Meyer Memorial Trust today announced an initial commitment of $1.3 million to fund nonprofit organizations across Oregon as the state grapples with the COVID-19 pandemic and its effects.
Two grants will fund two efforts put in place in mid-March, after Gov. Kate Brown banned public gatherings of more than 25 people to limit the spread of the novel coronavirus. Meyer granted $330,000 to MRG Foundation's Community Response Fund, which is rapidly deploying resources to community-based organizations at the frontlines of the COVID-19 outbreak in Oregon.
Meyer also made a $1 million grant to fund the Oregon Community Recovery Grant program at Oregon Community Foundation, which is working to provide funds to nonprofit organizations in Oregon that are particularly affected by the outbreak of COVID-19.
“These funds support immediate response efforts to prevent spread of the virus, recovery from the effects of the public health crises and the long-term resilience of nonprofits across Oregon," said Michelle J. DePass, president and CEO of Meyer Memorial Trust. “We are committed to the goal of mobilizing funds with urgency as we begin to better understand the longer-term needs of our communities.”
Meyer opened its 2020 Annual Funding Opportunity on March 16. The 2020 funding call through Meyer's Building Community, Equitable Education, Healthy Environment and Housing Opportunities portfolios aims to support efforts to build inclusive and diverse communities, break down inequities through local and statewide policy, foster systems change and support pathways for people most impacted by decisions to sit at the tables where those decisions are made.
While the annual grantmaking window formally ends April 13, Meyer recognizes that the coronavirus may hinder some organization’s ability to meet the deadline. Those needing flexibility are asked to contact questions [at] mmt.org (questions[at]mmt[dot]org) before April 8.
We open our Annual Funding Opportunity today in a moment of great uncertainty: Oregon is under a state of emergency, schools across the state are closed, offices, including Meyer, are shuttered while staff work remotely, store shelves are empty and all of us are asked to distance ourselves from one another.
Amidst the unsteady conditions caused by the novel coronavirus (COVID-19), Meyer is thinking of our grantee partners. We recognize that our nonprofit partners and the communities they serve — particularly the most vulnerable populations — are being impacted in numerous ways. Our approach will be guided, in part, by both the changing landscape and the insights of our partners.
We are moving quickly to identify ways to respond with support that complements government action and field leadership. We are currently in conversation with other Meyer trustees and staff as well as other philanthropic partners to create responses so the important work of the social sector can move carry on in the face of this crisis. We will sharethose as they become clearer. Please stay tuned.
In the meantime, we want to provide some stability and opportunity to access support for your work and be clear about what we know for now. Here are the current specifics related to the Annual Funding Opportunity:
AFO applications may be submitted starting today and through April 13.
Our funding priorities, process and timeline remain the same as last year.* We will continue to use our one-step application and staff will reach out to applicants as part of the review process.
Meyer staff will work from home through March 31st and Program staff will be available to discuss grant application ideas by contacting questions [at] mmt.org (questions[at]mmt[dot]org). You can also contact grantops [at] mmt.org (grantops[at]mmt[dot]org) for questions about our online application system, GrantIS.
In order to provide equitable access to our process, we have created video tutorials for each of the four portfolio areas here. If you aren’t sure which portfolio your organization fits in, you might find the 2020 AFO Overview video tutorial is a better place to start, linked here.
Our applicant resources page is another area where you can find answers to your grantmaking questions. While Meyer staff are working remotely, general inquiries can also be left on our voicemail at 503-228-5512, which we are monitoring.
For current grantees, we would also like to share that:
We recognize this developing situation may affect your ability to carry out work that you have planned as part of our funding. As always, we want to offer you flexibility. If your operations are impacted as you respond to the coronavirus pandemic, please contact your Meyer grant contact to discuss how to best proceed.
While we are working remotely, we have plans in place to ensure our ability to make grant payments with minimal disruption.
As we make any possible adjustments, we will remain true to our stated values around equity, our priority populations and our portfolio areas.
* Unlike last year, the Building Community portfolio will be accepting proposals from the field — and with a particular emphasis on systems change. Applicants will be able to apply under two different goal areas, including Civic Engagement and Community Connection and Belonging. These goal areas are similar to those that have been put forth over the past few years. We’re asking applicants to demonstrate a commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion, accountability to communities served and experience implementing strategies designed specifically to address the priorities of people of color, Indigenous communities, or immigrants or refugees.
It is times like this that reinforce the importance of your work for a flourishing and equitable Oregon. Thank you for all that you do. We are with you as our communities confront the challenges that lie ahead. And we will keep you apprised as we move forward together.
Meyer’s grantmaking shifted this year to be more responsive and timely and we were pleased to learn that grantees appreciated this shift. Grants for work aligned with the school year were made in the summer and in the fall we made the rest of our Annual Funding Opportunity grants, a total of 142 grants, totaling $17.5 million. I was incredibly impressed by the work and commitment happening across the state of Oregon from rural to urban settings. You can take a look at the full AFO awards list broken down by portfolio and goal.
Here are the highlights of each portfolio.
Equitable Education
The Equitable Education portfolio received 98 applications requesting $13.5 million in funding, with 40 grants totaling $5.7 million eventually awarded. Similar to previous years, this year’s grant recipients include a balanced mix of urban and rural organizations reaching nearly every corner of Oregon. The Equitable Education portfolio’s continued commitment to equity requires us to remain distinctly focused on projects and programs that meet priority student needs, above all. Without these targeted investments, disparities grow, resulting in even greater inequities in the very classrooms where we are trying to eliminate them.
