Donate to the Lake Merritt Conservancy Founder's Fund
Today your support is more crucial than ever - for yourself, for your neighbors, for the community
Dear Friends, Neighbors, Colleagues, Volunteers, and fellow Oaklanders,
It’s been a minute since our last update - and in that time, a whole lot has happened politically, both nationally and locally. Between the tectonic shifts in Washington and the deepening budget crisis here in The Town, there’s one thing that’s increasingly clear.
The cavalry will not be here to save us. That work we will have to do ourselves.
We need your support to turn a bold vision into reality so that we can:
Nurture a real public-private partnership at the local level.
Collaborate with corporations and foundations to fuel the engine of progress
Develop new ways of thinking and doing that provide more value to the community.
Every dollar counts, and your donation will bring us closer to our goal of creating a thriving, conservancy for Lake Merritt that serves as a nucleus for urban revitalization.
To make a secure online donation, simply click on this link.
Alternatively, you can send a check by following the instructions at the bottom of this page.
What we’ve accomplished in 2024
This past year, thanks to your generous contributions, we've made great strides in engaging with our community and advancing our mission:
With the generous assistance of our pro bono attorneys at Adler and Colvin, we were incorporated as a California non-profit in April, and as of August, have filed our application for tax-exempt status. In the meantime, we continue to enjoy our partnership with the Oakland Parks and Recreation Foundation, our fiscal sponsor for receiving tax-deductible donations.
We hosted a Connect to Create Equitable Impact Panel at Laney College Theater, featuring leaders from local non-profits, who helped us better understand the needs and concerns of the broader community around access, communication and funding. This in turn led to an even more exciting partnership…
The following month, we sponsored an Architectural Design Contest in partnership with Laney College and faculty members Barry Yu and Court Miller, which brought a raft of fresh ideas and perspectives to the table on how we may improve the built environment while preserving quality greenspace in the park.
Out of these exercises, and numerous conversations with community leaders, businesspeople and volunteers, we’ve developed a Three Year Strategic Plan, a living document that lays out our vision for the next three years and beyond, our mission, goals, programs and timeline, which we will continue to refine as we travel this shared journey of discovery and stewardship.
We welcomed two new board members, environmental litigator Erin Poppler, and landscape architect Jason Young. We also recognize Bob Redman for his invaluable service as an inaugural board member as he steps down to attend to his numerous other civic and personal responsibilities.
We have been grateful to Joel Ullmann, Ankeeta Sharma and Nikhil Sheel for their assistance in helping to shape the overall vision and to Lori Smith in solidifying a marketing plan for the Conservancy.
We’ve begun the process of negotiating the first phase of a general partnership agreement with the City that will include a lease for our first capital improvement project.
But today, as we engage with an ever-increasing array of design and educational partners, your support is more crucial than ever to ensure that we arrive at a robust, community-driven vision for the future of our public space.
Where we’re headed in 2025
The following projects and collaborations we’ve planned for 2025 will help us to take the broad concepts in the Strategic Plan and turn them into community-driven designs and programmatic visions that we can actually implement.
To provide a nucleus for community engagement, we are rehabilitating the Snack Shack in Lakeside Park to create a Conservancy Portal, a collaboration hub where we can explore our shared future. Fletcher Studio has graciously offered to assist us in this regard by providing design and facilitation services to help us gather community input.
We’ll be hosting a collaboration with Cal Poly San Luis Obispo's third and fourth year Landscape Architecture Students, along with SWA Group starting in January to unpack the challenges and opportunities of the parkland around the lake.
And on the heels of this collaboration we’ll be hosting a community event at the top of the newly built Lark, to showcase what we’ve learned and to get input on where we’re headed.
In the spring, we look to reprise last year’s design contest with the Architecture Department at Laney College, in partnership with the City, and local “Friends of” organizations, to unpack an architectural vision for updating an existing structure on the Lake to meet the needs of 21st century park goers
We’re also exploring a potential collaboration with UC Berkeley’s Landscape Architecture department and other university departments at Berkeley and elsewhere, to help us carry forward the insights from our discovery process into a business plan for the Conservancy.
Closer to home, we’re discussing new curriculum opportunities with Merritt College’s Landscape Horticulture Department. Collaboration aims to highlight practice and knowledge incentives to students interested in urban gardening and landscaping.
We’ve identified local and regional sources of philanthropic grants and funding and begun the process of establishing the relationships necessary to secure larger donations, but this work has just begun.
To help spread the word about the Conservancy, as well as issues on the Lake more broadly, we’ll be launching a marketing campaign to engage the public in imagining and influencing the vision of a revitalized Lake and its parkland.
We’ll also be launching our Smartbins program, which will bring community and corporate sponsors together to fund innovative waste management solutions that address ongoing litter issues along the Lake perimeter.
To make an online contribution, simply go to our donation page on the website of our partner and fiscal sponsor, the Oakland Parks and Recreation Foundation, and follow the instructions.
Alternatively, you can send a check:
Pay to: Oakland Parks and Recreation Foundation
Memo: Lake Merritt Conservancy
Mailing Address:
Oakland Parks and Recreation Foundation
360 Grand Ave, #261
Oakland, CA 94610 US
Tax Exempt Status:
OPRF’s 501(c)(3) non-profit Tax ID# is 94-2751052.
Together, we can ensure a prosperous future for our park and for our community.
In Gratitude,
Jonathan Hoffberg, Jennie Gerard, Erin Poppler and Jason Young
The Lake Merritt Conservancy