Full List of Events
Search for events tagged PAF, Partner, City, Housing, Transportation, Climate, Community, Volunteers Needed, Tabling
Gridlock To Green Trips
How can we create transportation options for workers and residents and address the housing shortage? What is Transportation Demand Management (TDM) and how can we implement it to reduce vehicle trips and lessen parking demand in our community?
Join Palo Alto Forward, the Palo Alto Transportation Management Association, and City of Mountain View staff on April 24 for our Gridlock to Green Trips event. We’ll discuss parking and traffic worries that are common barriers to addressing the housing shortage, and look towards local solutions. Together we'll myth-bust and think about how TDM measures can be implemented in our community, especially at new housing sites. Let's make transportation work for all of us!
** RSVP here (required).**
350 Silicon Valley: Love Our Earth Festival
Join us for a day of environmental education, family-friendly activities, and community celebration. This cherished annual event brings together local organizations, environmental experts, and community members to promote sustainability and environmental stewardship.
City of Palo Alto: Earth Day Festival
Save the date to join us for a day of fun celebrating sustainability and learning about what you can do now to help save the planet.
Learn about available resources for Palo Alto residents to make an impact and ways your neighbors are taking climate action to support achieving the City’s 80x30 S/CAP goals. Fun offerings include special library storytimes for kids and youth, Zero Waste trivia games, plant giveaways and guided garden tours, local youth sustainability networking, and hang out with Sequoia the Bald Eagle and Animal Control’s gopher snake. Plus, sign the Planet Protection Pledge with a sidewalk chalk twist—an excellent opportunity to think globally about our collective impact. Get ready to connect locally and take action together with your neighbors.
City of Palo Alto & Kiwanis: May Fete Fair
Please join us and help celebrate the 101st May Fete Parade! Gather your family and friends and help us celebrate growth, community and nurturing of relationships! Use your float making skills to possibly take-home some big prizes! Showcase your group, team, neighborhood, or extracurricular activity! No group? Feel free to walk with City of Palo Alto's Friends, Family & Pets category!
Silicon Valley Housing Advocates Meet Up
Join us at the Silicon Valley Housing Advocates Meet Up to meet local volunteers, leaders, organizations, and community members all working to improve the housing crisis in our region. We’ll talk about our work, enjoy each other’s company, and of course have some great snacks.
YIMBY: That YIMBY Party
In 2024, our movement made incredible strides. As one of YIMBY’s top supporters, you have been a HUGE part of this! We’re excited to share the impact you helped achieve. Check out our new Impact Report! We saw policy wins from coast to coast ranging from fast tracking affordable housing in LA to eliminating parking minimums in Richmond, and so much more! All of this is powered by YOU!
SVBC: Bike Commuting Class (VTA)
Do you want to bike to work or school more often but find it challenging? Learn the essentials to make a commute safe, practical, and repeatable at this class. You will learn from certified League Cycling Instructors who have done it often, rain or shine, day and night. Plus, you might even meet a biking buddy to ride together during Bike to Wherever Days May 15-17!
SVBC: Bicycle Security and Theft Prevention Class
Cars carry multiton security cages. Bicycles do not. Any theft can lead to serious danger and injury from your trusted steed no longer being safe and ready to ride.
Want to cut your risk of bike theft by over 80%? This class is for you!
In this workshop, you'll learn how to keep your bike safe and happy from Silicon Valley Bicycle Coalition's (SVBC's) certified League Cycling Instructors
Bike to Wherever Day
Whether you bike every day or once every couple of months - to work, to school, to the library... wherever! - you’re invited to join thousands in celebration of the humble bicycle! May is Bike Month and Bike to Wherever Days, and you, your friends, and your family are welcome to ride with us.
3rd Thursdays: We’re Two-gether
Bringing The Community Together!
3rdThursday is a FREE, monthly, year-round music festival
on Palo Alto’s car-free California Avenue.
SVBC: 2025 El Camino Real Ride (Santa Clara to Menlo Park)
SVBC's 5th annual ride to call for a safer & more vibrant ECR, 4 stops along the way for free refreshments from highlighted local businesses
SV@Home: Foundations of Affordable Housing
Come build a better understanding of how affordable housing works, how it helps solve our housing crisis, and how it benefits all of us!
