Announcing the Fall 2019 Grant Awards

We are excited to announce our Fall 2019 grantees! The Portland Parks Foundation (PPF) has awarded three small grants to the local organizations below – each with a focus on promoting equitable access for all Portlanders to parks and parks programming. Our grants program is founded on a generous bequest from Nancy Hebb Freeman, an artist, hiker and lover of Portland parks.   

Friends of Columbia Park: $2,471

Strengthening Organizational Capacity

Hiring a development consultant, database subscription, printed and branded materials, and volunteer appreciation event expenses

Columbia Park is 35-acres of mature Douglas-firs and lindens, sports fields, a historic cottage, an indoor pool, and an important shared community space. The Friends of Columbia Park is a group of supporters for the park who have maintained a presence in the area since the early 1990s. Recently they have hosted community forums, art and music events, organized daily clean-up efforts to pick up litter with a local school, their “Park and Poolooza” event, a celebration of the park and pool, and a monthly Bingo night for the park community .

This grant from the Portland Parks Foundation will help them diversify their fundraising efforts, recruit, organize, appreciate, and retain volunteers to continue their important efforts. With improved organizational support and volunteer power, Friends of Columbia Park plans to continue the work they’ve been doing while expanding to partner with Portland Parks and Rec to plant a native nature patch, grow park cleanup efforts to include other neighbors and organizations, advocate to fill funding gaps and keep the Columbia Park Pool operating, foster a new relationship with a local corporation, as well as host more concerts and community gatherings in the historic cottage.

Friends of Gateway Discovery Park: $2,225

Outreach to Create New Friends Group

Basic tabling supplies, translation of materials into Spanish and Russian, co-sponsor three large events in area parks

Gateway Discovery Park & Urban Plaza is a new 3.2-acre neighborhood park located near the Hazelwood, Mill Park, and Woodland Park neighborhoods in East Portland. The park was completed in August of 2019 and features a programmed urban plaza, green space, an inclusive nature playground, a small skate park and a picnic area.

Friends groups are an important link to the city’s agency tasked with managing our parks, Portland Parks & Recreation (PP&R). Friends of Gateway Discovery Park plans to help PP&R guide future programming so that it meets the community’s needs and to promote community activities in the park. They will also prioritize outreach to children with disabilities and their families, people of color, immigrants, and lower-income renters in the surrounding neighborhoods.

Our grant to The Friends of Gateway Discovery Park will help them form a strong identity to gather around, supplies to tell the community about the group’s existence, including materials translated into Spanish and Russian; host “Tree Walks” with PP&R, something a survey the group conducted showed the community was highly interested in; participate in three events, sponsoring when necessary, that will draw large numbers of participants from the groups prioritized for outreach; and finally engage community members who show interest in being more involved with the formation of the Friends of Gateway Discovery Park so the group’s efforts continue on into the future.

Grow Portland: $2,000

Parent Engagement Sessions at Rigler Elementary Pilot Project

Educator time, refreshments, translation of materials, administration costs

Grow Portland is the leading local nonprofit dedicated to school garden education. To date, they have served over 10,000 students, half of them students of color, primarily from low-income schools. They work with Portland Parks & Recreation and local school communities to improve school garden sites and to integrate hands-on, culturally responsive environmental science education into the school day. They also introduce fresh vegetables to school cafeterias to promote healthy eating.

The grant from the Portland Parks Foundation will allow Grow Portland to pilot a new project: bilingual garden education and parent engagement at Portland Parks & Recreation’s Rigler Community Garden at Rigler Elementary, where the organization has been at work for four years. They’ve chosen Rigler Community Garden and Elementary School because all students at the school participate in garden education and half of those students come from families where Spanish is their first language, but none of the current regular garden educators speak Spanish.

Our grant will allow Grow Portland to better engage with the students at Rigler, but it will also allow them to engage the children’s parents. This will help families understand why garden education matters and help them understand how the garden is a resource for both the school and the neighborhood community. If this pilot project is successful, Grow Portland plans to expand it to other schools in the future.

