Aspen Global Change Institute

Aspen Global Change Institute
2017 - $15,000 The Adaptive Mind Project

The Adaptive Mind Project

Understanding and Building the Capacity to Deal with Constant,
Traumatic and Transformative Change

Project Summary

Climate adaptation professionals, resilience planners, and community leaders informing and implementing climate adaptation must perform their essential work in the context of accelerating change, disruption and the breakdown of interrelated life-support and human systems. The focus of this transdisciplinary project is to identify the components of psychosocial resilience in the face of constant, traumatic and transformative change – the Adaptive Mind – and develop support at scale for these leaders through training, peer support programs, and other resources.

Motivation

Every day, scientific evidence and lived experience demonstrate the unfolding reality of accelerating, traumatic and transformational impacts of climate change. COVID-19, racial violence, economic disruption and increasingly apparent governance failures combine with climate crises to harshly convey the many and linked stressors that resilience-building efforts must address. Few, if any, in public offices, social and environmental service organizations and other institutions where the resilience workforce is situated have been formally trained to deal with these massive challenges and conditions of breakdown. And yet, accelerating change and disruption circumscribe the outlook for these professionals. Increasingly, the resilience workforce recognizes that we are headed into a world of (1) constant, accelerating change, marked by uncertainty, surprises and even outright not-knowing, (2) frequently direct or vicarious traumatic experiences, and (3) often transformational change (Moser et al. 2017). Grief, anxiety, fear, anger, depression, despair, overwhelm, and hopelessness vis-à-vis climate change are increasingly afflicting experts, communities and their leaders (Gilford et al. 2019). There is a pressing need to foster self-care and skill-building in the resilience workforce to support leaders as they lead their organizations and communities through transformational challenges (Moser 2020). 

Work Accomplished During the Seed Phase

Our work, conducted with support from The Seed Fund prior to COVID-19, reveals already high percentages of respondents who are working in climate change adaptation reporting burnout (80% among surveyed practitioners). Responses also revealed widespread emotional distress and the impulse to leave these demanding jobs despite deep personal commitments to this work. The pandemic, its economic consequences and increased awareness of systemic racism are likely to have exacerbated this situation. The predominantly female resilience workforce is additionally burdened with child/elder care, already causing some to leave their jobs. Those who will be called on to lead and support communities in this uncertain future need insights, training and support to do so well while maintaining their humanity, especially as they may also live in the same communities they serve. By not addressing the role of psychosocial resilience or investing in professional training and peer support, organizations face decreased productivity, health impacts, staff attrition and weakened morale. 

Additional work accomplished with initial seed funding include:

• Dozens of presentations and panel contributions to raise awareness of the psychosocial demands and needs among resilience professionals
• Numerous media interviews on the mental health impacts of climate change on professionals
• Submission of several funding requests to foundations and government funding agencies
• Collection of relevant literature 
• Compilation of selected resources for interested professionals
• Extensive networking with relevant experts, potential project advisors, and beneficiaries
• Expanded definition of the Adaptive Mind as skill-building for effectively dealing not just with climate change but the multi-stressor world in which resilience professionals do their work

Taking the Adaptive Mind Forward

• Continued fundraising 
• Experimentation with (virtual) personal resilience-building group processes
• Continued collection and review of relevant literature 
• Team-internal education and discussion of relevant insights and expertise
• Ongoing team-building 
• Once funded, the project will be launched in full, including
  • survey and interview research to better understand components of the Adaptive Mind
  • an expert workshop and synthesis of what is understood about Adaptive Mind skills and capacities
  • development of trainings and resources
  • initiation of peer-learning and support groups within established professional networks
  • continued outreach to foster employer acceptance of the need to foster and maintain the wellbeing of their employees and institutionalization of Adaptive Mind skill-building

More Information

A 2-page Project Summary

A 2-page Hand-out with personal resilience resources

Project Partners  

• Susanne Moser, Ph.D. (lead)
  Susanne Moser Research & Consulting, Antioch University New England &UMass-Amherst

• James Arnott, Ph.D. (co-lead)
  Aspen Global Change Institute & University of Michigan

• Kristen Goodrich, Ph.D. (co-lead)
  Tijuana River NERR

• Carol Berzonsky, Ph.D. (core team)
  Antioch University New England

• Theopia Jackson, Ph.D. (core team)
  Saybrook University

• Margaret Krebs (core team)
  Earth Leadership Program, Stanford University

• Elizabeth Rohring (core team)
  National Sea Grant Program

• Kristen Baja (core team) 
  Urban Sustainability Directors Network

• Lily Swanbrow-Becker (core team)
  Independent, and American Society of Adaptation Professionals

agci.org

Build Public Inc.

Build Public Inc. 2017 - $15,000 Green Benefit Districts Build Public is a mission-driven nonprofit that leverages creative public-private partnerships to create, finance and maintain high quality urban public space in San Francisco and beyond. theoneplus.org/np_profile/2912

City of Oakland

City of Oakland
2017 - $15,000 EcoBlocks Project

oaklandca.gov

Climate One

Climate One
2022 - $15,000 General Support
2021 - $18,000 General Support
2019 - $15,000 General Support
2018 - $15,000 Resilience Program
2017 - $15,000 General Support
2017 - $15,000 General Support
2015 - $15,000 Resilience Program

When Greg Dalton set off for the Russian Arctic in 2007, he didn't know how profoundly his life was about to change. Upon returning home, Greg worked with Commonwealth Club CEO Gloria Duffy to launch Climate One. 

Climate One is rooted in the belief that climate disruption is the single greatest challenge humanity has ever faced. A  sustainable, just, and equitable path forward starts when we come together to talk about our concerns, share expertise, and put forth bold ideas. 

Since its founding, Climate One has provided a unique and respectful space for influential, inclusive discussions. Dalton and his team have prioritized a broad, evidence-based conversation about climate disruption and its consequences by bringing leaders and experts on different sides of issues together in pursuit of empathy, common ground, and cross-sector solutions.

Now in their second decade, Climate One is doubling down on their mission to be the premier platform for the conversation about the climate emergency. Through their podcast, national radio show, and live convenings for thought leaders and concerned members of the public, Climate One creates opportunities for dialogue that inspire a more complete understanding of the current crisis. 

A pioneer in the podcast arena, Climate One has seized on the opportunity to become an influential voice in a previously untapped media segment, exceeding 100,000 downloads each month. In parallel, radio stations across the country have taken notice and Climate One now airs on more than 50 public radio stations in red and blue states from Texas, Georgia and Florida, to Pennsylvania, California and more. By building credibility and a broad community, every conversation they publish reaches more than 50,000 people, and that audience is growing rapidly. 

In addition to their weekly climate show, they support leading science communicators through the Stephen H. Schneider Award for Outstanding Science Communication. Created in 2010, the Schneider Award has honored a variety of natural and social scientists such as Dr. Robert Bullard, Dr. James Hansen, Dr. Katharine Hayhoe and more. In a world so littered with disinformation, Climate One is committed to recognizing the scientists who have dedicated their lives to understanding the climate crisis and informing the public. 

Imperative to a constructive conversation is diversity and representation. Across the nation, in all aspects of life and governance, the BIPOC community has been marginalized. Climate One recognizes that the climate conversation has been no exception. While black and brown communities are affected first and worst by the pollution, severe weather, sea level rise, and economic upheaval brought on by climate change, their voices have not been heard. In 2020, Climate One renewed their commitment to amplifying the voices of BIPOC speakers and perspectives on their program. Climate change is a racial justice problem, and needs to be covered as such. 

Climate One envisions a world where a clear-eyed awareness of the climate crisis shapes decisions ranging from personal behavior to public policy and where the full spectrum of humanity’s wisdom, talent, and expertise is marshaled toward the wellbeing of all life on Earth. That is why they are going beyond simply raising awareness to catalyzing action with a conversation that can expose the web of interrelated issues and the impact on the global ecosystems, economies and communities. They set the stage for one-time adversaries to develop empathy and perhaps become partners who develop solutions that inspire us all.

climateone.org

Climate Ride

Climate Ride
2023 - $8,000 General Support
2022 - $8,000 General Support
2021 - $6,000 General Support
2020 - $6,000 General Support
2019 - $6,000 General Support
2018 - $3,000 General Support
2017 - $3,000 General Support
2016 - $3,000 General Support
2015 - $3,000 General Support

Mission

Climate Ride is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization that organizes life-changing charitable biking, running, and hiking events to raise awareness and support sustainability, active transportation, and environmental causes. 

The Cause

Climate Ride, founded in 2008, inspires and empowers people to work toward a sustainable future. Climate Ride unites advocacy and philanthropy. We use sport as a means to change lives and build an effective, citizen-based sustainability movement.

You have the right to a healthy environment, yet the environment is one of the least funded sectors in American philanthropy. Climate Ride aims to change that. Climate Ride creates opportunities for people to engage in a way that is uniquely positive, life-affirming, and transformational while providing grants to environmentally-focused non-profits. Climate Ride participants take on a challenge much bigger than themselves and share their journey with their personal networks helping to amplify support for the cause. Our organization endeavors to foster environmental giving as a priority for new and seasoned donors. Climate Ride is the only organization taking this approach in the environmental sector. Our goal is to bring people and nonprofits together to inspire action and make protecting the planet a philanthropic priority for everyone.

We create and organize multi-day bike rides, runs, and hikes, as well as virtual and independent events. These challenges serve as a catalyst for participants to engage new stakeholders and strengthen advocacy for the environment while creating a substantial grants program for environmental and active transportation non-profits. Climate Ride supports participants with strategies to help reach out to thousands of people as they raise funds for our grants program. This creates unique opportunities to push for environmental justice and climate advocacy. Participants get to select the projects and organizations they fund from a list of groups working on climate change, environmental justice, clean energy, active transportation, sustainable infrastructure, and public health.

We are all feeling concerned, anxious, or overwhelmed by climate change. The threats to our world are numerous and growing more complex each day. While so many people care deeply and want to help address the problem, the enormity of the challenge and the political tone around climate change can feel dispiriting and disempowering. Climate Ride offers a way to make a difference while building new friendships and connections with a global network of outdoor advocates. 

The Movement

Our mission is to inspire and empower citizens to work toward a sustainable future. By using personal challenges as a means to change lives, Climate Ride is building an effective, citizen-based sustainability movement. Climate Ride empowers participants to actively engage in the fight against climate change by completing multi-day outdoor adventure events to fundraise for the organizations they value most and take action together for the planet. Our community proves that immersive outdoor experiences and personal challenges are powerful tools for generating the behavioral change to help ignite activism on climate policy, raise critical funds, and influence public opinion. 

