ABOUT

The mission of the Santa Cruz Mountains Stewardship Network is to help cultivate a resilient, vibrant region where human and natural systems thrive for generations to come.

The Santa Cruz Mountains Stewardship Network is a region-wide and cross-sector collaboration of twenty-four organizations who are committed to practicing effective stewardship on their own lands and coordinating their efforts with other land stewards to enhance stewardship on a regional level. The SCMSN is a vehicle collaboration and coordination.

The SCMSN engages in an emergent process. Member organizations come together in discussion. Through interaction, issues that are of collective importance emerge and ideas to address the issues are generated. Through the network process, SCMSN members find ways to move ideas into action.

The SCMSN is guided by a Memorandum of Understanding that all member organizations have signed.

About the Region

The Santa Cruz Mountains region, as we define it, extends from the San Francisco Bay Area, south to the Pajaro River and is bounded to the east by the Santa Clara Valley and the Pacific Ocean to the west. The region is comprised of a diverse array of ecosystems which include diverse natural features ranging from ridge tops to alluvial fans, old growth forests, saltwater lagoons, marshes, mudflats, and intertidal zones. Ownership and land use varies from park and open space preserves to privately held timber and agricultural lands interspersed with both rural and urban communities.