This year’s event has passed! We thank everyone for their support!
2025 Conservation Stewards Awards
Photo by Thomas Niemi.
Join ACT on Saturday, March 15, 2025, from 5:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m. for the Annual Conservation Stewards Awards at Prairie Creek Lodge. This event honors individuals in our community who are influential in a wide variety of ways – the arts, historic preservation, and particularly, in protecting our wildlife and natural resources. Past Conservation Stewards Awards have been some of the largest gatherings of community leaders and supporters of wild Florida in the region.
The event will include dinner, drinks and a musical performance. All funds from the event will support Alachua Conservation Trust's work towards land conservation.
As Florida’s biggest conservation event of the year, you won’t want to miss it!
Cocktail Hour • Catered Dinner • Silent Auction • Live Music from The Wire Birds
2025 Theme & Honorees
Return to Nature: Honoring Life & Conserving Land
The 2025 Conservation Steward Awards celebrates the conservation impacts and lasting legacies of Freddie Johnson and the Greene Family of Lake City, who have shaped the land through a deep-rooted passion for conservation and a unique approach that re-envisions how humans connect with nature.
Our honorees are committed to renewing the land through conservation as well as facilitating a meaningful and lasting impact for those who are no longer with us. These honorees represent the varied and meaningful ways in which we interact with the natural world over time. They have shown us that in both life and death, a brighter future for Florida’s environment is possible. Please join us in recognizing the 2025 Conservation Stewards!
Freddie Johnson
Photo of Freddie Johnson.
Freddie Johnson’s roots as a nature and animal lover stem from his childhood experience of growing up in and around the woods and creeks of northwestern North Carolina. His ongoing recognition and appreciation of our inseparable connection with nature, and its cycle of life and death, can be attributed to those timeless explorations in the wild.
Freddie is one of the founders of Conservation Burial Inc. (CBI), the non-profit 501(c)3 that manages Prairie Creek Conservation Cemetery (PCCC). He served as CBI’s Board President for three years prior to being PCCC’s Executive Director from 2011 to late 2021.
Freddie was instrumental in the founding of Conservation Burial Alliance (CBA) in 2017, a national non-profit 501(c)3 whose mission is to be a “collaborative of conservation burial grounds and invested allies that fosters the conservation and sustainable management of land with natural burial for the benefit of people and the planet.” Freddie currently serves on the Board of Directors of CBI/PCCC and CBA.
The Greene Family of Lake City
Photo of Audrey Greene of the Greene Family.
The Greene Family have been dedicated stewards of their land near Lake City for over one-hundred years. The first 300 acres of the property – which today is comprised of 1,500 acres of natural pine forests, forested wetlands, and floodplains along the storied Suwannee River – was purchased in 1925 by J Carter. Upon his death, Emory Carter, inherited the property and began purchasing the remaining acreage in the late 1920s. In 2008, Audrey Greene and her family inherited the property from Emory, who was her grandfather.
The property was originally purchased for turpentining, saw milling, and farming. When turpentining was no longer a viable product and saw milling and farming ended, the family enjoyed the recreational aspects of the land, while also working to actively restore its natural ecosystems through prescribed fire. In 2024, the Greene Family worked with ACT and the State of Florida of place a perpetual Conservation Easement over the property, ensuring that it will be protected from development forever.
Click here for a list of past Conservation Stewards Awards recipients.
Thank You to Our 2025 CSA Event Sponsors!
Click on the logos above as they scroll through to view each sponsors’ website.
Driving Directions to the Event
This year’s event will take place at Prairie Creek Lodge located at: 7204 SE County Road 234, Gainesville, Florida 32641 (Google Maps)
From Downtown Gainesville:
Drive east on University Avenue (S.R. 26) for approximately 1.1 miles.
Veer right onto Hawthorne Road (S.R. 20) drive approximately 5.2 miles.
Turn right onto County Road 234
Stay left on County Road 234, cross the Gainesville-Hawthorne Rail Trail, and drive approximately 1.1 miles south. Please note, Google Maps has been taking vehicles down a private driveway immediately after this turn - keep driving until you see the green ACT entrance sign on the right. This error has been submitted to Google for correction.
Turn right after mailbox labeled “7204” - there is a green ACT sign.
From Interstate 75:
Take Exit 374 (Micanopy), turn east onto County Road 234 and drive approximately 1.3 miles.
Turn right onto Highway 441 and drive approximately 0.7 miles.
Turn left onto County Road 234 and drive approximately 5.9 miles.
Turn left before mailbox labeled “7204” - there is a green ACT sign.
Banner image by Thomas Niemi.
