COBB, Calif. – A community group that has advocated for the preservation of the Cobb area has reorganized.
Hamilton Hess, chairman of the Friends of Cobb Mountain, said the group has reincorporated under a tax-exempt nonprofit status.
Hess said the environmental organization, incorporated with the state in 1975, previously had as its actual membership only its board of directors. When the group met, only the directors and invited consultants could attend.
Friends of Cobb Mountain recently applied for – and received – tax-free status for financial donations, Hess said.
However, to complete the process, Hess said the group was required to disincorporate from its earlier status and then reincorporate under the conditions of AB 501.c.3.
The new status is now in effect. The California Attorney General’s charities registry showed that Friends of Cobb Mountain was granted its charitable registration on Sept. 7.
Hess said the Friends of Cobb Mountain’s goal is the preservation and enhancement of the natural environment of the Cobb region, focusing mainly on the control of negative impacts on water quality, air quality, noise, and visual effects from the activities of the geothermal and logging industries.
“Ideally this is accomplished with the cooperation of county state and federal agencies together with that of the industries themselves,” he said.
In June, the group settled a lawsuit with the county of Lake over the certification of the environmental impact report for the Bottle Rock Steam Power Project, which it alleged that the county approved in violation of state law. Details of the settlement agreement can be found at http://bit.ly/K4t8ej .
The objective of reducing the frequency and magnitude of the earthquakes caused by geothermal production and water injection is always on the agenda, Hess said, and again with the cooperation of earthquake scientists and the geothermal industry, “but the matter is complicated and progress toward reduction is slow.”