Take Dave for example. Dave is a retired firefighter in California who Dave heard about Climate Ride from a local bike coalition he donated to annually. He decided to take on the challenge and along the way raised several thousand dollars. On the ride, he was inspired by speakers and found a movement he could believe in. Since that first ride, he’s raised over $50,000 for Climate Ride grants program and become a huge advocate in his community. Climate Ride is a growing movement of people like Dave who are joining together to take positive action to help our planet.

At a Glance:

• Climate Ride has raised over $6.2 million for climate, clean energy, and bicycle/pedestrian advocacy grantees
• Over 3,600 people have participated in Climate Ride events since 2008
• On average, a participant reaches out to more than 200 people about climate and sustainability
• 30% of Climate Ride participants are 30 years old or younger
• Climate Ride participants are a diverse group from 47 states and 12 countries

Recent Accomplishments

Because of the extraordinary efforts of the record 600 Climate Riders, Runners, and Hikers in 2019, Climate Ride awarded over $800,000 in grants. These powerful grants have resulted in direct support to help fight legal battles for public lands and clean air. Climate Ride amplified diverse voices in sustainable transportation and provided funds for organizations building safer options for bicyclists and walkers. These grants have led to renewable energy projects in national parks, relieving pollution in critically impacted ecosystems. Climate Ride helped brace an environmental movement that needs new voices and an active citizenry willing to walk the walk and bike the bike.

We expanded our Community Leaders awards program, which provided unparalleled opportunities for young sustainability leaders to experience the enrichment and inspiration of a Climate Ride. Our inaugural Green Fondo Weekend event engaged a record 250 cyclists – 70% of whom were new to the Climate Ride cause. Overall, we delivered 107 grants to beneficiaries working in sustainability, renewable energy, climate action, conservation, and public health. In 2020, Climate Ride needed to postpone several events due to challenge of the COVID-19 Pandemic. We launched a new virtual event, Climate Rise, which brought together over 400 people for the cause, and generated more than $100,000 in grants.

climateride.org

Dredge Research Collaborative

The Mississippi / Atchafalaya River Basin is the nation’s largest drainage area, directing over 1.2 million square miles of runoff from America’s heartland to the mouth of the delta and transporting fertile sediment downstream.
Image credit: Dredge Research Collaborative

The Mississippi’s levees, spillways, and revetments trap sediment in the main course of the river, impeding navigation and port activity and starving adjacent floodplains and wetlands of this nourishing resource. This image shows active dredging operations in the Birds Foot Delta in southern Louisiana. 
Photo credit: Ben Mendelsohn and Alex Chohlas-Wood

Lake Michigan is edged with a thick network of federally maintained navigation channels serving commercial and recreational interests, requiring periodic dredging and sediment relocation.   
Drawing credit: Dredge Research Collaborative

Currently, more than half of the material annually dredged in the Great Lakes requires placement in nearshore landfills, or Confined Disposal Facilities (CDFs). Many of these facilities are at capacity and unable to accommodate projected future needs.
Photo credit: Sean Burkholder
Drawing credit: Dredge Research Collaborative

The Placement and Reuse Facility (PRF) at Erie Pier in Duluth, Minnesota highlights a potential future for dredged sediment. Rather than a site of long-term disposal, the facility separates dredged sediment into graded material that can be resold and reused locally.
Photo credit: Brett Milligan

Dredging in the Bay and Delta enables ship traffic, generates material for shoreline construction, and remediates contaminated grounds. Where channels cut through the Delta, salinity intrusion into the waterways will follow, with cascading effects on already stressed aquatic habitats.
Drawing credit: Dredge Research Collaborative

An average of 3-6 million cubic yards of sediments are dredged from the San Francisco Bay every year to maintain safe navigation, 40% of this material is beneficially reused. While multiple restoration sites exist around the bay that need sediment for survival, financial and logistical hurdles often prevent beneficial reuse and lead sediment to be disposed of offshore, exported from the system.
Drawing credit: Dredge Research Collaborative

The 2,600 acre Hamilton Wetlands restoration site received millions of cubic yards of dredge piped from the Port of Oakland’s Harbor Deepening project onto the flat expanse of a retired airfield. This project was realized through careful timing and planning –advance notice of the harbor deepening project allowed for the sediment ‘matchmaking’ to occur, while economies of scale made the movement of sediment financially feasible.
Photo credit: Dredge Research Collaborative

Dredge Research Collaborative (DRC)
2017 - $10,000 Silt, Sand & Slurry: Sedimentary Infrastructure and the Geography of Dredge" Book Publication Project

The Dredge Research Collaborative (DRC) is an independent 501c3 nonprofit organization which investigates human sediment handling practices, through publications, events, and design projects. Our mission is to improve sediment management through design research, building public knowledge, and facilitating transdisciplinary conversation. Over the past ten years, the DRC has been at the forefront of exploring the massive human impact on the flows and movements of sediments, and investigating how these flows might be more intelligently and equitably designed.

The members and co-founders of the DRC organized the critically acclaimed DredgeFest event series across the four coasts of the United States. The first DredgeFest was held in New York City on September 28 and 29, 2012. DredgeFest NYC was organized in partnership with Studio-X NYC, an arm of Columbia University’s Graduate School of Architecture, Planning, and Preservation; sponsored by Arcadis, TenCate, and TWFM Ferry; and featured speakers and content from agencies including the US Army Corps of Engineers, National Park Service, Environmental Protection Agency, and New York City Economic Development Corporation. The second DredgeFest was held in Louisiana from January 11 to 17, 2014. Partners included the Robert Reich School of Landscape Architecture at Louisiana State University, the Coastal Sustainability Studio at Louisiana State University, the Center for Land Use Interpretation, Gulf Coast Public Lab. The third DredgeFest was held in Minnesota from August 14 to 21, 2015. DredgeFest Great Lakes was hosted by the University of Minnesota’s School of Architecture and Department of Landscape Architecture. DredgeFest California, the fourth event, included five days of interdisciplinary design workshops, discussions with many different experts, two days in the field with the DredgeFest California public tours, and background research conducted prior to the event. It was supported by Great Lakes Dredge and Dock, Landscape Architecture Magazine, the UC Davis Hellman Fellows Program, the University of California, Davis’ Department of Human Ecology, Groundworks Office, the Delta Protection Commission, the University of California, Berkeley’s Department of Landscape Architecture and Environmental Planning, and the Dutra Museum Foundation.

Each DredgeFest was designed as a learning encounter between government agencies, designers, theorists, academics, corporate practitioners, industry experts, students, and the public. Each DredgeFest situated sedimentary management in the context of current regional conversations and issues, including climate change, sea-level rise, wetland restoration, environmental justice, public access and recreation

In terms of design and landscape architecture, members of the DRC actively serve as consultants to multiple state and Federal agencies and NGOs to collaborate on infrastructural and ecological restoration design projects, including working with The US Army Corps of Engineers, U.S. Army Engineer Research and Development Center, US Fish and Wildlife Service, CA fish and Wildlife Service and the Nature Conservancy. Members of the DRC also co led the Public Sediment Team and helped craft their award-winning proposal for the Resilient by Design Bay Area Competition.

In addition to publishing numerous articles, book chapters and planning reports, they will soon be publishing a book called Silt Sand Slurry: Dredging, Sediment, and the Landscapes We Are Making, authors Rob Holmes, Brett Milligan and Gena Wirth demonstrate why sediment matters now more than ever, given sea level rise, accelerated environmental change, and spatial inequity. This is approached through a documentation of the geography of dredging and sediment on the four coasts of the continental United States. This documentation is accomplished through alternating, complementary visual chapters and text chapters. Along the way, they explore the many limitations of the way that sediment systems are currently designed, such as short-sighted efforts to keep dynamic ecosystems from changing, failure to value sediment as a resource, and inequitable decision-making processes. Finally, using Public Sediment as a case study, they describe an approach to designing with sediment that is adaptive, healthy, and equitable.

dredgeresearchcollaborative.org

Earth Law Center

Earth Law Center
2019 - $10,000 General Support
2017 - $10,000 Biodiversity Rights Ordinance

Mission: Earth Law Center (ELC) works to pass a new generation of Earth-centered laws in the United States and worldwide, including by seeking legal rights for Nature. California and the San Francisco Bay Area has long been a focal point of our work.

Introduction to Earth Law: Traditional environmental law has failed. Despite the passage of thousands of environmental laws and policies in the U.S. and globally, Nature's health continues to decline. We must awaken from the misguided belief that exploiting and destroying Nature leads to prosperity. Earth law, or ecocentric law, is an effort to remake the legal system in ways that promote a better balance between human needs and the needs of those ecosystems that we inhabit. 

Goal: ELC's long-term goal is to build a system of law that aligns human activities with biological constraints on a livable, thriving planet. In the U.S., our strategy to this end is to empower local movements and help them pursue regulatory and legal changes that are more protective of Nature. 

Strategy: ELC works throughout the USA and globally using the following strategies:: 

1. Write model laws that are “ecocentric”—i.e., ecosystem well-being is the primary concern;
2. Work to put ecocentric laws into practice in order to restore ecosystems to health; and

3. Train the next generation of legal professionals to help save the planet; and

Grassroots Campaigns: Much of ELC's work operates at the local level. ELC provides pro bono legal support to communities wishing to apply new, cutting-edge legal frameworks that are more protective of Nature.  With legal movements growing to give legal rights to Nature and recognize the human right to a healthy environment, amongst others, communities and governments need help drafting strong new laws. Not only does ELC draft these laws, but we also teach other lawyers to do similar work.

History: After being founded in Florida in 2009, ELC spent its formative years operating out of the San Francisco Bay Area, where it hired its first Executive Director and co-founded the Bay Area Rights of Nature Alliance. Since then, ELC has engaged in law and policy campaigns throughout the Bay Area and California, protecting rivers under the Clean Water Act, advancing new “Earth-centered” laws and policies, and building a movement of legal professionals who work to transform the legal system to better protect Nature. Over the years, ELC has also established a national and global presence with team members in Washington State, New York, and Mexico City, amongst other places. 

