California State Parks Foundation

California state parks foundation's park stewardship program organizes volunteer workdays year-round to protect and preserve state parks across california by addressing climate change and demands on natural resources. In partnership with california state parks, our program generates high-quality workday service projects to attend to unmet needs and engage californians with their local parks, including signature earth day climate action workday events in april. By expanding park staff's capacity, volunteers help overcome resource constraints and carry out essential tasks such as trail maintenance, habitat restoration, planting, and more. Their involvement fosters community engagement and connection, spreading awareness and inspiring others to appreciate and protect these natural and cultural treasures. Overall, our volunteer activity provided 10,410 hours of service equating to 5,287 native plants installed, 4.42 miles of trail restored, 6,124 square feet of fire buffer zones created, and over 172 bags of trash and recycling collected. Our earth day climate action 2024 granted a total of $57,305 to 12 state parks and park partners to support vegetation management needs as well as ongoing maintenance needs, including trails and fencing.

Climate resilience: we are using the best available science and research to learn deeply about climate threats and solutions, educate californians and the legislature, inspire people to take action, and ultimately influence policy and legislation that prioritizes the communities most impacted by climate change. This fiscal year we provided 6 grants directly to parks and park partners for wildfire resiliency, monarch conservation, to yosemite slough wetland restoration project at candlestick point state recreation area, and to ano nuevo state park habitat improvement.

The california state parks foundation is a supporter of nonprofit organizations and local governments who partner with california state parks in their area across the state. The foundation made services available to these group, including fundraising, fiscal sponsorship, capacity-building and other key elements of organization management. The foundation also provides ongoing support for operations and maintenance for several other parks throughout the year.