This year, organizations of all types affirmed their commitment to develop solutions designed to eliminate disparities in public education through policy and systems change and direct response to student needs. Among the Equitable Education grantees in the 2019 Annual Funding Opportunity, a few key themes emerged.
Oregon school districts are developing targeted strategies to advance education equity. Tigard-Tualatin School District, for example, will create a wraparound reengagement program for priority students experiencing school disconnection while Southern Oregon Education Service District will address disparities in hiring and retaining staff of color through improvements in their human resource systems.
Other grantees will bring their experience to statewide systems and policy change. Stand for Children and the Confederation of Oregon School Administrators both recognize that for education equity to take hold in Oregon, our state’s leadership, priorities and policies must better reflect the needs and rich diversity of Oregonians.
Acknowledging the need to balance long-term system and policy impact with the urgency to address and improve achievement and college and career readiness for students, groups such as Together We Are Greater Than, College Dreams and Oregon Campus Compact will focus their efforts on key transitional moments to boost student readiness and/or achievement.
The 43 Healthy Environment portfolio grants, totaling $4.8 million, support critical work in rural and urban communities across the state to shift how we work with each other and how we interact with the planet in ways that are grounded in values of justice, ecological sustainability and cooperation. These investments will strengthen front-line and community-based leadership to tackle some of the biggest challenges we face in Oregon: reducing greenhouse gases, shifting how we manage our precious water resources and redesigning land management practices to be adaptive to escalating wildfire risks, smoke and a changing climate, while also maximizing co-benefits for communities that experience disparities.
These are just a few examples of the work we are supporting that will contribute to environmental justice, healthy natural systems, an inclusive environmental movement and community well-being across this remarkable place we call home.
Housing Opportunities
The Housing Opportunities team was able to award 27 proposals, totalling $4.7 million in grants over three years. Meyer is supporting work to build and preserve housing that will be more affordable, give families room to manage their budgets and minimize instances of needing to choose between paying rent or a mortgage and paying for food, medication or school supplies. The investments will also bolster community-based work, grounded in values of equity and inclusion, to bring housing stability to people experiencing multiple forms of systemic oppression. Our partners work to foster stronger, more equitable and effective affordable housing systems using a variety of tools: community organizing and advocacy, applied research, and alignment of housing with health and other systems of care.
A few examples of the work funded in this batch of proposals: Cow Creek Band of Umpqua Tribe of Indians is making progress to build 33 affordable homes for Tribal families in Douglas County. Unite Oregon, in collaboration with the Community Alliance of Tenants, is forming the SW Equity Coalition to implement equitable development actions that empower, stabilize and build capacity among communities in the Southwest corridor of Portland. And Clackamas Women’s Services will work with partners to provide housing support and wraparound services for domestic violence survivors of color, immigrants/refugees, and human trafficking survivors in Clackamas County. We are humbled by the challenges that our nonprofit partners regularly tackle in their efforts to increase housing justice in Oregon.
Building Community
As announced in March, the Building Community portfolio followed a modified approach this year, administering the AFO by invitation to a group of existing grantees that have made significant progress toward meeting BC’s anchor criteria: demonstrated commitment to DEI, engagement in systems change work and raising up constituent voice. In total, 32 organizations received funding totaling $2.27 million.
Organizations in this group work in a broad range of issue areas and with varied approaches. Innovation Law Lab employs a novel legal framework that breaks immigrant rights work into component parts to help visualize and realize pathways to immigrant inclusion. Unite Oregon’s work recognizes that urban models of community organizing do not easily translate to rural communities and that deep differences in language, culture and world view can inhibit potential allies from working together for solutions. Project Access NOW is formulating a referral system that can be more responsive to community health needs. They are doing this through an approach that allows community health workers at community-based organizations to broaden and strengthen impact among communities of color by referring uninsured or underinsured clients to health systems for care.
In addition, the Building Community team launched a small funding opportunity to learn alongside direct service providers that are working to deepen their work toward systems change. Twelve organizations from around the state were selected to participate in a series of three convenings and, as the program concludes, receive funding for a project to deepen their organizational capacity for engaging in systems change work. Funding is expected to total $850,000.
As you can see, there are many organizations doing incredible work in Oregon. It is an honor for us at Meyer to be partnering with these organizations that work so diligently to ensure that underrepresented people’s voices are lifted and cared for. I look forward to continuing to learn more about Oregon and the amazing organizations out there.
You can stay up-to-date with future funding opportunities from Meyer and our outreach plans when you subscribe to our e-newsletter here.
Photo caption: Foreground, waves crash along the shoreline near an Oregon coast cliff. Background, rays of light radiate from a coastal lighthouse into the Pacific Ocean. Photo credit: Jamie Francis Photography.
This time last year, I was in conversation with Meyer staff and leadership about the foundation’s new Director of Program Strategy position. I was excited to think about joining a team that centered equity and lived experience in philanthropy. My career has been intensely focused on building partnerships with grantees and community members, and as I relocated here in January, I eagerly looked forward to connecting with our partners throughout Oregon. I am pleased to have made a number of trips out of Portland to meet with grantees, funders and community members — and one memorable visit to Multnomah Falls with my husband and two young sons — but, candidly, most of my time has been focused on wrapping my arms around the work internally.
That means I’ve used 2019 to deepen my connection with the Meyer’s team, assess our annual funding opportunity process, evaluate our grantmaking work overall and, most importantly, try to learn what the field asks of us and to implement strategic changes to be more responsive. The opportunity for centering grantees in our strategy work is an approach I’m excited to highlight here.
