|
A resident living here in the 7-county metro area may go buy coffee and a pastry at their favorite local cafe. As they sip on their drink, they may look over their receipt, noticing that a couple of cents in sales tax have been allocated to the Scientific & Cultural Facilities District (SCFD). But what does that tiny tax actually mean?
Well, those pennies start their journey by being collected by the Scientific & Cultural Facilities District. They join their other penny friends, waiting to be distributed to nearly 300 SCFD-funded arts, culture, and science organizations, from local gems to the metro area’s largest cultural institutions. But it’s when grants are allocated that a penny’s adventure really begins: the possibilities are endless. The penny from your pocket could end up supporting free admission to a new exhibition, music classes, or in this case, it could even travel alongside a child to a local river in search of microplastics and eventually, to the ocean.
Boulder County’s Ocean First Institute (OFI) is a Tier III SCFD-funded partner. Its educational programming, research, and conservation projects inspire young minds to explore marine science and innovate new ways to understand and protect the ocean. Here in land-locked Colorado, that starts with supporting water research and conservation in our own backyard. For years, Ocean First Institute had focused on exposing Coloradans to sharks, as its CEO and Chief Scientist, Dr. Mikki McComb-Kobza, is a marine biologist with a focus on the biology, behavior, abundance, and movement of sharks. However, when Dr. McComb-Kobza saw an article with the headline “It’s Raining Plastics” about findings of microplastics in Colorado’s rainfall, she knew that Ocean First Institute had to do something.
| 
