Meet three of the Portland Parks Foundation’s most committed volunteers: our board members.
Melissa Naito, Silas Sanderson, and J.R. Lilly share their what brought them to PPF and what keeps them working so diligently and generously for the Foundation today.
And please consider a year-end contribution and help us help people help parks!
PPF’s small grants program supports local organizations that steward public parks, park programs, community gardens and natural areas. This Fall our community-based review committee selected five organizations to receive a $2000 grant to support general operating or a specific program. PPF is proud to partner with five new organizations committed to increasing opportunities for Black, Indigenous and people of color, immigrant and refugees, individuals with a disability, and low-income and marginalized youth and their families in public parks, nature and community centers.
The Boise Eliot Native Grove is a volunteer run organization with a mission of restoring the habitat, cultivating education and growing community. The Boise Eliot Native Grove is a pollinator support grove and public nature space built by and for the community on Portland Bureau of Transportation land, formerly an unimproved right-of-way full of invasive species and used as a trash dump.
Community involvement is essential to the ongoing maintenance and support of the native grove. Students and teachers from Boise-Eliot and Humboldt School, who, along with students and faculty from The Ivy School and Self Enhancement, Inc., have contributed extensive design ideas and habitat restoration support to the grove.
This past summer the “heat dome” and the long, dry weather caused detrimental effects on the plant community, killing off a number of shrubs and knocking back some native ground covers.
This grant will go towards the 2022 Earth Day event plus plant specimen replacement, new signs and Library box and books, and general maintenance on the Grove.
Green Lents, cultivates a thriving, resilient and environmentally just community through engagement, education and collective action. In recent years, they have focused on increasing equitable access and leadership over environmental resources and benefits to those most impacted by gentrification, development, climate change and increased urban high-heat zones, wildfire smoke pollution and the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic.
Covid-19 has hit many communities and nonprofits hard over the last two years. Due to funding shortages, Green Lents was forced to cut back on staff expenditures. With programs funded by grants and donations, maintaining the same operational budget during Covid in 2021 proved difficult.
Over the next few month, they will work with board members, volunteers and partners to conduct surveys, determine community needs, and project outlines and budgeting. This grant will support the organization in addressing a funding gap to ensure current programming will not be interrupted during the planning process and provide stability and continuity for a robust 2022.
Portland Fruit Tree Project increases equitable access to healthful foods and strengthens communities by empowering neighbors to share in the harvest and care of city-grown produce. The organization coordinates harvesting and sharing surplus fruit amongst communities and community organizations, sustains several mobile orchard and vegetable garden plots in partnership with community organizations, and educates the community on issues of equitable tree canopy, food justice, and the complexities of the food system.
As the Portland Fruit Tree project expands, they seek to build a workforce development program around fruit tree care, increase equity centered harvesting opportunities, called Healing Harvests, to address harm experienced primarily by the Black and Latino/a/x communities around harvesting food, and further community based research around barriers to accessing fruit as well as a research project focused on increasing people sharing harvests that are less reliant on organizational intervention.
The grant will support the organization as they seek to expand these services and programs.
Sail2Change (S2C) empowers historically underserved and underrepresented youth through access to sailing, environmental education, mentorship and tutoring as a catalyst for equitable academic opportunity and maritime industry employment. Through sailing and outdoor education, S2C promotes equitable access to Portland’s waterways and natural areas.
Their activities encourage youth to spend more time outdoors and take advantage of Portland’s natural beauty. Many of the youth have never been to the local parks and waterways S2C frequents. As part of the sailing lessons they provide, youth explore the Willamette River and are able to experience their hometown in a new way. While sailing, youth will visit Sellwood Riverfront Park, Oaks Bottom Wildlife Refuge and will head downtown to the Tom McCall Waterfront Park.
Funding from this grant will provide programming to a larger number of youth and help to spread the word about their free programming.
The Scott School Basketball Program uses basketball as a way to enable children from the community to have a positive after school environment to develop physical, social skills and self-esteem. Scott School is located in the Cully neighborhood and has a large population of low income and students of color. The program is volunteer run, however there are costs associated with league fees, uniforms and equipment. After a season away, due to Covid, 80 students across 3rd, 4th and 5th grade will be able to participate in the Scott School Basketball Program.
