Funding Futures

The application for Funding Futures, Phase 2: Gameplan is now closed.

About Funding Futures:

The Understory, formerly Partners for Climate Action (PCA), has worked in the Hudson Valley for seven years. We see towns building consensus on their environmental priorities through community conversations. Some have even put financial mechanisms in place to fund those priorities. Through firsthand observation and listening to partners, we’ve noted elements of success. Each town is unique, but there’s no need to reinvent the wheel. The Funding Futures program guides people through nonpartisan ways to dig in with their community and figure out how to preserve and protect the natural resources on which we rely. Communities need a shared vision and the capacity to build support.

We see this as the basis for strong communities and a healthy environment in the Hudson Valley. To access expert guidance for your community on citizen-led democracy, projects that create ecological and social resilience and ways to fund them, check out our digest of Funding Futures guest speakers.

Do you share these concerns?

Our society has lost muscle memory for how to come together, listen, and envision a shared future. Spaces where everyone feels included.  National politics divide our country. At the same time, we all notice changes: 80 degree days in November, extreme storms and flooding, forests with no new growth, our favorite skating and ice fishing ponds that now rarely freeze. In too many of our communities, we’ve inadvertently degraded the environment through ordinary, cumulative actions, and a lack of dialogue about what really matters.

We can determine our future. How do we get started?

We can start by reconnecting—to each other and the places where we live. If we could set our differences aside, we could focus on what we have in common: our love for the beautiful Hudson Valley and our desire for a healthy, thriving future. 

Fall 2026 2026 Update from the Funding Futures Program

The Understory launched the Funding Futures pilot because we noticed that healthy civic conversations in the Hudson Valley needed bolstering. From July ‘25-June ‘26 the program provided funding and a framework for six communities: Woodbury, Highlands, Chatham, Claverack/Philmont, Rochester, and Millbrook/Washington. Each community had a Funding Futures Fellow who led the process in their town to bring folks together to voice ideas for their shared future. 

It was a challenging and fascinating process! The six Fellows reached out to every pocket of their communities through phone calls, email newsletters, postcards, tabling at events, meetings with organizations, leaders, and townsfolk. Throughout the year, The Understory introduced inspiring speakers to the Funding Futures cohort and provided coaching from the Ecological Citizens Project, an organization whose prior efforts in this area served as inspiration for the program. Their process culminated in direct democracy events where neighbors got on the mic and shared ideas for how to improve their communities. Those ideas were shared community-wide through balloting efforts. We invite you to browse these photo essays documenting Funding Futures events and the results of their community votes. Have a look at the power of neighbors connecting through direct democracy!

Click on the thumbnail images to view the photo essays.

Rochester

Claverack/Philmont

Milbrook/Washington

Highlands

Woodbury

The one-year listening campaign portion of Funding Futures, Phase 1: Together We Decide drew to a close at the end of June 2026. The Understory then invited groups from the six participating communities to submit letters of interest (LOI) for Funding Futures: Gameplan. This second phase of Funding Futures focuses on capacity building: organizing people power, developing project action plans, and determining financial viability for projects that emerged from the first phase listening campaigns and balloting processes. 

Gameplan offers program and grant support (up to $25,000) for planning, professional services, technical assistance, community events, and/or administrative staffing. We are now reviewing applications. The Gameplan grant term ends May 31, 2027. 

The goal of this grant is for groups to develop their skills and reach consensus on a plan to achieve their project. Project action plans chosen will align with The Understory’s focus on resilience in the Hudson Valley: 

  • land use planning

  • ecological repair and connecting people with the outdoors

  • climate adaptation

  • community and emergency preparedness

  • food systems

  • affordable and green housing and infrastructure

  • fostering community connections

  • self-sustaining funding mechanisms

Check back here for updates on Gameplan grant awardees.  We will share details of the exciting projects arising from these listening campaigns in the Hudson Valley. 

  • It would be a heavy lift for a Town Board to run a process like this on their own, and it can be challenging to reach beyond the regulars who attend Town Board meetings.

    Some of the greatest resources in rural towns are the natural assets—streams, forests, fields, aquifers. Combined, these make a place unique, tie back to its history, and provide quality of life.

    A Town Board could find tremendous value in a listening campaign that reveals insights and generates volunteerism. Therefore, we designed the pilot round of this program to meet a need for local governments and were encouraged by the letters of support they gave to their committees (Climate Smart Task Forces, Conservation Advisory Councils, Community Engagement Committee, etc.) and local organizations. And we were impressed with the collaboration that took place.

  • It would be a heavy lift for a Town Board to run a process like this on their own, and it can be challenging to reach beyond the regulars who attend Town Board meetings.

    Some of the greatest resources in rural towns are the natural assets—streams, forests, fields, aquifers. Combined, these make a place unique, tie back to its history, and provide quality of life.

Funding Futures Pilot Fellows

  • Chris Wilson

    WASHINGTON/MILLBROOK
    Millbrook Listens

    Christopher Wilson is an educator, grant writer, and strategic planner, with over 10 years of government and non-profit experience, specializing in grant administration, donor retention strategies, and community engagement.

