About WMG

Our Mission & Vision

Our Vision: We envision a world where the relationship between communities and the environment creates prosperity for all.

Our Mission: Watershed Management Group develops community-based solutions to ensure the long-term prosperity of people and health of the environment. We provide people with the knowledge, skills, and resources for sustainable livelihoods.

Our Values

We Are One Watershed

We embrace and value all people, perspectives, and experiences, and we center Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in everything we do.

Hydro-Local

We value and steward local, renewable water resources instead of depleting distant watersheds and rivers.

River as Teacher

We acknowledge water is sacred and strive to give as much back to our rivers, forests, and watersheds as they give to us.

Sustainable Mobility

We strive to walk the talk by taking personal actions to care for planet Earth, including choosing to walk, bike, and take public transportation.

Care of the Commons

We acknowledge our water, land, and air are shared gifts that we are all called to care for, and when we move through a space, we will leave it better than we found it.

Where We Work

We are based in Tucson, Arizona. Our work is centered in the Santa Cruz River Watershed, in both Arizona, USA and Sonora, Mexico, and extends across Southern Arizona. We partner with organizations and communities throughout the Colorado River Basin and in arid lands worldwide. 

Learn About the History of Our Rivers

Our 50-Year Vision & Strategic Plan

Our 50-year Vision is to restore our heritage of year-round, free-flowing rivers in Tucson and the Santa Cruz Watershed. To achieve this vision, we created a 50-year Strategic Plan—a bold roadmap through 2070 outlining river restoration, community engagement, and innovative watershed policy and planning actions and metrics. The plan was created in 2020, and we’re thrilled to have achieved many of the actions outlined in our first five years through our River Run Network program.

Our 50-year vision

Staff

WMG has a core group of staff based in Tucson, AZ as well as a new cohort of interns and apprentices that join us every year.

Meet Our Team

We Are One Watershed

Diversity, Equity, & Inclusivity

Watershed Management Group is committed to ensuring our work reflects and serves the diversity of our community—including Latinx, Black, Indigenous, LGBTQ+, and low-income communities. We’re dedicated to continuous improvement and accountability in our DEI efforts, so that everyone benefits from our mission and sustainable practices are accessible to all.

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Our History

2002

Founders, Lisa Shipek, Catlow Shipek, Jared Buono, and Sowmya Somnath, meet through the University of Arizona’s Watershed Management master’s program. WMG earns 501 (c) 3 non-profit status in 2003.

2006

WMG receives first grant to develop six water-harvesting demonstration sites in Tucson and Lisa Shipek becomes Executive Director (2nd from left). Working at Ward 3 Council office to complete rain gardens.

2007

WMG launches the Schoolyard Water Education program in partnership with local schools and teachers to help children learn to be good water stewards and builders of raingardens.

Learn about our history

Marguerite's Legacy: The Living Lab & Learning Center

In 2012, WMG received a generous estate gift from Marguerite Fisher that included a 1,500-square-foot adobe home in midtown Tucson with grounds suitable for demonstration gardens and water-harvesting features. Thanks to Marguerite’s efforts during her lifetime, we were also able to purchase the property next door, providing an additional 1,650 square feet of office and classroom space.

Marguerite followed a strong conservationist ethic and kept a small footprint: she never used heating and cooling in her adobe home; collected rainwater and distributed greywater to her garden; installed solar panels for her energy; and traveled by bus for errands. As caretakers of Marguerite’s property, WMG is proud to continue her values of conservation, community building, and education. 

Visit Us at the Living Lab & Learning Center

Land & Water Acknowledgement

Watershed Management Group acknowledges that we live, learn, work, and engage with community on the ancestral lands of the Hohokam and Sobaipuri, and those of the Apache, Pascua Yaqui, and Tohono O’odham, whose relationship with this land continues to this day. We acknowledge that water in the Sonoran Desert is of great spiritual, physical, and ecological significance to be protected, cherished, and celebrated.

We invite you to learn more about the indigenous communities, the lands we inhabit and the history of the land and its people by visiting: www.native-land.ca