Groundwork USA

April 2010 - The new Groundwork USA Funding Announcement was released on Grants.gov, see announcement "NPS-10WASO-00001" for the full application and detailed information.

The National Park Service Rivers, Trails, and Conservation Assistance (RTCA) program has had a successful 12 year partnership with Groundwork USA, in partnership with the Environmental Protection Agency Brownfields Program.

Groundwork USA is a network of independent non-profit organizations called Groundwork Trusts focused on stabilizing and revitalizing their communities through projects and programs that improve their environment, economy and quality of life.

Groundwork Agreement - NPS signed a new Interagency Agreement with the EPA on July 10, 2009 to extend our partnership supporting Groundwork USA. The latest agreement transfers $400,000 to help broaden the network to two more communities and continues to support the growing network of brownfield community-based conservation organizations. Currently, there are 17 Groundwork organizations operating across the country.

Groundwork USA also recently signed a new cooperative agreement with the NPS and is eligible to use its youth Green Teams to work on Economic Recovery Act Projects. Groundwork Green Teams, the Groundwork network’s environmental service learning program, is a summer long or year round opportunity for interested youth (ages 12–18) to learn and serve by providing them with the structure, knowledge and tools to help revitalize their own communities and engage with their local national parks. Read more about 2009 participants!

Investing in Future Leaders, shares the voices and faces of the Groundwork Youth who have worked with the NPS, visit the video at www.nps.gov/ncrc/nap

For more information about Groundwork USA and the partnership accomplishments, visit their website.

Establishing a new Groundwork Trust is a multi-step competitive process (see the current application on grants.gov). An interested community establishes a steering committee of diverse stakeholders and applies to the National Park Service Rivers, Trails, and Conservation Assistance program for consideration. If selected, they work with NPS to evaluate Groundwork for their community and to submit a full proposal for Groundwork USA Pilot Funding and Technical Assistance. If their proposal is selected they then work with NPS on in-depth feasibility study. Upon completion, if the final decision is to establish the new GW Trust, NPS provides seed funding and technical assistance. For more information, please contact Douglas Evans at NPS, douglas_evans@nps.gov

You can read the pdf documents online or download to your hard drive. To open these files, you must have Adobe Acrobat Reader. (Click here to download for free.)