The goal of the program, coached by long time physical education teacher and basketball coach, Ken Lee, is not to win games but to ensure all students are included in the game and develop team cooperation and individual growth.
The small grant will help defer some of the registration fees for children on free lunch programs at Scott School. Offsetting the costs of the program, uniforms and equipment will provide opportunities for more students to get involved in after school basketball.
The backbone of our parks system is small volunteer organizations. This week, we profile two such groups that your contributions to the Portland Parks Foundation have helped to do their work.
Friends of Pier Park (FPP) is an all-volunteer neighborhood group that enhances and advocates for this magnificent 85-acre North Portland park, ensuring all visitors feel safe and invited. FPP involves its surrounding neighborhoods' richly diverse communities to activate and care for the park. Through a small grant and training funded by your contributions, the Foundation helped Friends of Pier Park expand and transform their work.
The Foundation also helps new organizations like Friends of Gateway Green get started through fiscal sponsorships and training.
Please consider a year-end gift to help us continue this work. Make your tax-deductible donation today!
People of Color Outdoors does exactly what its name suggests: it connects Black, Indigenous and People of Color to Portland’s extraordinary parks and natural areas.
Portland Parks Foundation’s Small Grants Program gave People of Color Outdoors a boost this year. The Portland Parks Foundation’s Small Grants Program awards financial support to community-based organizations within the city of Portland who foster equitable access to our urban parks, natural areas, community gardens and community recreation centers.
For 20 years, we’ve helped groups like POC Outdoors realize their dreams. Any gift, big or small helps us continue this work. Consider a contribution today!
Thank you to everyone who joined us on zoom for the Fall 2021 Friends and Allies Summit! The sessions were filled with robust dialogue and questions. And a special thank you to those that volunteered at our Day of Service! Below you can watch the recordings from each workshops.
The remaining session will be added after the workshop takes place.
Thank you to our sponsor,
Jim Meyers
Portland Parks Foundation (PPF) is sad to share that our founding board member and longtime supporter Jim Meyer has died. Portland has lost a quiet force and civic leader of the highest caliber.
“The Portland Parks Foundation and the Portland Parks Board likely would not have happened without Jim Meyer and Joey Pope,” says Jim Francesconi, who as Parks Commissioner in the ‘90s spearheaded Vision 2020 that first conceptualized both. “Jim did for Parks what he accomplished for others, including his beloved Jewish community. And he did it the same way: behind the scenes; no ego; and by supporting, developing and mentoring others. With his wife Lora and his quiet but deep financial and personal commitments, he legitimatized our cause with other business, philanthropic and community leaders.”
Jim touched practically every public issue and cause, serving over many decades on the boards of Oregon Community Foundation, Portland Schools Foundation (now All Hands Raised) and Northwest Health Foundation. He helped found the Oregon Jewish Community Foundation, serving as its second president.
“Jim Meyer was firm in his belief of the importance of parks to all people of Portland,” says Julie Vigeland, emeritus board member of PPF. “His belief in parks led him to not only speak out for our parks but actively advocate and fundraise for them. It is visionaries like Jim who ensure that Portland will always be known for our parks.”
A memorial was held on Oct. 25 at Congregation Neveh Shalom, with interment at Ahavai Shalom Cemetery. We send our condolences to Jim’s widow, Lora Meyer, and children, Mark and Marcia Meyer, of Portland, Tom and Shawn Fields-Meyer, of Los Angeles, and Richard and Erika Meyer, of Portland.
The Portland Parks Foundation and a steering committee of BIPOC arts and social justice leaders worked for months to create Paseo, a 2-day August community gathering of artists to support 13 mutual aid groups helping our community. Over 40 sponsors joined us in this unprecedented effort to bring bold new creative life to downtown and celebrate PPF's 20th anniversary. With the support of PGE and Moda we even created a beautiful passport for the in person event.
Then came the Delta Variant’s surge.
Plan B: Pivot! The artists want to perform. The mutual aid groups still deserve our help. We still wanted to celebrate 20 years of helping people help parks. So we created a video showcase of 21 extraordinary, culturally diverse Portland artists and the Paseo Mutual Aid Challenge!
