Dear Friend of Sausalito Beautiful,

You have been very generous in supporting our volunteer organization since our founding six years ago. We could not do what we do without you—we are 100% donor funded, and fulfilling our role as advocates for public green spaces simply would not be possible without your help. As we hope you agree, we have made a visible improvement in the City’s public landscapes—from more vibrant and attractive medians to new street trees to beautiful parks. Please support our goal to raise $25,000 by the end of the year so that we can continue our valuable work to keep our community healthy, resilient, and green.

A major issue we want to highlight is the dramatic reduction in Sausalito’s landscaping services during these Covid times due to budget cuts. The drought has compounded the problem, causing brown where we’d all prefer to see green. In June, Sausalito Beautiful lobbied successfully in the City’s 2021-22 budget to restore the Parks and Recreation department’s funding for City maintenance workers and budget for outside contractors to maintain such landmarks as Bolinar Plaza (which we helped restore In 2018). Moving forward, we are exploring solutions to provide long-term maintenance of our public green spaces so that we don’t repeat the boom and bust cycles that led to the establishment of Sausalito Beautiful in the first place.

We feel proud that during the past two years we have achieved some major objectives with the funds you have donated. For example:

• Sausalito Beautiful was able to pay for the Phase II tree plan at MLK Park, including over 100 trees and shrubs. Early next year, board member Lise Ciolino hopes to repeat the successful community workday of fall 2019 when 80 volunteers planted over 90 trees and shrubs in just one day.
• We were able to fund a landscape plan for Southview Park and plan to lead a volunteer planting there, also early next year.
• We contributed matching funds to the City for trees to replace six dying callery pears on downtown Bridgeway and eight new trees at the northern end of Caledonia, paying a private contractor to keep them watered for the first year.
• We planted 1000 daffodils in Dunphy and MLK parks, adding a welcome splash of spring color.
• Our founder Shelby Van Meter coordinated Phase II restoration work at the historic >Poet’s Corner, repairing sections of the retaining wall.
• The 2nd Street Garden, a neighborhood project led by Rebecca Lanthorne and supported by your funds, benefited from professional maintenance in addition to volunteer efforts.
• We jump-started the long delayed public art project in the tunnel under highway 101 by paying for the initial Design Concept for “All Our Children United” by artist Raylene Gorum.

In order to continue our beautification work, we are again asking for your financial support. Your valuable contribution will assist with our priorities for the coming year—including planting more TREES and facilitating the transformative TUNNEL ART PROJECT:

• We are eager to continue adding trees to Sausalito’s public green spaces. We hope to plant additional trees in the downtown Bridgeway/Princess Street area and on Caledonia Street. Also, we hope to launch an analysis of the city’s overall tree canopy, to decide where additional trees should be planted throughout Sausalito to combat climate change and beautify our town.
• As partners in the Sausalito-Marin City coalition, we hope to contribute significantly to the tunnel art project “All Our Children United,” involving school children from both communities.  The project has been endorsed by the Sausalito City Council, the Sausalito Marin City School Board, Marin County Arts Council and others. This art project will beautify the grim and gray tunnel that our school children walk through daily and unify our two historic communities.

As thought leaders, Sausalito Beautiful will continue to explore climate change impacts on our public green spaces, promote visionary design and educate our community, while leading shorter term projects that make an immediate impact.

• Lise Ciolino is advocating for our public landscapes on the Sea Level Rise Task Force.
• Landscape architect Bill Hynes is developing forward-thinking plans for Sausalito’s downtown waterfront.
• Our Vice President, Morgan Pierce, a landscape architect, architect, and long-time Planning Commissioner is joining former commission colleagues as they explore design guidelines for parklets and other planning issues.
• Adele Nieto, an experienced grant consultant, is working with our treasurer Anna Bush to pursue  innovative funding sources for our projects.
• Yasmine McGrane, a Trustee of the Sausalito-Marin City School Board, is launching a student internship program and creating healthy home and garden workshops for residents, while Nathan Scripps encourages environmental awareness as a science teacher in our Bayside MLK unified middle school.
• Maureen McCoy continues to lead our Beautification Awards program that recognizes private property owners who enhance the visual environment, inspiring others to use sustainable landscape techniques.
• Carolyn contributes oversight to all our projects from her long experience as an urban planner.
• James Scriba leads our hands-on Green Thumbs workdays that provide periodic maintenance help at public parks.

We believe Sausalito Beautiful has established a well-earned reputation for being a responsible and dedicated partner to the City of Sausalito. We have developed a good working relationship with the new City Manager, Chris Zapata and we continue our successful coordination with the Parks and Recreation department and the Department of Public Works.

Our goal is to raise $25,000 by the end of the year.We ask for your support so that we can continue our valuable work to keep our community healthy, resilient, and green.

Sincerely,