One Tam

Growing a new movement for landscape stewardship.

There are big changes happening in land conservation today. We are shifting from a paradigm that was successful in setting lands aside for preservation over the last century to a new era focused on managing these preserved landscapes. In California alone, nearly half of the 100 million acres that comprise the state are protected. Yet increased visitation to public lands, combined with the dual stresses of a changing climate and declining public funding, calls for new strategies to protect them in perpetuity.

One Tam has emerged as a leader helping to shape this new paradigm. Under the leadership of Sharon Farrell at the Golden Gate National Parks Conservancy, I worked with my team at L Studio to name, brand and launch One Tam in 2014. Over the last 5 years, One Tam — a collaborative of the 4 public agencies that manage the Mt Tamalpais watershed in Marin County and the Parks Conservancy — has created a new model for stewardship by crossing over jurisdictional boundaries to manage the mountain watershed as a whole. Central to this collaborative stewardship model is building trusted relationships between the collaborative partners and local community, and encouraging everyone who visits Mt Tam to become a steward. Sharon is also leading a network of other landscape collaboratives across the state of California to develop strategies and methodologies for sharing best practices and resources for stewarding large landscapes. The purpose of this work is to care for the places we love, enjoy and depend upon, and continue to renew and sustain these places for current and future generations.

In my current role as an advisor to Sharon and her innovative team of internal stakeholders and outside collaborators, I am helping to connect the ideas, strategies and messages of the local and statewide initiatives and, ultimately, to build a national movement around this new paradigm of Landscape Stewardship.