Seed Fund Projects: ELC is a proud recipient of two grants from Seed Fund advancing our work. The first project involved advancing the Rights of Nature in San Francisco with an emphasis on Nature’s inherent right to thriving biodiversity. The second project involved new policies that promote native, low water usage, drought-resistant tree species in San Francisco. For both projects, ELC wrote in-depth policy reports, met with a broad range of stakeholders and governmental officials, and submitted formal proposals for new laws/policies that are under consideration in 2021. Through this work, we hope to create a blueprint for a future in which humans and Nature thrive together in harmony in the San Francisco Bay Area. We also hope that new laws will not only protect Nature, but also restore it to health. 

Other Recent Wins: In addition to our work with Seed Fund, here are some of ELC's wins from the last year or so:

1. ELC won a major Clean Water Act lawsuit against the State of California, helping to ensure that river pollution is fully addressed by state agencies.
2. ELC assisted the Nez Perce tribe to write a declaration establishing the rights of the Snake River (Idaho), including its right to flow, based on Native American rights.
3. ELC successfully secured the promotion of the Rights of Nature within the Convention on Biological Diversity, which was unprecedented for an environmental treaty. 
4. ELC submitted 8 amicus briefs on the Rights of Nature and human environmental rights in Latin America over the last year. Some have resulted in victories, including a ruling in Oaxaca, Mexico, to restore the health of two rivers, the Atoyac and Salado. 
5. ELC assisted the State of Colima in Mexico to pass a groundbreaking state constitutional amendment recognizing the Rights of Nature. 
6. ELC released a law school coursebook entitled “Earth Law: Emerging Ecocentric Law” with Wolters Kluwer as the publisher (September 2020). Numerous law schools and university programs will teach from the book beginning Spring 2021.
7. ELC drafted a Declaration on the Rights of the Southern Resident Orcas that received 15 organizational endorsements and support from several Washington State legislators.
8. ELC secured a proclamation by the El Salvadoran Legislative Assembly recognizing that “forests are living entities” with human duties to care for, preserve, and respect forests.
9. ELC is co-hosting a summit with the federal government of Nigeria to explore a new national law on the rights of rivers, which would be unprecedented in Africa.
10. ELC earned 35+ media mentions in the last year, including in the Guardian, the Chicago Tribune, NBC News, and numerous environmental magazines.

Learn More: Visit www.earthlawcenter.org. You can also sign up for our newsletter or follow us on Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter.

YouTube Videos About Our Work:

General https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lubNvaTigAU
Ocean Rights https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LH31biWQgt0 
River Rights https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I2p7EfOKaFA

earthlawcenter.org

Exploratorium

The Exploratorium is a LEED-Platinum rated building and the institution is working toward energy neutrality through systems like the solar panels on Pier 15. © Exploratorium, www.exploratorium.edu

The Exploratorium’s Pier 15 and 17 is centrally situated on San Francisco’s Embarcadero Waterfront, with access to public transit, and a working dock for visiting ships of all types.© Exploratorium, www.exploratorium.edu

The Exploratorium welcomes over 800,000 visitors every year, from field trip students to adult After Dark audiences to curious individuals from every walk of life. © Exploratorium, www.exploratorium.edu

The Fisher Bay Observatory is home to many of the incredible environmental programs of the Exploratorium. Among its many incredible exhibits and programs, it houses the Wired Pier—an array of sensitive instruments around the Exploratorium campus that measure and record conditions in the environment—the weather, Bay water, pollution, and more © Exploratorium, www.exploratorium.edu

The entire Exploratorium is a hub of environmental programming—our working dock welcomes NOAA research ships and other vessels, our buoy gathers information year-round, and the Fisher Bay Observatory convenes the leading minds in urban resilience and sustainability. © Exploratorium, www.exploratorium.edu

The Exploratorium’s Gallery 4 is dedicated to Living Systems and is one of the only informal learning institutions in the country with a working wet lab on site. © Exploratorium, www.exploratorium.edu

Exploratorium
2022 - $15,000 Urban Fellows Program
2021 - $15,000 Urban Fellows Program
2019 - $10,000 Coastal Resiliency Collaboration
2019 - $10,000 General Support
2018 - $10,000 Urban Fellowship
2017 - $10,000 Urban Fellowship
2017 - $10,000 Habitat: Bay As It Is Symposium
2016 - $5,000 Habitat: Bay As It Is Symposium
2016 - $10,000 Urban Fellowship
2015 - $10,000 Urban Fellowship
2015 - $10,000 Center for Art and Inquiry
2014 - $10,000 Urban Fellowship
2013 - $10,000 Jane Wolf, Bay Lexicon
2013 - $1,000 Living Innovation Zone
2011 - $10,000 Capital Campaign

Since 1969, the Exploratorium’s museum in San Francisco has been home to a renowned collection of 650+ exhibits that draw together science, art, and human perception, and that have changed the way science is taught. Our award-winning programs inspire visitors, empower teachers through our cutting-edge teacher development program, and influence a global movement where 80% of science centers across the globe contain Exploratorium exhibits. The exhibits on the floor are designed to enable experimentation with physical phenomena while simultaneously strengthening thinking and inquiry skills. This is true not only for our audiences of over 850,000 people a year in San Francisco, but for an estimated 250 million people who experience our exhibits at science centers around the world. As founder Frank Oppenheimer saw it: “A lot of people have given up trying to comprehend things, and when they give up with the physical world they give up with the social and political world as well. If we stop trying to understand things, I think we’re all sunk.” The Exploratorium continues to build on his foundational belief that citizens who are curious and empowered to learn about the world are more likely to take action and tackle problems in their communities.

The Exploratorium’s location on Piers 15 and 17, and in particular our investment in the Fisher Bay Observatory, has provided an unprecedented opportunity to engage the public with a wealth of data about the area’s natural and built environments and dynamic access to the researchers collecting it. Since our relocation from the Palace of Fine Arts in 2013, we have been continually evolving exhibits, programs, and partnerships to engage diverse audiences in understanding the complex ecologies that emerge through the interaction between social, cultural, and natural forces and systems. The facility serves as a new model for a combined research and learning space—an open laboratory for researchers, policy makers, and the public. We are educators who have learned that as we face global climate crises, our strategy must be expansive including the contributions of scientists, educators, artists, designers, historians and cultural workers, as well as practitioners in the realms of policy and advocacy. 

Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, the Exploratorium closed its doors on March 12, 2020. Our museum has always been a playground of discovery and hands-on learning, but as we remain closed, our educators, exhibit developers, scientists and other staff have gotten creative in sparking curiosity online. From helping teachers make science come alive in virtual classrooms, to engaging families all over the globe in tinkering projects, to illuminating timely science through online events like Covid Conversations and After Dark, the Exploratorium’s online content highlights what the Exploratorium does best: creating learning experiences that are engaging, interactive, inspiring, and trustworthy.

The digital programming and resources reach audiences from young kids to adults, and present a full range of topics from nearly all Exploratorium departments, from biology, to the environment, to Cinema Arts. In all, our digital resources are being used more than ever: traffic to our website, which serves 2M people annually, is up by nearly 300%. The Exploratorium is proud to continue sparking curiosity wherever people are, whether the kitchen table laboratory, the virtual classroom, the outdoors, or—eventually—back at Pier 15

Urban Fellowship
The Exploratorium's new Urban Fellow program will address issues related to climate change and rising sea levels.  This program situates an artist or urban practitioner in a residency within the Bay Observatory to explore the human relationship to the urban environment.  Fellows could explore concrete forms: such as architecture and infrastructure: as well as human forms: such as approaches to planning or individual practices within the city.  This investigation is both important and timely as urban areas globally explore the issue of climate change and coastal resiliency.

Jane Wolf, Bay Lexicon
Bay Lexicon is an illustrated field guide to San Francisco’s shoreline. Using methods and tools from landscape scholarship, design, and science education, Bay Lexicon aims to encourage observation and enquiry about the natural world and its relation to culture.

exploratorium.edu

Futurefarmers/Amy Franceschini

Futurefarmers/Amy Franceschini
2020 - $10,000 FogHouse Project
2017 - $15,000 Seed Journey
2010 - $5,000 Free Soil: Farming 2050 Publication
2007 - $10,000 Victory Garden Project

Amy Franceschini is a pollinator who creates formats for exchange and production that question and challenge the social, cultural and environmental systems that surround her. In 1995, Amy founded Futurefarmers, an international collective of artists. In 2004, Amy co-founded Free Soil, an international collective of artists, activists, researchers, and gardeners who work together to propose alternatives to the social, political and environmental organization of space.Victory Gardens
Victory Gardens 2007+ calls for a more active role for cities in shaping agricultural and food policy. It is a concept in development with the city of San Francisco that would provide a subsidized home gardening program for individuals and neighborhoods.  This program offers tools, training & materials for urban dwellers to participate in a city-wide transformation of underutilized backyards— turning them into productive growing spaces. The project draws from the historical model of the 1940's American Victory Garden program to provide a basis for developing urban agriculture as a viable form of sustainable food practice in the city.

Farming 2050
The first issue of the annual journal Free Soil, FARMING 2050, documents a one-day experiment where eleven artists, farmers, writers, policy makers, architects and philosophers were invited to imagine farming in 2050. What will it look like and how will we get there? What materialized was a range of apprehensions, evaluations and revelatory combinations of fact and fiction that offer a diverse look on the future of farming. This hyper-local portrait of critical, San Francisco voices reflects a sense of optimism intertwined with serious demands to re-evaluate the current logic that dominates our food system.

futurefarmers.com

Holding Ground Project

Holding Ground Project 2017 - $8,000 Film Project Raising Awareness of Conserved Land to Adapt to Climate Change holdinggroundproject.org

Island Press

Rep. Jose Serrano reads from an Island Press op-ed in The Washington Post calling for a return to science-based decisionmaking at the Environmental Protection Agency

Solutions that Inspire Change: Recent Titles from Island Press

Carey Gillam, author of Whitewash: The Story of a Weed Killer, Cancer, and the Corruption of Science (Island Press, 2017) testifies to the European Parliament about the dangers of glyphosate 

Steven Higashide, author of Better Buses, Better Cities: How to Plan, Run, and Win the Fight for Effective Transit (Island Press, 2019)

Book launch party for Transit Street Design Guide (Island Press, 2016)

Island Press
2023 - $10,000 Founders’ Pot
2022 - $10,000 Founders’ Pot
2021 - $15,000 Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Work 
2021 - $10,000 Founders’ Pot
2020 - $15,000 Online Programming During COVID-19 Pandemic
2020 - $25,000 Founders’ Pot
2019 - $25,000 General Support
2018 - $5,000 Founders’ Pot for General Operating Support
2017 - $5,000 Founders’ Pot for General Operating Support
2017 - $5,000 General Support
2016 - $5,000 General Support
2015 - $5,000 General Support
2014 - $5,000 General Support
2013 - $10,000 Sustainability Knowledge Network
2011 - $5,000 General Support

Island Press supports the environmental community in advancing their knowledge and practice which, ultimately, improves the natural systems on which humankind depends. A non-profit organization, its mission is to provide the best ideas and information to those seeking to understand and protect the environment and create solutions to its complex problems. 

