Save Our Little Lake Valley (SOLLV) announced that the first 1,000 signatures on a petition urging governor Brown to reconsider the Caltrans freeway bypass have been collected in person from area residents in less than one month. The campaign aims to collect thousands of signatures to show public officials that the majority of residents in Willits and the surrounding areas are opposed to Caltrans’ bypass freeway and determined to find an alternative.

”We are collecting signatures in front of grocery stores, the post office, restaurants and schools. We are canvassing door-to-door, doing phone banking, and urging all of our friends and neighbors to sign. Caltrans is a very powerful agency and it may take an intervention by the governor to stop this project,” said Sara Grusky with Save Our Little Lake Valley (SOLLV).

The petition urges the governor to consider alternatives to the Caltrans proposed Willits freeway bypass project. It states that this extremely expensive and environmentally destructive project does not serve the best interests of local, regional, or state citizens. There are practical alternatives that would save money, protect natural resources, and better meet the needs of the community. “Now is the time to put a hold on this needless project before irreversible damage is done,” states the petition.

State senator Noreen Evans is also concerned about the Willits freeway bypass and recently wrote a letter to Caltrans stating, “It is disconcerting when after all these years many ranchers, farmers, local businesses, environmental groups and ordinary citizens agree that the Willits bypass, as it is presently conceived, should not be built.”