Spotlight On: Eastern Sierra Conservation Corps

Spotlight On: Eastern Sierra Conservation Corps

After living here with my kids for the past five years, this place has become more than just a home for us. It’s a community I care about, and that’s what drew me to spotlight the people and organizations here in the first place.

This time, we reached out to Agnes Vianzon from the Eastern Sierra Conservation Corps, who are working every day to protect and strengthen the region we share.

For readers who might not be familiar, what exactly is the Eastern Sierra Conservation Corps, and what kind of work do you do in the region?

I founded and started this nonprofit in 2016. We are a local conservation corps and employ young adults between the ages of 18-30.

Many folks may be familiar with the California Conservation Corps, a state agency. We do not receive any direct state support. Our work primarily is fee-for-service contracts with the US Forest Service, the National Park Service, CA State Parks, and other non-profits.

We perform trail maintenance and restoration work throughout CA in both front country and wilderness settings.

Our summer seasonal programs operate between May and October and in 2025, we employed over 50 folks.

You’ve talked about creating a different kind of trail-work culture. How would you describe that culture, and what makes it stand out from other conservation groups?

I’m talking about not only a culture shift in the trails world but everywhere. We operate different than others in that our focus and prioritization of the experience that our members receive is not like any other organization, corps or otherwise.

Today’s culture is full of scarcity, fear, comparison. Our programs prepare young adults for more than a potential career in the outdoors These are skills for life in their future jobs, relationships, and so much more.

Many of your crew members come from underrepresented backgrounds. What kind of impact have you seen wilderness work have on those participants?

We greatly value the experience that we say we are going to deliver on during a summer season. For every single person involved, there is a focus on the success of each person as well as the success of a crew together. Our crews live and work together for a full 4 months including weekends. These are paid positions working in National Forests and Parks from the Redwoods and Trinity Alps to El Dorado, Yosemite and Kings Canyon National Parks, and our largest supporting partners, the Inyo National Forest and the JMT Wilderness Conservancy.

They gain confidence, they learn how to have an authentic conversation and resolve conflict. In real time they are learning what they can do. Especially if your workday includes a twelve-mile hike carrying heavy tools.

Can you share a memorable project or success story that really captures what ESCC is all about?

This shows it pretty well:

There can sometimes be political and funding challenges around diversity work. How do you stay true to your mission while navigating that landscape?

We haven’t and won’t scrub language from our website that isn’t authentic as an organization. In only 9 years, we grew to be an over one million dollar organization. As a small local corps, our reputation is out in the world. We received applications from across the country and have since the beginning focused on welcoming and the inclusiveness that we really strive for. It makes for a completely different experience that is life changing.

A special thank you to Agnes Vianzon from the Eastern Sierra Conservation Corps for answering our questions. You can find more information about them here: https://www.easternsierracc.org/

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