Introducing Portland Parks Foundation’s Major Gifts Officer

Say hello to Wendy Mitchell, Portland Parks Foundation’s first-ever Major Gifts Officer.

A child therapist by training, Wendy found herself helping to raise funds early in her professional life. Since then, she's been a fundraiser for nearly every place she’s ever worked. This unexpected lifepath solidified at UC Berkeley, where Wendy spent 20 years in university advancement (academia’s word for fundraising), with 6 of those years at UC Botanical Garden. Her time in Berkeley also sent her on a career track with an emphasis on gardens and the outdoors. From California, she headed to the upcountry regions of Hawaii's Big Island, and eventually on to Oregon, and Portland. She and her husband, Raymond, have lived up the street from Hoyt Arboretum for the last 24 years.

As a Portlander, Wendy has fundraised millions of dollars for a wide variety of well-known organizations. Among these are senior management positions with 1000 Friends of Oregon, the World Forestry Center, Portland Japanese Garden, and Lan Su Chinese Garden. If you're a longtime supporter of our work, Wendy's name may sound familiar. Among her many accomplishments, Wendy ran PPF's 10th Anniversary celebration at Director Park in 2011. 

With over 45 years of nonprofit development experience, Wendy has a comprehensive expertise in all areas of fundraising and philanthropy. In addition to sharing her wealth of knowledge with PPF, Wendy is committed to supporting and mentoring younger generations of development professionals throughout Portland, running a monthly Development Roundtable for 20 years. Wendy also serves as a consultant and board member to many Portland nonprofits. Last but certainly not least, Wendy has continued to practice her original calling as a part-time therapist throughout her career as a fundraiser.

Away from work, Wendy spends a great deal of time trying to keep up with two growing granddaughters who were raised in Forest Park and love climbing trees. As you might have guessed from her photo, Wendy is really an "ocean girl.” When you can’t find her enjoying Portland’s forests, gardens, and parks, it’s probably because she’s escaped to Manzanita, her favorite place in Oregon.

As our Major Gifts Officer, Wendy works closely with our staff and board to secure the contributions needed to support our mission and grow our impact. Wendy's primary focus will be with individuals and businesses wishing to donate $1000 or more each year. To connect with Wendy, email her at wmitchell@portlandpf.org. If you are a current donor, you can also meet Wendy in person at our Donor Appreciation Event on October 26th. Email Wendy for more information, and stay tuned in November when we’ll be introducing Kate, too!

Learn More about Our Staff & Board

Paseo: A Weekend of Music, Food, Art, and Community

What do 100 artists, vendors, community groups, grassroots outdoor organizations, and health groups create on the South Parks Blocks over a gorgeous July weekend: Paseo! Created with an amazing array of advisors, sponsors, and creative minds to celebrate community resilience, PFF’s first festival brought our oldest parks to new life.

PPF was proud to present Paseo, a new festival and community gathering, which took place July 15-17, 2022. Paseo featured music, dance, spoken word, drag, and other creative forms, along with yoga and healthful, family activities in the heart of downtown at the South Park Blocks and Director Park. 

Inspired by the Spanish custom of the evening stroll that reawakens the city, Paseo was conceived and curated by a steering committee of BIPOC social justice and arts leaders. Together, we tapped creators of all ages to offer a wide-angle view of Portland's creative breadth.

Click on the picture above to watch the video and see a quick showcase of the liveliness of Paseo!

Pasoe saw all-ages acts like Teeth and Chainsaw Girl tearing up the DIY scene and mixing music and activism. For more mature fare, there was the legendary Aaron Nigel Smith. Shemanski Plaza was devoted entirely to Indigenous performers and vendors, from the storytelling of Shoshone-Bannock elder Ed Edmo to the multimedia work of the queer, disabled Taino artist AC Ramirez. Director Park featured all-ages DJ's Opal and Anjali. Dance companies like Papi Ada and the Kiki House of Ada and Hula Halau’ Ohana Holo’oko’a elevated movement art to the next level.

Photos by Celeste Noche.

Thanks to our presenting sponsor, PGE, and major sponsorship from the City of Portland and The Standard.

