California Institute for Biodiversity

“The Organization will make the prepared Form 990 available to all voting Board Members for review. The prepared Form 990 will be sent electronically to each voting Board Member for review with a deadline for suggested changes.”

“The Organization requires all board members sign a conflict of interest form:Identifying what is a conflict of interest, classes of individuals within The Organization covered by the policy, ask questions that facilitate disclosure of conflicts of interest, and specify procedures to be followed in managing conflicts of interest.”

“The Executive Directors performance is reviewed annually by The Board of Directors in a closed session of The Board. Executive Director is excluded from participating in this closed session. Executive Director compensation is determined by The Board of Directors informed by salary comparisons for similar positions in peer organizations in the same area. Salary comps are obtained from peer nonprofit 990s, online job listings, online and published salary comparisons, and other sources of information.”

“Governing documents, conflict of interest policy, and financial statements are available to the public upon request.”

“COMPLETING THE CALIFORNIA ATBI (ALL TAXA BIODIVERSITY INVENTORY). Saving Intertidal Biodiversity. CIB convened an Intertidal Biodiversity working group of leading scientists to scope an ambitious plan for a statewide project that will secure a specimen of every species (currently most are unknown to science), develop a DNA barcode library, and complete other urgently-needed work. Insects, Funga, and Soil Biodiversity. CIB made 150+ grants to scientists at California Academy of Sciences, The Nat, CSU East Bay, UCB, UCD, UCR, UCSD, and others. Outcomes include FUNDIS vouchered thousands of macrofungi (mushrooms) from across California, most DNA sequenced yielding vouchers of well over 1,000 species. CIB grantees and partners collected thousands of soil samples for environmental DNA sequencing by CALeDNA, for prioritizing field expeditions, as well as a comprehensive map of California biodiversity. Hundreds of field collections made for Insecta Barcode, plus thousands of museum specimens sampled, achieved the goal of DNA sequencing 1,000,000 insect specimens. Biorepositories and Orphan Collections grants to scores of nonprofits and universities are supporting teams to rescue collections, accession specimen backlogs, and upgrade collection infrastructure and reboot scientific collections for the 21st century. SAVING PLACES.Land Conservation and Achieving 30 by 30. CIB calculates the next few years are a critical window of opportunity for conservation. Generational change, combined with the current polycrisis, provide urgency and opportunity. Our work ranges from supporting large coalitions, to ensuring conservation investments are guided by the best available science, to engaging in key local acquisition efforts. CIB worked within several coalitions to help ensure 30x30 goals are built into state practices, as well as stable and adequate funding for land conservation. CIB worked with partners to explore nontraditional conservation approaches that can provide solutions for Californians to save the lands and biodiversity they love. This work has identified a number of achievable changes to the broad conservation acquisition system that could dramatically improve efficacy of existing private funding, make public funding much more efficient and impactful, to accelerate the pace of habitat conservation in California. CIB is convening partners to transform these ideas into specific proposals, that can then be moved forward over the next two years.CIB served on Steering Committee for the states California Biodiversity Network, representing the needs and perspectives of scientists as the state makes investment decisions. Accomplishments include writing the Appendix D Science Needs report. In 2023 CIB identified a suite of properties for sale in the floodplain of a wild and critical riparian system in Southern California. The watershed is adjacent to National Forest land, provides movement connectivity for mountain lions and habitat imperiled species, and is central to several California tribes and bands. A team of land conservation specialists is now actively advancing acquisition of these parcels for durable protection, with the support of key funding agencies in the area. RENATURING CALIFORNIA:CIB advanced Pocket Forests solutions, to nurture recovery of local biodiversity and bring the benefits of nature to communities. CIB sponsored legislation establishing a statewide Pocket Forest program within CalFire to make grants to schools and communities; our coalition secured passage by the legislature but it was unfortunately vetoed by Governor Newsom. Working with local science teachers, CIB helped City of Berkeley allocate $150K to deliver four forests to underinvested communities. The Local Native Seedbank project convened NGOs, industry, agencies, scientists and other stakeholders to develop guidelines, build shared systems, secure funding, and ensure California has preserved seeds for the indigenous plants required to reestablish habit”