In a shift from years past, we tweaked Meyer’s 2019 Annual Funding Opportunity to be more flexible and timely. All four of our portfolios worked hard to get resources out the door quickly to organizations that needed funding sooner than our typical late fall AFO announcement.
Nowhere is that shift more obvious than Meyer’s Equitable Education portfolio. Schools and districts have made clear the importance of receiving funding prior to the start of the school year in September. You spoke; we listened. This batch includes 18 grants, totaling $2.5 million, nearly all for efforts set to launch with the new school year.
You’ll find the full list of awards made since spring here.
Another big piece of work centered around our Building Community portfolio, which has awarded 39 grants totaling more than $2.4 million since April: This year, we offered an invitation-only closed funding opportunity to refine our focus on systems-level change and direct-service providers. Clarifying those changes led to a robust response to an RFP supporting direct service — you’ll notice those awards among the latest batch of general operating grants, all organizations holding up key pieces of work to make Oregon a flourishing and equitable state. The Building Community portfolio team spoke about these changes (and more) in this interview and FAQ page.
The Building Community portfolio also released a report this summer on two years of Nonprofit Sector Support, shepherded by Carol Cheney, who became Meyer’s DEI manager earlier this year. In case you missed the report summary, it outlines grants Meyer awarded to organizations in 2016 to advance leadership in support of equity and capacity building for diversity, equity and inclusion practice within the nonprofit sector. Meyer worked closely with grantees who engaged in peer learning through 2018. The report reflects shared learning. I invite you to take a look at the summary, here.
For the past several years, Meyer’s environmental funding was delivered through two streams: the Willamette River Initiative for river-related grantmaking and our Healthy Environment portfolio, for statewide work. Together, Meyer’s environmental funding since April amounted to 30 grants totaling $1.8 million. This fall, the 10-year WRI will end, actively transitioning to an independent organization. So the time had come to add a program officer to what had been our smallest portfolio. Hiring a program officer for our environment portfolio increases the team’s capacity to partner deeply with our grantees across Oregon. Meet Mary Rose Navarro.
In addition to grantmaking, Meyer’s Housing Opportunities portfolio hosted its second Equity Housing Summit this summer, a daylong event for housing-focused or homeless service providers to share strengths, insights and lessons to advance diversity, equity and inclusion efforts specifically in rural spaces. You can learn more about the summit in a new blog post from our Philanthropy Northwest Momentum Housing Fellow, Lauren Waudé. You’ll also find resources from the summit, including speeches, materials and the land recognition that started off our day, here. All told, 19 Housing Opportunities grants since April total nearly $1.5 million.
Beyond our portfolio specific awards, Meyer occasionally makes grants to respond to timely needs and opportunities. Since April, Meyer has awarded 24 such grants, totaling $470,000, in support of philanthropy and through the Oregon Immigrant and Refugee Funders Collaborative.
The change in season means we’re approaching the announcement of grantmaking funded through Meyer’s 2019 AFO in November. I look forward to sharing more with you then — and I am especially committed to connecting more directly with community over the next year.
When it comes to affordable housing issues, the legislative session that just wrapped up in Salem was one of the most momentous ever. Advocates won major victories around additional state funding, tenant protections, preservation, attention to manufactured housing and more flexible zoning that will help create more housing choice in desirable neighborhoods across the state. So much important work happened we can barely keep track of it, but our friends at the Oregon Housing Alliance have put together a handy summary here.
It may have been tempting in the past for philanthropic funders to shy away from advocacy, worrying that involvement in “political” work could compromise their moral authority or broader influence in the community somehow. More and more, we all realize that that kind of hesitation marks a huge missed opportunity. Meyer’s housing work has become increasingly engaged in the past few years with supporting advocacy, simply because that’s the path to real impact on the housing issues facing Oregonians. If we want to make a real difference in affordable housing (or the other core issues that define Meyer’s agenda and mission), we need to help build a broader constituency and inform public discussions and decisions that shape how cities, counties and the state address those issues. A Meyer grant may be important to the success of a particular housing project or service program supporting housing, but addressing the issues we care about at scale requires shifting public investments and public policy.
We can’t take credit for the big wins in Salem (or in city halls and county offices around the state), but we’re proud to support grassroots advocates, nonprofit leaders, policy experts and journalists who are building momentum, mobilizing people and crafting effective messaging around affordable housing.
This spring, we released our fourth Request for Proposals specifically to support housing advocacy work, inviting proposals for up to two years, with eligibility broadly defined to include projects that expand the number and diversity of voices engaged in housing advocacy and promote concrete policy and systems changes at both the local and statewide levels. Reflecting the high level of interest and activity around the state, we received 40 proposals — more than any previous housing-focused RFP! We are excited to share the results: 11 new grants totaling $1 million over the next two years:
For a two year initiative to enlarge and increase the effectiveness of BHT’s growing cross-sector coalition to advocate for stronger pro-affordable housing policies and resources in Eugene, Springfield and the rest of Lane County.
To support the Rural Development Housing Advocacy and Communications (RDHAC) initiative over two years, educating community leaders about the need for and contribution of affordable housing in the mid-Willamette Valley, building a stronger and more durable constituency to support more affordable housing development.
To activate business voices to support housing diversity, mobilizing and amplifying the voices of progressive business owners around affordable housing issues in and around Portland.
For a two year collaborative, in partnership with Northwest Housing Alternatives and REACH CDC, mobilizing and supporting tenants of publicly subsidized affordable housing in East Portland to advocate for themselves and for affordable housing broadly. This work will complement and support a broader statewide effort led by the Housing Alliance to engage affordable housing residents.
