About

History:

In 2016, the City of Claremont approved the Claremont Hills Wilderness Park Master Plan & Implementation Plan, which recommended establishing a Friends group to actively work to preserve, program, support, and facilitate communication among park users, neighbors, and City staff, and to harness the energy of volunteers to help achieve the goals laid out in the Master Plan (Master Plan, pages 4.9–4.10; Implementation Plan, pages 4-5). The Friends of the Wilderness Park was established in response to the plan.

The Friends were first convened in 2017, and in response to the initial experience, the governance and committee structure was revised to its present form in 2018.

Structure:

Friends’ activities are initiated and coordinated by a Leadership Team, who establish ad-hoc or permanent committees or working groups to deal with specific issues as needed.

Leadership Team:

Charlie Gale, Chair
Ran Libeskind-Hadas, Vice Chair
Susan Starr, Secretary
Nancy Hamlett, Treasurer, Invasive Plants Coordinator, and Monarch Project Coordinator
Heidi Arch
Paul Faulstich
Dana Gomez
Scott Marnoy
Wendy Whitney

City of Claremont Liaison:

Luis Vaquera, Wilderness Park and Park Ranger Supervisor