From its growing network, Island Press identifies promising thinkers, inspiring stories, and game-changing ideas to publish some 30 books each year. Island Press’ publishing expertise delivers critical information that enhances the work of thousands of professionals striving to create healthier, more sustainable, and more just communities. Today, Island Press is one of the nation's leading providers of environmental ideas and solutions. 

Island Press’ goal is to spark lasting solutions to environmental problems. Its approach is two-fold: 

Identifying and Developing Ideas 

Island Press identifies and shapes the best ideas, methods, and approaches into accessible content. The most valuable lessons come from those who are doing the work—the scientists, activists, and professionals who are leading change every day. But these problem-solvers often need guidance on how to share their experience with others. Without the editorial and communications support Island Press provides, important new voices would be left unheard, and effective approaches unknown.

Promoting and Distributing Content

The field needs cutting-edge information and practical solutions to a wide range of problems. Island Press taps into a distribution network of environmental movement leaders, researchers, policymakers, professionals, and the public. The organization’s reach extends into many areas, ranging from transportation planning and food systems to affordable housing and green space.

Setting this work apart from for-profit publishers, Island Press is committed to providing reliable, science-based knowledge in digital formats—webinars, articles, opinion pieces, and online courses—most of them free. 

Island Press has developed a body of environmental literature that is considered by many to be the most comprehensive, rigorous, and innovative available. This work is shaping policies, establishing thought leaders, and advancing influential concepts that have had important real-world impacts.

Notable Accomplishments 

Creating Safer Streets for All: Publishing the Urban Street Design Guide guided billions of dollars in infrastructure spending for energy-saving, carbon-reducing public transit and pedestrian-friendly streets across the country. 

Reducing Toxic Chemicals: The award-winning Whitewash: The Story of a Weed Killer, Cancer, and the Corruption of Science led to limits on the cancer-causing chemical glyphosate (the main ingredient in Roundup) in several countries, as well as on college campuses and public lands across the U.S. 

Regulating Overfishing: The Most Important Fish in the Sea led to the first-ever limits on menhaden fishing, which had reached unsustainable levels. The quota resulted in a 26% reduction in the menhaden catch—a huge victory for fishing communities and conservationists.

Response to COVID-19 Pandemic

As workplaces closed and events were canceled, Island Press moved quickly to create more online offerings for professionals and students who were now working from home. Island Press released a dozen e-books for free and nearly tripled its schedule of free webinars for professionals. As a result, attendance to online trainings more than doubled. This evolving approach helped the organization grow the number of people it serves, and has widened its geographic reach.

islandpress.org

Literacy for Environmental Justice

Literacy for Environmental Justice
2021 - $15,000 General Support
2019 - $10,000 Interpretative Signage
2019 - $10,000 General Support 
2018 - $10,000 Nursery expansion
2017 - $10,000 Justice Installations and Educational Outreach Materials at Candlestick Point Recreation Area
2017 - $10,000 Nursery Expansion and Capacity Building
2016 - $10,000 Candlestick Point State Recreation Area Rehabilitation
2015 - $10,000 Candlestick Point State Recreation Area Rehabilitation

Literacy for Environmental Justice (LEJ) is a non-profit youth development organization in Bayview Hunters Point that works to address environmental justice issues in San Francisco with two native plant nurseries, ecological restoration projects, youth outdoor education, and green job training.

Their neighborhood's mix of industrial and residential zoning and geographic location result in poor air quality & high particulate matter concentrations, exposure to radiation and hazardous waste, difficulty accessing open space, and flooding issues amplified by climate change and sea level rise.

LEJ’s priority is to empower young environmental leaders and to care for open spaces. They do this by 1) providing free environmental education programs for low-income youth that focus on hands-on environmental stewardship and recreation, such as kayaking, hiking and camping; 2) operating two native plant nurseries that grow thousands of native plants per year used for habitat restoration; and 3) running a multi-track, year-round internship program designed to get young, diverse leaders into ‘green’ careers. The 2018 San Francisco Biodiversity Initiative named LEJ a leader in diversity, equity, and inclusion in the environmental field.

Since the onset of COVID, LEJ has still held to its mission of serving local, San Francisco youth. The Eco-Apprentice program was deemed an essential service by the City, for work in ecosystem restoration. Our eight (8) Eco-Apprentices are local, low-income young adults (approximately 18-25 years old). In normal years, Eco-Apprentices run ecological restoration activities and youth programs. This year, they have focused entirely on restoration work, as youth programs were not safe to operate.

Eco-Apprentices normally facilitate over 2,000 youth and volunteers in stewardship and environmental education programs each year, which contributes greatly to our ability to grow native plants and perform park stewardship. This year, Eco-Apprentices have completed 100% of the native plant nursery and park stewardship work, achieving the same targets that were in place last year with the help of youth and volunteers. Eco-Apprentices are scheduled to begin facilitating Covid-safe youth community kayaking events beginning in March 2021. They are planning to host 1-2 kayaking events per month, as long as it is Covid-safe, until the pandemic subsides.

In two decades of work in the Bayview community, LEJ has restored over 100 acres of public, urban open space with over 250,000 newly planted native plants. Currently, there are about 450 San Francisco native species still intact, of which LEJ grows about 200 species. LEJ’s community-based restoration has led to the resurgence of several rare, threatened, & endangered species, including: the Clapper Rail, Burrowing Owl, Western Meadowlark, Western Pigmy Butterfly, Pacific Ring-Neck Snake, Chorus Frog, Long-Tailed Jack Rabbit, and more. As California and San Francisco have rolled out their biodiversity initiatives, LEJ is poised to lead even larger-scale restoration and green-infrastructure installation in these urban areas.

This winter 2021, LEJ is breaking ground to double the size of their native plant nursery and community garden. This will allow LEJ to hire and train more young environmental leaders and to amplify the ecological restoration work they do in Bayview Hunters Point and Southeast San Francisco.They've already raised over $1 million dollars and only need $150 thousand more to bring this project to completion by the summer of 2021. You can help them get there by donating here: https://lejyouth.networkforgood.com/

Check out LEJ’s website for volunteer opportunities and other ways to connect with the organization.

To learn more about LEJ's Eco-Apprentices, check out “Literacy for Environmental Justice: Cultivating Youth Leaders in Southeast San Francisco” from Kristin Tieche on Vimeo (8 min): https://vimeo.com/324521956

lejyouth.org

Marin Agricultural Land Trust

Marin Agricultural Land Trust
2017 - $15,000 Carbon Farm Plan

malt.org

Marin Carbon Project

MALT staff conducts a baseline assessment to determine the composition of grassland species at a ranch.

MALT staff digs a soil pit to analyze soil characteristics at different depths.

Soil scientists collect soil samples that will measure changes in organic carbon through time (carbon sequestration); soil texture and bulk density (structure and compaction); soil pH (acidity); and soil fertility (nutrient availability).

A soil scientist takes a sample which will be analyzed for bulk density, a measurement of compaction.

Compost is applied to a grazed rangeland at Stemple Creek Ranch. 

Marin RCD staff maps the location of compost application onto different pastures.

A profile of native grass and its root system.  photo credit: PRathmann

Marin Carbon Project
2019 - $20,000 Carbon Cycle Institute
2018 - $20,000 Point Reyes Carbon Farming
2017 - $20,000 Point Reyes National Seashore Carbon Farm Plan

As much as one-third of the surplus CO2 in the atmosphere driving climate change has resulted from land management practices, including agriculture. Carbon farming, a whole-farm approach to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and promote long-term carbon sequestration in agricultural ecosystems, holds the potential to significantly reduce GHG by increasing the rate of transfer of atmospheric carbon dioxide to plant material and the soil organic carbon pool, leading to enhanced soil health and increased farm productivity. 

Years of rigorous research undertaken by the Marin Carbon Project (MCP), under the leadership of UC Berkeley Professor Dr. Whendee Silver, has culminated in robust confirmation of the GHG-mitigating efficacy of organic matter amendment on rangeland soils. Dr. Silver’s research demonstrated that agricultural land management practices can measurably increase rates of carbon sequestration, resulting in enhanced soil quality and soil water holding capacity and increased soil carbon and forage production (Ryals and Silver 2013). 

With this research and field validation, MCP integrates carbon farm planning into the existing conservation planning program that help land managers meet their natural resource management goals while supporting productive lands, thriving streams, and on-farm wildlife habitat. The program is applicable to a diversity of land uses and enables MCP partners to identify and quantify practices to increase carbon sequestration and reduce GHG emissions on farm in a whole-farm planning context. These practices support climate change resiliency by reducing atmospheric CO₂ levels, improving soil health, water holding capacity, and crop and forage production. By increasing soil water holding capacity, carbon farm practices promote water conservation, reduce overland flow and sediment and nutrient transport, reduce irrigation needs and reduce stream withdrawals, thereby enhancing water quality and instream habitat. Agroforestry practices, such as hedgerows, silvopastures and windbreaks, sequester CO₂ while enhancing on-farm microclimate and wildlife and pollinator habitat.

MCP prescribes these climate-beneficial practices by completing Carbon Farm Plans for farmers. MCP partners have completed 19 CFPs across 8,000 acres for dairy and grazing operations in Marin County. The plans have been used to inform Drawdown Marin and the new (2020-2030) Marin County Climate Action Plan. Carbon farm plan data has been used to scale up and estimate agriculture’s potential to meet the goal of reducing GHG emissions and enhancing carbon sequestration on the working lands of the county. An average of eight practices are prescribed in each plan which, if implemented, would collectively sequester 11,585 MTCO2e annually. Over twenty years, this is 258,237 MTCO2e sequestered. The Marin County Climate Action Plan establishes an annual target of 55,752 MT CO2e reduced or sequestered on county working lands, with a target date of 2030.