To support equitable reform of Oregon’s biggest housing subsidy over two years for policy analysis and education concerning the state’s tax deduction for mortgage interest. OCPP will lead an experienced and savvy coalition of advocates to continue a focused, strategic plan for reform that could redirect unprecedented resources to affordable housing in Oregon.
To advance the movement for housing justice and develop leaders in low-income communities of color in East Portland and East Multnomah County and to expand OPAL’s housing justice work in Clackamas and Washington counties.
Q Housing Project $80,000 (Portland Metro)
To launch a two year initiative engaging the LGBTQ+ community in the Portland Metro area around specific unmet housing needs and development of a clear vision and action plan around LGBTQ+ friendly housing for youth, elders and families.
To support Housing: The Next Generation, a news series reporting in-depth statistics and information related to the daunting housing situations confronting younger people in Oregon, utilizing a strong equity lens specifically calling attention to homeless youth, Native American youth, youth aging out of foster care and youth trapped in cycles of generational poverty.
To support Washington County Equitable Housing Coalition, a partnership including HomePlate Youth Services (HPYS) and Community Housing Fund (CHF), to advance an equitable housing agenda that amplifies and incorporates the voices of immigrants, refugees, communities of color and youth into key housing policy discussions taking place over the next two years in Washington County.
To lead a statewide campaign to bring tenant screening policies into compliance with Fair Housing law to enable greater access to rental housing for African Americans and people of color living in Oregon.
$80,000 over two years to inform and influence the region’s push to reduce homelessness and expand the availability of permanent supportive housing (PSH), by centering the experience of people with lived experience in PSH.
We hope you’re as excited about this list as we are! And as impressive as that list is, it doesn’t show ongoing Meyer support for other key partners like the Oregon Housing Alliance, Community Alliance of Tenants, and Housing Oregon.
Katrina Holland, executive director of Community Alliance of Tenants, speaks at a 2016 rally for tenants’ rights. Behind her, from left to right, are Jeri Jimenez, D. Pei Wu, Pastor Mark Knutson and Justin Buri.
It’s been four years since Meyer redesigned its grantmaking to focus on equity. The organization has learned so much over that time, and we’re grateful to support organizations all over the state whose work makes Oregon better for every Oregonian. Looking forward, we want to ensure that our processes and practices make sense for our partners: to balance the weight of a grant with the process of applying for it, to solve for what has become an onerous application process, to time our grantmaking to better serve our grantees.
So we are making some changes in this year’s AFO process:
First, in the spirit of learning from our grantees, we have streamlined Meyer’s application process from two steps to one step. A simpler, single-step process allows for a more personalized, individualized conversation with applicants to inform our grantmaking. If required, additional information will be requested in a follow-up conversation and site visit.
Second, listening to our grantees led us to look at the timing of our education grantmaking. Beginning this year, the Equitable Education portfolio grants that are dependent on the academic school year will be awarded in July; the remaining Annual Funding Opportunity education awards will be announced in December with the bulk of our AFO awards.
Finally, our attempt to remain responsive resulted in the Building Community portfolio becoming a catch-all for applications that fell outside the other three portfolio areas. Over the past three years, it received more than 1,000 applications, with only 20 percent of applicants receiving grants. As a result we learned that we needed to better define and refine the portfolio. This year Building Community will invite key groups working explicitly on systems-level change to apply for about $2.5 million in funding.
Those are the changes. What we won’t change is our commitment to centering those who have been under-represented and historically disinvested, including Native communities and those often unseen or undercounted in rural areas.
We know that the challenges we face can’t be addressed within silos so we will continue to invest in cross-portfolio work that moves the needle on the work of diversity, equity and inclusion and ensures we are tapping the complexity of the strategic areas where we focus.
Beyond our strategic portfolios, Meyer remains committed to responding to relevant and urgent issues, supporting efforts that touch upon the lives of Oregonians. We believe in the importance of the Census Equity Funder Committee of Oregon, working with Portland’s Office of Community & Civic Life and 10 other foundations to ensure an accurate counting in the 2020 U.S. Census. Meyer continues to collaborate with the Health & Education Fund partners to invest in assessing and supporting parent, child, family and community resilience across all sectors. Finally, we remain active supporters of the Oregon Immigrant and Refugee Funders Collaborative designed to address crucial and time-sensitive issues facing immigrants and refugees.
Meyer Memorial Trust recently approved $24 million in grants to organizations working throughout Oregon to remove barriers to equity and create conditions in the state where all individuals thrive. Among the 188 Annual Funding Opportunity grants are efforts to directly dismantle systems perpetuating hate and injustice in Oregon, to push forward systems-level change across rural and urban communities, and to amplify the impact and credibility of community level solutions to advance justice.
Meyer's third Annual Funding Opportunity (AFO) supports 24 new-to-Meyer grantees, has statewide reach and overwhelmingly benefits communities and people who are marginalized and experience disparities. Those priority populations include people of color; lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer Oregonians; immigrants and refugees; women and girls; economically disadvantaged individuals; people with disabilities; indigenous populations and Tribes; and underserved rural communities.
The 2018 funding call includes support for efforts to build inclusive and diverse communities, to break down inequities through local and statewide policy and systems change, to support pathways for people most impacted by decisions to sit at the tables where those decisions are made, to grow organizations so diverse people see themselves reflected at all levels and to help build wealth in communities that have long experienced income disparities.
