About Us
The Santa Cruz County Mounted Posse is a nonprofit 501(c)(3) volunteer organization, established in 1948. We are dedicated to charitable and educational purposes. It is our privilege to support and serve multiple organizations, emergency services, and members of our community.
The story goes… in 1874, Santa Cruz County Sheriff Robert Orton formed a posse to track and arrest bandits that had been robbing stagecoaches traveling from San Jose to Santa Cruz. In 1948, 74 years later, the Santa Cruz County Sheriff’s Posse was incorporated. Our vision and purpose was to have a standing posse to assist the Sheriff in search and rescue missions. Additionally, our purpose included promoting goodwill amongst our community. As one of the first mounted posse groups in California, the Posse helped create the state standards by sharing our mounted certification guidelines. In 2004, these were adopted by the Law Enforcement Branch of the California Governor’s Office of Emergency Services. These guidelines for search and rescue teams are currently being used as the standard today. Over the years, the posse has assisted in many successful searches for lost adults and children throughout Santa Cruz County.
Consecutively over the past 40 years, the posse has proudly hosted a special event called “Kids Fun Day”. It’s an end of the year party for the children of the Santa Cruz County Office of Special Education. We have exciting activities like dancing, music, food, police and fire vehicles, officers and firefighters, face painting and arts and crafts. We have also hosted, educated and donated to many special groups. For example, SPCA, Girl Scouts, Jacob’s Heart, American Red Cross, Pony Club, The Adoption Story Project and Adopt a Family. As well as neighborhood meetings, organizations and nonprofit affiliations. The search and rescue training academy and team trainings were also hosted on our site. In addition, we offer our location for staging of emergency services which is crucial in a disaster response.
Our volunteers and financial resources enable us to give back to our community. We depend on donations to host special events, historical preservation, offer outreach and programs for our community. We do not receive any federal, state or local government funding and we are extremely grateful for our community’s support!
Volunteer
Be a part of the Posse. Feel involved. Help the community. There are various wish list projects available that anyone can help our non-profit organization with. Please contact us for further information.
Contact us
Santa Cruz County Mounted Posse
info@sccsp.org
831-336-8295 (leave a message)
Mailing Address
Santa Cruz County Mounted Posse
2127 Ocean Street Extension
Santa Cruz, CA 95060
Formerly Known As
Santa Cruz County Sheriff’s Posse
We are no longer affiliated with the Sheriff’s department as of December 2023.