Watch the artists, learn about the aid groups, and help us multiply the $4,000 challenge made by the Parks Foundation and Paseo’s lead sponsor, PGE. Any gift, no matter how small, enters you into our drawing for: two bicycles, a family membership to the Oregon Zoo, gift certificates to Fred Meyer, and the Foundation’s 20th anniversary posters.
You can visit all the videos at paseopdx.org/challenge.
Check out all the videos and learn about local mutual aid organizations! Click on the picture to watch the video!
Would you or your parks volunteer group or organization like to grow your volunteer group, collaborate with community partners, or put on an event? Are there other ways to inspire or educate you in how to help your park or a parks program? PPF wants to hear from you!
Columbia Park
This Fall PPF is hosting our annual Friends and Allies Summit. Let us know what you would be interested in learning about so we can incorporate it into the Summit!
Please take 5 minutes to complete this survey about current challenges your organization is facing or topics you would like to learn more about.
Questions? Reach out to Jessica at jgreen@portlandpf.org
Sabrina grew up with a love and appreciation for parks and the environment. Growing up next to Golden Gate Park in San Francisco and spending summers in Yosemite National Forest set the foundation for Sabrina’s exploration of our natural spaces.
In 2020, Sabrina received her bachelor’s degree from the University of Oregon in Planning, Public Policy, and Management. She is excited to bring her nonprofit management education, love for the outdoors and experience working at the San Francisco Parks Alliance to the Portland Parks Foundation. On sunny days you can find Sabrina in her neighborhood park, Laurelhurst, hiking in the Gorge or tending to her garden.
As we wind down Portland’s first City of Gardens Month, what better time to enjoy a moment in one of our most storied—but to many Portlanders today, least known—public gardens: Elk Rock, or as it is sometimes called, “Bishop’s Close.”
First the historic. We welcome to our guide one of our most storied—but to Portlanders today, least known—public gardens: Elk Rock, or as it is sometimes called, “Bishop’s Close.” Located just off Highway 43, between Portland and Lake Oswego, it took shape on between the 1890s and the mid-1950s on the estate of Peter Kerr. Now owned by Oregon’s Episcopal Diocese, the garden is still open, quietly, to the public and is well worth searching out, particularly in the early morning light.
The garden wears the fingerprints of legendary park designer John C. Olmsted, Portland’s first parks superintendent Emmanuel Mische, and one Portland’s greatest garden designers Wallace K. Huntington. But the guiding hand for its decades-long development was its owner, Peter Kerr, a Scotsman who learned the craft of gardening from books, friends, and the great designers he worked with (whose recommendations he often ignored).
A businessman who made a fortune in grain after years of economic ups and downs, Kerr developed “what is possibly the oldest surviving private landscape garden in the Pacific Northwest,” according to historian Eileen Fitzsimons. “In his six decades at Elk Rock, he grafted memories of his youth in southwestern Scotland onto an initially unfamiliar landscape. He grew to understand the physical limitations of the property and his garden changed: he experimented, made compromises and sought professional advice. His property at the end of Military Lane was a private domain, a refuge from a business world that was stressful and unpredictable.”
Early in Kerr’s ownership, he hired John C. Olmsted (nephew and adopted son of Frederick Law Olmsted) to develop a site plan for the steep, hillside side overlooking the Willamette River. He later hired Mische, an engineer in Olmsted’s Boston office who later moved to Portland to become parks superintendent, to further evolve the design to integrate a new home. Though Kerr took both designers’ plans more as suggestions than maps, the Olmstedian bones remain clear, particularly in the picturesque composition of the stone walls and trees and captured views of Mount Hood, Elk Rock Island, and the river. The plantings, a mix of sturdy old natives and long-adapted exotics have changed over the decades. But historian/designer Wallace K. Huntington, who worked on the garden for a decade, left his mark, too, with his typically light nudging of the natural landscape into formality.
There’s nothing quite like Elk Rock in the region. Kerr’s heirs left to the Diocese under the condition the garden be open to the public. A small endowment Kerr left helps pay for upkeep, organized by a volunteer group. It’s well worth a visit—but a quiet, contemplative one. And don’t forget to leave a donation!