Specifically, this batch of grants will help build 204 new units of affordable housing and preserve an additional 34 affordable homes. Grants will support 23 organizations working to integrate diversity, equity and inclusion in their services and throughout their operations to better serve Oregonians. And the 2018 grant awards reflect partnerships with four of the state’s nine federally recognized tribes: the Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde; the Confederated Tribes of Siletz Indians; the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation; and the Cow Creek Band of Umpqua Tribe of Indians.
In all, the foundation received 630 AFO applications this year, requesting more than $74 million through Meyer's Building Community, Equitable Education, Healthy Environment and Housing Opportunities portfolios. More than half of the requests were directed to the Building Community portfolio with the remaining spread across the other three portfolios.
Highlights from the Building Community portfolio awards
Meyer provided a $180,000 grant to Mano a Mano to support Radio Poder, a startup full-power, non-commercial FM radio station broadcasting in three indigenous Mexican languages: Purepecha, Mixteco and Trique. Radio Poder, "La Voz del Pueblo," aims to reach a Latinx community of 350,000 people throughout the Willamette Valley with trusted, vital and timely information focused on housing, immigration, workers' and LGBTQ rights, gender, criminal justice, health care, gun and domestic violence, local elections, community leadership, cultural traditions and other equity issues.
Meyer made a $175,000 grant to Elders in Action for coordination of a coalition focused on improving policies and services for low-income older Oregonians in Multnomah County. One-eighth of the county's population of 800,000 people are over 60 years old, the fastest growing demographic, projected to increase by 60 percent by 2025.
Meyer also made a grant of $99,600 to Self Enhancement Inc., to support the Portland African American Leadership Forum, which is implementing a newly adopted, community-driven strategic business plan. The Portland African American Leadership Forum, which helps Oregon's Black community build political participation and leadership, takes seriously the words of civil rights activist Fannie Lou Hamer: "Nobody's free until everybody's free."
These grants are among 61 Building Community portfolio awards, totalling more than $7.7 million, aimed at making Oregon a place where all Oregonians can be part of vibrant communities they help to shape and where they feel valued, represented and seen.
"We're looking for projects that propel systemic change in tangible ways," wrote Building Community portfolio director Dahnesh Medora in his blog post announcing the 2018 Annual Funding Opportunity awards. His team sorted through more than 350 applications. "This philosophy and belief in systems-level change is fundamental to what we do at Meyer: support solutions that counteract and fix the underlying issues of inequities and not just the symptoms that create the need for a given program or service."
Read more about the Building Community grants here.
Highlights from the Equitable Education portfolio awards
Meyer provided a $100,000 grant to the American Indian Science and Engineering Society for programming in computer science, science, technology, engineering and mathematics for Tribal and urban Native students throughout Oregon. The American Indian Science and Engineering Society (AISES) was founded 41 years ago with the mission of substantially increasing the representation of American Indians, Alaska Natives and Pacific Islanders in STEM-related fields. The grant is one of 40 Equitable Education portfolio awards, totalling nearly $5.2 million and leveraging strategic impact for an Oregon where all students have true opportunity to pursue their dreams.
Meyer made a $141,933 grant to Chemeketa Community College for a program that will increase the number of biliterate and bilingual teachers in Oregon schools. Last year, 31 states — including Oregon — reported teacher shortages in the areas of bilingual, dual-language immersion or English as a Second Language education. These shortages reflect a national struggle to find teachers with needed pedagogical knowledge and skills to support the country's growing English language learner student population.
Meyer also made a grant of $120,000 for innovative academic programming to help low-income, rural youths in Harney County go to college and become career ready. Dozens of the current batch of AFO grants serve rural and frontier communities and Tribes in communities that are home to 16 percent of Oregon's population of 4.1 million people.
Matt Morton, the Equitable Education portfolio director, explained how Meyer's education strategy guided his team through 99 applications: "We remain laser focused within our lane and to support projects that don't just feature high representation of our priority students. We have to fund projects that meet and satisfy student needs, above all," in his award announcement blog. "Without targeted investments for those experiencing disparities, disparities grow, resulting in even greater inequities in the very classrooms where we are trying to eliminate them."
Read more about the Equitable Education grants here.
Highlights from the Healthy Environments portfolio awards
Meyer provided a $165,000 grant to the Bonneville Environmental Foundation (BEF) for expansion of a pilot program that brings community solar projects to serve low-income residents in Oregon. The poorest 20 percent of Americans pay a disproportionately large share of income for their energy. The pilot is part of BEF's efforts to build an inclusive clean energy movement to support the economic vitality of disadvantaged communities while also improving the environment. The grant is one of 55 Healthy Environment portfolio awards, totalling $5.3 million and helping to diversify Oregon's environmental movement.
Meyer made an $86,000 grant to Beyond Toxics for a collaborative addressing environmental racism, health and justice issues affecting African American, Latinx and immigrant communities in Jackson, Josephine and Lane counties. Oregon's environmental justice organizers demand that government policies and business practices use a framework of justice and equity to protect all Oregonians from environmental harm.
Meyer also made a grant of $100,000 to the Forest Stewardship Council Investments and Partnerships to expand the market for sustainably sourced construction materials grown in Oregon and the Pacific Northwest. The globally recognized leadership standard for forest management, FSC requires stringent forestry practices to prohibit deforestation, to protect rare old growth forests and threatened and endangered species, to strictly limit clearcutting, to restrict the use of highly hazardous pesticides, and to protect the rights of Indigenous peoples on public and private lands.