HLC: Kiku Crossing TDM Tour
Join us to learn about how developers are helping people reach their destinations using affordable, sustainable, and efficient transportation options, such as walking, biking, public transit, and carpooling, while also reducing traffic congestion and pollution at the Kiku Crossing Transportation Demand Management (TDM) Tour in San Mateo!
Bloomhouse: Let’s Talk Housing: In Conversation with The Atlantic's Jerusalem Demsas
The Atlantic Magazine staff writer Jerusalem Demsas is an established voice on housing and local democracy. In her new book On the Housing Crisis: Land, Development, Democracy, she explores the generational impacts of the housing shortage in the US, and offers a clear perspective and policy solutions to a path forward.
Join us at Bloomhouse for a conversation with Jerusalem, followed by Q&A with audience members. Come share your thoughts and questions on how Jerusalem’s work can help inform the future of housing in East Palo Alto.
Living Large: Density At Its Finest
Join the team at Channing House on May 31st from 10:00 until 11:30 a.m. to learn more about this amazing tall building and its many residents. We'll talk about the history of this not-for-profit senior living and healthcare provider, how they operate today, and why the downtown location (near retail and services) contributes to the vibrancy and health of residents. PLUS we'll take a tour of the upper-floors and several apartments to really experience the community -- and appreciate the amazing location!
Palo Alto: Cubberley Master Plan Community Meeting 2
Shape the future of Cubberley!
Agenda to come.
3rd Thursdays: Local Libations Wine Walk
Bringing The Community Together!
3rdThursday is a FREE, monthly, year-round music festival
on Palo Alto’s car-free California Avenue.
3rd Thursdays: Summer Fun & Games
Bringing The Community Together!
3rdThursday is a FREE, monthly, year-round music festival
on Palo Alto’s car-free California Avenue.
3rd Thursdays: Taste of Cal Ave
Bringing The Community Together!
3rdThursday is a FREE, monthly, year-round music festival
on Palo Alto’s car-free California Avenue.
Palo Alto: Cubberley Master Plan Community Meeting 3
Shape the future of Cubberley!
Agenda to come.
3rd Thursdays: Let’s Dance
Bringing The Community Together!
3rdThursday is a FREE, monthly, year-round music festival
on Palo Alto’s car-free California Avenue.
3rd Thursdays: Sustainability Fun Fair
Bringing The Community Together!
3rdThursday is a FREE, monthly, year-round music festival
on Palo Alto’s car-free California Avenue.
3rd Thursdays: ThanksCaring
Bringing The Community Together!
3rdThursday is a FREE, monthly, year-round music festival
on Palo Alto’s car-free California Avenue.
3rd Thursdays: Winter Lights
Bringing The Community Together!
3rdThursday is a FREE, monthly, year-round music festival
on Palo Alto’s car-free California Avenue.
Terner Center: Leveraging CalAIM in Permanent Supportive Housing
California’s CalAIM (California Advancing and Innovating Medi-Cal) initiative allows housing providers to use Medi-Cal funding to cover housing and supportive services for people experiencing homelessness. Because of this, CalAIM could help overcome funding shortfalls and allow operators of permanent supportive housing to expand their services and provide person-centered care to their residents. In this webinar, we will provide an overview of some of the challenges housing providers face in integrating CalAIM funding into their properties, as well as highlight models and partnerships that are successfully leveraging CalAIM to improve outcomes for their residents.
PASCC: Rally for Our Future: Make Polluters Pay!
Palo Alto Student Climate Coalition
Rally For Our Future: Make Polluters Pay! Join us for an empowering and impactful environmental and climate justice rally at King Plaza (in front of of Palo Alto City Hall) on Friday, April 18, 2025, at 5:00 PM - 6:30 PM. We will be rallying in support of the effort to hold major climate polluters accountable for their disastrous damages, specifically in support of CA SB 684/AB 1243 (a bill that would establish a climate superfund that would require large climate polluters to pay for their damages to the state, reducing the tax payer burden for such disasters and funding robust state-level climate resiliency and clean energy endeavours.)
The student-organized and led rally will feature a diverse range of speakers, live music from local bands and community organizations across the Bay Area. The speaker list will be announced later in April.
3rd Thursdays: Greening Up Cal Ave
Bringing The Community Together!
