Guests at Palisades Tahoe have helped the resort raise $30,000 annually for the Tahoe Fund and the Truckee River Watershed Council. Since 2013, guests have been able to add $1 to their lodging and dining purchases, earmarked specifically for the Green Bucks Program.
Recently, the Truckee River Watershed Council used Green Bucks to help restore Bear Creek Lower Meadow, located at the base of Alpine Meadows ski area. It was once a healthy, wet, meadow with multiple, small channels crisscrossing its surface. But centuries of past land uses and road construction degraded the area.
Today, Bear Creek is confined to a single channel, actively eroding, and disconnected from the meadow surface. The restoration project will reconnect the creek with its floodplain. The bulk of the Bear Creek Lower Meadows project is complete, but crews and volunteers may conduct additional planting this coming summer and will continue to monitor the site thereafter.
With the help of their partners and funders, the Truckee River Watershed Council takes on 5-6 restoration projects each year. Healthy meadows filter pollutants, provide wildlife habitat and hold snow melt longer into the year, to buffer the effects of wildfire, flooding, and droughts.
