Topic: Watersheds
Documentary Spotlights Dam Removal Partnerships
March 24, 2023
To celebrate its first five years of work, Open Rivers Fund—a program of Resources Legacy Fund, launched in November 2016 with a 10-year, $50-million investment from the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation—worked with film director Jason Jaacks to produce a documentary highlighting several dynamic dam removal projects and partnerships that are reshaping waterways across the American West. The 15-minute documentary, “Restoring Our Rivers: Communities Taking Action,” premiered on Thursday, March 23 at the Washington, DC Environmental Film Festival. The film takes a look at aging dams and the problems they cause, answering a question made increasingly urgent by climate change: How…
Wildfire Strategies Program
May 27, 2022
Our Wildfire Strategies program aims to achieve a more wildfire-resilient California and Western United States by 2030 through better policy and significantly increased funding for forest management, community resilience and home hardening, Tribal leadership on forest stewardship and fire management, and public health measures that protect people from the impacts of smoke. The program supports research, coalition-building, budget advocacy, and tests innovative proofs of concept for broader adoption.
Open Rivers Fund
February 23, 2021
The Open Rivers Fund supports local community efforts to remove obsolete dams, modernize water infrastructure, and restore rivers across the American West. The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation supported the Fund’s launch in 2016 with a 10-year, $50 million grant aimed at removing barriers that impair river function and pose challenges, costs, or risks to communities. In addition to creating significant environmental and economic benefits, the Fund also seeks to build technical knowledge, organizational wherewithal, and public awareness in order to enable future projects. More information at openriversfund.org
Land-Sea Connection
February 23, 2021
The Land-Sea Connection (LSC) program, launched in 2017, works to advance the long-term health and resilience of California watersheds by promoting more effective local and state policies and conservation programs; supporting high-value, on-the-ground conservation efforts; and helping secure equitable and sustained public funding to support community needs. The LSC program, funded by the Campbell Foundation, seeks to improve stewardship and reduce impacts to watershed health across a range of issues, with focused investments related to cannabis cultivation, agricultural practices, and urban runoff/stormwater.
Partnership and Vision Restoring Abundance to Tomorrow’s Rivers
December 3, 2020
In the last few years, we’ve witnessed what is becoming a profound change across the American West. Obsolete dams are coming down. Streams are being restored. Tribes are reconnecting with the fish runs of their ancestors. Irrigation diversions are easier to manage. And water is cleaner. If one follows the water through our nation’s rivers, the removal of these dams might look like isolated incidents. But the individual acts are adding up to a significant whole, and momentum is growing. Change like this doesn’t happen overnight. It takes careful planning, prudent investment, smart partnerships, and effective tools. Thanks to…
Pandemic Spotlights Importance of Local Farms to Food Security
August 31, 2020
COVID-19 has hit our economy like a wrecking ball. While news headlines have been filled with stories about bars re-closing and shuttered hair salons, even the most fundamentally essential of industries, farming, has been hard hit. Now, as wildfires rage across more than a million acres of California, dense smoke fills the air, further compromising the health and well-being of those working to put fresh food on our tables. Just as the first spring crops of asparagus and strawberries were beginning to show up at California farmers markets in March, schools and restaurants throughout the nation abruptly closed and entire…