MCP has already begun the work of helping farmers with practice implementation. In partnership with farmers, public agencies and the Seed Fund, MCP has kicked off the implementation of climate-beneficial practices as prescribed in plans. These practices are improving water quality and quantity for farms and fisheries on coastal agricultural lands. Practices are collectively sequestering 136.2 MTCO2e annually (108 cars driven per year), as calculated using COMET-Planner, an on-farm GHG model developed by Colorado State University, USDA-NRCS and the Marin Carbon Project. Cumulatively, the completed carbon farm practices total: 3,088 linear feet of hedgerow; 1,315 linear feet of 2-3 row windbreak; 2 acres of silvopasture; 518 linear feet of riparian planting; 0.34 AC of critical area planting, and 23.5 acres of compost application.  A total of 2,542 trees and shrubs were planted in conjunction with implementation of these plans. 

The Seed Fund has supported the following MCP endeavors:

• Carbon Farm Plan Development and Implementation
• Soil Sampling
• Assessment of carbon farming potential in the Point Reyes National Seashore
• Programmatic environmental review of carbon farming practices for streamlined permitting

marincarbonproject.org

Nature in the City

Nature in the City
2021 - $15,000 Climate Resilience Work
2017 - $5,000 Backyard Natives Nursery Program
2017 – $10,000 General Support
2014 - $5,000 General Support
2011 - $5,000 Green Hairstreak Butterfly Project
2010 - $5,000 Green Hairstreak Butterfly Project

As the only non-profit organization dedicated to restoration & stewardship of San Francisco’s natural heritage, Nature in the City plays a critical role in securing the city’s wild lands for future generations. Nature in the City connects with the city at large through the sponsorship of nature walks, events for children and families, eco-literacy training, volunteer opportunities, and resources for community groups wishing to start their own citizen science projects.

Green Hairstreak Butterfly project
Discovered by modern science in the late 1800s from “the hills of San Francisco” the Green Hairstreak (Callophrys dumetorum) is a small, nickel-sized butterfly isolated in three remaining remnant habitats within the city: Hawk Hill and Rocky Outcrop overlooking the Sunset District and the coastal bluffs of the Presidio. The primary goal of the Green Hairstreak Project is to connect two disjunctive butterfly populations in the Sunset District with street level plantings of host and nectar sources. If the two populations can interbreed, their genetic viability and diversity will be more secure.

natureinthecity.org

Outdoors Empowered Network

Youth taking a moment of rest and reflection on an overnight backpacking trip with an OEN member organization.

Youth enjoying an overnight backpacking trip with an OEN member organization.

OEN helps member organizations secure outdoor gear to ensure that youth are safe, warm, and dry on all their trips.

Youth at a river crossing on a day hike with an OEN member organization.

An example of an OEN member organization’s gear library. Each library is set up differently depending on the needs of their community.

An outdoor leadership training at one of OEN’s member’s campsite-based programs.

Keynote speaker, Autumn Saxon-Ross at OEN’s 5th annual National Summit in 2019. 

Outdoors Empowered Network
2018 - $10,000 Grant for Capacity Building
2017 - $10,000 General Support
2016 - $5,000 General Support
2015 - $7,500 General Support
2014 - $10,000 General Support

Outdoors Empowered Network is a national network of community-led, youth-centered outdoor education groups that are dedicated to increasing access and diversity in the outdoors through gear libraries and outdoor leadership training.

OEN’s member organizations support access to outdoor adventures for tens of thousands of youth each year. Members partner with youth service agencies, schools, and other youth-centered groups to make transformative outdoor experiences through these core programs:  

• Gear Libraries - Members reduce one of the biggest barriers to getting outside—cost of gear—by curating and providing access to outdoor equipment libraries that cater to schools, youth service organizations, and families. Gear libraries can look different in different communities, using a wide array of partnerships.

• Outdoor Leadership Training - Members provide experiential, skills-based trainings for teachers and youth workers in their regions so they are empowered to take youth outdoors on their own. For every adult trained, 20+ youth get a chance to experience the power of nature and the outdoors. For many young people, this is the first time they’ll see the Milky Way, hear a rushing waterfall, or experience an environment free of the urban cacophony of horns, sirens, and cell phones. Nature-based experiences change lives.
• Community Support - Members often provide mini-grants, transportation subsidies, and connections through social media and listservs. Some also provide campgrounds, simplifying the preparations required for teachers and youth mentors as they plan their trips.

Being part of OEN gives members the opportunity to build networks, share best practices, fundraise for gear, and see the national impact of collective work. The core “train and support” program model brings together a wide variety of members, all working together to bring equity and access to the outdoors. 

Outdoors Empowered Network supports members in the following ways:

• Outdoor Gear Acquisition - Our members are responsible for twenty gear libraries throughout the United States, reducing one of the biggest barriers to access for hundreds of thousands of young people. Outdoors Empowered Network supports these gear libraries through fundraising for in-kind and monetary donations, bulk purchases, and programmatic design.
• Member Support - From designing new programming to applying for grants, running an outdoor education organization can involve a lot of hard and lonely work. OEN staff works hard to create connections, problem-solve, and support new program design.
• Professional Community - From monthly calls to ad hoc virtual meet-ups to our annual  Summit, OEN cultivates a professional community for outdoor educators and administrators. Our network model gives members a community to work with as they explore new ideas, develop programming and best practices, and face inevitable challenges.
• Thought Leadership - We support conversations about issues like diversity, equity, and inclusion in the outdoors by bringing in external thought leaders and facilitating conversations among our members. Our annual Summit is a highlight of these ongoing opportunities for growth and leadership.

Member programs are at the heart of the work of Outdoors Empowered Network. Together, the network is working to increase our collective impact on the world, and create equitable access to nature. 

outdoorsempowered.org

Prelinger Library

Prelinger Library
2018 - $5,000 General Support
2017 - $5,000 General Support
2016 - $5,000 General Support

The Prelinger Library is an urban oasis of research, community, art and collaboration in San Francisco. Co-founded by Rick and Megan Prelinger in 2004, it is a freely publicly accessible workshop where artists, writers and activists from around the Bay Area and across the Nation meet to pursue research-based works of all kinds. The Library offers a collection of over 30,000 books and an equal number of pieces of printed ephemera, including maps, zines and pamphlets. It is an appropriation friendly resource for all visitors.

Within its social function as a public workshop, the Library offers ongoing experiments in the future of reading, research and collaboration. No less important than what is in the collection is how it’s used: through social reading, through appropriation and through collaborations that arise from both careful planning and accidental meetings alike.

prelingerlibrary.org

San Francisco Bicycle Coalition Education Fund

A recipient of the SF Bicycle Coalition’s Bike Match program.

Car-free space in Golden Gate Park.

People biking and enjoying a car-free Great Highway during the pandemic.

Students during a socially-distant bike education class.

Bay area residents enjoying biking on San Francisco streets.

San Francisco Bicycle Coalition Education Fund
2019 - $10,000 General Support
2017 - $10,000 Transportation Equity Network
2013 - $5,000 "Kit of Parts" Manual
2012 - $25,000 2nd Street Project
2011 - $10,000 Family Biking Guide and Programs
2010 - $10,000 Connecting the City
2009 - $5,000 Great Streets Program

The San Francisco Bicycle Coalition is one of the oldest bicycle advocacy organizations in the country and was founded in 1971 by a group of activists representing a coalition of environmental and neighborhood groups. The organization quickly evolved into a powerful alliance of individuals working for a more bicycle-friendly city. The SF Bicycle Coalition has been dominated by a grassroots volunteer ethic ever since, growing into one of the strongest bicycle advocacy organizations in the country. For over 45 years, the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition has been transforming San Francisco streets and neighborhoods by promoting the bicycle for everyday transportation. Through their day-to-day advocacy, education and working partnerships with city and community agencies, the organization continues to create safe, just, and livable streets for all San Franciscans.

The San Francisco Bicycle Coalition embodies their core principles: transportation justice, sustainability, people power, and joy in all areas of their work. In their 2018-2022 strategic plan, the SF Francisco Bicycle Coalition incorporated these values to construct and execute a plan that prioritizes quality bicycle infrastructure and increases safety and invites more people to bike. In an effort to adapt to a world that’s changing the way it gets around, the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition aims to transform the streets of San Francisco through:

1. The demand of high-quality infrastructure and visionary improvements to connect the city;
2. Building public support and political power to win affordable and sustainable transportation for all San Franciscans; 
3. The growth, engagement, and empowerment of membership in order to strengthen the organization and deepen community support for bicycling and; 
4. Introducing San Franciscans of all ages, identities, and backgrounds to the joy of bicycling and encouraging more San Franciscans to bicycle more often.

To fulfill these objectives, the SF Bicycle Coalition employs both their programmatic and advocacy related work to promote, educate, and reimagine transportation in San Francisco. Nationwide, transportation remains to be the second biggest expense in a household’s budget, and families in San Francisco feel that cost acutely. The San Francisco Bicycle Coalition strives to provide affordable transit options to those in need and promote the bicycle for everyday transportation. 

Through the Bike It Forward program, the SF Bicycle Coalition works alongside community groups around the City to organize events structured to provide bikes to neighborhood residents. The organization reclaims unclaimed and abandoned bikes from the SFMTA, BART, and other agencies that are repaired with the help of volunteers. Alternatively, the Bike Match program connects people who have bikes they no longer use with those who need a bike. As a cooperative, community-driven collaborative, neighborhood residents who have expressed a need through partner organizations, complete a bicycle education course, get properly fitted for their new bike, and leave with a new, affordable, fun and healthy way to get around. 

The San Francisco Bicycle Coalition is considered the leading resource for street safety and education in the city. The organization structures its curriculum to cater toward people who bike and those who share the streets with people who bike. Whether a course is dedicated to youth and family biking, navigating safely through San Francisco, learning how to share the streets with all forms of transit, riding at night and in all weather conditions, or just getting acquainted with the basics, the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition is proud to offer free online resources and classes that accommodate all age ranges, levels of comfortability, and experience.

Through their advocacy work, the SF Bicycle Coalition continues to push for more car-free spaces, slow streets, and safe, high-quality biking infrastructure. To keep expanding the number of Slow Streets, the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition continues to push the City to explore more permanent treatments and prioritize the densest San Francisco neighborhoods, including the Tenderloin and SoMa. In 2020, advocacy for better bike infrastructure pushed forward and construction continued on Lefty O’Doul Bridge, 7th Street from Folsom to Townsend, Howard Street from 3rd to Embarcadero, new protected bike lane segments on the Embarcadero, and improvements to 20th Avenue in the Outer Sunset. 

