What we learned when we brought our giving program into the field.
At 8:00 a.m. on Sunday, July 5, 2026, a group of volunteers gathered in the courtyard of Station House Inn in South Lake Tahoe. Hotel staff. Guests still in town after the holiday. Locals with reusable bags. A dive team from Clean Up The Lake. The town was quiet in the way that only follows a very loud night.
This was the morning after the 4th of July — historically the busiest weekend of the year in the Tahoe region. It’s also, predictably, the weekend that leaves the most behind. Every year, holiday celebrations along the lakeshore produce a stretch of litter that requires more than the usual weekly cleanup. Every year, someone has to pick it up.
This year, we decided that “someone” would include us.
The Clean-Up Event
Over the course of Sunday morning, the group walked the South Lake Tahoe hotel corridor between Heavenly Village and the lakefront, gathering what the holiday had left behind: bottles, cans, smoothie cups, wrappers, firework debris. At the same time, Clean Up The Lake’s dive team ran an independent SCUBA cleanup near the fireworks area, pulling submerged debris directly from the lake.
By the time everyone regrouped mid-morning, roughly 70 pounds of trash had been removed from the neighborhood — none of it destined for the lake. FOX26 KMPH, MyNews4 Reno, and the Tahoe Daily Tribune all covered the event.
It was the first hands-on environmental cleanup in the history of our Stay With Purpose program, and it marked Clean Up The Lake as our first environmental partner.
The Program Behind the Event
Stay With Purpose began earlier this year with a simple premise: what if hospitality’s contribution to a place didn’t depend on whether guests remembered to opt in to a donation at checkout? What if it were part of the operation itself?
Every reservation across our four Lake Tahoe hotels — Station House Inn, The Jeffrey Hotel, Firelite Lodge, and HiMark Hotel — now directs $4 to a local nonprofit. Guests don’t have to do anything; the giving is built into the business, not the brand.
The program began with a partnership with the Boys & Girls Club of Lake Tahoe as our first community partner. This July, we extended the model from community support into conservation with Clean Up The Lake — backed by an annual commitment of over $30,000 to the organization’s ongoing work.
“The long-term success of environmental nonprofits depends on reliable community support. This partnership creates a meaningful connection between visitors and the protection of Lake Tahoe.”
Colin West, Founder and CEO, Clean Up The Lake
Why We Built It This Way
We’re an independent hospitality group. That means we don’t have a corporate CSR office or a foundation budget line. What we have instead is a portfolio of four hotels in one of the country’s most-loved lake regions, and enough operational autonomy to make choices about how we run.
We built Stay With Purpose because we didn’t want hospitality’s contribution to Tahoe to be something we talked about. We wanted it to be something the business does whether we talk about it or not.
The math is straightforward: every stay generates revenue; a portion of that revenue moves directly to organizations doing local, measurable work; that movement happens without asking guests to do anything extra. We’re doing this work in partnership with MOD Movement, a nonprofit driven by a mission to uplift underserved communities — creating pathways to opportunity through direct service, strategic partnerships, and impactful projects.
What Comes Next
Sunday’s cleanup is the first of what we hope will become an annual tradition — showing up on July 5 to help take care of the place that hosts us. Over time, we expect to expand Stay With Purpose to include additional partners, both in community and environmental work, and to continue investing in on-site sustainability across all four properties.
The most immediate next step, though, is simply continuing. Every stay this week, next week, and next quarter will keep directing $4 to Tahoe nonprofits. The cleanup was the visible piece. The program is the work behind it.
A Note on Tourism
Tourism is often cited — in Tahoe as in many other beloved places — as part of the problem. We understand why. Millions of visitors put strain on a system that wasn’t built for them.
We also believe that visitors, hotels, nonprofits, and local businesses all have a role to play in destination stewardship—the shared responsibility of caring for a place so it remains healthy, welcoming, and resilient for generations to come. For us, that means looking beyond our hotel walls and asking how our business can contribute to the long-term well-being of the community and environment that make Lake Tahoe such a special place to visit.
Hospitality can be part of the solution if we choose to build our businesses that way. Redirecting real revenue to local groups doing meaningful work. Investing in operational sustainability. Showing up on the ground when it matters. These aren’t marketing initiatives; they’re operational ones.
We’re grateful to Clean Up The Lake for trusting us with a first environmental partnership. Grateful to the Boys & Girls Club of Lake Tahoe for opening the door earlier this year. Grateful to MOD Movement for building the program alongside us. And most of all, grateful to every guest whose stay quietly funds this work.
Tahoe deserves more than good intentions. We hope Stay With Purpose is one small part of what more can look like.
Learn more about Stay With Purpose and our four independent Lake Tahoe hotels at playparkhotels.com.
