Calling your attention to something going down at Manzanar... Last month, the Manzanar Committee launched an online petition drive and community letter-writing campaign calling on the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power (LADWP) to halt its efforts to build a proposed industrial solar energy generation station in California's Owens Valley, adjacent to the Manzanar National Historic Site.
As you know, Manzanar was one of ten camps where over 110,000 Japanese Americans were incarcerated after being forcibly removed from the West Coast during World War II. Today, the Manzanar National Historic Site stands to preserve and interpret the legacy of Japanese American incarceration in the United States.
But the LADWP has grand plans to build Southern Owens Valley Solar Ranch, a 200-megawatt solar energy generating facility that would consist of solar photovoltaic panel modules and associated infrastructure. The approximately 1,200-acre project site would be located on City of Los Angeles-owned property east of the Owens River, but in a direct line of sight with the Manzanar Historic Site, which lies immediately to the west.
The Manzanar Committee says LADWP's proposed facility will create an environment that is highly detrimental and disrespectful to the history and culture of the Owens Valley and the Manzanar National Historic Site.