"One of the new developments in this pool of awards is a robust collective of grants to Tribes and Native-led organizations that seek to elevate and integrate Indigenous knowledge and practices into conservation and environmental protection efforts across the state," Portfolio director Jill Fuglister wrote in her latest blog. Half a dozen grants serve Oregon Tribes and Native American communities across the state, grantmaking that reflects the portfolio's renewed efforts to strategize more closely with Oregon's sovereign tribal neighbors. "Not only are we delighted to support these efforts, but we are excited to learn more about how traditional ecological knowledge of indigenous communities and Western science can work together to support healthy natural systems and communities."
Read more about the Healthy Environment grants here.
Highlights from the Housing Opportunities portfolio awards
Meyer provided a $200,000 grant to Sponsors Inc. to build five tiny house duplexes for people with criminal histories in Lane County. Plans call for each home to be just under 300 square feet and rent for around $300 a month. Average rents in Eugene run $1,250, with studio apartments renting on average for $840, one-bedroom apartments for $980 a month and two-bedroom apartments for $1,170. The grant is one of 33 Housing Opportunities portfolio awards, totalling more than $5.8 million, addressing thorny housing issues throughout Oregon.
Meyer made a $185,000 grant to the Coalition of Communities of Color to support an Oregon-wide network of housing advocates of color and culturally specific organizations active in housing issues. Affording a safe and stable place to live remains a challenge for many Oregonians, particularly renters. Housing costs weigh more heavily on communities of color, especially for the state's African American community, where seven in ten households are renters, double the rate of non-Hispanic white Oregon households.
Meyer also made a grant of $135,000 to Northeast Oregon Network (NEON), for the Housing Matters Collaborative, which is focused on increasing affordable housing options for low-income and vulnerable families and individuals in rural Union County. Residents of Oregon's more isolated areas struggle to find safe, affordable places to live despite lower costs of living because incomes in many rural areas are also significantly lower thanks to limited economic opportunities and struggling or dormant industries.
"Knowing that our funds are limited, we look for strategic investments that reflect an understanding of racist and discriminatory housing practices that have created disparities and work to eliminate those imbalances through collaboration, systems-level change and resource alignment," Theresa Deibele, director of the Housing Opportunities portfolio, wrote in her blog announcing $5.86 million in grants. "We applaud our partners in the field — including Sponsors, CASA of Oregon and dozens of others — that remain committed to solving some of the hardest issues in affordable housing and breaking down barriers to equity that have likely been in place for decades, possibly generations."
Read more about the Housing Opportunities grants here.
And take a look at the full AFO list here, or for a more visual experience, check out these spreadsheets with the 188 grants broken down by portfolio, goal and counties served.
Meyer is also excited to announce another 44 grants totaling $1.58 million made outside the annual funding call; check out that list here.
Through our Annual Funding Opportunity, this year the Housing Opportunities portfolio saw many of our partners propose innovative solutions to address some of the most complex housing challenges in Oregon. In surveying the awards, grit and creativity rise to the top as two of the most prominent themes of the efforts of this year's 33 grant recipients — taken from 78 applicants — receiving awards totaling $5.86 million.
And, yes, like previous years, projects funded in 2018 span the entirety of our state, from urban to rural regions and include large and small organizations focusing on single efforts and group collaborations. And a few organizations were funded by Meyer for the first time.
Each year, we seek grant proposals that will move us closer to our vision of safe, affordable, long-term housing for all Oregonians. Knowing that our funds are limited, we look for strategic investments that reflect an understanding of racist and discriminatory housing practices that have created disparities and work to eliminate those imbalances through collaboration, systems-level change and resource alignment. That's the joy and challenge of working within this portfolio. Needs make themselves known and we respond. It's our job to find them.
Thankfully, our partners make that easy.
We'll take a closer look at two topics that gained traction in this year's batch: replacement of substandard manufactured housing and providing housing for formerly incarcerated people.
When Meyer established its initial housing goals five years ago, preservation of rural manufactured housing was one of our key strategies. We knew that manufactured housing is a primary source of affordable housing in many rural Oregon communities. A significant percentage of those homes were built before 1980, and many are in significant disrepair, forcing families to live in unstable and unhealthy environments and pay a significant portion of their limited incomes on utility costs. Our partners labored for years to piece together the puzzle of resources needed to replace these substandard homes at a price families could afford.
Four proposals funded in this batch focus on replacing dilapidated mobile homes. Each proposal comes at it from a unique angle, bringing expertise and connections to address part of the issue. For example, we've been working with Community and Shelter Assistance of Oregon on housing issues for a number of years. This year, CASA of Oregon received a two-year grant to fund a replacement strategy manager position that will both manage and document the ambitious collaboration happening at a resident-owned cooperative park in southern Oregon.
That means fewer repairs, lower energy bills and healthier homes. Better homes allow families to focus more energy on career, education and family goals. Families will also feel empowered because they'll be living in new homes that can be preserved for the next generation.
We at Meyer are even more buoyed by the long-term ripple effect this model may one day achieve.
A critical component of the newly funded position at CASA of Oregon is to memorialize every phase of the process so that other organizations throughout the state can reproduce and adapt its processes to fit their needs and unique circumstances. It's thrilling to imagine the number of new homes for low-income individuals and families, immigrants and elderly people that may emerge from this project.
Three other proposals in this batch are also immersed in manufactured housing. When viewed together, the collective work is poised to make big strides that can address the thorny issues around manufactured housing replacement.
