The Trust for Public Land in Action: 2018 C E L E B R AT I N G W HAT YO U M A D E P O S S I B L E IN COLORADO AND THE SOUTHWEST
Introduction Thanks to your interest and support, today more than 8 million people live within a 10-minute walk of a place created or protected by The Trust for Public Land—and countless more visit these sites each year.
We hope to convey just some of the tangible, lasting results your support has made possible this year in Colorado and the Southwest (Arizona, New Mexico, and Utah), and what we and our partners will accomplish together in the years to come. Thank you for helping to protect the places that make Colorado and the Southwest great places to live, work, learn, and play. Whether building a neighborhood playground or preserving a family ranch, we’re working to ensure healthy, livable communities for generations to come.
In cities like New York, New Orleans, and Oakland, schoolchildren and neighbors now have a beautiful place to play thanks to their new state-of-the-art rain garden schoolyards that capture stormwater runoff. Community members in Ohio are making their voices heard as they help shape the design of a future public space that will increase park equity for low-income residents. And hikers on the Pacific Crest Trail, Continental Divide Trail, and the Appalachian Trail are enjoying time outside together thanks to even more protected landscapes along the trails.
In the following pages you will learn about our recent successes in more detail—like celebrating Montbello, Westwood, and Nome Park openings this summer in Colorado’s urban areas, and the successful protection of the scenic Trampe Ranch, a critical private in-holding inside Zion National Park, and critical wildlife habitat at Cienega Ranch in Arizona.
Jim Petterson Southwest & Colorado Director
Annette Mainland Director of Philanthropy THEO STROOMER
Here at home in Colorado and the Southwest, The Trust for Public Land has conserved 666,232 acres of land, creating community parks, and ensuring public access to the wildlands and open spaces that define our region.
Sincerely,
Community art
Westwood Park, CO
Colorado—Parks for People W E S T W O O D PA R K In August, we celebrated with Denver's Westwood neighborhood as they reopened Westwood Park. The park’s theme is migration, which is echoed in native plant gardens, sidewalk etchings, and an ongoing community art project. We led the community engagement and master plan process for the park renovation, which includes three clusters of Fitness Zone® areas, a walking loop, nature play features, pollinator gardens, and a traditional kiosko that reflects the culture of this community. Westwood Park is part of the Via Verde, a connected system of multi-benefit green infrastructure connecting residents to neighborhood resources such as parks, schools, libraries, and health clinics.
In 2015, the project was awarded a $40,000 grant from the National Endowment for the Arts to incorporate art into the park’s design and infrastructure. We convened a community panel to select local artist Reven Swanson, who engaged community members, students, and teachers to develop three kinetic gateway sculptures that reflect the connection of neighborhood residents and represents dreams, hope, and freedom. The new park features were driven by the community engagement process and include custom play equipment, a Fitness Zone® area, walking loop,
MONTBELLO BOULDER UNVEILING In July, we unveiled a brand new climbing feature at Montbello Open Space Park in Denver. Designed by local kids, this climbing boulder was sponsored by The North Face as part of the company’s Walls Are Meant For Climbing campaign, a partnership with The Trust for Public Land to create more free climbing walls in city parks around the country— starting in neighborhoods where kids face the highest barriers to exploring the outdoors. The boulder adds another unique feature to Montbello Open Space Park. Located in a dense, diverse Denver neighborhood where a quarter of residents live below the poverty line, the once vacant lot is being restored to a native prairie landscape with trails, artwork, nature play, and interpretive displays. NICOLE SCHMEIDL
N O M E PA R K In 2013, we began the process of helping the City of Aurora transform a “sad little park” into a community gem by purchasing property to expand Nome Park and triple its size from one to three acres. A public outreach process revealed the community didn’t feel safe in the park and students from the adjacent Aurora Central High School didn’t have a place where they could comfortably gather.
a plaza picnic area, a multipurpose community garden, native low water landscaping, a teen hang-out area, and improved access for the school. Thanks to The Trust for Public Land and partners, Nome Park is now a community resource for the 4,000 neighbors and 2,000 students within a 10-minute walk of this high-quality park!
Opening day climb
Montbello Open Space Park, CO
Partnering for open space and connectivity TRAMPE RANCH We helped protect Trampe Ranch, which covers 30 miles of river bottom from Gunnison to the doorstep of Gothic. The lands owned by Trampe Ranch are some of the most familiar, productive, beautiful, and scientifically significant in Colorado's Gunnison Valley. These islands of ranchland—6,000 acres in all— include scenic meadows along the Gunnison River visible from Highway 135, expansive grazing lands along Farris Creek at the outskirts of Crested Butte, and the iconic meanders of the East River visible from below the Gothic Road.
