Rock Creek Conservancy
Strategic Plan
2021-2025
Adopted November 2020
By the Rock Creek Conservancy Board of Directors
Our Vision
Rock Creek Conservancy is an award-winning 501(c)(3) nonprofit, an official philanthropic partner to Rock Creek Park (National Park Service), and the only organization dedicated to the entirety of Rock Creek and its parks.
Our Mission
Rock Creek Conservancy exists to restore Rock Creek and its parklands as a natural oasis for all people to appreciate and protect.
Our Values
Rock Creek Conservancy’s values serve as a compass as we do our work. They help to guide our approach to solving problems, engaging our audiences, and advocating on behalf of the watershed. Though our values haven’t changed since our last strategic plan, we revisited and renewed our commitment to each one of them to reinforce our organizational philosophy as a staff and board.
Our Vision
Though this strategic plan will guide the Conservancy’s work over the next two years, we remain committed to achieving lasting, long-term change. Our vision for the future is unabashedly ambitious and our work in the coming years will set us up for enduring positive impact.
The Conservancy envisions a new model of city, in which the natural benefits of the park extend to the communities around it. The creek will meet water quality standards while supporting a rich and diverse ecological community. Surrounding the creek will be healthy, climate-resilient forests – free of invasive plants, with an emerging assemblance of thriving species – that continue to offer protection to the surrounding watershed.
Rock Creek Park will be an inclusive, vibrant park that is able to protect and revitalize the recreational, cultural, educational, and natural resources that define it – from the forests that make it an urban wilderness to the historical structures and performance spaces that bring us together in celebration. Neighbors will recognize its national significance as well as its local benefits, and visitors will support the park through their behaviors and through direct contributions. Through engagement in the park, community members will support the restoration of the Rock Creek watershed.
The residents of the Rock Creek watershed will be engaged stewards of Rock Creek and its parklands, with a strong sense of place fostered in the park. Everyone will feel safe, welcome, and included in Rock Creek Park, especially communities historically underrepresented in conservation.
The Conservancy will operate as a high-performing organization that is able to be responsive and adapt to the social and cultural needs of our communities. AS the Conservancy’s organizational and resource capacity grows, so does its positive impact throughout the watershed.
Our Goals
The following four goals emerged following extensive research and through focused discussion within the Conservancy and the community. Each goal represents a uniquely important area of focus for the Conservancy over the next three years, and, while they are distinct and different, they are highly interrelated and interdependent. If the Conservancy’s mission is Rock Creek, each of these goals is a primary tributary. The goals draw upon varied sources, yet each goal flows centrally towards the mission. Collectively, these four goals are aligned to generate mutually supportive impacts downstream.
Over the next two years, the Conservancy will use people-powered restoration to build an ever-more inclusive constituency for Rock Creek and will leverage the power of the park to continue to help our communities thrive.
