- Details
- By Tribal Business News Staff
- Real Estate
The Esselen Tribe of Monterey County has gained stewardship of the 327-acre Pico Blanco property on the Little Sur River in California through a transfer from the Western Rivers Conservancy (WRC).
This land, which holds cultural significance for the state-recognized Esselen tribe, is located at the base of the mountain known as Pixchi (also called Pico Blanco), according to a news release from WRC. The property includes 1.3 miles of the Little Sur River and contains one of the oldest stands of old-growth redwoods on the Central Coast. The land provides habitat for endangered species including California condors and threatened California red-legged frogs.
"The Pico Blanco area, defined by the Little Sur River, is the spiritual, cultural, and geographical center for the Esselen Tribe," Tribal Chairman and President Tom Little Bear Nason said in a statement.
The Wildlife Conservation Board (WCB) funded the purchase with a $1.4 million grant, per the Board’s meeting minutes. The project has been in the works since 2019, when WRC started discussions with the Silicon Valley Monterey Bay Council of Boy Scouts and the Esselen Tribe about purchasing and protecting the land. Private donors also supported the project.
This marks the second significant tract of ancestral land transferred to the tribe by WRC. In July 2020, WRC transferred the 1,199-acre Adler Ranch (now renamed Eagle Peak) into tribal ownership. That project, per a report from WesternRivers.org, involved a $4.5 million grant from the California Natural Resources Agency
