For 20 years Santa Barbara Channelkeeper has served our community as a vigilant watchdog and tenacious advocate for the Santa Barbara Channel and its watersheds. We’ve successfully championed stronger policies to better protect our water resources, stopped scores of illegal discharges into the Santa Barbara Channel and its tributaries, removed tons of trash from local beaches and creeks, collected and leveraged much-needed scientific data on the health of our streams, beaches and Channel, engaged 4,500 volunteers in our programs, provided environmental education and exploration for 36,000 youth, and so much more.
None of these achievements would have been possible without the generous support of our community and the many partners we’ve worked with over the years. We are deeply grateful, honored and uplifted by the support and trust our community has invested in Channelkeeper over the past two decades to help us become such a powerful and effective force for clean water.
Channelkeeper will be celebrating our 20th anniversary throughout 2020, and I invite you to join the party, because we’ll also be celebrating you! Through a series of fun initiatives and events, we will reflect back on our clean water victories over the past two decades, provide opportunities for our community to explore and connect with the waterways we love and work so hard to protect, and honor and appreciate those who have helped us grow and succeed along the way.
For a sneak peek at what’s to come, in the next few weeks we’ll be unveiling a beautiful new website, launching a super fun new community engagement initiative called the Channelkeeper Challenge, and rolling out the first of a series of multi-media profiles recognizing and appreciating twenty Channelkeeper Heroes who have supported our organization and work over the past 20 years.
We’re also thrilled to welcome Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. back as the keynote speaker at our 20th Annual Blue Water Ball on March 14, 2020. Mr. Kennedy was here to officially inaugurate Channelkeeper at our very first Blue Water Ball in 2000, and his vision, dedication and leadership has since propelled the creation of more than 300 other grassroots Waterkeeper organizations on six continents, collectively patrolling and protecting 2.7 million square miles of watersheds and defending people’s fundamental right to clean water across the globe. You will not want to miss this momentous celebration, so get your tickets here today, and stay tuned for other ways to join in the fun of Channelkeeper’s year-long celebration of making waves for two decades!