January 7, 2025
January 7, 2025
For the sixth consecutive year, Mission North joined forces with fellow San Francisco and Silicon Valley-based PR agencies to celebrate Earth Day and care for our natural surroundings.
Joanna Kulesa, CEO of Offleash PR (formerly Kulesa Faul Public Relations) started the annual Earth Day tradition in 2013, inviting all San Francisco and Silicon Valley-based PR agencies to participate. Her goal was twofold: get to know each other better while working toward a common goal unrelated to PR.
The program has blossomed from five participating agencies to 13: 10Fold, Mission North, Double Forte, Highwire PR, Hotwire PR, InkHouse PR, Method Communications, Mindshare PR, Nectar Communications, Offleash PR, PAN Communications and Racepoint Group.
The additional participating agencies resulted in a record high of more than 50 volunteers. In addition to financial donations from the organizations involved, these companies donated more than 200 hours of volunteer time.
The Friday before Earth Day, we gathered at one of San Francisco’s most beautiful landmarks to support the Mountain Lake Promise campaign initiated by the Presidio Trust. We rolled up our sleeves, pulled weeds, spread mulch and enjoyed a break from our typical routines while working alongside the Presidio Park rangers and our peers in the industry.
Over the course of four hours, volunteers laid flat three massive mounds of mulch and pulled enough weeds to fill two dump trucks.
Before we started, a park ranger gave us a brief tour of the Mountain Lake area, which served as a great opportunity to learn more about the biodiversity in our own backyard. The areas around Mountain Lake are home to 250 species of birds, 30 species of butterflies, 50 species of mammals, and more federally protected species than any other national park in the continental United States.
We learned San Francisco residents were dropping off former pets (mainly fish) to live the rest of their days in Mountain Lake, which has proven to be a major threat to local plant and animal biodiversity. As a solution, the Presidio Trust built a “drop-off station” where people can leave pets like fish or lizards that they’re no longer able to care for themselves. The rangers check the station every day and will take any pets to an animal rescue or participating pet shops.
We thank Joanna for organizing this wonderful initiative — it was worth the sore muscles!
