Save Our Springs 30th Anniversary Celebration

Thank you Host Committee!
Tracy DiLeo ~ Brenda and Scott Mitchell ~ Travis County Commissioner Brigid Shea and John Umphress ~ State Senator Sarah Eckhardt
Christopher Cross and Joy Authur ~ Andrew and Nona Sansom ~ Susan Walker

Our Story
​
On August 8,1992 Austin voters approved the citizen-initiated Save Our Springs Ordinance, committing our whole city to the mission of saving Barton Springs and the Edwards Aquifer.  Then, on November 29, 1992, SOS campaign leaders incorporated the nonprofit Save Our Springs Alliance to defend the ordinance and champion protection of all our Hill Country natural and cultural heritage.  Today Barton Springs flows clear and strong but the task of saving our springs from pollution and overpumping is not finished.  ​

---

Highlights of What Your Generous Support Has Made Possible and Will Allow Us to Accomplish:

Over the last 30 years, the SOS Alliance has:

• Helped catalyze permanent protection of more than 25,000 acres in the Barton Springs watershed

• Kept treated sewage out of Barton Creek, Onion Creek, and the Blanco River and off of the Edwards    Aquifer recharge zone

• Developed Barton Springs University to be Austin’s leading outdoor environmental education event with year-around programming

• Secured "endangered" status for the Barton Springs salamander with 2 federal lawsuits

• Made winning argument to Texas Supreme Court in defending the SOS ordinance as valid city law 

• Won mitigation measures on or blocked hundreds of polluting projects

​

With your help and participation, we will in the days, weeks, months, and years ahead:

• Save Lady Bird Lake and City Parks from attacks by the Statesman PUD and other developers seeking to pave over and commercialize our central city parks

• Secure a Rewilding Plan for Zilker Park (and for all of Austin) for shade, water, wildlife, climate and a cooler central city

• Expand Barton Springs University to reach students, newcomers, and long-time residents with the information to be active, engaged stewards of our Central Texas natural and cultural heritage 

• Convince the City of Austin and Travis County to commit at least $1 billion to protect our land and water east and west (to be matched at least 1-to-1 by federal, state, and private funds)

• Expand our legal advocacy to keep all of our Hill Country waters off limits to municipal wastewater discharges and to protect all of our endangered wildlife

• Keep Mopac a local commuter highway and not an Interstate 35 alternative for regional and interstate truck and auto traffic

Please join us to celebrate 30 years of shared community action to protect what we love most about Austin and to provide the necessary funding to save our springs in the days, months, and years ahead.