DELEON SPRINGS, Fla. — Across the state, Citizen Support Organizations (CSOs) play a major role in maintaining Florida’s state parks.

What You Need To Know

  • CSOs are nonprofit groups staffed by volunteers that support Florida’s state parks

  • According to the Florida Department of Environmental Protection, CSO members have raised millions of dollars for Florida’s state parks and contributed hundreds of thousands of volunteer hours

  • In Volusia County, members of the Friends of DeLeon Springs State Park CSO do everything from maintenance to fundraising for park improvements

  • There are more than 80 CSO’s in Florida

CSOs are nonprofit groups staffed by volunteers who provide maintenance, funding and improvements to state parks. There are more than 80 CSOs across the state.

“Our whole goal is to support the park in any way that we can,” Sharon Pinder, the President of the Friends of DeLeon Springs State Park, said.

According to the Florida Department of Environmental Protection, CSO members have raised millions of dollars for Florida’s state parks and contributed hundreds of thousands of volunteer hours. 

“These are people who love the parks and love being outdoors and want to make sure that all of this beauty and the nature is preserved,” Pinder said.

Pinder has been the President of the Friends of DeLeon Springs State Park for four years, but the park’s held a special place in her heart for decades.

“When I came to Stetson in the 1970s, it was the first time I came here and just the beautiful spring — it’s so peaceful here,” she said.

After college, Pinder and her family came back to the state park dozens of times on vacation. Now, it’s somewhere she enjoys every day.

“I feel so fortunate just to be able to come here every day and just soak it all in,” she said.

Pinder and other Friends of DeLeon Springs State Park members work to preserve the park they love. They do everything from maintenance to fundraising for park improvements. 

“We can get things for the park that are needed but that are not in the budget,” Pinder said. 

Their work is visible all over the park. They’ve updated buildings, purchased equipment, and developed exhibits in the park’s visitor’s center.

“All these things in this room are just bringing us back to things that happened in the past,” Pinder said.

CSO members combed through hundreds of artifacts to curate the displays. Right now, they’re working on creating a digital database of the park’s history. 

“It will be on a screen in this visitor center so people can look at pictures of the documents, the articles, the letters,” Pinder said.

Another project of the CSO is replacing the boardwalk that leads out to the park’s 500-year-old Cypress tree, Old Methuselah.

“People love to come out here on this short little boardwalk and just see the big cypress tree and all the beautiful things around it,” Pinder said.

Replacing the boardwalk wasn’t in the park’s budget, but Pinder and the Friends of DeLeon Springs were able to fundraise and secure a grant from the Florida State Parks Foundation to pay for it. Earlier this year, the foundation awarded $100,000 dollars in grants to 10 CSOs to fund park projects.

“It’s not part of the budget, but it’s something that we feel is necessary for the safety and the longevity of this boardwalk,” Pinder said. “So that’s why we took it on.”

Pinder said it’s a big project for their small organization — but improving and preserving the park is what their CSO is all about.

“Friends of DeLeon Springs State Park is here to do whatever we can to make the park a better place,” she said.