And a special callout to our producers, Vida en Color's Michelle Comer and Carolina Soto Nascimento, Amanda Stubits for organizing the Daa-nu'-yash space, the youth sound engineers of Friends of Noise, and the many volunteers who made Paseo happen!

Welcome, Taylor!

Taylor is a University of Oregon student joining the Portland Parks Foundation as our summer intern. While not a native Oregonian, Taylor has spent the greater part of the last decade in the Portland Metro area, experiencing the wonderful nature and parks that Oregon has to offer. From spending summers volunteering at the Oregon Zoo, nestled in Washington Park, to hiking the gorgeous trails in Forest Park, Taylor has a great appreciation for the nature respites in the city. She is excited to join the team for the summer and increase the accessibility of parks in the Portland area.

At the University of Oregon, Taylor loves to spend as much time as possible outside–when the weather allows. You can find her biking on and off-campus, walking the trails along the Willamette, and attending events at Alton Baker Park. In between studying and enjoying the nature of Eugene, she has worked as a resident assistant and research assistant and continues to be a part of the Corona Corps and Oregon Public Health Corps as a care team caller.

Taylor just completed her third year at the University of Oregon, Clark Honors College. She studies Sociology, General Social Science, and Nonprofit Administration. Her academic studies focus on social structures, criminology, and the prison industrial complex. She will be completing her thesis on prison education programs next year. Taylor will graduate from the UO next June. Her summer internship is a part of the Portland Internship Experience program offered by the University of Oregon.

Announcing PPF’s Spring 2022 Small Grants Recipients

PPF’s Small Grants Program recognizes organizations who are dedicated to increasing the accessibility of our urban parks and nature areas. The Portland Parks Foundation provides support to these organizations who embody our mission; here at PPF “we help people help parks.”

With our small grants, PPF focuses on the people and organizations working to fill gaps in access to parks, so everyone can benefit from the healing and transformative nature of parks. We intentionally prioritize organizations supporting low-income populations, communities of color, and other historically marginalized groups.

This spring, PPF was able to partner with 13 organizations awarding at total of $25,000.

A big thank you to Portland Parks & Recreation for helping to support PPF’s Small Grants Program this year.

Spring 2022 Small Grants Recipients:

• Black Parents Initiative (BPI)

• Friends of Gateway Green (FoGG)

• Impact Northwest and the SUN (Schools Uniting Neighborhoods)

• Independent Publishing Resource Center (IPRC)

• Pacific North West Council of Water Protectors (PNWCWP)

• Portland Opportunities Industrialization Center + Rosemary Anderson High School (POIC + RAHS)

• Prose before Bros

• The Rose City Rollers

• The Bookmobile Babe

• Transformative Living Community, International (TLC, Int’l)

• Urban Nature Partners PDX (UNP PDX)

• Verde

• Atabey BIPOC Medicine

Read about each of the organizations and the work they are doing to help our parks!

Announcing the 2022 Joey Pope Award for Parks Leadership Nominees & 2022 Honoree

Joey Pope

Guided by her belief that parks and the outdoors are for everyone and an essential part of Oregon life, Josephine “Joey” Pope has devoted over four decades of her life to activism, philanthropy, and leadership in making Portland’s parks system more accessible to all.

In the spirit of Joey’s legacy, The Portland Parks Foundation, in partnership with the Pope family, has established an endowment fund to support emerging leaders advancing accessibility and innovation in Portland’s parks system.

This award includes a $10,000 grant plus wrap-around support from PPF to advance the goals of the recipient and their organization.

Nominations were made through an online form open to everyone and promoted through the Foundation’s email newsletter and social media accounts and direct outreach. They were accepted between March 1, 2022 through March 31, 2022.

The 2022 nominees are:

Chad Brown, Love is King

Gabe Sheoships, Friends of Tryon Creek

JoAnn Vrilakas and Dr. Derron Coles, Leach Botanical Gardens and The Blueprint Foundation

Pamela Slaughter, People of Color Outdoors

Pacific North West Council of Water Protectors

Prashant Kadad, Dance United

Rob Whitson, Troll City Boathouse

Urban Nature Partners PDX

Vanport Placemarking Project

Congratulations to Pamela Slaughter of People of Color Outdoors on receiving the 2022 Joey Pope Award for Parks Leadership!

