Santa Cruz Redwoods National Monument Campaign Advances With Addition Of Environmental Leader

News submitted from The Santa Cruz Redwoods National Monument Campaign:

The Santa Cruz Redwoods National Monument Campaign is pleased to announce the addition of Laura Kasa to the leadership team. Kasa, for nine years the Executive Director of central coast non-profit Save Our Shores, joins the campaign as Community Engagement Director.

Sempervirens Fund president Fred Keeley stated, “The addition of Laura Kasa to an already first-rate team is very exciting. Laura’s track record of taking Save Our Shores to new heights, including Styrofoam bans, single-use plastic bag bans, and record-setting beach clean-ups, will be most helpful in building on the community’s favorable response to the National Monument idea.”

Sempervirens Fund is leading a group of local and regional organizations in support of the National Monument designation. The Resources Legacy Fund, Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, David and Lucile Packard Foundation, and the Conservation Lands Foundation are major funders of this effort.

Local organizational endorsements include Save Our Shores, the Land Trust of Santa Cruz County, and 23 other groups.

The campaign’s goal is to have 5,800 acres known as Coast Dairies on Santa Cruz County’s north coast designated by President Obama as a National Monument.

Santa Cruz Redwoods National Monument campaign director Steve Reed said, “More than 1,500 people attended the National Monument campaign kick-off in Santa Cruz, and hundreds more are signing the on-line and community-tabling petition each day. The addition of Laura Kasha will increase our capacity to reach out to local governments, non-profit organizations, the business community, and neighborhood groups throughout the central coast area.”

The National Monument kick-off was held at the Kaiser-Permanente Arena in Santa Cruz, and featured former Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt, Congressmember Anna Eshoo, California Natural Resources Secretary John Laird, and 150 local school children who led the attendees in singing “This Land is Your Land.”

The campaign field operation is adding more than 200 signatures each day to the 1,500 endorsers who attended the kick-off.

In addition to thousands of petition signers, the campaign has the formal support of Santa Cruz County Supervisor Ryan Coonerty, Assemblymember Mark Stone, state Senate Majority Leader Bill Monning, Congressmember Anna Eshoo, California Natural Resources Secretary John Laird, California Governor Jerry Brown, and United States Senator Barbara Boxer.

Photo via Santa Cruz Redwoods National Monument Campaign on Facebook.