Challenge: How might we gain allies for public land conservation?
Summary: This is What a Land Conservationist Looks Like is designed to reach out to specific audiences within specific communities of the Bay Area. Target audiences were identified and content was created to specifically engage with them, and ultimately to inspire action. The goal of this work is to gain allies for land conservation that may have been overlooked or who are underrepresented.
Strategic Plan
The strategy of this campaign reaches out to nontraditional allies and demonstrates that they are a part of a larger community working towards a singular cause.
Leveraging Social Media
One of the groups identified as strong candidates for action towards land conservation were retired community members. By creating content that reflected this group visually, and directing them to information about the individual portrayed, retirees were able to personally identify with a person and location that was meaningful to them.
The short video above was created to be shown on the social media channels of retirees living in the city of Alameda. After clicking on a “Learn More Here” button viewers would be directed to images of the conserved land, more about Elsie’s story, and ways to get involved in Alameda:
“Elsie Roemer who was a former Alameda resident is a big reason why the salt marsh on the eastern end of Crown Memorial State Beach exists. The Elsie Roemer Bird Sanctuary is conserved land that Elsie and other community members worked to preserve. When Alameda was being developed the marsh was slated to be filled. The Alameda Sun writes, “In 1965, the Golden Gate Audubon Society began working with Alameda conservationist Elsie Roemer to stop the Utah Construction and Mining Company from filling in salt marshes on Bay Farm Island. Conservationists, including Roemer, worked to preserve some of these marshes, including one along the shores of San Francisco Bay at the southern end of Broadway. When developers wanted to purchase this marsh, the East Bay Regional Park District stepped in and made it a part of Crown Beach. In 1979, Roemer’s friends approached the district and asked that it create a bird sanctuary on the marsh and name it for Roemer.” BECOME A PART OF LAND CONSERVATION IN ALAMEDA HERE”