During the pandemic, the organization has seen six times more people biking in Golden Gate Park. Now, after decades of advocacy, San Franciscans can enjoy a fully car-free route from the Panhandle to Ocean Beach; take a car-free ride through the Panhandle, to the eastern segment of JFK Drive, through Overlook and Middle Drive, and onto the car-free western segment of MLK Drive. While more people are looking to spend more time outdoors amidst the lifting of shelter-in-place orders, the Slow Streets program has also expanded car-free space across San Francisco to help people stay healthy and safe. Thanks to this program, people can maintain social distance as they walk, bike, and roll on over 30 corridors that are closed to vehicle through traffic. 

The Seed Fund have been supporters of the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition for over a decade and have partnered with the organization to fund certain campaigns centered around transportation justice, sustainability, people power, and joy. Some of these projects include:

• In 2012, the Seed Fund granted the SF Bicycle Coalition $5,000 toward the 2nd Street redesign in San Francisco’s South of Market neighborhood to push for and prioritize biking and walking infrastructure. 

• In 2013, $5,000 was granted to the SF Bicycle Coalition’s “Kit of Parts” manual that provided city planners with information on how to quickly transform city streets that included separated bikeways, greening initiatives, and sidewalk expansions. The toolkit was intended to be an open and accessible resource that provided inspirational, practical, and feasible designs not only for San Francisco officials but other cities looking to create more sustainable solutions on both a national and global scale. 

• In 2017, The Seed Fund funded the SF Bicycle Coalition’s Transportation Equity Network proposal that identified the need to come together with other local community partners to establish a collective that ensured an equitable distribution of bikes. The Community Bike Build program (now formally known as the Bike It Forward program) needed to extend beyond simply providing low income residents with a bike, lights, lock and helmet. The San Francisco Bicycle Coalition — along with its partners —  determined that additional resources like bicycle safety education, affordable maintenance and culturally competent infrastructure needed to be implemented.

• In 2019, The Seed Fund funded the SF Bicycle Coalition’s Embarcadero campaign which helped hire staff and additional resources to ensure that the vision of a two-way bike lane along the waterfront side of the Embarcadero project advanced toward approvals. The $10,000 grant toward this project gave the SF Bicycle Coalition the flexibility to work with elected officials and City agencies to identify and allocate funding for construction. Additionally, these funds helped ensure that the necessary time and resources to make this project a national and international model for linking climate adaptation and mitigation efforts through the best practices of green infrastructure were met. 

sfbike.org

San Francisco Estuary Institute

San Francisco Estuary Institute
2021 - $15,000 Urban Nature Lab Website
2019 - $10,000 Operational Landscape Units Project (with SPUR)
2018 - $10,000 General Support
2018 - $10,000 Biodiversity Integration into the SPUR Regional Plan
2017 - $10,000 Catalyzing Urban Biodiversity Book Project by Robin Grossinger
2017 - $10,000 Operational Landscape Units Project (with SPUR)
2017 - $10,000 Framework for Sea-Level Rise Adaptation
2016 - $15,000 Framework for Sea-Level Rise Adaptation
2014 - $10,000 Center for Resilient Landscapes

The San Francisco Estuary Institute (SFEI) delivers visionary science that empowers people to revitalize nature in their communities. Created by the region for the region, we are a unique local science think-tank supporting diverse organizations to improve the environmental health of the Bay Area and beyond. We provide independent science on water quality, urban sustainability, and ecological resilience to public agencies, NGOs, communities, and business leaders. These organizations collaborate with our team of 70 dedicated scientists and technologists for the innovative solutions needed to make our region, and the people who live here, healthy and resilient.

For more than a quarter century, SFEI has served as a trusted science advisor to local and state agencies charged with implementing natural resource mandates. Our pioneering historical ecology research has established an ecological foundation for large landscape restoration efforts in watersheds throughout California, prompting paradigm shifts in management. In the Bay, SFEI staff have provided science leadership to the California Coastal Conservancy’s 2015 Baylands Goals—a blueprint to accelerate the restoration of tidal marsh in San Francisco Bay toward a goal of 100,000 acres. In the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, our landmark studies have supported a partnership between state agencies and major water users by creating science-based options and a vision to restore up to 30,000 acres of Delta wetlands habitat. In cities, our Urban Nature Lab uses the quantitative science of nature in cities to help advance innovative, ecologically based urban planning and design.

SFEI develops nature-based solutions to improve conditions across the landscape -- along shorelines, in cities, and in rural areas. We use science-based planning to create multi-benefit approaches to improve ecosystem functions for people, like reducing flooding and sequestering carbon, and for nature, like creating habitat for native wildlife. These interventions are cost-effective, resilient, and can be implemented across the land-use spectrum from high in watersheds, through the valleys that hold our cities and agriculture, down to the edge of the Bay and Delta, with the intention of ensuring equitable outcomes for all communities. Our approach takes advantage of natural processes by restoring wetlands, floodplains, and riparian areas; creating high-performance networks of nature throughout; realigning creeks to reduce flooding and improve sediment delivery to protect the shoreline; and managing landscapes to sequester carbon rather than emitting greenhouse gases. 

Our vision of the Bay Area, as a model for other urbanized regions facing similar challenges, encompasses:

• Healthy ecosystems supporting people and nature across the landscape: along the shoreline, in cities, in agricultural areas, and in open space,
• Natural infrastructure helping urban areas and their surrounding landscapes manage sea-level rise, water supply challenges, higher temperatures, water pollution, more severe drought and flooding, and other climate-related threats, and
• Green space in developed areas improving the health and quality of life for all residents and for native wildlife.

For more information about SFEI and the Resilient Landscapes Program, please see our Strategic Plan.

Seed Fund Specific Projects

• The SF Bay Shoreline Adaptation Atlas is guiding local and regional strategies to adapt to sea level rise.
• Hidden Nature SF reveals the San Francisco landscape before the city.
• SFEI’s Urban Nature Lab uses the quantitative science of nature in cities to help advance innovative, ecologically based urban planning and design.

Our novel research on cities, published in The Biological Deserts Fallacy (BioScience 2021), identifies the different pathways by which cities can benefit regional ecosystems 

sfei.org

San Francisco Urban Film Festival

Folks enjoy City Is Alive, socially distant on Egbert Avenue, a night of musical performances and interactive murals to celebrate the legacy of everyday heroes that brought joy and life to the Bayview. Photo: Lucas Bradley

Felipe Riley dances in front of an interactive mural projection of his mother, Lenora LeVon, during City is Alive. .Photo: Shantré Pinkney

Folks gather in an unfinished ground-level unit in the East Cut district of San Francisco for a film screening and panel discussion.

A film screening and panel discussion in Fern Alley, San Francisco, where audience members sit in chairs or on blankets.

Participants drafting stories at a Storytelling Workshop at the SFUFF’s 6th annual film festival in 2020.

Audience members gather in the Bayanihan Center for a SFUFF film screening and panel discussion, co-presented by SOMAP Pilipinas, on how different grass-roots organizations use arts and culture to promote community preservation and self-determination. Photo: Emma Marie Chiang

Participants work in small groups during a Storytelling Workshop in partnership with Young Community Developers aimed at building Black intergenerational wealth in the Bayview. Photo: Austin Blackwell

San Francisco Urban Film Festival
2019 - $5,000 General Support 
2018 - $5,000 General Operating Support
2017 - $5,000 Climate Change Programming

WHAT WE DO

The SF Urban Film Fest (SFUFF) gathers a diverse, engaged audience and uses the power of storytelling to spark discussion and civic engagement around urban issues. They ask what it means to live together and create just and equitable cities.

SFUFF is an interdisciplinary storytelling organization that produces an annual film festival, year-round film-based discussion events, and long-term community storytelling projects.

They collaborate with cultural, academic, grass-roots, and civic organizations including the Roxie Theater, SPUR, Imprint City, Bay Area Video Coalition (BAVC), and many others. Projects are often jointly initiated to combine film and community planning, most recently with Young Community Developers (YCD) in the Bayview Hunters Point and SOMA Pilipinas Cultural Heritage District in the SOMA district of San Francisco. In recognition of their impact on empowering communities using storytelling and film, the SFUFF are Artists in Residence at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts (YBCA).

IMPACT

Film Festival
Since its founding in 2014, SFUFF has produced an annual film festival for 7 seasons and year round programming encompassing 115 events reaching over 8,000 people. They expect to reach many more through their virtual film festival in February 2021.

Based on their festival surveys, year after year, SFUFF attracts diverse audiences and reaches across demographic divides. Its 6th annual film festival audience was 53% people of color. Their audience was also remarkably intergenerational: 18% are aged under 25, 69% are between 26-55 years old, and 13% are aged 55+.

SFUFF engages with diverse filmmakers and panelists. 63% of our 2020 Festival filmmakers are people of color; most notably, 44% of our 2020 Festival filmmakers are women of color. Additionally, 74% of our 2020 Festival panelists are people of color.

Community Storytelling
SFUFF’s community storytelling projects create opportunities for unique cross disciplinary partnerships between community organizations, businesses, cultural institutions and public agencies.

In partnership with YCD, they organized storytelling workshops and produced a short video to kick off the Black Owner’s Campaign. The goal was to build a strong narrative aimed at galvanizing a coalition of Black property owners to support more affordable housing. The resulting video features prominently on the YCD homepage and has resulted in a local developer expressing interest in building housing for Black teachers.

The storytelling and community planning with YCD led to the production of a multi-media one-night socially distant event featuring a live streamed hip hop concert and interactive film projections depicting historic murals. The event, City is Alive, was centered on the theme of everyday heroes who fight for resources and bring joy to the Bayview Hunters Point and was produced in collaboration with Imprint City and YBCA.

SFUFF is working with the SOMA Pilipinas Cultural Heritage District on a short documentary film that chronicles the displacement of Pilipinx community by the force of redevelopment in the Yerba Buena district of SOMA during the 1970's, and the community’s resistance and struggle for self-determination that grew out of it and in face of ongoing gentrification and displacement. They are currently in community-driven pre-production with a team of Pilipinx filmmakers and archival researchers, and in late 2021, will organize work in progress screenings and community discussions centering the stories and people of the film. The process of making this film is designed to dovetail with the community planning around the creation of the cultural heritage district that already includes the famous UNDISCOVERED SF night market and Kapawa Gardens.

