USFS supervisor embraces work — indoors and out

By Kathryn Reed

STATELINE — Sometimes the line between work and play is hard to delineate for Terri Marceron.

As supervisor of the 153,000 acres that encompass the Lake Tahoe Basin Management Unit of the U.S. Forest Service, she is responsible for more acreage than any other entity in the basin. As an avid hiker, equestrian and boater, she likes to experience the area beyond reading report after report at her desk in South Lake Tahoe.

Marceron wove a tale of her experience packing into the wilderness with friends for more than a week last year and how that relates to life on the job. The hard work, the hours involved, the beauty, compromise, overcoming challenges, setting goals and sense of accomplishment at the end of the day are part of life on the job and in the outdoors.

Terri Marceron

“I have a spiritual connection to the land,” Marceron said.

She started working for the Forest Service in 1988, coming to Tahoe in 2005.

On Wednesday she was the guest speaker at Soroptimist International of South Lake Tahoe’s lunch meeting at Harrah’s Lake Tahoe.

“One challenge in the basin is to get consensus. It doesn’t happen here in a lot of cases,” Marceron said.

She believes the process is as important as the product, but she also believes being decisive is a critical component of her job.

“I love change. A lot of people in my agency don’t,” she said.

Policies often change within the U.S. Forest Service each time a new president takes office.

With all of the regulatory bodies in the basin, Marceron’s job is not just about the land.

“My world is more political than any other forest,” she said.

When a U.S. senator calls, she picks up the phone. She is also held accountable to the regional office in Vallejo and the folks in Washington.

Questions from the audience were about the old Meyers Landfill and Angora Fire restoration.

To the former, she said the cap for old El Dorado County dump will be in place this summer or in 2011. She added Lake Tahoe Wildlife Care will not move there because the use is not compatible.

In regards to work on the 3,000 acres that burned in 2007, most of which was Forest Service land, Marceron said public comment will be sought soon on the next stage of restoration.

Part of the plan deals with tree removal around urban lots, trail work, restoration to Angora Creek, work on Seneca Pond, removing noxious weeks and improving aspen stands. Not all sections of the burn area will be touched.

“I love the work we do. I believe in my agency’s mission,” Marceron said.