We are welcoming June with arms wide open! Summer time officially begins, and more precious time can be spent outside. We are very excited to celebrate this month’s Climate Hero, who lends one of her special skill sets to one of the most challenging areas of grassroots organizing. Three cheers for Karin Rueff!
A Colorado native, Karin moved back to the Conifer area in 2022 after living in Asia, Europe, Africa, and all across the Western United States. Prior to moving back to Colorado, she was a senior nonpartisan staffer for the Utah State Legislature. Karin had also led large-scale collaborative planning initiatives in Salt Lake County, the Lake Tahoe Region, and San Francisco. During her six years in Tahoe, she led the development of Lake Tahoe’s first bi-state Climate Action Plan, managed the Lake Tahoe Sustainable Communities Program, and coordinated the $3B+ Lake Tahoe Environmental Improvement Program. It’s clear that Karin believes in the power of local action, place-based work, and grassroots advocacy.
So when Karin came to 350 Colorado through the Catchafire national volunteer database (which we were able to access thanks to Patagonia!), we were thrilled! Her background in public policy and environmental studies made her an excellent candidate for what we were looking for; support in research and fundraising for campaigns and operations.
Our mission at 350CO is to build a powerful grassroots movement that works to solve the climate crisis and transition us to a sustainable future. And in order to do that important work, we needs on-going funds. So while it may not be an outward facing part of our organizing, it is a critical body of work for us. We must secure grants and donations to keep campaigns going, to provide mutual aid to organizers, and live our values of justice, equity, diversity, and inclusion. All to say then that having Karin’s support in this realm is tremendous!
In November 2024, we set periodic meetings to have Karin start a project researching different fundraising opportunities. She has researched local businesses for us to approach, and eventually moved on to further research foundations. Since she has started we have been able to better understand new funding opportunities and connect with different foundations that align with our work to keep fossil fuels in the ground and promote solutions.
Karin’s detail oriented workflow and research has been instrumental to the 350CO team! Her work has saved the fundraising and admin team hours of work.
Karin holds a master’s degree from the Goldman School of Public Policy at the University of California at Berkeley and an undergraduate degree in Environmental Studies from the University of Colorado Boulder. As a consultant with Equilibrium Collaborative, a government / nonprofit consulting firm that is dedicated to making a positive impact in the world, Karin lives and breathes doing good work. She also sits on the Jefferson County Open Space Advisory Committee and volunteers in her local Conifer community.
And when she isn’t organizing and giving back, she loves to mountain bike, cross country ski, rock climb, and camp with her husband and 4 year-old twin boys.
Karin shared that she has “loved her time working with the talented 350CO team and looks forward to continuing to add capacity to an organization doing such important work.” We are so grateful you joined our fundraising team’s business/ grant outreach, Karin! Thank you so much for all the hours you’ve put in these last months helping us keep things moving forward!
Written by Chelsea Alexander, Kim Nelson, and Brigit Stattelman-Scanlan