February 1st, 2022 | This year the Forest Service started a major reconstruction project on the popular Cathedral Rock Trail. This project is tackling deferred maintenance on a trail unlike any other on the Coconino National Forest. As the Forest’s second busiest trail, and located in a sensitive place by Oak Creek, the project is needed to protect watershed health and to provide an enduring high-quality experience for trail users.

January 24, 2022 | Jessica’s time with ALCC changed her life. She shares, “I was a little lost before the program and I needed some direction. I was excited for a new beginning but not prepared for what was about to come. Reconnecting with ancestral lands gave me purpose and meaning again.” She found out about Conservation Legacy through her tribe’s Tribal Historic Preservation Office. These offices have many responsibilities and typically advise Federal agencies on the management of Tribal historic properties, supervise when there are archeological digs or prescribed burns on tribal lands, and conduct surveys and inventories of tribal historic properties.

January 21, 2022 | Watch this video that describes the complex history at the Arlington House.

January 21, 2021 | In early May 2020, Conservation Legacy was asked to pilot an AmeriCorps Contact Tracing program. Their Stewards Individual Placement Program was awarded funding to launch a VISTA Summer Associate (VSA) program that became known as the Colorado Containment Response Corps. Facing the urgent need for contact tracers, Conservation Legacy had to scale up quickly. Over the course of three weeks, they hired twelve former Corpsmembers and staff to implement the program and, out of more than 1,100 applicants, recruited 143 VISTA members. The group was diverse, including displaced PeaceCorps members, retirees, college students, stay-at-home parents, and AmeriCorps alums.

January 24th, 2022 | Hear more about Rodney Flora's experience with the Traditional Trades Apprenticeship Program.

For decades, the need for action on climate change and the need to address local Environmental Justice issues have driven a network of nonprofits to develop a series of programs that reduce carbon emissions, increase carbon sequestration, and improve climate resilience, while improving quality of life and creating opportunity for the most vulnerable residents. As the Department of the Interior develops a strategy for the Biden Administration for the Civilian Climate Corps, we respectfully submit the principles and models these Corps and partner organizations have developed for consideration.

January 20th, 2022 | The 18 people spending their day (or days, in some cases) with the trees included civilians from all walks of life, members of the Arizona and Nevada Conservation Corps, and a group of women who brought along two pack camels to help carry baby Joshua trees through some of the more treacherous terrain. Joshua trees typically have a lifespan of 150 years; if all goes according to plan, these saplings will become a fixture of the preserve for a long, long time.

January 20th, 2022 | Asheville native and Western Carolina University grad Stephanie Dillingham is spending her time post graduation in Highlands serving the Highlands Cashiers Land Trust maintaining trails and organizing educational efforts through AmeriCorps.

January 18th, 2022 | Working for a conservation nonprofit during the COVID-19 pandemic has shown me how much we are like water. Like water, our society has had to adapt to fill the container we put ourselves in. We are in the midst of a pandemic, so we adapt by changing how we work, and changing how we view work too. We have adopted better systems for showing up, doing what we can with the resources we have, and changing plans to keep ourselves and our volunteers safe.

January 3rd, 2022 | There are two dangers inherent in trimming brush, and at the moment I am confronting both of them. The first is physical fatigue, the strains and overuse injuries stemming from bending too much from the back, from swinging too much with the wrist. The second is tedium, a side effect of bending and sweeping for hours in silence with little more than a stiff breeze and the chance of autumn rain for company. The first I mitigate by bending from the knees, using my core, drinking water. For the second, I attempt to create meaning out of monotony. I reach out with the loppers, clip a beech limb, bend to collect it from the ground, toss it into the undergrowth. Reach, clip, bend, toss. The motions build upon each other like waves, or maybe better, like tree rings, or the seasons that etch them into the cross section of each young tree I cut.