NORTH FLOYD HILL The foothills near Denver are known for family ranches, open meadows, and public trails; but with booming population growth, development is encroaching on much of this land. In partnership with Jefferson County Open Space, Clear Creek County Open Space, Great Outdoors Colorado, and the Mountain Area Land Trust, we purchased a 110-acre property along the busy I-70 corridor. This land provides a unique opportunity to create a new trailhead and public access to more than 12,000 acres of Clear Creek County and Jefferson County Open Space. New trails for mountain biking and hiking will connect to an existing trail system that is currently inaccessible from I-70. Protected from development, this land will provide recreation opportunities to people throughout the Denver metro area for years to come.
XAVIER FANE
Trampe Ranch
Gunnison Valley, CO
WINSLOW MCCURDY
Triple Creek Greenway
Aurora, CO
T R I P L E C R E E K G R E E N W AY In partnership with the City of Aurora, we are creating the Triple Creek Greenway, a new urban trail corridor offering pedestrians, bicyclists, and equestrians 27 miles of uninterrupted travel between the Aurora Reservoir and the South Platte River in Denver. We have protected over 600 acres along this greenway, stretching from Colfax Avenue to E-470. This greenway is ecologically diverse, providing habitat for numerous animal and bird species, and offering visitors a unique natural experience in an urban setting. COLORADO COMMUNITY TRAILS PROGRAM In April 2018, we launched the Colorado Community Trails Program to make strategic investments to enhance and secure trail corridors and build trails that connect communities, increase mobility, improve health, expand outdoor access, and inspire economic stimulus. As part of this work, we are exploring projects to close the northern gap of the Ring The Peak Trail in El Paso County and transform the user experience at Rocky Mountain National Park with a dedicated pedestrian and cycling trail from the neighboring town of Estes Park.
GOCO REAUTHORIZED In May 2018, The Trust for Public Land and key conservation and parks partners led an effort to reauthorize the Colorado Lottery which provides funding for Great Outdoors Colorado, the Conservation Trust Fund, and Colorado Parks and Wildlife. Governor John Hickenlooper signed a bill that will generate approximately $4.4 billion in proceeds over the next 25 years for the people of Colorado for outdoor recreation and land conservation projects across the state. This legislation ensures that Colorado’s parks, trails, rivers, wildlife, and open spaces continue to receive Lottery proceeds. A coalition named Keep it Colorado garnered support from 146 Colorado towns, counties, cities, and special districts and nearly 200 nonprofits and businesses, ranging from the Access Fund to the Petroleum Marketers Association of Colorado. As part of this effort, our team of conservation experts put together a report entitled The Economic Benefits of Great Outdoors Colorado and the Conservation Trust Fund, which proved to be a powerful tool for building support among elected officials, key media outlets, and other nontraditional partners.
Preserving iconic landscapes across the Southwest Z I O N N AT I O N A L PA R K —Utah As part of our longstanding commitment to the splendor of Zion National Park, The Trust for Public Land permanently preserved a 35-acre inholding within the Park known as Firepit Knoll. The parcel is located alongside the popular Hop Valley Trail and ensures millions of annual visitors’ uninterrupted views of the stunning Zion Wilderness. The land, transferred to the National Park Service, is now permanently protected from future development thanks to support from the National Park Foundation, National Park Trust, George and Delores Doré Eccles Foundation, and an anonymous private donor.
A R E N A L O P E N S PA C E —New Mexico Working in partnership with New Mexico’s most populous county, Bernalillo, we helped preserve one of the rapidly disappearing agricultural properties in the Rio Grande corridor. These properties are important sources for local food production and provide resting and foraging areas for a large number of migratory birds. This acquisition was the fifth major transaction funded by a county mill levy passed in 2014 with the help of our team of conservation finance experts. The property will help strengthen open space infrastructure to support local food production and preserve the area's agricultural heritage.
MIKE SCHIRF
Hop Valley Trail
Zion National Park, UT
CHRIS HINKLE
Cienega Ranch
Cochise County, AZ
C I E N E G A R A N C H —Arizona Building off other recent protections in the Southern Sulphur Springs Valley in Southeastern Arizona, we protected an additional 13,197 acres of Cienega Ranch through the purchase of a conservation easement, bringing the total acres conserved to nearly 20,000. The land contains high-quality native grasslands and critical wildlife habitat while keeping the land as a working cattle ranch. The conservation easement was purchased from Josiah Austin who is committed to the longterm land protection and restoration efforts across the landscape and will be reinvesting the funds from this purchase for additional conservation efforts, including acquiring adjacent land that was slated for subdivision into 40-acre “ranchette” lots. Funding came from the Natural Resources Conservation Service, National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, Knobloch Family Foundation, and Nina Mason Pulliam Charitable Trust.