WHO WE ARE

The SFUFF Core Team brings rich backgrounds in civic innovation, urban planning, housing finance, media, filmmaking, and the humanities. They work year-round planning events and curating programming. During the festival season, a small army of volunteers help them with photography, marketing, ticket sales, audience surveys, and more.

Our Core Team plays artistic roles as Program Producers. They also guide organizational growth and fill administrative and technical roles. The following are brief detailed bios of SFUFF’s Core Team:

Fay Darmawi, Founder and Executive Director
Fay is an urban planner, cultural producer, and community development banker. She belongs to a persecuted Chinese minority group and immigrated to the U.S. from Jakarta, Indonesia as a child.

Kristal Celik, Festival Manager
Kristal has a background in energy and mechanical engineering and identifies with her Turkish immigrant roots.

Robin Abad Ocubillo, Program Producer
Robin is an urban designer and urban planner at the City of San Francisco Planning Department and identifies as an LGBTQ Filipino-American.

Omeed Manocheri, Program Producer
Omeed is a first generation Iranian-American multimedia producer and entrepreneur with a fine arts degree. His media projects include Daily Kabob, a new digital platform to unify the MENA and DESI communities.

Susannah Smith, Program Producer
Susannah is a documentary filmmaker interested in ways race and sexuality interact with the politics of urban development. Susannah is assistant editor on the documentary “Homeroom” premiering at the Sundance Film Festival in January 2021. She identifies as an LGBTQ Jewish-American.

Ronald Sundstrom, Humanities Advisor
Ronald is a Professor of Philosophy and a member of the African American Studies, Critical Diversity Studies programs at the University of San Francisco (USF). He identifies as mixed-race Filipino-American and Black, and LGBTQ.

sfurbanfilmfest.com

Save the Bay

Save the Bay
2017 - $10,000 Community-Based Habitat Restoration Program

savesfbay.org

Seed Journey

Seed Journey
2017 - $10,000 General Support
2016 - $10,000 General Support

“We can speak of this voyage as return or a re-tracing of a very ancient route combining human and non-human initiative by which wheat was domesticated from the wild and then slowly made its way through gifts, trade, winds, and sea currents, from the highly cultured Middle East to the barbarians of the north...” - Michael Taussig

Seed Journey (2017 - 2020) was a seafaring voyage from Oslo, Norway to Istanbul, Turkey upon an 1895 rescue sailboat. Carrying hand fulls of seeds and a rotating crew of artists, farmers, bakers and researchers, Seed Journey was a process of reverse migration, retracing the path of seed dissemination, and by extension human migration, back to their origins in ancient times.  At each port, Futurefarmers gathered local heritage seed custodians, enacted Seed Ceremonies (elaborated seed exchanges) and accepted gifts and grains to add to a growing archive. The project situates grains as emancipatory actors with respect to intellectual property rights pertaining to biological matter.

futurefarmers.com/seedjourney

Shaping San Francisco

Shaping San Francisco
2019 - $10,000 General Support
2018 - $5,000 General Support 
2017 - $5,000 General Support
2016 - $5,000 General Support
2013 - $5,000 General Support
2012 - $5,000 General Support
2010 - $5,000 Ecology Emerges Project Documentation

Serving the City for 25 years, Shaping San Francisco is an ongoing multimedia project in bottom-up history, offering an online archive at FoundSF.org—a place to document, discover, and shape San Francisco history—and public programming sharing the stories of daily life in the City by the Bay. Shaping San Francisco provides access to the City's lost history, with a long-term goal of facilitating its discovery, presentation, and preservation. The project seeks to create a physical and virtual commons where together we make—and understand our place within—history every day

Shaping San Francisco believes that “History is a Creative Act in the Present,” or in other words, each person is an agent of history, and every moment is historical, even if relatively little makes it on to the “historical record.” Shaping San Francisco’s public engagement promotes the idea that history can—and should—be de-professionalized, made into a popular, participatory process. More than just a website, more than just a lecture series, more than a collection of ongoing walking and bike tours, Shaping San Francisco encourages collective investigation of and creation of new shared social histories about the world we cohabitate together.

Shaping San Francisco's work encourages ordinary citizens to see the urban environment around them having been created in by a combination of social and ecological processes over time, within historic economic and cultural contexts; just as important the urban environment is shaped, too, by a ceaseless effort to challenge the meaning and direction of those processes and contexts. Shaping San Francisco has focused from its origins on San Francisco's ecological history, the relentless leveling of its famous hills and the steady filling of the bay to “make land,” which permanently altered the surrounding bay. Shaping San Francisco’s historical investigations of the changing ecology of the City have led to unique and enduring analyses integrating its tradition of dissent with the dramatic (and often catastrophic) changes that dissenters often sought to prevent.

15 seasons of FREE Public Talks provide an informative, engaging cultural forum inviting presenters and audiences to dialogue about issues covering Art & Politics, Historical and Literary Perspectives, Social Movements, and Ecology, emphasizing the intersections of multiple themes across fluid boundaries of disciplines and paradigms. This in-person discussion space is meant as an antidote to historical amnesia, creating a place to change the climate of public intellectualism in San Francisco, and an unmediated place to meet and talk. Most all of the Public Talks are archived online. Historical walking and bicycle tours—and the recent addition of Urban Forums: Walk & Talks and Bay Cruises—bring people together to learn how the City is shaped through the efforts of engaged citizens and from a perspective rooted in its overlooked and forgotten histories, including those of marginalized populations (and species!) who don’t show up in the history books.

Shaping San Francisco fosters academic and community partnerships, incorporating a service learning element to its public programming, offering historic context for the issues currently faced in the urban setting through tours to students and community members. As seasoned tour guides, editors, and educators, the directors are frequently asked to share their expertise through custom tours and classes; they create customized tours each month as well as collaborative projects year-round including teaching, guest-curating, and co-producing projects. Shaping San Francisco is a fiscally-sponsored affiliate of Independent Arts & Media, with whom successful collaborations have been forged over the course of a decade.

shapingsf.org

SPUR (formerly San Francisco Planning + Urban Research Association)

SPUR’s We Are the Bay exhibition

Farmer’s market in San Francisco; photo credit Sergio Ruiz

Rising tides threatening to flood; photo credit Sergio Ruiz

SPUR’s How We Move exhibition

A transit + design workshop held at SPUR’s Urban Center

SPUR (formerly San Francisco Planning + Urban Research Association)
2023 - $20,000 Transit Oriented Communities
2021 - $15,000 Transit Priority Program
2019 - $10,000 Operational Landscape Units Project
2018 - $20,000 Regional Plan
2017 - $10,000 Operational Landscape Units Project (with SFEI)
2017 - $10,000 Framework for Sea-Level Rise Adaptation
2016 - $15,000 Framework for Sea-Level Rise Adaptation
2014 - $15,000 Fossil Fuel Reduction Report
2010 - 2014 $38,000 Food Systems and Urban Agriculture Program
2007 - $5,000 General Support

Work

Through research, education and advocacy, SPUR works to create an equitable, sustainable and prosperous region. SPUR practices urban policy, developing and advocating for ideas and reforms to bring about systems change. The decisions that shape housing, transportation, land use, economics, food access, sustainability and resilience have significant impacts on people’s lives. SPUR also focuses on governance because it’s how communities organize themselves to achieve collective goals and because SPUR believes in the power of government as a force for good. SPUR works across the nine counties of the Bay Area because the structural systems that shape people’s lives— the housing market, the transportation network, the economy — are regional. SPUR does deep work in San Francisco, San José and Oakland because policies set in the region’s three biggest cities have widespread impact on most Bay Area residents and because local context is critical for effective policy. SPUR believes that community and individual well-being are healthiest when a society achieves equity, sustainability and prosperity. Equity because systemic racism continues to create unjust and unacceptable outcomes for many members of our community. Sustainability because human well-being depends on a healthy and thriving natural environment. And prosperity because meeting individual and collective needs requires resources. SPUR conducts its work through research, education and advocacy because these tools have the power to change minds and shape outcomes. The organization believes that profound systems change requires addressing beliefs, relationships and policies, and SPUR works at all three of these levels. SPUR grounds its work in a spirit of inquiry and a big-tent perspective that engages partners and communities across the region.

Goals

SPUR has many key goals related to each of the organization's major policy areas, including:
Planning: Add new jobs and housing where they will support equity and sustainability, and make neighborhoods safe and welcoming to everyone.
Housing: Make housing affordable for everyone.
Transportation: Make it fast, easy and inexpensive to get around without driving alone.
Sustainability + Resilience: Eliminate carbon emissions and make communities resilient to climate change.
Economic Justice: Enable all people to participate in the region’s thriving economy and attain economic security.
Good Government: Support a high-functioning public sector that serves the collective good.
Food + Agriculture: Create healthy, just and sustainable food systems, and put an end to food insecurity.

Achievements

SPUR has accomplished many things over the course of its 100+ year history. The organization shaped some of the most important planning and urban policy issues in the region, including planning for the BART system, establishing the Golden Gate National Recreation Area and the Bay Conservation and Development Commission, proposing San Francisco’s Affordable Housing Trust Fund and more. Recent achievements of the organization in 2020, include:

• Crafting more than 70 policy recommendations on housing, transportation, planning, sustainability and resilience and more
• Welcoming more than 13,000 individuals to public forums covering pressing issues in the Bay Area, such as the housing affordability crisis, economic inequality, how COVID-19 affects small businesses and more
• Co-sponsoring three pieces of legislation passed by California lawmakers, including SB288, which expands CEQA exemptions to speed up the delivery of sustainable transportation projects in the state
• Hosting the organization's first Ideas + Action symposium, which brought together public space experts and more than 1,500 attendees from across North America
• Released numerous reports and white papers, on topics such as the future of transportation, transit project delivery, climate hazards and modeling future places, which envisions a Bay Area that can welcome everyone
• Hosting a forum with Mayors Breed, Liccardo and Schaaf of San Francisco, San José and Oakland to learn how cities of the Bay Area can collectively work toward a more equitable, sustainable and prosperous region
• Leading convening efforts for the new California Home Builders Alliance, an informal advocacy coalition focusing on state legislation and regulatory reforms to build more housing

Impact Report attached; our most recent annual report was online only--it is available here: https://www.spur.org/about/annual-reports/2020

spur.org

Streetsblog

Streetsblog
2023 - $12,000 General Support
2021 - $12,000 General Support
2019 - $10,000 General Support
2018 - $8,000 General Support
2017 - $8,000 General Support
2017 - $8,000 General Support
2016 - $8,000 General Support
2011 - $8,000 General Support

Streetsblog is a non-profit daily news source, online community and political mobilizer for the Bay Area’s Livable Streets movement. Streetsblog frames the public debate on transportation and planning issues, creating momentum for more sustainable streets. A team of local writers collaborates with writers throughout California and Nationally to provide full coverage of transportation reform, urban planning and the Livable Streets movement locally and nationwide.