About the Small Grants Program

Projects for funding consideration may include organizational development, programming, events, transportation, challenge grants or other imaginative ideas.

PPF is especially interested in projects that further develop an organization’s capacity to fulfill its mission. Grant applicants may seek to stabilize or strengthen their operations through a specific activity, including, but not limited to:

• Building and diversifying revenue sources

• Planning or updating communications, marketing and outreach

• Improving and diversifying volunteer recruitment, training and retention

• Strengthening governance, leadership or volunteer expertise

• Developing and implementing a fundraising plan

Competitive projects will clearly align with PPF’s mission to ensure a thriving and accessible parks system for a healthy Portland.  Preference will be given to projects that promote equitable access for all Portlanders to parks and parks programming, primarily benefitting low-income populations, communities of color, and other historically underserved groups.

Find more information here.

Major Bank of America Grant Enhances PP&R's Mobile Lunch + Play Program

The Portland Parks Foundation and Portland Parks & Recreation are pleased to announce that they have received a $200k Neighborhood Builders grant from Bank of America. The two-year grant ($100,000 each year) will significantly expand free summertime lunch and recreation activities in east Portland, the region of the city most in need of those services.

Portland Parks Foundation and Portland Parks & Recreation staff, including PPF Executive Director Randy Gragg (black sweater), PP&R Director Adena Long (center) accepted the grant with Parks Commissioner Nick Fish (checkered shirt). The Bank of America grant will allow the Bureau's Mobile Lunch + Play program to expand significantly.

The BofA grant will greatly expand Portland Parks & Recreation’s (PP&R) Summer Free For All Mobile Lunch + Play program. In partnership with Meals on Wheels People, Mobile Lunch + Play brings free summertime lunch, sports, arts, crafts, and games to apartment complexes and sites in Portland where parks are currently scarce. Meals on Wheels People was the recipient of the Neighborhood Builders grant last year. 

“Thanks to Bank of America, thousands more Portland children will receive a free, healthy meal,” says Portland Parks Commissioner Nick Fish. “The Neighborhood Builders grant strengthens our longstanding partnership with Bank of America. Thanks to our philanthropic partner – the Portland Parks Foundation, and to Roger Hinshaw and Monique Barton at Bank of America for their commitment to Portland families.” 

“We recognize the critical role that local nonprofits play to build pathways to economic progress in the Portland community. Through Neighborhood Builders, we connect nonprofits like Financial Beginnings Oregon and the Portland Parks Foundation to the funding and leadership development resources they need to further scale their impact,” said Roger Hinshaw, Bank of America’s Market President in Oregon and Southwest Washington. “Both of these nonprofits do extraordinary work, so I am pleased we are able to bring forward this additional support at a particularly strategic time for them.” 

Nearly forty percent of east Portland households still lack a park within a half mile of their homes. Density continues to grow in east Portland with an estimated 25,000 more housing units coming by 2035. Bank of America’s support will allow PP&R and PPF to expand the Mobile Lunch + Play program to reach more kids and families in need, and bring fun and games to areas without easy park access. 

A Mobile Lunch + Play event brings smiles to kids at an east Portland apartment complex. The Portland Parks & Recreation program brings free lunches and the summertime park experience - games, sports, arts and crafts - to areas which don't yet have ready access to parks.

“The Bank of America Neighborhood Builders grant will allow us to bring a lot of the fun of a park directly to the kids,” says Randy Gragg, PPF’s Executive Director. “With our city growing so quickly, Mobile Play + Lunch is a fast, effective way to better serve more of our city’s kids.” 

“We are so thankful to Bank of America,” says Portland Parks & Recreation Director Adena Long. “The grant helps our Free Lunch + Play program grow in size and scope; to deliver the summertime experience every Portland child deserves.” 

For more information on Portland Parks & Recreation’s Mobile Lunch + Play and other Summer Free For All programs, please click here. 