3rdThursday is a FREE, monthly, year-round music festival
on Palo Alto’s car-free California Avenue.
City of Palo Alto: Transportation Planning Workshop
Share your feedback about biking, walking, and rolling in Palo Alto at an upcoming transportation workshop. Ask questions, share feedback, and participate in station activities about the proposed citywide bicycle and pedestrian network, possible future bike/ped projects that build out the network, and two possible bike/ped crossings in south Palo Alto.
SVBC: Volunteer Bike Ambassador Training
Bike Ambassadors are volunteers for Silicon Valley Bicycle Coalition (SVBC) who set up in their communities and spread the word about biking. Join us for an online training session on Zoom that will cover all you need to know to become a Bike Ambassador to represent SVBC at community tabling events as well as at Energizer Stations during Bike to Wherever Days in May.
Spring EV & Ebike Show
See a variety of EVs and Ebikes all in one place! Talk to EV and Ebike owners, and find the EV or Ebike that’s right for you. Ebike test rides on site.
Learn how to switch to electric and:
Save money with incentives
Charge at home and on the road
Use your EV during a power outage
Bring your kids for a spring-time scavenger hunt.
SV@Home: From Homelessness to Housing- The Continuum of Response
Join us for a conversation between interim shelter and affordable housing leaders about the range of tools we have to address homelessness
LWV: Climate with Tom Steyer
Hear Tom Steyer, climate investor, champion and visionary, speak about the climate crisis and how local action is critical.
SVBC: Volunteer Bike Ambassador Training
Bike Ambassadors are volunteers for Silicon Valley Bicycle Coalition (SVBC) who set up in their communities and spread the word about biking. Join us for an online training session on Zoom that will cover all you need to know to become a Bike Ambassador to represent SVBC at community tabling events as well as at Energizer Stations during Bike to Wherever Days in May.
NPH Training: Energy Efficiency Unleashed
Discover solutions to help ease the financial burden of rising energy costs on California's low-income residents and owners. This workshop delves into energy saving programs and incentive layering, which is the strategy of combining multiple initiatives to maximize benefits and reduce utility costs for affordable housing communities.
Terner Center: Integrating Housing and Behavioral Health Services through Homekey+
Proposition 1 and Homekey+ are unlocking significant new resources to support and house people with behavioral health challenges. This webinar will focus on the types of housing projects and services that can make the most impactful use of these new resources, among others.
The webinar will include a research presentation on the types of projects produced through Homekey and other state programs, as well as who those projects serve. A panel of experts will discuss: a) best practices for serving people with behavioral health challenges (including special considerations for veterans); b) lessons learned from prior Homekey projects and other types of PSH serving this population; and c) the potential to support residents' ongoing services and properties' operations with the Behavioral Health Services Act (BHSA).
350 Silicon Valley: PAUSD Meeting
Support our students in their ongoing fight for a healthier and cleaner community: show up at the School Board’s Tuesday, March 25 meeting, 25 Churchill Avenue, from 6:30 to 10:30 pm. Support asking PAUSD to embed climate action into the Palo Alto Promise. Our youths are fighting for increased building electrification – including installing clean heat pump heater/AC units into all schools as soon as possible -- as well as adding more climate education.
Urban Planning 101
How do we decide what goes where in our city, what is our vision? What does zoning have to do with it? How does the permit process work?
Join us for URBAN PLANING 101 at noon on Wednesday, February 5th on Zoom.
This is for anyone just learning, as well as those who want a refresher on the urban planning process locally. Sign up here and we'll send you the Zoom link:
The more we learn the better advocates we are!
South Bay YIMBY General Meeting
Join South Bay YIMBY at their monthly general meeting held on Zoom.
Annual Holiday Party!
It’s that time of year again!
Join us for our Holiday Party. We will celebrate housing and transportation victories and honor our Housing Heroes award winners. As always, we will have amazing food from our friend Chef Julien of The Redwood!
The location is provided upon RSVP to info@paloaltoforward.com.
Project Review Meeting
Email us at info@paloaltoforward.com for an invite to this important project support meeting!
Humanizing Heights
Join our Downtown walking tour with professional architects Elaine Uang (Van Meter Williams Pollack), Chris Ard (PYATOK), and John Barton (Architectural Design Program lecturer at Stanford). We'll learn how to characterize and discuss:
The overall "feel" of taller buildings, what features make them comfortable
What helps shield/blend buildings, or does amazing architecture want to be seen
The trade-offs between height and other city priorities
Space on the tour is limited so sign up and get more information here!
