You’ve read the headlines. Twenty-nine workers killed in a West Virginian Massey Energy Company coal mine. More than 5,000 barrels of oil leaking a day in the Gulf of Mexico. Wildfires burn 100,000 acres of California forests. It’s enough to make you want to uncork a bottle of wine and down a glass or two just to keep calm.
Redwood Creek Wines understands this. They treasure the US environment and have granted $140,000 annually to various nonprofits in order to preserve our land and waterways. Now in its third year, they’ve selected 10 finalists with the help of a few judges, including Tonic columnist Ethan Zohn. The grand prize winner will take home $50,000 and the remaining nine will get $10,000 each.
Every week, we’ll introduce you to one of those finalists, and if you like what you read, head on over to the Redwood Creek Wines’ Greater Outdoors Project and vote for them. You have until August 31 to make a difference.
American Forests
No one who founded this nonprofit is still alive to tell the tale. If they were, we’d be writing about the oldest person alive instead as American Forests began in 1875. That makes it the oldest charitable citizens’ conservation organization in the United States. But don’t write them off as a group of country bumpkin treehuggers — they also hug trees in urban jungles too.
If selected to win the grand prize, American Forests will use the money to replant trees through their California Wildfire ReLeaf Program. It began in 1991 and since then, they’ve planted more than one million trees, but nature isn’t forgiving and has scorched several of those, making it an ongoing battle. American Forests has 36 replanting programs in action throughout the state and if selected, the $50,000 would make one of them a little greener.