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Sustainable Preservation: California’s Statewide Historic Preservation Plan, 2013-2017

Introduction

This Statewide Historic Preservation Plan for California (State Plan) is intended to guide
the activities and priorities of agencies and organizations involved in preservation in the
Golden State during the years 2013 through 2017.
The next five years will mark pivotal anniversaries The next five years will
in American history and the development of mark pivotal anniversaries
historic preservation, and these milestones provide in American history and
California preservationists with opportunities to get the development of
our message out to a wider public within broader historic preservation, and
national contexts. The year 2014 is the 50th these milestones provide
anniversary of the landmark Civil Rights Act, as well California preservationists
as the sesquicentennial of the establishment of with opportunities to get
California’s State Park System. The our message out to a wider
sesquicentennial of the end of the Civil War and the public within broader
assassination of President Lincoln takes place in national contexts.
2015. The year 2016 will mark the 50th anniversary
of the National Historic Preservation Act. Finally, 2017 represents the 25th anniversary of
important amendments made to the act, including those that created the Tribal Historic
Preservation Officers program, which more formally brought into the federal preservation
program the vast amount of information and expertise held by tribes and their members.

In order to be successful, this plan should be the starting point for developing subsequent
specific strategic or action plans developed by and for individual agencies and
organizations. For example, the California Office of Historic Preservation, which authored
this plan, will develop annual work plans that list specific activities the office will
undertake in each of the next five years in order to help fulfill the goals and objectives in
the State Plan. The suggested activities listed below for each goal and its corresponding
set of objectives are intended to help preservationists identify the types of actions they
can take in support of this plan.
Readers of previous State Plans will find this current plan takes a different approach from
its predecessors (see below for information about past State Plans prepared for California).
Rather than focusing on specific issues and developing goals and objectives to address
each issue, this plan takes a more holistic approach to defining how we can all work to help
achieve a common vision for preservation in California. For this reason, the plan discusses
and defines that vision before then identifying a set of broad goals and objectives to help
achieve this vision. Issues that are currently most important to preservationists are then
addressed. These issues are also discussed in relation to specific resource types, where
appropriate, in the section below titled “Historical Resources of California, An Overview.”
Finally, readers will find Preservation Success Stories sprinkled throughout this
document—these vignettes were developed by Office of Historic Preservation staff and are
intended to provide specific examples of successful preservation efforts as they relate to
various preservation programs.

Plan History and Background

Preparation of a Statewide Historic Preservation Plan is a requirement of all states
participating in the federal historic preservation program and is necessary in order to
receive financial support from the federal Historic Preservation Fund. The National Historic
Preservation Act (Section 101(b)(3)(c)) instructs the State Historic Preservation Officer

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