Looking to do some homework before you attend? Watch this quick video on assumptions with regard to building heights.
South Bay YIMBY General Meeting
Join South Bay YIMBY at their monthly general meeting held on Zoom.
The Enchanted Garden Panel Discussion
Join the City of Palo Alto for a conversation spanning the panelists’ research interests and personal ties to plants and designed, racially integrated neighborhoods here in Palo Alto and elsewhere in the San Francisco Bay Area. Alexis Madrigal is the co-host of Forum on KQED and a contributing writer at The Atlantic. He is the author of the forthcoming book, The Pacific Circuit, and the proprietor of the Oakland Garden Club. Nanosh Lucas is a Ph.D. candidate whose dissertation focuses on grassroots, multiracial housing cooperatives on the San Francisco Bay Peninsula. Kija Lucas uses photography to explore ideas of home, heritage and inheritance. She is interested in how ideas are passed down and seemingly inconsequential moments create changes lasting generations. Lisa Ellsworth is the Director of Development and Strategy at Minnesota Street Project Foundation. She has worked as a curator, cultural producer, and project manager in contemporary art and design.
Housing Leadership Day
For over 20 years, the Housing Leadership Council’s Housing Leadership Day (HLD) has been a crucial platform for sharing knowledge and tools to bring affordable homes to our neighborhoods. This year, HLD 2024 will be held on Friday, October 25, 2024, at The South San Francisco Conference Center.
Housing: A Home for All?
Bloomington, IN has the most expensive housing in the state. Likewise, Palo Alto’s housing prices have been sky-high for decades. Both cities, especially of late, have focused their attention on affordability and access to housing and both have recently updated their housing plans.
What can we learn from each other? Come and enjoy the conversation and learn. Register Here > https://forms.gle/vi8dEVu4oSCEWgww5
South Bay YIMBY General Meeting
Join South Bay YIMBY at their monthly general meeting held on Zoom.
Bike Palo Alto
Join Bike Palo Alto for a pedal-powered adventure through the beautiful streets and trails of our vibrant city!
Whether you're a beginner or a more experienced cyclist, this in-person event will provide you with maps that help you discover convenient bike routes around Palo Alto, with hundreds of other families biking exploring the same routes at the same time.
Starting from Fairmeadow Elementary School, the on-campus Bike Palo Alto Safety Fair will offer everything you need to be ride-ready. Register here!
Clean Air at Home in Palo Alto
Join the City of Palo Alto, 350 Silicon Valley Palo Alto, and the Palo Alto Student Climate Coalition at this fun and informative event for everyone!
In recognition of Clean Air Day, enjoy ice cream while learning about the best ways to create clean air inside and out of your home. By going electric and choosing clean alternatives, you can support clean, healthy air and save money.
For more information, click here!
YIMBY Action and Ezra Klein: Abundant Housing in Our Backyards
Join YIMBY Action for an evening with The New York Times’s Ezra Klein to discuss how pro-housing laws can make communities across the country more affordable, abundant, and liveable – if they actually get implemented. Ezra will be in conversation with Sonja Trauss, co-founder of the YIMBY (Yes in My Backyard) movement and the Executive Director of YIMBY Law.
Purchase a virtual ticket, or if you’re in D.C., why not go in person! For more information, click here.
Office of Transportation Open House
Join City Transportation staff to learn about projects, programs, and initiative underway around Palo Alto.
During the open-house style evening, connect with staff to ask your questions. Learn about what’s going on with the Safe Street for All planning process, the Bicycle and Pedestrian Transportation Plan Update, rail grade separation, parking, quiet zones, and progress on other transportation initiatives underway. Share your input and more.
For more details, click here!
Caltrain Electric Service Launch Party
Caltrain is excited to launch its new schedule for electrified service, which will provide faster, cleaner, quieter, and more frequent service!
Join Caltrain for this free, family-friendly community event and enjoy the following:
Community Performances
Caltrain Giveaways
Food Vendors
Games
Photo Booth
Art Demonstration by Eric Rewitzer from 3 Fish Studios
Community Resources
For more information, click here!