Programs
We support community and nonprofit partners with scaling and accelerating their vital work. We help funders connect to and advance ambitious water strategies and systems change.
Over the last few years, the Water Foundation has grown its role in the positive political and policy changes that provide families across the country with clean drinking water, restore freshwater ecosystems, and ramp up climate resilience efforts.
How We Work
To move the legislation, administrative actions, regulatory enforcement, and public funding needed to effect change at every level, meeting our goals means turning the “policy wheel.”
Our policy wheel moves and builds power through three crucial turns:
- Developing strong policies within government
- Ensuring successful implementation in communities
- Leveraging actionable storytelling to inspire public support
As we do this work, you’ll find the Water Foundation collaborating with partners to strengthen our movement’s infrastructure, bringing stories that make water a winning political issue to the forefront, and mobilizing resources that can be invested at every turn.
Investment in the coalitions and communities that are the most impacted by water challenges, and the most capable to address them, continues to be a top priority for the Water Foundation, as is working with partners to find shared solutions to shared problems.
Program Team
Click a team member for their bio and contact information. View all Water Foundation staff.
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Alesandra Nájera (she/her)
Program Officer
About Alesandra -
Alexandra Paxton (she/her)
Senior Program Officer
About Alexandra -
Andrew Fahlund (he/him)
Program Director and Senior Policy Advisor
About Andrew -
Ava Farriday (she/her)
Program Associate
About Ava -
Chloe Lieberknecht (she/her)
Program Officer
About Chloe -
Elizabeth Söderström (she/her)
Senior Program Officer
About Elizabeth -
Jennifer Sokolove (she/her)
Chief Program and Strategy Officer
About Jennifer -
Lauryn Magno (she/her)
Senior Program Associate
About Lauryn -
Nina Carranco (she/her)
Program Officer
About Nina
Highlights from Work
Water Boards: Pathways to Community Power
Community and justice groups are helping a new generation build their power and technical skills for values-based governance that listens and responds to the people who are most directly affected by water challenges.
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Highlights from Work
Report Puts Spotlight on Drinking Water Policy Advances and Challenges
In partnership with the US Water Alliance and water leaders across the country, we hope this report will help advance a deeper national dialogue on how communities, advocates, utilities, policymakers, and funders can collaborate to achieve and sustain the human right to water.
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Highlights from Work
Green Stormwater Infrastructure: Good Jobs and Healthy Communities
Take a Google Earth tour of Los Angeles County green stormwater infrastructure projects, from early adopters to new project designs.
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Highlights from Work
Water Solutions Are Climate Adaptation Solutions
We are undeniably already living with climate change. We’re focused on solutions that help communities and watersheds adapt to climate change that is already here, with a focus on places and people with the fewest resources to pull through and recover. (Photo by OurWaterLA)
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Highlights from Work
California Regions Submitted Their First Groundwater Sustainability Plans in 2020. How Did They Do?
A team of researchers and advocates released the state’s only analysis to date of Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (SGMA) implementation that connects environmental justice, public health, and ecosystem health.
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Highlights from Work
Bringing Land and Water Decision-Making Together
To adapt to a changing climate and address long-standing inequities, we need to leave behind the era of single-issue decision-making. One place to start is by connecting water and land.
Read more...Strategy
Our strategic framework hinges on building the political will to achieve our boldest goals and ensure the water field benefits from the insight and experience of partners, new and old.