    As a native of the Hudson Valley, he obtained his M.S. in Parks and Public Land Management from Indiana University (2019) and worked for organizations such as NYS Parks and Recreation, Hudson River Housing, Inc., Outward Bound Schools, NYNJ Trail Conference, and Peace Corps Armenia. Chris lives with his wife and two young children in Dover Plains where they explore local trails and eateries, frequent story time at the Millbrook Library, and sing through the Disney Princess Playlist at least once a day.

    Portrait by Richard Beaven

  • LisaMarie Hintze

    WOODBURY
    Voices of Woodbury

    After touring North America with Cirque du Soliel for 4 years I settled in Woodbury, NY where I have been a resident for 30 years and raised my daughter. I became the Chairperson for Woodbury’s Climate Smart Task Force, starting for the town in 2021 and then the village in 2022. Under my leadership, the Taskforce has successfully earned the designation of a NYSERDA 2-Star Certified Clean Energy Community and Bronze status as a Climate Smart Community. I was recently awarded the Chris Eachus Extraordinary Women’s Award and the NYS Planning Board Levine Community Service Award. I love photography, traveling and staying active, so I also volunteer at the Coordinator for Wreath’s Across America at Cemetery of the Highlands, where 826 wreaths are laid to honor local veterans.

    Portrait by Richard Beaven

  • Olga Anderson

    HIGHLANDS
    Highlands: Together We Decide

    Olga Kuchar Anderson is currently Chair of the Town of Highlands Citizens Environmental Advisory Committee which she founded in 2019. The Committee focuses its work primarily on New York State’s Clean Energy and Climate Smart Community initiatives on behalf of the municipality. Olga is manager of the Community Garden at Holy Innocents in Highland Falls, a member of the Friends of the Highland Falls Library, and sits on the Board of Directors at Sustainable Hudson Valley. She is a recent recipient of the Evelyn Drew Memorial Democratic Service Award for her environmental work.

  • Anya Bonanno

    CLAVERACK/PHILMONT
    Stewarding Claverack and Philmont's Environment (SCAPE)

    Anya Bonanno works at the Philmont Public Library and is excited to help her community identify shared environmental priorities through the Funding Futures program. She moved to Philmont in 2021 and lives there with her daughter and husband, who grew up in northern Dutchess County. She holds a PhD in Environmental Anthropology and recently completed a research fellowship with the U.S. Forest Service through the Oak Ridge Institute for Science and Education. 

    Portrait by Richard Beaven

  • Heather Eckardt

    ROCHESTER
    Rooted in Rochester

    Heather Eckardt has been a resident of Kerhonkson since 2011 and brings a thoughtful, values-driven approach to environmental and community concerns. Her professional experience includes roles at the Community Foundations of the Hudson Valley, Ulster Community College Foundation, Scenic Hudson, and Woodstock Byrdcliffe Guild, where she supported mission-aligned initiatives and fostered community engagement. She holds a degree in Agricultural Science from Oregon State University and has pursued graduate studies in sustainability, environmental leadership and communication, deepening her commitment to a more sustainable and connected world.

  • Kate Butler

    CHATHAM
    Chatham Voices

    Kate Butler is an avid nature lover and horse back rider who grew up in Chatham NY. Kate received a BA in Historic Preservation and a BA in Art History from the College of Charleston in SC and spent most of her young adult life working as a visuals artist.  She currently serves on the Town of Chatham’s Climate Smart Committee and Conservation Advisory Council. 

    Portrait by Richard Beaven

Meet the Team

  • Paige Ruane

    Co-founder of PCA, co-director of Funding Futures. Prior PCA programs include Local Champions and Building Decarbonation Grants. Paige has a background as a therapist and currently serves on Austerlitz’s Climate Smart Communities Task Force.

  • Vanessa Bertozzi

    Co-director of Funding Futures. Prior PCA programs include Local Champions and Building Decarbonation Grants. Vanessa is also in her third term as Trustee on the Village Board of Rhinebeck, where she implements climate action on the local level.

  • Jason Angell

    Co-founder and Co-director of the Ecological Citizen's Project, serves on the Town Board of Philipstown. Jason is partnering with PCA on Funding Futures to provide coaching modeled on the Ecological Citizen’s Project’s Community Congress. Jason and Jocelyn also own and operate Longhaul Farm.

  • Jocelyn Apicello

    Co-founder and Co-director of the Ecological Citizen's Project, professor of public health and on the boards of Cold Spring’s farmers’ market and the local public school district. Jocelyn is partnering with PCA on Funding Futures to provide coaching modeled on the Ecological Citizen’s Project’s Community Congress. Jocelyn and Jason also own and operate Longhaul Farm.

  • Joel Glanzberg

    Joel is a founding partner of Regenesis Group. Joel will host nature-based kick offs for each of the six communities. Joel is an expert tracker and has decades of experience leading groups and working with Native Americans to deepen human connection to the natural world. His passion is using these experiences to inform how people think about living systems.