Peninsula Open Space Trust

Land acquisition & transfer:in fiscal year 2023, post completed and assisted a total of 8 transactions that protected 3,853 acres while advancing several other longer-term acquisitions and transfers.land transactionspurchased lakeside ranch, a 1,986-acre multi-benefit property, bringing the total acres of protected land in and around coyote valley to more than 8,700protected 839 acres of redwood forest, wildlife habitat and working ... lands at estrada ranch near watsonvilletransferred 5,100 acres of cloverdale ranch in pescadero to midpeninsula regional Open Space district (midpen) after 26 years of post's care supported sempervirens fund in protecting the 921-acre camp jones gulch with a conservation easement, securing the future of old-growth redwoods and a beloved children's camp in la hondaestablished an agricultural conservation easement on a 90-acre farm located near pescadero on the san mateo county coast.assisted the santa clara valley habitat agency in protecting a 17-acre property at the northern end of coyote valley, essential for wildlife and trail connectivitytransferred the 136-acre calero lakeview property in san jose to santa clara county parks after extensive cleanup and restorationtransferred our remaining interest in the iconic and scenic south cowell ranch on the san mateo county coast to midpen after strengthening the terms of its conservation easement, including a farmhouse that was significantly upgraded by post.

Community outreach and education:to further our community growth and engagement efforts, in fiscal year 2023, the organization continued our content marketing and engagement programs which aim to grow and diversify our community of supporters and engage prospective donors. Between new pieces and updates to existing content, we distributed over 50 informational pieces such as guides and blog posts, hundreds of social media posts (both paid and organic), 3 annual magazines, and numerous press announcements. We also increased awareness and generated new contacts by advertising with various publications, both online and off. Our gated guides require viewers to provide their email address and are our most effective ... tool to generate new contacts. As a result, we attracted over 32,539 new community members to our database which includes 193,000 contacts. We continued to implement digital donor acquisition campaigns using our crm, social media and marketing automation platforms to renew existing donor support, convert community members into donors, and deepen engagement across our entire community. Our august 2022 1,000 donor challenge campaign generated 1,359 gifts and $188,848 in revenue. Similarly, our three year-end digital campaigns which took place between giving tuesday (the first tuesday after thanksgiving) and december 31 generated $1,478,550 in revenue from 3,763 donors, with combined revenue and donor counts up 12% and 9% respectively over fy22. Donor support remained very strong through fiscal year end, with post achieving annual operating fund revenue and donor counts of $7.599 million and 9,904 respectively. Community members and donors continued to stay connected to post throughout the year via our monthly newsletters and outreach events. We provided a robust schedule of 96 events including virtual, in-person events in formats both large and small. In a post-covid era, we were able to fully realize a schedule of ambassador-led hikes, delivering 4-5 in person hikes per month Open to all members of the community. During this fiscal year we also launched affinity group events, meant to serve community members of underrepresented identities including specific cultural groups, women, and members of the lgbtq+ community. In total, over 8,386 people registered for our events with 4,166 people attending, 35.6% of whom were new to our list. We have continued to run a robust suite of digital ad campaigns that include the find your place campaign which aims to broaden and diversify our audience of support. This is supplemented by organic and paid social posting. The find your place campaign delivered 9,055 new contacts to our data base. Other paid efforts promoting post-created content produced over 20,000 new names to our list, roughly two thirds of all new contacts. By more tightly integrating post content, events, and fundraising with the find your place advertising engine, we saw improved top of the funnel marketing performance. From january through may of 2023, our awareness program that includes the find your place campaign enabled 6.5m impressions across a reach of 1.1m people and link clicks in excess of 85,000. Our instagram following topped 30,000 at the end of fiscal year 2023. Additionally, our annual website traffic included 580,000 active users, of which about 454,000 were new, 720,000 sessions and about 1m views. Post produced and delivered two issues of our landscapes magazine this year and one edition of our annual impact report both of which were distributed to over 13,000 recipients. Additionally, post produced a number of media/news stories in support of our transactions work. This included two acquisition stories estrada ranch and lakeside ranch, both of which generated front page coverage in the san jose mercury news. The transfer of cloverdale ranch to the midpeninsula Open Space district also garnered front page coverage in the san francisco chronicle, which covered our audrey edna cabin opening on the front page as well. Altogether, our news announcements through the year produced on average 22 articles per month and a possible audience reach of 102 million. We have also worked to coordinate messaging on transactions to take place in fy 2024, in order to get in front of various messages and stories and ensure a positive view of the post brand and importance of our work in the media.

Land management:post currently holds 17,514 acres in fee ownership and holds conservation easements and deed restrictions on 14,574 acres. The organization has an established stewardship program for the lands it owns that includes resource conservation planning and management, along with active uses of land for conservation grazing and agriculture, sustainable forest management and restoration where appropriate, and development of compatible recreational opportunities. Post works to protect and manage lands in its possession through site-specific stewardship plans for the natural resources on each ... property. Post staff and volunteers actively monitor the acreage on which post holds easements or restrictions. Volunteers also assist with stewardship projects on post-owned land. In total, post land volunteers contributed an impressive 1,700 hours of work time on post-protected land including conservation easement monitoring, participating in highway clean-ups, and mapping and treating invasive plants that degrade natural systems. These are some of the most impactful projects we implemented in order to care for the lands we protect:fy23 projects san vicente redwoods:fire recovery and forest resilience and restoration:created two miles of shaded fuel breaks and converted 5,000 tons of dead and dying trees into biochar and charcoal led regional study of woody biomass and piloted innovative treatment technologies, sharing results with regional partners and statewide decision-makers- deepened partnership with amah mutsun land Trust to identify, collect, and cultivate culturally significant plants- opened 7.3 miles of new trails in partnership with land Trust of santa cruz county- completed improvements on more than 3 miles of damaged road, curbing erosion in the most critical watershed for central coast coho salmoninitiated new agricultural lease on pebble beach farms in san mateo county encompassing over 80 acres of formerly fallow coastal farmland helped farmers get back to business after the 2023 winter storms, removing large, downed trees; repairing corrals, fencing, and roofs; cleaning up after flooding; and more;completed the coyote valley road ecology study with partners pathways for wildlife and the santa clara valley habitat agency. This study assessed wildlife movement between protected areas in north coyote valley, provides recommendations to reduce wildlife-vehicles collisions and maintain or enhance habitat connectivity;reintroduction of burrowing owl on post-protected land in partnership with talon ecological research group, valley habitat agency, and Open Space authority;opened the audrey edna cabin at alpine ranch to the public with fees supporting maintenance and partner initiatives like san mateo county health's park rx program.