Title
Updates: Camp Sacramento Annual Updates
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FileID
File ID: 2026-00609
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Location
Location: Citywide
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Recommendation
Recommendation: Receive and discuss.
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Contact
Contact: Sjon Swanson, Recreation Manager, (916) 808-6049, sswanson@cityofsacramento.org, Department of Youth, Parks, & Community Enrichment
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Presenter
Presenter: Chadwick Richardson, Camp Supervisor, (916) 808-6169, crichardson@cityofsacramento.org, Department of Youth, Parks, & Community Enrichment
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Attachments
Attachments:
1-Description/Analysis
2-Presentation
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Description/Analysis
IssueDetail
Issue Detail:
Camp Sacramento Report 2025
Background
Camp Sacramento, operated by the City of Sacramento, has a rich history of providing families with opportunities in outdoor recreation. Since its establishment in 1920, just seventy years after the City of Sacramento’s own incorporation, Camp Sacramento has become one of the City’s longest-lived and most cherished programs for families looking to spend some summertime reconnecting with the great outdoors. Located in the High Sierras (~80 miles East of Sacramento), Camp narrowly survived the Caldor Megafire in 2021. Thanks to the tireless efforts of firefighting crews, Camp continues to act as a source of outdoor education and stewardship in a truly unique natural environment
Camp Sacramento is an overnight family summer camp program that allows families and individuals to attend pre-determined camp sessions in the summer months. Registration and attendance at Camp Sacramento during a pre-selected set of dates include a variety of popular camp activities, including hiking, archery, tie-dye, team sports, campfires, and crafts. Campers stay on site for either 4- or 6-day sessions between June-August, while personnel live on site from approximately June-September. Campers stay on site in small, pre-reserved cabins intended to house family units for the duration of the session, while camp personnel live in dormitories, lead activities, work in the camp store, prepare meals, and maintain facilities. The Camp Sacramento program is intended for families, so children under 18 years of age do not attend without a parent or guardian.
Camp Reservations: Operations
Camp Sacramento had a busy 2025 season, with 100% of available cabins initially being reserved after the public open enrollment date (August 16, 2025 @ 10am). Camp served over 1,700 Campers during Family Camp Season 2025 (June-Aug), and approximately 700 more during our Post-Season 2025 (Aug-Sept) for a combined total of approximately 2,400 campers in 2025. Approximately 81.3% of those Campers were Residents of the City of Sacramento, and approximately 47.6% of our total Campers were within the youth category (age 24 years or younger).
Camp Reservations: Improvements and New Programs
Last season, camp saw success from simplifying online reservation/booking procedures and increasing overall accessibility by making all unreserved cabins available to the public on a single pre-determined date (as opposed to the traditional multi-session, multi-day enrollment approach). Due to this success, Camp continued to apply this strategy for the 2026 season and, thus far, has continued to see success in the form of consistently filled cabins, new reservations, and an increase in new families attending.
Camp Sacramento personnel also worked closely with the YPCE marketing team to create different forms of promotional media for its various programs.
When cabins were made available to the public online (August 10, 2024 @ 11am), 68 new reservations were made for the 2025 season, with approximately 80% of these reservations belonging to new campers.
New programs, the Bonus Summer Session and Senior Camp also allowed 36 new families to make reservations, for a total of 93 new families in 2025, meaning closer to 88% of newly made 2025 reservations belonged to new Campers.
As of 2026 open registration (August 16, 2025 @ 11am), 69 new reservations have been made for the 2026 season, 57 of which belong to new families (~82%).
Waitlists were also an effective way to fill cabins in 2025, with over 30 additional cabins distributed to waitlisted individuals after all sessions had initially filled. Additional cabins remained available for many of the sessions last season.
Camperships
In partnership with the Friends of Camp Sacramento (FOCS), Camp Sacramento sets aside several cabins each year for the scholarship program. Working in conjunction with Cottage Housing and Beyond Sacramento, FOCS were able to identify and send 4 families to Camp in 2025. With a high volume of positive feedback, FOCS hopes to continue and grow the scholarship program in the coming years, allowing even more families to experience the Camp Sacramento program who might not otherwise be able to.
Post-Season Groups
While Family Camp Season (June-Aug) is considered peak season at Camp Sacramento, there is also a highly successful post-season (Aug-Sept), which includes 7 weekends of private group rentals. Camp Sacramento is proud to have served a wide variety of groups during our post-season, including: The CA Breast Cancer Survivors Group, Kaiser Permanente professionals and their families, the Country Dance Society, West Yost and Associates, plus other small weddings and events.
On average, post-season allows camp to serve approximately 700 individuals during the back half of the summer months. In 2025, 640 individuals attended the various post-season groups at camp.
Waitlists were also effective way to fill cabins in 2025, with over 30 additional cabins distributed to individuals that were waitlisted after all sessions had initially filled.
New Ways to Experience Camp
In an attempt to extend opportunities to a wider range of individuals, Camp introduced two new programs for 2025: The Bonus Summer Session and Senior Camp. The Bonus Summer Session is a condensed mini-schedule program with its own special pricing that allows interested parties a chance to experience the Camp Sac program before summer is over. No rebooking is allowed for the Bonus Summer Session, so it is guaranteed to have 100% availability each season when registration opens, which gives new families more opportunities to experience Camp. Senior Camp was a program that was only available to Seniors (50+ years of age), and it included a modified program with a variety of popular camp activities. Combined, these added programs gave 79 individuals an extra opportunity to enjoy Camp Sacramento in 2025.