For more information on Bank Of America’s Neighborhood Builders grant, click here. 

We Did It

When we dreamed of a big celebration for the bridge connecting the iconic Wildwood Trail over West Burnside, we wondered if anyone would actually come—it would probably rain, planning it would be complicated, and we would need so many permits. 

Well nearly 1,300 of us showed up to celebrate the opening of the Barbara Walker Crossing last Sunday. Under sunny skies, the Grand Ronde Color Guard and BrassRoots Movement led hundreds of us up West Burnside, a half-mile to the bridge; kids and adults tested their speed in a 100-meter dash organized by Foot Traffic; we witnessed the bridge’s blessing by leaders of the Siletz and Grand Ronde tribes; Bodyvox and Michael Curry Design performed an enchanting “ribbon tying”, symbolizing the joining of Washington and Forest parks; speakers from the City of Portland and the U.S. House of Representatives acknowledged our community for the groundswell of energy now memorialized in a new safe crossing for one of Portland’s crown jewel’s: the Wildwood Trail. 

And best of all, we stepped onto the bridge we’ve all been dreaming about for more than 20 years! 
 The Barbara Walker Crossing has been a dream for decades.

It moved from dream to drawing board in 2012 when architect Andrew Wheeler and artist Ed Carpenter began lobbying.

In 2014, the Portland Parks Foundation adopted the project and partnered with Portland Parks & Recreation, the Portland Bureau of Transportation, Metro, and hundreds of Portlanders to bring the bridge to life.

Companies like KPFF, R&H Construction, Walker Macy, and Shiels Obletz Johnson all played important roles, donating hundreds of hours of work for the design, engineering, construction, and installation of this bridge. 

Contributions from foundations, businesses, and hundreds of donors made all of this possible. If you were one of them: thank you!

Now get out there, get in touch with nature, and enjoy that bridge!

See photos from Sunday's event here. 

See media coverage here:
KGW
KPTV
KOIN
Portland Tribune

The Oregonian

Oasis of Hope: Casey Sclar on American Public Gardens in an Era of Radical Change

Speaker:          Dr. Casey Sclar, Executive Director of American Public Gardens Association

Date:               Monday, November 4

Time:              6:30 pm

Place:              The Armory, 128 N.W. 11th Avenue, Portland

Tickets:           $5-20 sliding scale; tickets at Eventbrite

Casey Sclar, Executive Director of the American Public Gardens Association, will explore the urgent and evolving role public gardens must play in knitting the social fabric of our communities and addressing global challenges.

Can our public gardens preserve threatened plant species as the climate changes? Can they be places of beauty and psychological health that are more inviting to communities our public gardens have not typically engaged? Can public gardens transition from traditional ornamental collections to becoming critical societal infrastructure?

"There is an urgent new role public gardens can play," says Sclar. "We must get it right."  

Dr. Casey Sclar is the Executive Director of the American Public Gardens Association (APGA). APGA connects, protects, and champions over 600 public gardens and 9300 individual members throughout the U.S., Canada, Mexico, and 24 other countries. These gardens reach over 121 million visitors per year, continually envisioning “a world where public gardens are indispensable.”

Casey’s work experience in horticulture and plant science spans three decades. He spent 15 years at Longwood Gardens (Kennett Square, PA) directing integrated pest management, soils and composting, land stewardship, and other sustainability programs. That work earned him APGA’s Professional Citation in 2011 for outstanding achievements in public horticulture.  He is the Inaugural Chair of NICH - the National Initiative for Consumer Horticulture - which raises overall awareness of the $196B/yr. end-use horticulture industry, serves on the Board of the Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation, and sits on the Advisory Council for Seed Your Future to help more leaders pursue horticulture and the plant sciences as a career. He holds a B.S. degree in horticulture from Cal Poly State Univ., San Luis Obispo, M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in entomology from Colorado State University.

