To “gaslight” someone means to manipulate another person into doubting their own perceptions, experiences or understanding of events. As a former resident of Avalon, I know CIC is famous for it. Manipulating information to make people believe what their own eyes and personal experiences tell them is untrue.
First, in the spirit of transparency, CIC should publicly publish the application sent to CDFW, along with all supporting exhibits and materials, and address the following:
• Explain YEARS of publications, reports, interviews and announcements celebrating CIC successes with the preservation/restoration of Catalina flora, bringing them to 20,000+ plants maintained; publications in which the deer are casually mentioned along with the bison, cattle, goats, and pigs as “non-native browsers and grazers”. Not ever as being critically overpopulated, or specifically as the single biggest extinction threat to native plants.
• Explain how such great success has been possible with, according to CIC, thousands of ravenous deer destroying every new sprout that pops up?
• Explain why CIC can’t strategically plant more common chaparral-type vegetation for the deer, away from the precious endemic/threatened plants, and why wireless fencing can’t be used to protect the most threatened or vulnerable areas.
• Explain why CIC authority to remove the bison is included in CIC’s proposal to CDFW, along with any other non-native animals, birds, reptiles, amphibians, etc. deemed to be a “threat” by CIC.
• Explain why CIC NEVER made an appeal to the hunting community for an increase in deer yield. Years have been wasted that could’ve been spent bringing deer numbers down to a sustainable place – and how CIC “just knows” that hunting isn’t the answer no matter how it’s managed.
• Explain why CIC only partners with 1 hunting outfitter, and why that outfitter offers such short hunting opportunities with so many restrictions at such great cost.
• Explain why more than 2 months of the hunting season, Sept 16 – Nov 21, isn’t open to Island hunters at all.
• Explain why previous CIC President/CEO, Tony Budrovich, stated in a 2018 CIC publication that the Island could easily sustain 500 deer, but now CIC insists that number is ZERO.
• Explain how CIC already has a solid plan and timeline BEFORE receiving approval from CDFW.
• Explain why CIC is willing to spend MILLIONS to slaughter the deer, but not one penny to find a way to embrace them.
• Explain CIC’s plan to rehabilitate the human victims in Avalon who are already suffering from anxiety, panic attacks and PTSD in anticipation of the helicopters and rifle-fire to come. Their symptoms will certainly get worse, so explain how CIC will repair the permanent psychological damage it inflicts on Avalon’s children, veterans, and others. Or explain how that’s not CIC’s responsibility.
• Explain how CIC decided there will be NO financial impact to the community due to the slaughter of the deer – are they really so out of touch with Catalina’s visitors? It doesn’t take a college degree to figure out that 10,000+ petition signatures/supporters = at least 6,000 visitors and their dollars, with more to come.
• Most importantly, explain why CIC’s proposal wasn’t properly presented to the residents of the Island that CIC is paid to serve, denying them any opportunity to ask questions or suggest alternatives – why any new alternatives won’t even be considered now.
CIC asks those who oppose the deer removal plan to be open-minded, yet CIC effectively closed its collective mind before the community even knew the deer were being targeted. CIC has a long history of saying all the right words to all the right people to get what they want, but that works both ways. They make it sound like a miracle that the island survived the 50 years the deer were there before CIC was created!
The Islanders will find experts to support their side of this too, and CIC may find itself losing where it really counts.
The truth is, while the Island’s unique plantlife is interesting, most visitors can’t tell rare endemic plants from any others – the plants aren’t what they come for. Does CIC even realize how many beautiful botanical gardens there are, just in California? Few Catalina visitors come to see the plants.
They come for peace. They come for serenity. They come to connect with and share the purity and magic of a thriving little California town whose residents have a deep bond with the environment that reminds them of classic Disney. They come for hope that it’s still possible to harmonize with nature.
They come for the bison.
They come for the foxes.
They come for the deer.
Do the work, spend the money, find another way.
With respect,
Kim Oddone, former Avalon resident
