bay regional parks are hikers, according to a 2021 survey, there has been a growing push from mountain bikers to create more bike-only trails, in part to avoid conflict with other users.

“For the past two decades, only 25 miles of bike trails have been added to the regional parks system, while hikers have access to hundreds,” said Cooper, one of the contenders for a seat on the west Contra Costa County executive committee.

Andrew Butt agrees.

“For a long time the East Bay Regional Parks have not been friendly to bikers, especially when it comes to single track trails,” said Butt, who is also a volunteer coach for the El Cerrito High School mountain biking club. Butt said he was asked to run for a seat on the Sierra Club committee by other mountain bikers concerned about access to local trails. Asked if there were other reasons he was interested in serving, Butt acknowledged that he was also enticed by the potential to bring a “new perspective on development.” 

“The local chapters under the current leadership have been very anti-development, and that’s a disservice to the needs of the region,” Butt said. “Point Molate could have been an ideal candidate for brownfield development for housing, a project that would have rehabilitated the historic Winehaven site and restored access to open space, all of which would have been paid by the developer. It could have been a transformative project.”

Former mayor Butt has gotten involved in the debate as well, last month sending an email asking his supporters who are members of the Sierra Club to vote for the “pro mountain biking” slate to oust LaForce, who also serves as the chair of the East Bay Public Lands committee and several other Sierra Club committees.


Jamin Pursell, a member of the Sierra Club executive committee seeking re-election, suspects if the pro-development candidates are elected they will vote as a block to achieve their goal of “undermining progressive causes and candidates.” Courtesy Sierra Club

“Norman believes that parks are not for multi-purpose activities like for playing fields and dogs, but should be pure nature,” Butt told Richmondside. “The west Contra Costa ex-comm (executive committee) has historically been a very closed group that has supported very radical views and is not at all in line with the views of the greater public.” As an example, Butt cited Point Molate, which he called “a fiasco.”

“The narrative has been controlled by a small group of people who have their own agenda and are out of touch with what the majority of residents want,” he said.

But Pursell and Johnson, another west Contra Costa County Sierra Club executive committee candidate, say that opponents are playing dirty to get the Sierra Club to take a different stance on local environmental issues.

“The idea behind the tactic is that they will vote as a block and coordinate around what their end goal is, which is undermining progressive causes and candidates,” Pursell said.