New grants projects connect underserved communities with local parks and programs

Portland Parks Foundation is pleased to announce the new grantees from our Small Grants Program, which provides capacity building support for organizations whose work aligns with PPF’s mission to ensure a thriving and accessible parks system for a healthy Portland. “We are excited to work with our new grantees, Immigrant and Refugee Community Organization (IRCO)  and Ecology in Classrooms and Outdoors (ECO). These projects directly address PPF’s priority for supporting underserved communities that have barriers to accessing the benefits of local parks and programs,” said Jessica Green, PPF’s Operations Officer.

IRCO’s Slavic Youth and Families Schools Uniting Neighborhoods (SUN) Community School Program at Gilbert Park Elementary.

IRCO is nationally and locally recognized as a culturally and linguistically specific community-based organization with a deep understanding of the diverse communities residing in Oregon. Their proposed project supports Portland’s Slavic Community, Oregon’s largest refugee-based community, which includes diverse ethnicities such as Russian, Ukrainian, Serbian, and Czech. “After experiencing religious and political persecution, conflict, and corruption, Slavs are often isolated and reticent to mainstream systems. Almost one in three Slavic children live in poverty, twice the rate of White children. One in five Slavs speak English less than well. These disparities represent significant obstacles for Slavic families seeking resources through PP&R,” IRCO wrote. Through this project, IRCO will provide opportunities to engage Slavic community members with Portland parks spaces and programs through information sharing and events. IRCO hopes to not only increase Slavs’ access to parks, but also help “provide the sense of belonging that Portland’s public spaces, and by extension the city itself, is ‘for them.’”

Students participating in an ECO program at Kingsley D. Bundy Park in SE Portland.

With a mission to reconnect kids with nature, ECO shared that their work “is rooted in the understanding that when kids enjoy and understand the natural world, they grow into adults who take value and take care of it.” Eighty percent of the students ECO serves qualify for free or reduced lunch and 63% identify as minority. City parks that ECO students engage with include Powell Butte Natural Area, Springwater Corridor, and Kingsley D. Bundy Park. The proposed project is to provide diversity, equity, and inclusion training for ECO’s staff and board, with the goal of increasing capacity for the organization to deliver equitable and culturally responsive ecology programs. With increased capacity, ECO sees the impact of this program as helping to build “a more inclusive and diverse next generation of Portland residents who value and support access to thriving parks and natural areas.”

Congratulations to IRCO and ECO!

If you’re with a public park friends group or another community partner, be sure to keep in touch with the PPF throughout the year. You can learn more about our Small Grants Program here. Our next round of applications will be open beginning March 1, with a deadline of March 30, 2019. In addition to small grants, we also offer seasonal technical assistance workshops. Past programs have focused on fundraising strategies, equity and inclusion, grant writing, and building your board.

Portland Parks Foundation welcomes new Executive Director Randy Gragg

Portland Parks Foundation (PPF) welcomes Randy Gragg as the new Executive Director. Gragg succeeds Jeff Anderson who recently retired from the role. Bringing a dynamic background in journalism, urban planning, and advocacy, Gragg will lead the organization that serves as the chief philanthropic partner for the City of Portland’s Parks & Recreation.

For nearly 30 years, Gragg has helped to shape conversations about the city of Portland’s spaces and culture. His leadership and advocacy has helped champion a number of public parks projects, including Eastbank Esplanade, Pioneer Courthouse Square, and Lawrence Halprin’s Portland Open Space Sequence, also known as Lovejoy Fountain, Pettyrove Park, and Keller Fountain.

“The Portland Parks Foundation is proud of the impacts we've made on Portland’s Parks system, most recently the Barbara Walker Footbridge over Burnside, opening next summer,” said Mary Ruble, the foundation’s Board Chair. ”With Randy Gragg at the helm of the Foundation, our goal is to increase our visibility and expand our range of public/private partnerships to build a stronger and more vibrant parks and recreation system throughout Portland. We are honored to have Randy join us, and look to his vision and experience to take us to new heights.“

As a journalist, Gragg served as Editor-in-Chief at Portland Monthly Magazine from 2009-2013 and as a columnist and reporter at the Oregonian for 17 years. More recently he has developed exhibitions and public programs with Design Week Portland. From 2013-2017, Gragg was the Executive Director of the University of Oregon’s John Yeon Center for Architecture and the Landscape where he developed a major 2017 retrospective for the Portland Art Museum on the seminal Oregon architect and landscape designer John Yeon.