Neighborhood Economic Development Corporation has engaged in a range of homeownership counseling services, such as financial capacity building, matched savings accounts, reverse mortgages and foreclosure counseling. Increasingly, it was seeing owners of manufactured housing coming in with requests but found it was ill-equipped to serve them because of distinct differences inherent in manufactured housing. Meyer's grant will support NEDCO staff focused on manufactured housing education and counseling services over two years.
Craft3 received a two-year grant to pilot a funding model with the Energy Trust of Oregon to replace aging and unsafe manufactured homes in southern Oregon with healthy, energy-efficient models, helping low- and moderate-income homeowners with long-term housing stability.
Meyer supported St. Vincent de Paul Society of Lane County to preserve needed affordable housing at Saginaw Mobile Home Park. With many park homes deemed unlivable, the grant will help to replace existing single-wide manufactured homes with new, energy-efficient models and improve the health, safety and long-term viability of the park.
We also saw breakthrough work this year from Sponsors, which provides transitional and long-term housing services to previously incarcerated individuals, for whom firm grounding in the housing market has always proven elusive. The Sponsors grant will staff and support a multi-sector collaborative integrating comprehensive case management and parole and probation supervision support with permanent supportive housing for the prison re-entry population in the Lane county area.
This level of assistance is essential. Individuals released from prison often can't compete for housing in the marketplace for numerous reasons: a prison record, inadequate rental history, lack of funds, the absence of a job and so on. Yet housing is the most stabilizing factor in a person's life and provides a crucial platform for employment, education and health.
Sponsors works directly with Homes for Good, which is familiar with supporting high needs populations, to ensure a holistic approach to property management and solving housing disputes in an equitable way before resorting to evictions. The pilot was extremely successful, achieving a one-year housing stability rate of 87 percent and a one-year incarceration recidivism rate of only 2.4 percent. Recent analysis conducted by the Oregon Criminal Justice Commission found that the one-year felony re-conviction rate among residents at one of the Homes for Good sites with Sponsors was 60 percent lower than the Oregon state baseline.
Sponsors has been working for years to make housing less daunting to this vulnerable population. The rest of us are just catching up to their good work.
We applaud our partners in the field — including Sponsors, CASA of Oregon and dozens of others — that remain committed to solving some of the hardest issues in affordable housing and breaking down barriers to equity that have likely been in place for decades, possibly generations. It is only through our partners' work that Meyer will see strides toward our mission of an equitable and flourishing Oregon.
A full list of the grants in this year's Annual Funding Opportunity batch can be found here.
A guiding principle for the Healthy Environment portfolio is to support work that transform the systems which create and sustain inequities and environmental degradation in our communities. This means changing the rules, relationships, roles and practices in institutions and systems — large and small — that shape culture, politics, the economy, how we manage natural resources and more.
As I consider the 55 grants totaling $5.32 million that we awarded this year through Meyer's Annual Funding Opportunity, I see a common vision woven throughout that seeks to undo the extractive, transactional and damaging relationships we have with the planet and each other to advance new and proven approaches at all levels — organizational, local, regional and state — that are based on values of justice, cooperation, ecological sustainability and equity.
The breadth of applicants and grantees this year reflects the continued scope of this portfolio: advancing solutions toward climate change and climate justice, land and forest conservation, clean air, watershed health and green workforce development. Awards include small technical assistance grants, particularly for organizational development work to deepen internal diversity, equity and inclusion efforts, as well as support for larger projects and broader state policy efforts.
One of the new developments in this pool of awards is a robust collective of grants to Tribes and Native-led organizations that seek to elevate and integrate Indigenous knowledge and practices into conservation and environmental protection efforts across the state. Not only are we delighted to support these efforts, but we are excited to learn more about how traditional ecological knowledge of Indigenous communities and Western science can work together to support healthy natural systems and communities.
This collective of Tribe and Native-led projects includes:
$185,000 to The Confederated Tribes of Siletz Indians to fund a natural lands conservation plan that integrates the Tribes' cultural and healthy traditions goals.
$176,037 to The Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation to support a program that will improve air quality and mitigate health impacts related to prescribed burning for wildfire management.
$249,850 to support a collaborative effort of five Tribal communities — The Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde, The Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation, The Confederated Tribes of the Warm Springs Reservation of Oregon, The Confederated Tribes of Siletz Indians and the Nez Perce Tribe — to study and assess the loss in Tribal natural resource services of importance to the governments and members of the Tribes as a result of contamination in Portland Harbor and to integrate this information into watershed and habitat restoration in the lower Willamette.
$50,000 to The Confederated Lower Chinook Tribes and Bands to purchase, protect and revitalize the Tribes' historically important Tansy Point treaty grounds.
$136,978 to the Nez Perce Tribe to support the integration of Tribal knowledge into Wallowa Lake management that will benefit Tribal members and Wallowa County communities.
$185,000 to Wisdom of the Elders to train Native American adults living in both urban areas and on reservations about Native plant nursery work and to help them develop agricultural careers and/or micro-enterprises using these new skills.
One aspect of the legacy of colonization is how it privileges the colonizer's viewpoint related to land, which is oriented around concepts of "ownership" and "private property," rather than an Indigenous perspective, which is oriented around the concept of a reciprocal relationship with the land. In short, colonization has destroyed, exploited and invisibilized Indigenous communities and their approach to environmentalism. A common example of this is the predominance of Western science information in environmental education versus an approach that also includes spiritual or cultural values and understanding of the environment. Another example is the commodification of plants by pharmaceutical companies based on Indigenous community knowledge and medicinal use of these plants.
