Rgisc Inc.

“Rgisc solicits annually to the public to become members by contributing funds in different levels.”

“Melissa cigarroa 1101 mier st. Laredo, tx 78040 juan livas 208 newcastle laredo, tx 78045 adrian zapata 117 horizon loop laredo, tx 78046 kathy garcia 10611 mcpherson rd. Laredo, tx 78045 danny gunn 307 e. Croydon pl. Laredo, tx 78045 eddie garza 1310 junction dr. Suite b laredo, tx 78041 gabriela "maita" fernandez de ponce 6950 mcpherson rd. C laredo, tx 78041 maria eugenia "meg" guerra 1812 houston street laredo, tx 78040 rocio lopez 7610 patricia highsmith laredo, tx 78041 alyce mccain 1421 longhorn dr. Laredo, tx 78045 monica molano 9817 mahim laredo, tx 78045”

“A draft of form 990 is presented to the board of directors for review prior to cpa's electronic submission of tax return.”

“Rgisc monitors and enforces compliance at least annually and when new officers, board members and key employees are added.”

“Compensation is reviewed by board of directors and any decision made is based on comparable pay in similar positions, demographics of region, and merit.”

“The executive director makes recommendations on compensation of other key employees. This is reviewed by board of directors and any decision made is based on comparable pay in similar positions, demographics of region, and merit.”

“Governing documents are available upon request.”

“The rgisc mission is to preserve and protect the rio grande-rio bravo, its watershed and environment, through awareness, advocacy, research, education, stewardship and bi-national collaboration for the benefit of present and future generations.”

“1st exempt purpose accomplishment: education/awareness annual meeting: in the second quarter of each year, as per its bylaws, rgisc holds an annual meeting with its membership. It's the moment when we recap our organization's work over the past year, give an accounting of our finances, elect a new board of directors, recruit new members, and recognize our community honorees and scholarship recipients. Laredo birding festival: in early february, rgisc holds its annual laredo birding festival, in partnership with the monte mucho audubon society and laredo convention & visitors bureau. In 2018, rgisc held its 6th festival - a highly structured, multi-day niche festival designed to attract birders from all over the u.s. And canada to laredo. The goal is to highlight the economic and sociological benefits of eco-tourism, and to demonstrate the need for local leaders to preserve regional green spaces. We had a record number 150 registered birders from 22 states and 40 texas cities who identified more than 170 species. They went on daily field trips with professional field guides, and attended multiple talks by birding experts. We partnered with roughly 20 ranchers from webb and zapata counties. The festival also included various community outreach events for locals: -a highly successful bird art contest that was open to the community, and received a record 431 art submissions, and -we also carried out a fun with feathery friends event for youngsters at the laredo public library. Rio research roundup: each october, we host our annual rio research roundup, an award-winning binational student water testing project that takes place throughout the entire watershed. Our goal is to educate middle and high school students from the u.s. And mexico about the importance of the rio grande watershed basin as a primary, and in some instances, only source of drinking water in their respective communities, and how its fragile ecosystem is determined by a number of factors including human interventions. Students submit other components, which are then reviewed by a team of judges: short videos, short essays, artwork, and public service announcements. In 2018, we organized our 9th roundup with nearly 2,000 students via teams from colorado, new mexico and texas (u.s.) and durango, chihuahua, coahuila, nuevo leon and tamaulipas (mexico) and teach them how to collect and process water samples; and incorporate biology, chemistry, geography, and ecology lessons into the project for a meaningful experience. Dia del rio celebration: each october, we host our annual dia del rio celebration, a month-long celebration of events. In 2018, we hosted our 24th annual celebration that included: 1)several hundred volunteers to help care for laredo's oldest nature trail, paso del indio, and in so doing, worked to instill respect and "care" for our natural resources through hands-on activities in our community, which includes trash removal, mulching of trails, planting native plants, trees, shrubs and wildflowers, and potting native tree seedlings at the nursery of the lamar bruni vergara environmental science center. 2)engaged 60 members of the community + 1 dog for our 2nd annual ddr river paddle as a way to reconnect laredoans with the river by providing a kayak excursion. Most had never paddled the river. We believe this activity helps to create greater understanding and awareness of the river and the local flora and fauna that depend on it. 3)held our annual binational proclamation along the banks of the river with officials from laredo and nuevo laredo. General river: we conducted monthly river monitoring through the texas clean rivers program. This allows us to measure and document water flow and the level of pollutants and pathogens in the rio grande. For nearly 25 years, rgisc has conducted monthly sampling of water at multiple points along the river and submitting the data to federal and state agencies. In may 2018, our executive director attended her first m”

“2nd exempt purpose accomplishment: conferences in november 2018, rgisc attended a conference in dallas with former first lady laura bush through her environmental nonprofit, texan by nature, to network with her organization and others on work as it relates to monarch habitat preservation, and water quality issues. In may 2018, a rgisc board member and rgisc staffer traveled to lake tahoe, ca for the annual river rally conference, an annual gathering of river advocates from throughout the country. It's an intense multi-day conference that hosts a cross section of topics and training for river advocates and nonprofit organizations.”