Read about each of the nominees and the incredible work they are doing in our city!

Meet the 2022 Joey Pope Award for Parks Leadership Awardee

Pamela Slaughter, People of Color Outdoors

Pamela Slaughter founded People of Color Outdoors (POCO) where black, indigenous and all people of color can enjoy and learn about nature in a safe, welcoming, caring community. POCO blends networking, outdoors career options, environmental education, history, and outdoor skills—and, “of course, fun”—while bird watching, fishing, canoeing, bike riding, and overnight camping. Still working as a realtor and using little more than email and a Facebook page, she has rallied 3,000 constituents and partnerships with, among many others, Metro, Columbia Slough Watershed Council, Audubon Society, and the Nature Conservancy.

Over the years, Pamela has evolved POCO from simple meet-ups for people of color to a growing program of environmental and cultural education. Since inception, POCO has hosted over 200 outings ranging from hiking, birding, canoeing, snowshoeing, biking and camping. As POCO continues to grow, Pamela has added youth summer camps and training opportunities for POCO members to take specific skill training coursework in order to lead future POCO outings.

Support this work and learn more: www.pdxpocoutdoors.com

Announcing the 2022 U.S. Bank Parks Champions

The U.S. Bank Parks Champion Award recognizes individuals who provide outstanding volunteer service to a park, community center, natural area or community garden. The two winners each receive the opportunity to direct a $1,500 grant from PPF to a community organization that aligns with our vision: to help Portland communities create more equitable access to nature, play, health, and places of connection.

We had 37 outstanding nominations this year. Please read about each of them here. Get inspired, learn about new opportunities to volunteer and how to support organizations where they volunteer.

Some of the nomination highlights include:

• Service spanning decades to places like Leach Botanical Gardens,Forest Park, Mt. Tabor Park, Crystal Springs Rhododendron Garden,Lan Su Chinese Garden and Terwilliger Parkway.

• Placemaking projects in the Brentwood Darlington neighborhood.

• Organizing work parties to maintain parks and public spaces in places like Green Thumb Community Orchard, Leach Botanical Garden, Concordia Neighborhood Parks, Marquam Nature Park, and Wilshire Park.

• Maintaining garden plots, providing food to the community and building plots for people with mobility issues in gardens like Green Thumb Community Orchard, Johns Garden and Fulton Park CommunityGardens.

• Advocating for recreation and programming and creating a sense of belonging through soccer and biking.

• Providing safe and inclusive educational opportunities in nature forBIPOC community members.

• Cleaning up trash and graffiti and increasing safety in Laurelhurst Park.

• Managing countless volunteer groups and inspiring others to join new groups at places like Rose City Bluff and Elizabeth Caruthers Park.

• Providing workshops and resources on bees and native plants.

Here are your 2022 U.S. Bank Parks Champions

Christie Quinn

Christie founded the Bookmobile Babe in 2018, a volunteer-run nonprofit that distributes free books and a free literacy camp for ten weeks in the summer at both Lents Park and Columbia Park. Christie got the idea of starting Bookmobile Babe after volunteering with the Multnomah County Libraries and realizing they didn’t have a mobile way to bring books to the community. Bookmobile Babe distributes free books and offers book exchanges to children ages 1-18 from historically excluded communities. Christie partners with Portland Parks & Recreation, Reading is Resistance, The Children’s Book Bank and local authors to provide diverse literature and reading guides for youth. The Bookmobile Babe also leads discussions about the books on themes such as BLM, indigenous history, environmentalism and offers art activities too.

Laura Campos

Laura has been volunteering and serving SW Portland for decades, bring-ing the view and voice of Native Americans to parks and park activities throughout her civic engagement. A recent example of her volunteer efforts include the Eena (Beaver) Festival held at Multnomah Arts Center in 2021. She brought together SW Neighborhoods Equity & Inclusion Committee, Grand Ronde Tribal members, Westside Watersheds, Neighborhood House, and Multnomah Arts Center to support the event. Through this event the community was introduced to the concept and substance of imparting traditional ecological knowledge (TEK) to the humans occupying their territory. Over the decades she has continued to bring organizations together to better serve the community.

