Kate (right) chatting with volunteers during our Valentine’s Day 2025 invasive plant workday.

We’re coming to you with an urgent request. AmeriCorps Project Conserve has been terminated. For 20 years, this program has supported work like Kate’s in the Little Tennessee River watershed. Now that work and AmeriCorps’ commitment to our AmeriCorps Western Region Water Quality & Habitat Restoration Associate, Kate Bridgers, are in jeopardy.

Americorps funding ends this Friday, May 16, but you can help.

We need to raise $10,000 so that Kate can finish her term. Your support will cover 14 weeks of full-time water quality work. This means 14 weeks of Swim Guide monitoring in the Little Tennessee, microplastic sampling in the Little Tennessee and Tuckasegee, volunteer coordination, and environmental education.

“As an AmeriCorps member, I have dedicated hundreds of hours to the improvement and conservation of the place I call home. Alongside my cohort members, our skills and time have made major impacts in the recovery of this region post-Helene. We are conservationists, botanists, trail stewards, educators, post-disaster relief workers, community organizers, and essential contributors to the well-being and longevity of this region. Our absence will be felt by the people that rely on us, the land we steward, and the organizations we have become a part of.” -Kate Bridgers

This cut comes in the middle of the eleven-month AmeriCorps term, leaving nonprofits and local governments struggling with an unexpected loss of capacity. It also leaves AmeriCorps members potentially facing an abrupt loss of the living stipend they use to pay their rent and buy groceries.

Fortunately, the state of North Carolina announced that it is joining a lawsuit challenging the termination of Congressionally-funded AmeriCorps programs as unlawful. A total of 24 states and the District of Columbia have joined the lawsuit. 

The legal battle will continue, but in the meantime, we must honor the commitments we’ve made to those who selflessly protect these places we share. 

Join us in supporting Kate and her important work protecting the Little Tennessee Watershed.