The Tribe-led projects that we are funding this year disrupt this colonial legacy and integrate cultural and traditional ecological knowledge with Western science in their efforts to protect and restore ecosystems. They embody what we in Meyer's Healthy Environment portfolio are trying to achieve.
I'm pleased to celebrate our partnership with the grantees that I've highlighted here as well as the other organizations that we are honored to support this year. View a full list of Healthy Environment grantees here.
I look forward to entering 2019 in search of new opportunities for partnership and to build on our portfolio's growing body of environmental justice and conservation work that aims to benefit communities experiencing disparities in Oregon and change the institutions and systems that perpetuate inequities.
History tells us that extraordinary change begins by way of small but significant steps that often aren't even visible at first glance.
For example, as we welcome this portfolio's Annual Funding Opportunity awards, I notice, on the surface, similar numbers as last year: 99 applications requesting $12.8 million in funding, with 40 grants totaling $5.16 million eventually awarded.
Grant recipients also include, once again, a broad mix of urban and rural organizations stretching from Portland to eastern Oregon. There are both independent and collaborative team efforts, featuring organizations of all types, trying to redress disparity in public education from different approaches: by amending policy and systems and by proposing both short and long-term impacts.
But as I dig deeper through the numbers and each of the 2018 grant proposals, I see a reason — woven subtly into the many narrative threads of this year's grantees — to be excited by the potential of seismic, systemic change in education across the state. The organizations funded reveal a small wave of momentum that clarifies the guiding, game-changing spirit of this portfolio. Our North Star, if you will.
That tiny murmur actually made its presence known last year, during our inaugural season, when we funded a multi-year $250,000 grant for Oregon Coast Community College (OCCC) in Newport. In a sentence, the proposal outlined a collaboration between OCCC, the Lincoln County School District, Tillamook Bay Community College and Western Oregon University to grow a teacher workforce for Lincoln County.
The details, however, revealed a deeper story that's still progressing and will continue to evolve for some time.
It's no secret there is a shortage of teachers in Oregon coastal communities. But more importantly, data show that the teaching workforce in the state is 90 percent white even though the student body — like the coastal population as a whole — is increasing in racial diversity. The OCCC proposal recognized this inequity and formulated a plan to recruit high school students of color who have an interest in teaching. The collaborative effort seeks to shepherd students from high school into a community college network and then onto four-year institutions such as Western Oregon University, where they can prepare for the professional credentialing process.
This year, to our delight, the trend involving community colleges continued but in an even more targeted way. Columbia Gorge Community College and Chemeketa Community College each proposed plans similar to OCCC's in scale and focus. Their proposals call for direct outcomes intended to recruit and transition a diverse student pool into the teaching profession so they may eventually serve their respective communities. Aside from diversifying the workforce in their regions, each proposal applauds diversity itself: Biliteracy is treated as a tool meant to be celebrated, one that adds to the life potential of bicultural students.
Only time will show if these unique, forward-thinking projects achieve fruition, but I believe they will. The implications could be staggering and could tell us several critical things.
In 1991, the Oregon Legislature passed the Minority Teacher Act, which means Oregon has been working to close the diversity gap between students and teachers for 27 years. But the progress made over nearly three decades has been modest, perhaps because it's difficult for members of any legislature to commit to systemic change when the state operates on two and four-year cycles. But here's the problem: You can't plan for long-term solutions when you don't have time for leverage.
This is where philanthropic organizations like Meyer can add to the discussion and make a tangible difference. For example, over the past two years we have received education grant requests that exceed $35 million in funding. For us, this is evidence of the depth of need that is out there. Although our $5.16 million in grants for equitable education are microscopic compared with Oregon public school system budgets that total in the billions, we aren't tied to limited duration planning cycles that understandably handcuff risk-taking for the sake of pragmatism.
These projects also buttress what those of us working in the education sector have always believed: Community colleges are uniquely poised to serve as low-barrier intermediaries for diverse student populations. What's more, they have the entrepreneurial initiative to build enduring and replicable networks that catapult students toward achieving their dreams.
As I look at the first two years of funding opportunities as one continuous story, I see three proposals that, while unrelated to one another practically, emanate from the same governing spirit and ethos: School districts and the communities they serve recognize the value of empowering their diverse populations and providing students with educators who reflect their history and backgrounds. Community colleges have taken note and are acting on it.
Collectively, these events spur Meyer and the Equitable Education portfolio to think about the job we're doing and how it can be done better as we move forward.
Three years ago, we at Meyer decided to focus our efforts exclusively on achieving equity in Oregon. For those of us working in the Equitable Education portfolio, that now means we must always hew to the meaning of the word "equitable" and our North Star of advancing meaningful public education for anyone who has faced enduring, systemic barriers to equal access: students of color, those living in poverty or as part of the foster care system, young people with disabilities, members of the LGBTQ community and more.
Practically, our commitment to equity demands we remain laser focused within our lane and to support projects that don't just feature high representation of our priority students. We have to fund projects that meet and satisfy student needs, above all. Without targeted investments for those experiencing disparities, disparities grow, resulting in even greater inequities in the very classrooms where we are trying to eliminate them.
Our efforts have a chance to operate as a catalyst for change and possibly shift how institutions conduct business. One day, for example, we may even alter how public resources are spent or advance ideas that other institutions can emulate without fear of risk.
Admittedly, I'm describing game-changing, potentially transformative, scenarios here. But this year's annual funding opportunity fills me with the potential of promise that, after two years, the Equitable Education portfolio is very much on to something.
— Matt
P.S. I encourage you to review the full list of 2018 Equitable Education Annual Funding Opportunity grantees here.
