
Impact
Twice a year we award grants. Here is what that money did.
Short reports from the field — fencing on Elfin Forest Road, a Fire Safe Council website, cameras in a preserve, a picnic that needed chairs.

Elfin Forest Interpretive Center / The Escondido Creek Conservancy
Photo contest display at the Interpretive Center
April 2023 · $1,134
A $1,134 grant helped the Interpretive Center hang the annual amateur photo contest — animals, plants, water, and youth — so visitors actually see the watershed they walk.
Read story
Elfin Forest Harmony Grove Fire Safe Council
A website for the Fire Safe Council
October 2022 · $5,000
A $5,000 grant built the Fire Safe Council a real website and email so defensible-space advice and alerts reach the whole community, not just whoever is on a paper list.
Read story
The Escondido Creek Conservancy
Trail cameras for Keithly Preserve
April 2020 · $1,055
Four locked Browning trail cameras let the Conservancy watch wildlife and trespass on Keithly Preserve without posting a ranger on every acre.
Read story
Elfin Forest Harmony Grove Town Council — Trails Committee
Trail and fencing repairs
April 2020 · $9,000
A $9,000 grant helped the Trails Committee replace aging fence along community trails — the same ten miles of rail that walkers, bikes, and horses share along our roads.
Read story
Elfin Forest Harmony Grove Town Council
Keepin’ It Rural 5K/10K underwriting
October 2019 · $2,500
A $2,500 underwrite of the Keepin’ It Rural trail race and festival so the Town Council could put the event on without gambling the whole budget on a weather weekend.
Read story
The Escondido Creek Conservancy
Trail maintenance machinery for Los Cielos
March 2019 · $3,565
A Yardmax power trackbarrow with hydraulic hopper and blade, used to move repair material and debris on Los Cielos Preserve trails.
Read story
Elfin Forest Harmony Grove Town Council
Fourth of July parade and picnic
April 2018 · $3,000
A $3,000 contribution toward chairs, tables, a DJ, and portapotties for the yearly Fourth of July parade and picnic — the gathering most of the valley still marks on the calendar.
Read story
Harmony Grove Spiritualist Association
Native restoration after the Coco’s Fire
April 2018 · $4,000
After the 2014 Coco’s Fire, $4,000 plus donated labor replaced native plants and trees and repaired the drip system on ground the whole valley looks at.
Read story