Friend of the Month | Jorge Gomez-Gonazlez

Jorge clearing and harvesting English Ivy in Dimond Canyon

FOSC: What is your connection to the Sausal Creek Watershed? Can you share a bit about the spot where you’re doing restoration work in Dimond Canyon?

Jorge: I learned how to balance on rocks from running up and down Sausal Creek as a kid. Joaquin Miller and Dimond Park are where my family gathered for carne asadas. I know these parks like the back of my hand—they’re my home.

I started doing restoration work for FOSC in high school through buildOn, a community service club that partnered with FOSC. That’s how I first got involved. My friend Carmen, a graduating senior at Skyline High, approached me about taking over the native garden they had started in Dimond Canyon. I completed my FOSC internship in 2011 and became a crew leader for many years after that. buildOn members from various Oakland schools also worked on this spot. We called the native garden at Dimond Canyon, and the area right across the creek, the “buildOn/Skyline spot.” I continued to do restoration work at UCSC once I became a student.

Jorge in 2012 as a crew leader with Megan Hess Lilla, FOSC's former restoration and nursery manager.

FOSC: What drew you back to Dimond Park and Dimond Canyon, and how did it feel to re-engage with this space?

Jorge: I moved back to Oakland two years ago after being away for almost ten years. I went on a solo hike to Dimond Park—I grabbed my Hasselblad and did the hike. I saw the old site I’d worked on with the help of friends and buildOn. Through the lens of my camera, I saw a familiar world, but I was 10 years older. And the creek made me feel like a kid again. How magical! I needed to feel the love of Sausal Creek again after a rough 10 years away.

FOSC: What role do relationships and connection play in your experience of restoration and ecology?

Jorge: I was an intern for the Site Stewardship Program at UCSC and for a while studied ecology. But I was faced, and continue to be faced, with being one of the few, or often the only, people of color in these environmental spaces. As a student supporting myself through financial aid, I often couldn’t afford the “right” shoes or fancy equipment required to be successful in my classes. It was very discouraging.

I almost dropped out of school, but instead I pivoted to a different major—Art. Even so, these experiences shaped me. They made it clear how important relationships, support, and representation are in conservation work.

FOSC: What inspired you to start the BIPOC Conservation Club, and what is your vision for the club?

Jorge: I started the BIPOC Conservation Club to invite the community to experience what I felt reconnecting to the creek, to feel the magic and the love. I have brought cousins that also grew up running through the creek and new friends.

The club is also here to expand on those much-needed conversations about racism and misogyny within the world of conservation and ecology. My hope with the club is to break down those barriers. I want to cultivate a space where it’s okay to have these conversations while we are excited to also share our knowledge about all the critters, the soil, the water, the fauna, and to learn about each other. 

I go to Sausal Creek to center myself, to heal. My motto has been “You can’t pull Ivy once and expect it to go away. You have to keep coming back and continue to pull it”. We need these spaces for Black, Indigenous, and People of Color to heal, and I hope this club can be something special for the community I love.

Follow bipoc.conservation.club on Instagram to learn more and connect!

Jorge is working to clear invasives from this spot in Dimond Canyon