Mayors' Monarch Pledge Survey

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Issue a proclamation to raise awareness about the decline of the monarch butterfly and the species’ need for habitat. This proclamation must incorporate a focus on monarch conservation.

• Issue a Monarch Day Pledge
• Incorporate monarchs into your Earth Day, Pollinator Week or other proclamation

Launch or maintain a public communication effort to encourage residents to plant monarch gardens at their homes or in their neighborhoods. (If you have community members who speak a language other than English, we encourage you to also communicate in that language; Champion Pledges must communicate in that language.)
Engage with community garden groups and urge them to plant native milkweeds and nectar-producing plants.
Engage with city parks and recreation, public works, sustainability, and other relevant staff to identify opportunities to revise and maintain mowing programs and milkweed / native nectar plant planting programs.
Engage with gardening leaders and partners (e.g., Master Naturalists, Master Gardeners, Nature Centers, Native Plant Society Chapters , other long-standing and influential community leaders) to support monarch butterfly conservation.

• Develop community gardens with local gardening leaders
• Host programming and other activities with Nature Centers
• Coordinate and collaborate with local gardening groups at schools, colleges, and universities

Engage with Homeowners Associations (HOAs), Community Associations or neighborhood organizations to identify opportunities to plant monarch gardens and revise maintenance and mowing programs.
Engage with developers, planners, landscape architects, and other community leaders and organizers engaged in planning processes to identify opportunities to create monarch habitat.
Create a community-driven educational conservation strategy, initiative, or practice that focuses on and benefits local, underserved residents.

• Conduct outreach and support habitat / green space improvements in underserved communities
• Develop brochures in different languages

Create a community art project to enhance and promote monarch and pollinator conservation as well as cultural awareness and recognition.

• Host photo contests
• Comission murals
• Create and show films and documentaries
• Support public art installations
• Collaborate with local artists, including school, college, and university art departments to create community-wide art

Host or support a native seed or plant sale, giveaway or swap.
Facilitate or support a milkweed seed collection and propagation effort.
Plant or maintain a monarch and pollinator-friendly demonstration garden at City Hall or another prominent or culturally significant community location.
Convert vacant lots to monarch habitat.
Plant milkweed and pollinator-friendly native nectar plants along roadsides, medians, or public rights-of-way.
Launch or maintain an outdoor education program(s) (e.g., at schools, after-school programs, community centers and groups) that builds awareness and creates habitat by engaging students, educators, and the community in planting native milkweed and pollinator-friendly native nectar plants (i.e., National Wildlife Federation’s Schoolyard Habitats program and Monarch Mission curriculum).

• EcoSchools U.S.
• PK-12 Monarch Mission Curriculum (English and Spanish)
• National Wildlife Federation Campus Pollinator Pledge
• Schoolyard Habitats Program

Earn or maintain recognition for being a wildlife-friendly city by participating in other wildlife and habitat conservation efforts (i.e., National Wildlife Federation’s Community Wildlife Habitat program).

• Join the Community Wildlife Habitat

Host or support a monarch neighborhood challenge to engage neighborhoods and homeowners' associations within the community to increase awareness, support community unity around a common mission, and/or create habitat for the monarch butterfly.

• Host photo challenges
• Create property certification challenges
• Collaborate with schools, universities, and colleges to host joint awareness and habitat creation challenges

Initiate or support community science (or citizen science) efforts that help monitor monarch migration and health.

• NWF’s Monarch stewards program certification
• Engage with local colleges and universities science departments to host community-wide opportunities
• Monarch Migration Tracking (Journey North)

Add or maintain native milkweed and nectar-producing plants in gardens in the community.
Launch, expand, or continue an invasive species removal program that will support the re-establishment of native habitat for monarch butterflies and other pollinators.

• Partner with volunteers and/or stakeholder organizations to remove herbaceous and woody invasive plants from city parks and other natural areas.
• Host educational events to teach community members about invasive plant identification and how to safely remove invasives from their personal properties
• Create a distributable list of invasive species to your ecoregion to share with stakeholders and community members

Host or support a monarch butterfly festival that is accessible to all residents in the community and promotes monarch and pollinator conservation, as well as cultural awareness and recognition.
Display educational signage at monarch gardens and pollinator habitat.

• Add neighborhood garden signs (e.g., Victory Garden of Tomorrow)
• Create plant labels or interpretive language for community gardens, parks, prairie habitat, rights-of-way, etc.

Remove milkweed from the list of noxious plants in city weed / landscaping ordinances (if applicable).
Change weed or mowing ordinances to allow for native prairie and plant habitats.
Increase the percentage of native plants, shrubs and trees that must be used in city landscaping ordinances and encourage use of milkweed, where appropriate.
Launch, expand, or continue an effort to change municipal planting ordinances and practices to include more native milkweed and native nectar producing plants at city properties.

• Pass an ordinance to incorporate the planting and cultivation of native milkweed, where feasible, into the city’s landscape portfolio to increase native biodiversity in public landscapes
• Check out the NWF Lanscaping Guide with Example Ordinances!

Integrate monarch butterfly conservation into the city’s Park Master Plan, Sustainability Plan, Climate Resiliency Plan or other city plans.
Reduce or eliminate the use of herbicides, pesticides, or other chemicals that are harmful to monarchs and pollinators and urban wildlife.

• Work with local school districts to eliminate or minimize the use of pesticides, herbicides, and insecticides on school properties
• Adopt Integrated Pest Management (IPM) practices
• Adopt “chemical-free” landscape practices at city-maintained parks, municipal buildings, and/or other city-maintained properties

Launch, expand, or continue one or more ordinances to reduce light pollution to benefit urban wildlife.

• Introduce ordinances that requires fully shielded outdoor light fixtures that have low color temperature and direct light downwards in city-maintained spaces
• Change city ordinance to require that building owners and managers reduce and/or turn off excess lighting during periods of migration (Spring/Fall).
• Check out this NWF blog about successful reduction of light pollution for birds in Texas!

California Specific: Pass a resolution to protect over-wintering monarch butterfly habitat on public or private lands.