Bring the Tools to the Trees
A Home Base for Healing Everett Crowley Park
You are the heart of Everett Crowley Park’s recovery. For over 40 years, the Everett Crowley Park community has been the force behind healing the park’s ecology, transforming a former landfill into a thriving urban wilderness.
We have an active and eager group of volunteer park stewards but our progress is limited by logistics. We currently burn up to a quarter of our collective volunteer time hauling gear back and forth from the community centre instead of directly planting and protecting the park.
But we have an exciting opportunity to establish a permanent park headquarters: the Community Stewardship Basecamp.
We plan to transform a used shipping container into a custom-built, solar-powered, off-grid park hub. Bringing a legacy project like this to the heart of Everett Crowley Park is a complex undertaking that requires dedicated leadership and a lot of support. The Champlain Heights Community Association is thrilled to be the owner of this project, and the Vancouver Park Board support this vision!
We need your help to make it happen! Our goal is to raise $5,000 between Earth Day (April 22nd) and World Environment Day (June 5th) so we can move the project forward.
To give you an idea of the scale and needs for this project, here are some expenses needed to bring the Community Stewardship Basecamp to the park:
$200 installs the exterior rain-capture system. This off-grid system allows tools to be cleaned after a day in the field.
$300 secures the site with industrial locks to protect our specialized gear.
$2,000 prepares the site for the Community Stewardship Basecamp to the securely placed.
$2,500 funds the heavy-duty delivery and placement, covering the specialized transport to the heart of the park.
$20,000 kits out the solar-powered unit including installing solar panels, batteries and more to keep equipment safe and dry.
Your support is a one-time investment with a long-term impact. By giving today, you are ensuring the Community Stewardship Basecamp is built, delivered, and ready to support decades of healing stewardship work to come!
Please note that we cannot provide tax receipts because we are not a federally registered charity. All donations will support the Community Stewardship Basecamp project. If the project cannot proceed as planned, funds will be redirected to closely related stewardship and restoration work in Everett Crowley Park.
Phase 2 teaser: Creating the Social Heart of the Park
This project will be more than creating a basecamp; it is about creating a community hub. Once the container is in place, we will focus on turning the Stewardship Basecamp into a social landmark where neighbours can connect, share stories, and relax both before and after park events.
To celebrate the Basecamp as a permanent part of the park's landscape, we hope these final touches will include:
An exterior mural by a local First Nation artist. We will work with an artist to create a mural that reflects the cultural and ecological stories of this land.
A community bulletin board to be a central spot to learn about upcoming park events, recent nature sightings in the park, and more.
A pop-up learning space to connect and share our common love of the park.
The Everett Crowley Park Committee is a proud committee of the Champlain Heights Community Association.
The Everett Crowley Park Committee humbly acknowledges that we work and live on the unceded traditional territories of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), and səlilwətaɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) Peoples.
