Richmond Outside

Friends of Pocahontas cash in on statewide grant program

By Andy Thompson | May 7, 2012

Keep Virginia Beautiful is awarding “30 Grants In 30 Days” in April and May 2012, and the Friends of Pocahontas State Park have been awarded a $500 grant in the Beautification and Community Greening Category.  The KVB grant program focuses greater resources and attention on organizations and individual localities throughout the Commonwealth and how they are addressing the issues of litter prevention, recycling, waste reduction, beautification and education.

KVB provided the opportunity for government, non-profit and/or service organizations in Virginia to apply for one of (30) grants ranging from $500 to $1,000 in three different categories:  Beautification, Litter Prevention, and Recycling.  These grants are made possible by KVB partners – Capital One, Waste Management and Lowe’s.

Dam at Pocahontas State Park

Friends of Pocahontas State Park will use Keep Virginia Beautiful grant funds to plant native milkweed and butterfly weed at multiple high traffic public locations at the park including the park sign at the park entrance, the nature center and the pool area.  These areas already have established garden beds, but require cleaning and greening up with new plants.  This project will beautify public park areas, educate visitors about native plants and the importance of native pollinators, establish butterfly and pollinator habitat, and increase educational program offerings at the park.  The park interpretive staff will then have an opportunity to use signage purchased by the grant funds, and programs to teach people about using native plants in their landscape plans and yards.  Furthermore, they will be able to offer public programs on Monarch butterflies and Monarch butterfly tagging as well as other programs based on much needed pollinator species.  Milkweed is not only beautiful, but is also an important host plant for Monarch caterpillars and butterflies.  The park entrance, nature center and pool area are located in high traffic areas that saw 300,000+ visitors in 2011.

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Make your presence felt in the JRPS

By Andy Thompson | May 5, 2012

The Friends of the James River Park is one of the few local volunteer groups without which the river would be a different place. Same goes for groups like James River Outdoor Coalition and Richmond MORE. The river, trails and wilderness areas Richmonders know and love would be fundamentally different places without their efforts. And each group could always use more members, more donations and more volunteers.

With that in mind, the below is a newsletter from the Friends reminding people about upcoming chances to make the park a better place. If you’re not a member, take a look at their site and consider becoming one. Or just get out there and volunteer.

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Powhatan among future state parks

By Andy Thompson | April 27, 2012

Credit: Rex Springston

Any time I write about state parks in my T-D column, it draws a lot of reader response. It’s not surprising: Over 8 million people visited one of Virginia’s 35 state parks last year. As a unit, Virginia state parks are some of the most diverse, best run state parks I’ve been to. True, that’s a limited sample, but I’ve been to parks in Maine, New York, Utah, Colorado and a few other states, and Virginia has them all beat.

Today I wrote about the parcels around the state owned by the Department of Conservation and Recreation that are in various stages of becoming state parks. The good news for Central Virginians is that the next state park will almost certainly be Powhatan SP, on the banks of the James in Powhatan County. Director Joe Elton told me that construction is ongoing on the 1,500 acres next to Beaumont Juvenile Correction Center. He said that if funding comes through in the next General Assembly session, the park should be open for day use by this time next year. It should be a great place to boat and fish, among other pursuits.

Click here to read about the other parks in the works.

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