Your Investment in Local Stewardship: 2025 Review & Annual Fundraiser
- amy
- 3 days ago
- 5 min read
Dear Friends and Neighbors,
Well, what a year! The work to protect quality of life in our shared local communities remains vitally important in the face of absurd proposals like the twin 999.6 animal unit “not-CAFOs” from Illinois, and a 765kv transmission line coming from Minnesota with towers the height of the Statue of Liberty. Luckily, Crawford Stewardship Project (CSP) remains up for jobs like these!
Did you know that your contributions are CSP’s primary source of funding, and our superpower? The unique, locally-focused work we do is notoriously difficult to fund through grants. Being funded by you allows us to speak up for you without having to bite our tongues in the ever-shifting landscapes of power.
Your contributions in 2025 allowed us to challenge unwanted outside industrial developments, acting as effective facilitators, organizers, and stewards of our community resources. Your ongoing investments in CSP keep us humming as a strong, grassroots organization dedicated to our mission of uniting neighbors in care of human and natural communities.
Here are some highlights of how we put your money to work in 2025:
I. Protecting Our Communities And What We All Depend Upon
CSP stood up for our local community in the face of powerful corporate and industrial interests. We are able to take these ‘controversial’ actions because we are supported by YOU!
Empowered The Community To Be Heard: CSP alerted the community to the twin Gruber 999.6 “not-a-CAFO” applications and provided crucial resources: clear public information, an expert scientific review, and legal counsel. This work resulted in a massive public turnout, including 40 public testimonies and 85 written comments.
Watchdogged CAFOs: Construction on Roth Feeder Pig II, the largest hog CAFO approved in Wisconsin, has not yet begun—a delay of over three years since its expected opening. Thanks to CSP's diligent watchdogging of this operation the county also raised the level of accountability on Nutrient Management Plans.
Alerted The Community And Provided Critical Resources: The proposed 765kV
“MariBell” transmission line, the largest ever proposed in the state, threatens both private homes and community assets. CSP quickly researched and provided critical information on our website, the need for which is shown by the 2,500+ views on that webpage to date. We alerted directly affected landowners via mailed letters, broadcast an informative local radio episode, shared maps, and provided templates for effective action. We also helped catalyze the formation of a grassroots group dedicated to keeping this outsize powerline out of the Driftless. CSP continues to follow this complicated development closely and evaluate next actions, stay tuned!
Connected With Decision-Makers: CSP held a coordinated meeting to connect with our Representative Travis Tranel (D49). Seated next to a karst sinkhole in a local orchard, we shared apple pie while discussing the importance of Local Control in tailoring policies to fit unique places. This authentic, grassroots approach proved effective: one of CSP’s educational karst posters now hangs in Tranel’s Madison office.
We are able to take these ‘controversial’ actions because we are funded BY YOU!
II. Our Karst Geology: Learning To Steward Our Driftless Land
We instigated public study & community science projects, facilitated data collection and map-making. We led classroom & field explorations into the nooks and crannies of this special place we all call home.
Guided Immersive Learning: Our 13th annual Karst Exploration event invited geologist Eric Carson (WI Geological Survey) to share his years of research at the Hogback Prairie, first with a slideshow and then a bus ride to the Hogback to bring the research to life. Attendees rated the event 4.8 out of 5 for increasing their appreciation and engagement around our local landscape.
Secured Unprecedented Resources for WaterTesting: CSP’s effective, community-based approach to science won us a grant to fund a year of the Tri-County Well Testing partnership we instigated in 2020. In 2026 we will fund & facilitate the testing of 400 private wells across Crawford, Richland, and Vernon Counties for nitrates and metals, establishing baselines and increasing awareness of the need to protect our local drinking water.
Provided Useful Tools for Local Government: Our citizen-science-created sinkhole map was included this year by the Crawford County Land Conservation Department in evaluating manure spreading acres. This crucial map layer shows direct conduits to groundwater, which should be avoided when spreading manure in order to protect our drinking water.
Filled A Critical Gap In Water Monitoring: We published our 16th annual report from our award-winning Water Quality Monitoring program, monitoring streams of concern. Our dedicated 19 volunteer monitors (including 3 student monitors) collected over 90 samples from 14 sites, with results published in the State Database. The WI DNR recognizes the quality of CSP’s work, appreciating that we fill a critical gap in their stream monitoring capacity. An October luncheon celebrated our volunteers, and all have re-upped for 2026—a huge endorsement that they understand the value in this local stewardship work.
III. Our Working Landscapes: Supporting Quality Of Life & Livelihoods
We believe that stewardship includes responsibility to both the land and each other. We built civic bridges & engagement around shared values of strong communities, sustainable livelihoods, sustainable land management, and local governance.
Partnered To Sustain Local Peer-To-Peer Stewardship: This year we began actively collaborating with local farmers and established a fiscal sponsorship to support the Great River Graziers (GRG), a 32 year old peer-to-peer pasturewalk group created by Crawford County graziers. Our collaboration with GRG led to successful extra events on topics like bird-friendly grazing, cover-crop grazing, and small farm cooperative meat marketing. We are feeling joyful about new partnerships to sustain local livelihoods!
Put Our Heads Together For A Local Small Farm Economy: CSP is participating in a local working group to build and promote agritourism in Crawford County. Ventures like farm-stays, farm-shops, and farm-to-table restaurants are positive ways to keep small farmers on their land while boosting our local economy in a way that promotes long-term land stewardship.
Built Personal Trust With Public Stewards: CSP maintains a regular presence at various county and township meetings. Personal attendance keeps us informed on developments and grounds our working relationships in personal ones…reminding us that we are all neighbors, not demographics or politicians.
Passed Stewardship Values Forward: CSP received invitations from schools, civic groups, and other venues to share our educational presentations. In 2025 we directly reached ~1000 folks of all ages with our groundwater model, karst cutaways, and managed grazing demonstrations.
All of this was possible because of you.
Your investment today ensures that the capable, authentic organization you’ve built can continue to be a proactive voice for local self-determination and shared stewardship, where together into creeks, caves, pastures, and boardrooms we go, raising understanding, connection, and appreciation of our landscape and each other.
Let’s do it again in 2026! Please return the form below with your tax-deductible gift today, or donate securely online at www.crawfordstewardship.org/donate.
With gratitude for your engagement,
Amy Fenn
Executive Director, CSP
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