“3rd exempt purpose accomplishment: green space preservation in 2018, we held a loving laredo hike in november and december to get people better acquainted with some of our nature trails. We also began working in earnest to save las palmas nature trail, a natural asset and world-renowned birding site in downtown laredo along the river that is vulnerable to border patrol impacts of bulldozing and motorized vehicles. We held several meetings with the chief and other top officials from the sprawling border patrol laredo sector to start a dialogue that involves regular meetings of how the river vega (floodplain) and its vegetation is managed. Meanwhile, we were involved with several meetings to get the city to establish formal landmarks of natural assets in laredo as wildlife preserves and birding sanctuaries along the rio grande that would involve endangered species like the federally endangered inland least tern. We also began working with a city councilman to help draft ordinance language to protect laredo's open spaces and river vega (floodplain) from significant developments. Our work also includes a watchdog function. We became involved with the unpermitted bulldozing of a large swath of shiloh hike & bike trails by a developer for a water line easement to connect to his planned development. The clearing took out nearly 40-50 feet in width and a football field in length of this pristine and rare inner city green space, and blocked two tributaries of manadas creek. The city ended up fining the developer for this activity. Early in january, we scored a significant victory when the laredo city council formalized its decision to withdraw north central park as the site location for construction of the veterans museum. Clean-ups: in 2018, rgisc organized various cleanups throughout the community, particularly along creek systems and other waterways: 1.in april, we held our 4th post-easter cleanup blitz at lake casa blanca international state park with 80 volunteers who removed 2.11 tons of trash left behind by thousands of visitors over the easter weekend; 2.on may 10, we helped oversee nearly 30 realtors with the realtor firm keller williams conducted a cleanup at las palmas nature trail. They removed 600 pounds of trash as part of their annual day of service. Single-use plastic bags on june 22, 2018, the texas supreme court issued its ruling that struck down the laredo ordinance aimed at reducing single use plastic bags, for all texas municipalities with such an ordinance in place. Rgisc traveled to hear oral arguments in austin in january 2018. After the june ruling, rgisc, along with city officials and other concerned citizens, immediately regrouped and launched the new love laredo b.i.g. (bag it green) campaign. It's an education awareness campaign aimed at: -retailers (urging them to not go back to single-use bags) -shoppers (encouraging them to keep using their reusable bags) -students and teachers - draft a teks-aligned curriculum to help them understand the impacts of single-use plastic in our environment. Meanwhile, we have had several conversations with filmmakers in new york who are working on a 5-part documentary series about plastics and the plastic bag for netflix. They are looking to include the texas (and therefore laredo) story in this series, as well as developments in asian countries. In late december, we participated in the annual laredo christmas bird count. It was an historic event with three rarely seen neotropical species spotted: blue mockingbird, blue bunting and golden-crowned warbler. Rgisc also provided numerous talks and presentations year-round to different groups and schools about certain environmental threats, and to inform them about the presence of ecologically rich areas in our midst.”

“Other exempt purpose accomplishments: fundraisers run with the monarchs 5k/10k + festival + monarch garden construction in july, plans came to life for rgisc's 1st run with the monarchs that was laredo's first race on the chacon hike & bike trails. The event took place in october 13, and involved a significant partnership with the city of laredo to bring greater awareness about this disappearing butterfly. Highlights: 150 runners and walkers; we built a large monarch garden/waystation at the haynes health and wellness center with more than 80 host and nectar plants that we sourced from the national butterfly center in mission. The event included a small festival of 30 interactive booths related to the monarch. Earth day: april was dominated by our 3rd annual earth day festival held at lake casa blanca international state park on april 28. This year's festivities mushroomed into a complex and multi-faceted event that included: -eco-games, eco-stations (approx. 25 stations), -laredo kayak race (approx. 40 kayakers plus a new tabulating system designed by the uhs robotics team), -vendors (approx. 12 vendors), -a noplasticstraw/diasinpopote campaign (approx. 40 restaurants), and -campus art contest with recycled materials (approx. 12 campuses). This concluded with a series of earth day tree planting ceremonies, and pizza parties/rgisc environmental presentations at school campuses that placed in our inaugural earth day art contest with recycled materials. Tree plantings: 1) may 22 macdonell es - karla rodriguez (instructor), cathy deleon (principal) 2) may 22 christen ms - maxine rebeles (instructor), lizzy newsome (principal) 3) may 23 power christian academy - helen trevino (instructor), cindy morales (principal) class pizza parties/presentations: 1) may 18 finley es - toni garcia (instructor) 2) may 18 lamar bruni vergara ms - alberto guajardo (instructor) 3) may 21 clark es - eleanor coronado (instructor) 4) may 21 united hs robotics - linda rodriguez (instructor) 5) may 22 fasken es - angelica contreras (instructor) 6) may 23 kennedy-zapata es - jennifer martinez (instructor) 7) may 25 salvador garcia ms - amanda santos (instructor) 8) may 25 k. Tarver es - liza vega, michelle acosta (instructors) golf tournament on jan. 6, we held our 8th annual birdies on the rio golf tournament. It was our most successful golf tournament to date with a record number 73 golfers and nearly 40,000 in net income scholarship fundraisers in 2018, we received 47 scholarship essays, of which 41 met the initial criteria to be reviewed and judged by rgisc board members for the luis zapata memorial scholarship fund. We awarded one 1,000 scholarship in may. 25th anniversary gala in the summer, planning began in earnest for rgisc's 25th gala, which included plans for a loving laredo paddle on the river, and a gala dinner awards event.”

“Adjustments to prior periods -2,503”