Caring for Community Lands
“We are proud to have worked with Sand Hill Foundation for so many years. We have done great things together. Their generosity and passion for open space conservation makes them the perfect partner.” — Walter Moore, President
The San Francisco Bay Area has more parks, farmland, beaches and other open spaces than any other major urban area in the United States. Roughly 75 percent of all the land in the Bay Area is either permanently protected in parks or open space, or at low risk of development because it is zoned for farming or other rural uses. This is the product of 100 years of advocacy by park lovers, hikers and environmental groups like Peninsula Open Space Trust. POST and the Sand Hill Foundation have a history of partnership starting in 1977 when Sand Hill Foundation founder and environmentalist, Tom Ford, provided POST with their very first office space. With mutual commitment to environmental preservation, the Sand Hill Foundation and POST relationship has been a lasting and natural fit.
POST protects and cares for open space, farms and parkland in and around Silicon Valley. Helping to shape a vibrant ecosystem for the area, POST has created a network of protected lands that provide scenic beauty, clean air and water, locally grown food, and a place for people and wildlife to thrive. Now headquartered in Palo Alto, POST’s unique and effective approach to land protection taps the power of both private and public sectors and has been responsible for saving more than 70,000 acres as permanent open space and parkland in San Mateo, Santa Clara and Santa Cruz counties. These lands are now part of the National Park System, National Wildlife Refuge System, California State Parks, county and city parks, regional preserves, and private farmland. They are places of natural beauty and abundance that have come to define the region.
In the last 30 years, 40 percent of historically agricultural land in San Mateo and Santa Clara Counties has been lost to development. In January 2015, POST’s board of directors approved a new initiative to significantly increase POST’s work in farmland protection.
The Farmland Futures Initiative seeks to raise $25 million for its first phase, which will focus on the farms and ranches of coastal San Mateo County.
POST seeks to triple the number of protected farms from 11 to 33, and triple the amount of protected agricultural acreage from 750 to 2,250. They will also invest $1M in innovative new farm stewardship programs to increase the productivity and health of local working lands.