Read about each of the nominees and the amazing volunteer work they are doing in our city!

2022 U.S. Bank Parks Champion Nominees:

• Alicia Craft, Green Thumb Community Orchard

• Alison Hardinh, Lincoln Youth Soccer,

• Anton Vetterlein, Historic Terwilliger Parkway

• Bill Bannister, Forest Park Conservancy

• Bob Dolphin, Whitaker Ponds

• Christie Quinn, Bookmobile babe / Lents Park

• Volunteer, Marx Pedestrian Pathway along SW Broadway Avenue

• Dottie Alberg, Crystal Springs Rhododendron Garden

• Gloria & Tom Wiemann, Leach Botanical Garden

• James Tunley, Laurelhurst Park and neighborhood

• Janet Parenteau, Lan Su Chinese Garden

• Javier Puga-Phillips, Concordia Neighborhood Association (CNA)

• Laura R. Campos, Multnomah Art Center and SW Portland

• Leigh Nunez, Sellwood Community House

• Leslie Smith, Johns Garden

• Marianne Dickinson, Fulton Park community gardens

• Mark Smallwood, Peninsula Park Rose Garden

• Marti Yoder, Elizabeth Caruthers Park

• Nancy and Peter Mogelnicki, Wilshire Park

• Paddy Tillett, Portland Parks Board

• Rachel Burdon, Columbia Park

• Robin Jensen, Marquam Nature Park

• Scott Goodman, Brentwood Darlington Neighborhood

• Stephen Anderson, Colonel Summer Community Garden

• Suzanne Briggs, Rose City Bluff north of the Rose City Golf Course

• Tim Copeman, Gateway Green

• Tom Hernandez, Hoyt Arboretum Friends

Beyond Recreation: Climate, Social Justice, and the Urban Landscape Ahead

Monday, March 28, 2022 6pm on Zoom

As with most American cities, Portland's park system has been shaped by two movements: the City Beautiful/Olmsted tradition of the turn of the 20th century and the mid-century recreation movement. In our parks, we enjoy the beauty and we play.

Researchers, professors, and activists Vivek Shandas and C.N.E. Corbin contend the 21st century demands new approaches. "This is not your grandfather's recreation," says Corbin. "We are entering an ecological reality in which speculation is all we have." In short, we need to imagine and experiment, reconciling what parks, urban nature, and recreation are and who they serve. As climate change, inequities, and political discord become more acute, they argue, we must imagine bolder futures.

Shandas, is a professor in the Nohad A. Toulan School of Urban Studies and founder of the Sustaining Urban Places Research Lab at PSU. He is chair of Portland’s Urban Forestry Commission. Corbin is an assistant professor of Urban Political Ecology. Both are visionaries. Shandas's research on urban tree canopies and heat island effect has been featured in publications and is increasingly used by cities across the world. Corbin studies the relationships between uneven distribution of environmental harms and the uneven development of environmental goods. She incorporates media studies and visual culture, often deploying speculative fiction and Afrofuturism, to understand how images represent and influence environmental and racial understandings of urban spaces.

Thank you for joining us for Beyond Recreation: Climate, Social Justice, and the Urban Landscape Ahead! We are truly grateful to our speakers C.N.E. Corbin and Vivek Shandas.

During the Q&A C.N.E. Corbin and Vivek Shandas recommended these books

• Ecotopia by Ernest Callenbach

• Parable of the Sower by Octavia Butler

• The Hidden Life of Trees by Peter Wohlleben

• The Soil Will Save Us by Kristin Ohlson

And special thanks to our presenting sponsor U.S. Bank and all the attendees who donated at registration!

