San Miguel Rivermouth. Photo: Gina Sinotte
A year and a half ago, I stood overlooking San Miguel in Baja with a very distinct choice: take a very well paying job as a Sustainability Manager at a huge corporation or take on the leadership position with a small, scrappy surfing non-profit. As sets rolled through the perfect cobblestone point silhouetted in the fading Baja sunset, I chose the latter (as any surfer would), but not for the reasons you may think. Yes, there was a chance to surf every day, meet the surf world’s elite, and protect the places we all care about as surfers. However, more than that, the major draw for me was the opportunity to play a very central role in evolving an organization whose mission can shape the health of our coasts. This was exciting to me.
Save The Waves started as a passionate vision of Will Henry and grew quickly. Dean LaTourette assumed leadership and provided structure, sound financial practices and marketing acumen. Important early victories in Madeira, the Caribbean, Spain and Chile fueled the stoke for the organization. From this solid base, my vision has been to further evolve the organization to systematically combat the variety of threats that face our waves and coast. In the non-profit world, we often equate growing with evolving, yet growth is simply one attribute of evolution. There is no question that Save The Waves (and the environmental movement as a whole) must grow in size, but we must do it adeptly. We gotta get bigger, but we gotta get smarter. That is, to evolve.
Over the last year, our evolution has already been evident. We’ve evolved our program strategy to focus on three simple areas (Protected areas, economics and direct action) with tangible results:
– We’ve hired new staff to plan, dedicate and manage new World Surfing Reserves for long-term protection.
– We’ve created new partnerships and launched new economic studies on the value of waves all over the world.
– We’ve taken direct action and stopped trash flowing from a major coastal garbage dump in Peru, obtained a complete freeze on all new development at Punta de Lobos in Chile, and organized hundreds of people to become stewards of their own coast and surf spots on World Water Day.
And we’ve had fun. Yeah, we’re growing, but more importantly we’re evolving. As surfers, we too are evolving – from the Spicoli stereotypes of the 1980s to educated flag bearers and protectors of our coast. I am proud that I chose this path, I am proud of what we’ve done, and I’ll be proud of what we’ll be together.
Join us as we evolve. Make the choice.