Camp Sacramento will also host two “A Day at Camp!” sessions in 2026: the first on July 9th and the second on July 23rd. This program will allow Sacramento residents to register online and attend a day-camp program at the camp facility free of charge. This program provides attendees with the chance to experience a variety of popular camp activities, have lunch in the historic camp dining hall, and access information about all camp programs and registration.
Camp personnel have already been working closely with YPCE Marketing to increase outreach for any similar programs in 2026, which will hopefully increase attendance in the coming season.
Expanded Opportunities
Working in coordination with the California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW), Camp was able to assist in the expansion of their quality fishing and outdoor education opportunities in the area by facilitating CDFW-hosted workshops, which Campers were able to attend. CDFW staff held 4 individual trout fishing and online reporting workshop sessions between June and August 2026, which 95 Campers attended, providing valuable natural resources data to the State of CA. In turn, CDFW used Camp Sacramento as a preferred location for planting rainbow trout (O. mykiss) to promote recreational fishing in the South Fork of the American River, which runs directly through the Camp facility. CDFW and Camp Sacramento planted 3,071 individual fish throughout the meadow complex, totaling 1,920 pounds. This included 10 trophy-sized fish (5+ pounds each) that Campers could pursue on their own time. This signifies a 1,229-pound increase over the 2024 planting statistics, plus one additional fish planting event. Campers rated their experience and enjoyment with this workshop as a 4.5 out of 5 according to state-provided surveys.
Facilities and Site Maintenance
Following the Caldor Fire in 2021, forestry operations were minimal, but in 2025 Camp Sacramento removed a significant quantity of dangerous trees from the property, ensuring the safety of our staff and campers and improving the overall health of the ecosystem the camp calls home.
Camp continues to make improvements to the food service program, with significant facility maintenance underway in the dining hall and kitchen. Floor and wall materials were completely replaced and will help maintain high standards in cleanliness, health, and service. A non-working walk-in refrigerator unit will also be replaced with a large freezer unit, increasing food storage ability and improving staff ability to provide consistent service across the entirety of the season.
A large section of the main water intake line was replaced with updated materials, increasing the efficiency of the camp’s drinking water intake systems. Since the Caldor Fire in 2021, surviving pipes have continued to degrade, causing leaks, line breaks, air pockets, and challenges for the camp’s operations. In the autumn of 2025, City of Sacramento Department of Utilities crews replaced 1/3 of the entire line before snow fell, with plans to replace the remaining sections in the coming seasons.
Parks Plan 2040 Key Direction Updates
• Heath & Wellness
o Provide facilities, programs, and resources to support physical and mental health, fitness, and well-being.
§ Camp Sac offers a variety of physically and mentally stimulating activities during program sessions, including hikes, morning yoga, and various team sports.
• Youth Wellbeing
o Develop and maintain recreation assets for children and youth ages 0-25. Expand challenge features.
§ Significant investments in maintaining camp assets, including kitchen, floor, and waterline infrastructure critical to camp operations, were made in the last year.
o Provide a range of recreation and enrichment programs for toddlers, children, youth, tweens, teens, and young adults.
§ Camp provides a wide variety of age-appropriate programming in social groups with age-appropriate peers for toddlers, children, youth, tweens, teens, and young adults. These activities range from obstacle courses and story time with toddlers, up to all-day hikes and archery programming with young adults.
o Expand programs and services to support youth health, special needs, educational programs, childcare, youth development, workforce/volunteer training, and family support.
§ On average, greater than 50% of camp personnel are youth. L&L operation also collaborates to support camp.
• Nature & Trail Connections
o Expand nature-based recreation facilities and programs.
§ The unique natural setting and outdoor recreation facilities of Camp Sacramento allow for outdoor recreation that is the core of its programming and the camper experience.
§ CA Dept. of Fish and Wildlife programming, including expanded fish planting at the South Fork of the American Rivers expanded recreation opportunities for families at camp.
o Designate natural areas for the purpose of protection and best practice maintenance planning.
§ The Camp Sac facility sits amidst the El Dorado National Forest, which is a large natural area on the SW side of Lake Tahoe, CA. Camp is required to work in conjunction with the US Forest Service and other natural resource entities to continually apply practices that protect and benefit the surrounding natural areas as effectively as possible. Natural areas within the Camp property are also prioritized, with steps taken to increase area health/longevity and reduce negative human/wildlife interactions or conflicts.
o Mitigate climate impacts and enhance ecological function of parks.
§ Camp Sacramento works in coordination with local natural resource agencies to minimize impact on surrounding natural ecosystems, especially in relation to nutrient and hydrological cycles. Camp works to ensure that all operations do not impact nearby water sources, maintains facilities in a manner that minimizes environmental impact, and reduces the effects of increased runoff events (particularly in the wake of the Caldor Fire).
§ Camp also takes steps to reduce impacts through operational practices and policies, such as a recycling program, and educating Campers about water-use reduction.
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PolicyConsiderations
Policy Considerations: Not applicable.
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EconomicImpacts
Economic Impacts: None.
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EnvironmentalConsiderations
Environmental Considerations: Not applicable.
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Sustainability
Sustainability: Not applicable.
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Commission/Committee Action
Commission/Committee Action: Not applicable.
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RationaleforRecommendation
Rationale for Recommendation: Youth, Parks, & Community Enrichment provides annual updates to commission on Community Centers and Community Recreation.
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FinancialConsiderations
Financial Considerations: Not applicable.
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LocalBusinessEnterprise
Local Business Enterprise (LBE): Not applicable.
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