40 Volunteers from 20 Natural Areas Steward Groups met up on Sept 4, 2025 at Utepils to launch our new Minneapolis Natural Area Stewards Alliance working to restore habitat and remove invasives on MPRB park land, with volunteer agreements with the MPRB to help restore Bassets Creek, Cedar Lake Point Beach, Cedar Lake Park Association, Eloise Butler, Grass Lake, Father Hennepin Park Lake Hiawatha, Minnehaha Falls Park, Lake of the Isles, Lake Harrier, Loppet Foundation, Loring Park, Richardson Bird Sanctuary, River Gorge, Wirth Park

Our Group is being mentored by volunteers from the Friends of Minnetonka Parks https://www.mtkaparks.org/

Somme Woods Eco-restoration Community in Northbrook, Illinois – true pioneers in volunteer-led ecosystem restoration.

Dear Friends, It’s an election year for the Minneapolis Park Board, so it’s an important opportunity to create positive change for ecosystem health in our city. We recently convened the first meeting of over 20 Natural Areas stewardship leaders in Minneapolis parks. The intention was to organize and advocate for more high-quality ecosystem restoration in Minneapolis.

After calling the meeting, I learned of an action taken by the park system that significantly damaged one of the finest remnant natural areas left in our parks.

As a group, we agreed on the following statement and question, to be posed to all candidates for Park Board Commissioner. If you agree with the message, please contact the candidates for your park district, and the at-large candidates. Share this message. Personalize it with your own experiences.

We’re calling this effort “1% for Ecosystems”

  • “Natural Resources” is first in the list of areas of responsibility in the Mission of the Minneapolis Park and Recreation Board (MPRB), and rightly so. Healthy ecosystems are foundational to the health of our parks, people, and wildlife.
  • Message and question:
  • However, the 2021 MPRB Natural Areas Plan shows that Minneapolis ecosystems are heavily degraded.
  • Our small, fragmented urban natural areas simply can’t maintain ecological integrity and diversity on their own. They are too small, isolated and under constant pressure from invasive species to thrive. Ecosystems only survive when people build healthy long-term relationships with them. Short-term money and labor can’t help a savanna, wetland or prairie if no one is available to follow-up and care for it.
  • Volunteer stewards are an essential part of restoring and maintaining ecosystems, but any land-owning agency must provide significant professional planning, labor, guidance and other support to achieve long-term success.
  • The MPRB Natural Resources Department, which is responsible for stewarding all of our designated Natural Areas, has only three permanent full-time staff, out of over 600 permanent full-time equivalent positions–less than one-half of one percent of the MPRB workforce!
  • We believe a premier urban park system, holding extensive natural areas that make up almost one quarter of its parkland, should devote at least one percent of its permanent staff to restoring and stewarding healthy ecosystems.
  • MPRB has no ecologist or wildlife expert on staff, and doesn’t have the capacity to acquire and successfully manage the abundance of partnerships and grants available in Minnesota.
  • As a Commissioner, will you work towards correcting this significant staffing imbalance in your upcoming term, so we can all experience inspiring, healthy, biodiverse ecosystems right here in our home, Minneapolis?