Established:
1996
Mission:
Indiana Forest Alliance’s mission is to preserve and restore Indiana’s native hardwood forests for the enjoyment of all.
Indiana Forest Alliance works tirelessly to be the voice for you and our Indiana forests. Our hardwood forest ecosystem here in Indiana is teeming with biodiversity and unique character in a manner that rivals even the Amazon rainforest. We demonstrate that fact through our scientific research and work to see it reflected through policy.
Serving Our Community:
Our main services include our Forests for Indy (FFI) and urban forest campaigns, our state forests–focused Wild Indiana Campaign, our Hoosier National Forest (HNF) program, and our Ecoblitz work. This past year, our FFI campaign succeeded in raising $2 million for urban forest preservation in Indianapolis. Through our Wild Indiana Campaign, we advocate for legislation that has a positive impact on forests and against legislation that leads to harmful outcomes at the Statehouse level, as well as drive public engagement with state forest issues. Through our Ecoblitz program, we conduct the most comprehensive and up-to-date biological inventories in our forests and have documented a plethora of species from different taxonomic groups never before identified in Indiana. Through our HNF program, we succeeded in getting a bill introduced in Congress that would double the size of Indiana’s only wilderness. We need your help to get it passed by the end of this year.
Leadership:
Staff
Jeff Stant, Executive Director
Melody Dunn, Director of Business
Neil Goswami, Development Director
Mike Oles, Forests for Indy Campaign Director
Evan Robbins, Director of Communications and Legislative Affairs
Steven Stewart, Program Director, Hoosier National Forest
Deidre Pettinga, Ph.D., Business and Strategy Advisor
Jennifer Christie, Development Advisor
Jerome Delbridge, Arborist and Urban Forest Preservation Advisor
Board of Directors
Dave Seastrom, President, Nashville
Angelo Datillo, Treasurer, Westfield
David Haberman, Ph.D., Bloomington
Larry Kane, Carmel
Lora Kemp, Spencer
Elizabeth Mahoney, Indianapolis
Nina Mutone, Indianapolis
W. Russel “Russ” Sipes, Indianapolis
Mark Stoops, Bloomington
Other Ways to Help:
In September of 2023, after decades of conservation advocacy by Indiana Forest Alliance, U.S. Sen. Mike Braun introduced a federal wilderness bill, S.4402, that will more than double the size of the Charles C. Deam Wilderness, Indiana’s only wilderness area. This bill will also establish a National Recreation Area adjacent to the newly expanded wilderness area. If passed, this will be the largest and most historic conservation legislation to affect Indiana forests. This legislation is now in both the U.S. Senate and the U.S. House of Representatives. We need your help to ensure it becomes law. Please contact your U.S. representative as soon as possible and urge them to support the legislation, H.R. 8535 (the U.S. House of Representatives companion bill to S.4402), the Benjamin Harrison National Recreation Area and Wilderness Establishment Act. We only have a number of weeks to get this bill across the finish line.
615 N Alabama St., Ste. A
Indianapolis, Indiana 46204
(317) 602-3692
