Unlike standing timber, a load of logs, or an acre of forested ground, you cannot put a dollar value on an archaeological site. It is equally hard to assess the value of other cultural intangibles such as art, music, literature, amateur sports, local or family history, and so forth and so on, but these are the things that enrich our lives in modern society. The understanding of our past is one of those priceless things.
Archaeological sites contain the irreplaceable evidence to reconstruct the past.
Without archaeological sites, we would be ignorant of the very long and diverse archaeological record that makes California stand apart from its neighbors, and helps us locate ourselves in time and space within our state. Our own lifetimes are but a drop in the bucket compared to the total time human beings have lived in what we now call California. California has a uniquely varied archaeological record, and one as old as anywhere else in North America. Hundreds of different prehistoric cultures have been and are still being found within our state, most of them discoverable only through archaeological methods. However, unless we can recognize the fragile traces left behind by these earlier peoples and take steps to protect and preserve them, we can accidentally destroy the only remaining evidence of those who came before us.