TRUCKEE, Calif. – The Tahoe Truckee Community Foundation’s (TTCF) Forest Futures Salon returned to in-person meetings for the first time since 2019, bringing the community together on the topic “Stewarding our Collective Home” at CoffeeBar Bakery. The panel of speakers including vice mayor of Truckee Anna Klovdstad and liaison for the Washoe Tribe Lydell Wyatt spoke about what stewardship meant—both personally and for the community.

The Forest Futures program was started in 2017 by the TTCF with the goal of reducing tree mortality and protecting the community from wildfires. Since then, it has expanded to projects that build the forest economy and accelerate market solutions. In their three-year recap, Forest Futures has had $6.1 million in funds granted, $16.44 million committed and 140,000 acres impacted by their work.

Erika Veidis, director of the Forest Futures program, expressed how excited she was to be engaging the community with Forest Futures Salons again and noted that there were upcoming salons in March, April, and May, with one planned for San Francisco in spring or summer.

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Stewardship in the Basin has a long connection to the environmental aspect, as well as the connection with the Washoe Tribe, who have been stewards of Lake Tahoe, even when they were pushed out of the area.

Eric Horntvedt from Truckee Fire spoke to that impact of Indigenous work in cultural burning, which fire departments around the lake now use to manage the land. Horntvedt also spoke about his responsibility to the landscape and neighborhoods, as well as the collective responsibility for those areas.

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“If you’re going to live in Truckee, you need to be a mountain-minded person,” Horntvedt said. “Mountain-minded isn’t just skiing, biking, and hiking. It’s taking control of your property, using a chainsaw and rake to manage your defensible space, hardening your home to embers, and proactively working with your neighbors and Firewise community to create fire resilience. There is collective and impactful action happening at all levels in our community to bring our forests back into a healthy and resilient condition and we need the same level of responsibility and commitment from our individual residents as well. Let’s do this Truckee!”

Mayumi Peacock of Moonshine Ink also spoke about her connection with the community and how she considered her work as a journalist as stewardship of her community. “A key part of stewardship is being able to listen deeply,” Peacock said of her community-centric model of journalism. She referenced an opinion piece regarding fire practices of the U.S. Forest Service and CalFire, which led to a story in the summer of 2022 regarding their divergent policies. She believes that that story wouldn’t have been possible without community engagement with the paper and a willingness to pay attention.

Will Richardson, executive director of the Tahoe Institute for National Sciences (TINS) said that stewardship was “a core part of [his] being” as someone with a passion for science and wildlife. He felt that stewardship was deeply connected with contributing to collective impacts by considering “the highest use of your skillset.”

Lydell Wyatt, the Tahoe liaison of the Washoe Tribe, talked about his background in fire stewardship in the area and the importance of listening to Traditional Ecological Knowledge. “What does stewardship mean to you all, and what does taking care of the land mean to you?” asked Wyatt. He emphasized that cultivating community and relationship with each other and with nature has been integral to the Washoe Tribe’s way of life, but that it is also true for people who are trying to be mindful of the land they live on.

The final speaker, vice mayor of Truckee Anna Klovstad, was “thrilled” that they were starting with the Forest Futures Salon again. “Forest Futures Salons opened my mind to what the community was considering,” said Klovstad. The educational and community-building aspect were major points for her.

“We’ve all chosen to live here, and it’s not an easy place to live,” said Klovstad. “It is a conscious decision to prioritize our lives here. And we are all stewards: we love where we live and want to protect it.” Klovstad is part of the Climate Transformation Alliance, which aims to bring Tahoe and Truckee to carbon neutral by 2045. She urged people to be the change that you want to see in your community, to recognize that the environment will change, and that action can create hope.

The next Forest Futures Salon will be on March 27. More information can be found on the Tahoe Truckee Community Foundation site at ttcf.net

Eli Ramos is a reporter for Tahoe Daily Tribune. They are part of the 2024–26 cohort of California Local News Fellows through UC Berkeley.