Greenbelt Alliance Origins: Growing Organizationally while Protecting Open Space
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Greenbelt Alliance Origins: Growing Organizationally while Protecting Open Space |
Greenbelt Alliance * The Newswire
Volume 2, May 2003
2003 marks the forty-fifth anniversary of Greenbelt Alliance's work to protect open space and promote livable communities. Throughout this year we are highlighting our history in the Newswire.
People for Open Space, Greenbelt Alliance's forerunner, entered the 1970s as a strong grassroots organization with an impressive track record. From protecting lands, including Fort Baker and vineyards in Napa, to spurring the Association of Bay Area Governments to establish a regional greenbelt plan, to publishing the groundbreaking report The Case for Open Space, People for Open Space led efforts in the Bay Area to protect the greenbelt and limit sprawl development. As time passed, however, development pressures increased, and People for Open Space responded by expanding its programs and organizational structure.
The Association for Bay Area Governments approved a regional plan for a 3.4 million-acre Bay Area greenbelt, but then allowed the plan to fall dormant. As noted in a 1977 article by T.J. Kent, Jr., then President of People for Open Space:
ABAG, having no mechanism to enforce or implement its regional plan, has gone as far as it can go. Transforming this paper plan into literal demarcation lines on the ground must ultimately be the responsibility of local governments in cooperation with some appropriate regional mechanism representative and strongly supported by citizens of the Bay Area.
Recognizing these challenges, People for Open Space became more active in local county issues, expanding its reach throughout the Bay Area. The regional approach pioneered in the 1970s remains at the core of Greenbelt Alliance's present work.
While People for Open Space expanded its efforts during the 1970s, the organization expanded to accommodate its new roles and responsibilities. For its first eighteen years of existence, People for Open Space (and its predecessor Citizens for Regional Recreation and Parks) remained largely a volunteer organization funded by individuals and a few small grants. In 1976, People for Open Space hired its first Executive Director, Larry Orman, and expanded its membership base. By 1982, membership had increased from 300 to 3,500, and People for Open Space had become the Bay Area's leading organization protecting open space and promoting livable communities.