“Portland is entering an exciting era,” Gragg said. “The city is growing dramatically, not just in numbers, but with deepening cultural diversity, creativity, and awareness. With the Parks Foundation’s 16-year legacy of good work to build on, we’re ready to partner with Portland’s wide-ranging communities to create new parks and programs, refresh those we have, even rethink what a park is and where it can be.”

Gragg was a Loeb Fellow at Harvard University’s Graduate School of Design and an inaugural National Arts Journalism Fellow at Columbia University. His volunteer affiliations include roles as a board member with Pioneer Courthouse Square and the Alumni Council Loeb Fellowship at Harvard University. As board chair of the Halprin Landscape Conservancy, he co-led the development of an innovative $4.5-million public/private partnership to restore Halprin’s world-renowned fountain plazas.

Portland Parks & Recreation recently came under the leadership of City Commissioner Nick Fish, who will also be the Foundation’s City Council liaison. “Randy is a respected community leader and will bring a strong vision during this time of growth for the Portland Parks Foundation,” said Portland Parks Commissioner Nick Fish. “I look forward to building on our longstanding partnership and expanding Portland’s world-class parks and recreation system.”

About Portland Parks Foundation

The Portland Parks Foundation is devoted to building a thriving and accessible parks system for a healthy, sustainable, and creative Portland. We are the chief philanthropic partner for Portland Parks & Recreation. Through leadership, partnership, and philanthropy, we advance the City of Portland’s commitment to excellence, equity, inclusion, and good stewardship of our public parks. PPF will soon complete the Barbara Walker Footbridge over Burnside.  We have played key roles in the creation of Cully Park, Director Park, the Bill Naito Legacy Fountain, the Gateway Green Master Plan, and the Dawson Park interactive fountain. PPF also provides technical assistance and financial support to parks affiliates and friends groups.

Photo courtesy of Sabina Poole.

‘Parks Champions’ are working to create more vital, inclusive public parks

At Portland Parks Foundation, we are so pleased to honor Matthieu Kambumba and Ginger Edwards as the 2018 Parks Champions award winners. This annual award recognizes outstanding park, community center, natural area, or community garden volunteers. Honorees also get to designate a Portland Parks Foundation grant of $1,500 to a community organization that aligns with the Foundation’s goal to create a thriving and accessible parks system for a healthy Portland.

Matthieu Kambumba is a leader in Portland’s Congolese community and an Oregon Food Bank Ambassador. He has been integral in activating the new Wood Community Garden in SE Portland’s Centennial neighborhood. His contributions include community outreach, culturally responsive gardening classes, and securing of grants. Matthieu has designated a grant to support Wood Community Garden, noting that it means “more opportunities and resources for the Wood community to achieve [our] goal to be self sufficient and sustainable. It is the opportunity to have more time together to build and strengthen the community."

An advocate for North Portland parks and neighborhoods, Ginger Edwards has been especially active with Arbor Lodge Park. She organizes community groups and businesses to volunteer throughout the year, is part of the tree team, and helped to fund and personally maintained an ADA accessible restroom at the park’s popular and inclusive Harper’s Playground. She said, "if you do things for the right reasons, and share your goals, other like minded people will show up and join you. That is what has happened at Arbor Lodge Park and Harper's Playground. This shows that something close to me and important in our neighborhood resonates with others outside of our neighborhood." Ginger also works as Ginger has designated her grant to support Arbor Lodge Neighborhood Association.

Congrats Matthieu and Ginger and thank you for all you are doing to support thriving, inclusive Portland parks!