Streetsblog began in 2006 as a single local blog covering transportation and land use issues in New York City. The experiment proved a dramatic success, and it showcased the potential for focused advocacy journalism to empower overlooked constituencies and to usher in a reform-minded transportation policy agenda - SF.Streetsblog was launched in January 2009. The blog quickly became an influential voice and a mobilizer for the local transportation reform movement. Today, it reaches nearly 70,000 direct monthly readers, and plays a key role in the Bay Area’s Livable Streets movement. Their work is published on SF Gate and Bay Citizen. Streetsblog’s drumbeat of pedestrian, bicycle and transit stories have helped keep these important issues on the radar of supervisors and policy makers at City Hall and the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency.

sf.streetsblog.org

Trust for Public Land

Trust for Public Land
2022 - $20,000 Green Schoolyards Oakland
2021 - $20,000 India Basin
2018 - $20,000 India Basin Waterfront Park
2017 - $20,000 Parks for People Project: India Basin, San Francisco
2017 - $20,000 Innes Avenue Project
2016 - $20,000 Innes Avenue Project
2015 - $20,000 Innes Avenue Project

The Trust for Public Land (TPL) is dedicated to helping local communities with their conservation needs by raising funds, conducting research, designing and renovating parks, playgrounds, trails and gardens, as well as acquiring and protecting land. With over 30 offices across the nation, TPL works to provide access to nature for everyone and has completed over 5,000 conservation projects nationwide.

Locally, TPL is developing a plan to transform the 900 Innes Avenue property from an industrial brownfield into a vibrant community park featuring climate-smart infrastructure. Redeveloping the property is an important step in creating a more resilient shoreline that is adapted for sea level rise. 900 Innes will create green space and alternative transportation options for the under-served residents of Bayview/Hunters Point.

tpl.org

Urban Sustainability Directors Network

USDN members work together to visualize their upcoming priorities.

USDN members engage in forensic idea mapping to learn how to become more effective change agents.

USDN members and community members play “Game of Floods” to build relationships and learn to collaboratively plan for more resilient communities.

Kristin Baja (USDN Resilience Program Lead) presents to and collaborates with members in Hawai’i on the Nexus Project.

Members drawing to illustrate their plans and visions for the future.

Urban Sustainability Directors Network
2021 - $15,000 Nexus Program
2018 - $10,000 Climate Equity Leaders Program
2017 - $10,000 General Support
2016 - $10,000 General Support
2015 - $10,000 General Support

USDN is the primary network through which local government sustainability and climate practitioners access mission-critical resources and collaborate to advance their work. As of early 2021, over 230 communities and 1700 practitioners participate from across the US and Canada. As a member-led network, USDN enables groups of cities and counties to inspire and learn from each other, solve shared challenges, and engage in collective action to achieve impact in their communities. By bringing members and field partners together, USDN broadens, informs, and synthesizes perspectives on crucial issues and catalyzes new partnerships.

Programming focuses on three key areas: building practitioners’ capacity, accelerating action and innovation, and influencing enabling systems. Members highly value the support they receive through USDN and report that the network is critical to their success. From our annual member impact survey in December 2020:

• 74% of members report that USDN enabled them to find a solution to a key challenge.
• 73% of members reported that USDN involvement saves them time.
• 64% said USDN participation enabled them to make a change in local policy.
• 42% of USDN members indicated that USDN saves them money.
• 80% of members indicate that USDN participation was a valuable asset in helping them achieve their highest impact action of the past 2 years.
• “[USDN creates] a systemic resource for municipal sustainability professionals to access knowledge, connections, and financial resources. Such an organization does not exist in any other field, and it is a testament to its creators and the network. I simply could not be as effective as I am in my position without USDN.” -- USDN member

Two overarching strategies guide USDN programming:

• USDN’s High Impact Practices (HIPs) are the priorities in which USDN programming helps members take impactful actions to advance equity, GHG reduction, and resilience -- the nexus of member leadership and USDN’s unique capabilities for support and action. The updated framework reflects a broad and more equity-focused summary of sustainability priorities, placing equal emphasis on both how members work as well as what work they do.  
• In its Equity Principles and Commitments, USDN recognizes the root causes of climate change, environmental injustice, and racial inequity are the same and commits to using resources to advance members’ individual capacity to address racial equity, improve the diversity of practitioners, and transform the field. This builds off years of work in training local governments on the close connections between sustainability and equity, diversity, and inclusion.

The Nexus Project is one illustration of where USDN’s core strategies and programming focus areas converge and come to life. The Nexus is step-by-step guidance to help local government practitioners who are trying to fundamentally transform the traditional approach to climate planning and practice. It focuses on recognition of current power structures and outlines how to shift power to communities (particularly marginalized communities) as part of any process. 

Part of what is unique about the Nexus Project is that members learn to operationalize equity and work across department and technical silos in a supported process. The project provides 1:1 coaching for local government practitioners through USDN staff, and also brings in community partner coaches for government practitioners and community partner organizations to help them work together better. This holistic and multilayered approach is transforming how government practitioners approach their work and how communities and government can collaborate to build more equitable and sustainable communities.  

"We have transformed our work on climate to lead across the nexus as a result of the USDN Innovation Fund Grant - we have learned significantly from our peers in this space. The direct training and support from Baja [Resilience Director and Nexus Project Staff Lead] has helped us to build crucial interdepartmental support and relationships with other departments and jurisdictions, especially with the County. We're working to transform the countywide approach to their All Hazard Mitigation Plan because of Baja's technical support." -- USDN member 

USDN is grateful to the SEED Fund for its support of the Nexus Project. 

usdn.org

Vision Zero

Hank, Schulte Memorial, April 2013

Photo credit: Denver Street Partnership

Photo credit: Denver Street Partnership

Photo credit: NACTO, Urban Street Design Guide

Vision Zero
2017 - $10,000 General Support

Vision Zero Network is a nonprofit project working to advance Vision Zero – the goal of zero traffic deaths or severe injuries. Since its inception in 2015, it has helped grow the number of US communities committing to Vision Zero from 3 to more than 45. In addition, mainstream awareness of and support for the goal of safe mobility for all has grown significantly amongst elected leaders and policymakers, advocates, community members, and the private sector.

Traffic crashes cause 40,000 preventable deaths each year in the US and millions more serious injuries. And amongst youth, traffic crashes are the leading cause of death. This translates to 100 people losing their lives every day simply while walking, biking, riding transit, or driving. This equates to a mid-sized plane crashing every day, killing all passengers on board, which would certainly garner attention. But, most people are complacent about the tragedy of our daily death traffic toll.

Some communities are disproportionately harmed by traffic crashes in the US, including: children and seniors, people walking and bicycling, people of color, and low-income community members. When we factor in the health impacts of lack of physical activity due to overreliance on cars and auto-focused land use, as well as the pollution-related health impacts of motor vehicles, the already-staggering death toll of our car culture increases exponentially.

Vision Zero Network advances the goal of safe, healthy, equitable mobility for all people nationwide, whether walking, bicycling, riding transit or driving. As a learning network, they develop and share best practices, research and strategic communications. And, as an action-based campaign, they set milestones for success, help ensure accountability, elevate champions and raise public awareness. Their work includes facilitating peer exchange amongst community leaders and public sector staff leading traffic safety work on the ground, including public health and transportation professionals, policymakers, and community-based advocates. And by developing and sharing resources and setting up learning opportunities amongst peers, they help communities share promising strategies and lessons learned to advance Vision Zero. 

The Vision Zero framework treats traffic safety as a public health issue deserving of greater attention, support, and resources. Vision Zero is predicated on the understanding that these tragedies are not inevitable, but rather that we can make progress in safety by focusing on the upstream factors that influence people’s actions, particularly road design that accommodates all users and policies that prioritize safety over speed, including how speed limits are set. 

Vision Zero Network supports US communities in taking a systemic approach to reduce traffic deaths & severe injuries among all road users. Vision Zero is a new way of thinking about - and acting on - the need for safe mobility. It is both a goal and a strategy and represents a shift in three ways: First, it acknowledges that traffic deaths are preventable. Second, it is an interdisciplinary approach, coalescing diverse and necessary stakeholders to address a complex social problem. Lastly, Vision Zero is a data-based approach.

With Vision Zero, people across the nation are stepping up to declare that “Enough is enough” of the preventable loss and tragedy on our streets, sidewalks, and bikeways. Community members, mayors, transportation and public health professionals, police officers, and others are declaring that zero is the only morally responsible goal to set for safety.  They are acknowledging that we can prioritize safety while still ensuring mobility in our communities: This is a political choice. Slowly, but surely, we are seeing Vision Zero communities challenge the old paradigm that speed (or perception of speed) trumps safety.

The only acceptable goal for deaths on our streets, sidewalks, and bikeways is ZERO.

Seed Fund generously supported Vision Zero Network efforts to improve prioritization of racial and economic equity in traffic safety work. Staff focused on building knowledge, partnerships, and a long-term strategy toward centering equity in Vision Zero work. This included participation in national convenings on equity and policy implications.  In addition, they served as a resource to Vision Zero cities on this critical topic of how to ensure both effective and equitable strategies and outcomes in Vision Zero work growing around the nation. Examples of work in this area include development and sharing of resources such as “Equity Strategies for Vision Zero Practitioners” and educational webinars bringing together traffic safety leaders with racial and equity justice leaders. This has led to development of relationships and partnerships with leaders in the racial justice/transportation field and greater racial diversity on the VZ Network’s Advisory Committee. Longer-term, Seed Fund’s investment has supported the development of Vision Zero Network’s equity series, bringing together Vision Zero peers from around the country to discuss and develop traffic safety alternatives to promote both effectiveness and equity.

visionzeronetwork.org