C A Z C A N AT U R A L I N F R A S T R U C T U R E V I E W E R —Arizona The Trust for Public Land’s award-winning GIS team is working with the Central Arizona Conservation Alliance (CAZCA) on a Natural Infrastructure Viewer, a web-based decision support tool addressing multi-benefit land conservation opportunities in the rapidly developing landscape of Maricopa County. It is being used as an important tool in current community efforts to create a regional open space plan for the County. This tool includes a focus on human impact, making analysis relevant to the needs of people’s use of nature for health and recreation, including identifying populations sensitive to extreme heat and potential naturebased solutions to mitigate those heat risks. By bringing data into the hands of land managers, applied scientists, and conservation groups, the Natural Infrastructure Viewer informs decisions, increases collaboration, and helps align conservation efforts around common goals.
Meet The Trust for Public Land’s Colorado and Southwest Team WINSLOW MCCURDY
Staff from our Colorado office
From left, back: Jim, Peter, Annette, Hillary, Peggy, Leah, Justin, Emily, Jake. From left, front: Wade, Steven, Chandi
Chandi Aldena, Project Manager Steven Baker, Institutional Giving Manager Peggy Chiu, National Counsel Peter Hambidge, Associate Director of Philanthropy Greg Hiner, Southwest Director of Land Protection* Jake Houston, Community Trails Program Director Leah Kahler, Philanthropy Associate Annette Mainland, Director of Philanthropy
Hillary Merritt, Sr. Project Manager Michael Patrick, Sr. Project Manager* Emily Patterson, Parks for People Program Director Jim Petterson, Southwest and Colorado Director SaLees Seddon, Canopy Intranet Manager Wade Shelton, Sr. Project Manager Justin Spring, Director of Land Protection * not pictured
Colorado Advisory Board We are so grateful for our amazing volunteer leaders! Jonathan Adelman Dennis Carruth Greg Felt Rick Garcia Beverly Griffith Allegra “Happy” Haynes, Chair Christopher Himes Scott Ingvoldstad
Peter Kirsch, Vice Chair Michael LaMair Ryan Martens Wynn Martens Kim Morss Jeff Resnick** ** also serving on the National Board of Directors
MIKE SCHIRF
Kolob Terrace
Zion National Park, UT
Meet our new President and CEO Diane Regas joined The Trust for Public Land as President and CEO in spring, 2018. “We’re at a time of enormous potential in providing equal access to parks and public lands, and Diane’s inclusive and laser-focused approach to problem-solving will help The Trust for Public Land’s innovative team seize these opportunities in the years ahead,” said Thomas S. Reeve, Chair of the National Board of Directors of The Trust for Public Land. For more than a decade, Diane worked with the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF), leading the oceans program, and most recently serving for three years as Executive Director; she developed EDF’s strategic plan and drove ambitious initiatives to address the impacts of climate
“I am deeply inspired by the team and results at The Trust for Public Land.” Diane Regas, President & CEO
change. Prior to her legacy of work at EDF, Diane directed solutions to protect wetlands, oceans, and watersheds at the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in Washington, D.C. She earned her A.B., M.S. (Energy and Resources) and J.D. at the University of California, Berkeley. She once again calls Berkeley, California her home, where she hikes, bikes, dives, camps, and enjoys the beauty of natural areas.
WHIT RICHARDSON
Thank you
for supporting The Trust for Public Land as we protect land and create parks for people in Colorado, the Southwest (Arizona, New Mexico, and Utah), and beyond. We couldn’t do it without you. Photo: Wilson Peak, CO
Join us. The Trust for Public Land creates parks and protects land for people, ensuring healthy, livable communities for generations to come.
tpl.org
Jim Petterson Southwest and Colorado Director 303.863.8485 | jim.petterson@tpl.org Annette Mainland Director of Philanthropy 303.867.2337 | annette.mainland@tpl.org 1410 Grant St. Suite D210 Denver, CO 80203
COVER: TOP LEFT, MARY CHRANKO/NICOLE SCHMEIDL; TOP RIGHT, DENVER PARKS & RECREATION; MIDDLE LEFT, JOHN FIELDER; MIDDLE RIGHT, CARA BENAK; BOTTOM, XAVIER FANE.