Acterra: Action for a Healthy Planet

A well-​established Palo Alto environmental nonprofit, with many projects underway, most notably the habitat restoration and stewardship project on Arastradero Preserve, a collaborative effort with the City of Palo Alto that has been going on for 10 years. Visit their website to learn about their many other projects, which change periodically as Acterra responds to changing conditions and priorities.
Props go to Acterra for Arastradero, the Business Environmental Awards, and their ongoing fiscal sponsorship program, which has nurtured many powerful, high-​impact local environmental startup groups over the last 20 years. Occasionally, however, they seem to experiment with rather slow-​moving in-​house programs that generate fanfare and consume funding but are light on delivering results. This, I find, is not a judicious use of public-​benefit funds. In all fairness, of course, not all projects succeed, and some experiments are worthwhile; nevertheless, some recent projects such as the «Green@Home» initiative (which sends «tiger teams» of three people to «green» a single household by installing CFL bulbs and whatnot) just seem outright goofy from a cost-​benefit perspective. Because of this recent trend towards slow, expensive ‘wonderfulness” in preference to rapid, tangible achievements, I suspect they would benefit from some fresh blood and fresh perspectives somewhere in the upper echelons of the organization – board or management.
On balance, though, this 30-​year-​old outfit is doing a great job of pursuing its primary mission of «acting locally» for the good of the environment, and has enriched the lives of many, many local people who have volunteered with Acterra’s projects or attended its events.