Presented by

Parks and Consequences—Hidden Histories of Olmsted Parks Tradition, from New York to Portland

Monday, March 14, 6PM on Zoom
and in-person at Steeplejack Brewing Company, 2400 NE Broadway

Portland Parks Foundation is hosting our first live event since 2019 inside the beautiful architecture of a former 1906 Unitarian Universalist Church-turned-brewery as two of Portland's most accomplished historians probe Frederick Law Olmsted's design and creation of Central Park in New York and John Charles Olmsted's 1903 parks plan for Portland.

The brilliance, beauty, and ecological influence of the two Olmsted's visionary work continue to be enjoyed, but they've come with other impacts: displacement of previously settled populations, exclusionary zoning, practices in design, and sanctioned parks activities. We'll look at the successes, the myths, and the influences, intended and not, in both cities and the larger American parks tradition.

Catherine McNeur, is professor of history, PSU, and author of Taming Manhattan: Environmental Battles in the Antebellum City. Carl Abbott, emeritus professor of urban studies and planning, PSU, is author of Portland in Three Centuries and many other books about Portland.

Thank you for joining us in our programming experiment: Parks and Consequences—Hidden Histories of Olmsted Parks Tradition, from New York to Portland!

• Our first live event since 2019

• A new venue

• Our first hybrid live/Zoom event

We are truly grateful to our speakers Catherine McNeur professor of history, PSU, and author of Taming Manhattan: Environmental Battles in the Antebellum City, and Carl Abbot, emeritus professor of urban studies and planning, PSU, and author of Portland in Three Centuries and many other books about Portland.

And special thanks to our presenting sponsor U.S. Bank and all the attendees who donated at registration!

Lastly, a correction:
As moderator, I mistakenly stated that Portland's first Parks Board members were "developers." They were, in fact, Mayor George Williams (Chairman, and variously, a lawyer and judge), Ion Lewis (architect), J.D. Meyer (a "Common City Councilor"), T.L. Eliot (Minister, Unitarian Church), and L.L. Hawkins (banker). My larger point was that Olmsted hoped that his proposed parks would be kept out of public eye so as to not spark land speculation. But in Portland, as in many cities, that wish was not fulfilled. The Oregonian published the plan soon after it was completed as the city was about to expand several-fold in private development. Meantime, Olmsted went on to work for a number of private clients, several of whom were developers. Apologies for the mistake! -- Randy Gragg, Executive Director

If you enjoyed this talk, check out our upcoming Green Dreams Lecture:

• March 28 on Zoom or live at Steeplejack Brewing Co. Beyond Recreation: Climate, Social Justice, and the Urban Landscape Ahead. Get tickets here

Presented by,

Greening Democracy: Frederick Law Olmsted, Slavery, & American Park Design with Sara Zwede

Monday, March 7 at 6pm, Zoom.
Please note: this event is live only and will not be recorded.

Frederick Law Olmsted is best known as America’s most influential public park designer. He and his firm developed parks for countless cities across the continent, from NYC's Central Park to Portland's earliest park system. But to landscape designer Sara Zewde, Olmsted helped shape democracy through his parks, and that began with his travels through, and writing on, the southern Cotton Kingdom. His widely read journalism and books helped galvanize the northern states against slavery before the Civil War.

Historians typically portray Olmsted’s journalism and landscape design as distinct chapters of his career. But to Zewde, landscape architect and professor of landscape design at Harvard University, Olmsted was simply working at “different scales” in a larger project of American social reform. His thinking, she says, encompassed everything from the “national state of democracy to what that means for a path in the park.” In the summer of 2019, Zewde retraced Olmsted’s steps to understand how his travels and observations led to the formation of landscape architecture as we know it today. She will share her research and how she applies Olmsted’s principles in her own award-winning park designs.

During the Q&A Sara Zewde recommended these three books.

• The Park and the People: A History of Central Park by Elizabeth Blackmar and Roy Rosenzweig

• River of Dark Dreams by Walter Johnson

• Colonial Ecology, Atlantic Economy Transforming Nature in Early New England by Strother E. Roberts

And special thanks to our presenting sponsor U.S. Bank, to GreenWorks, and all the attendees who donated at registration!

Presented by,

Meet Three of Our Most Committed Volunteers

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!