منحت منطقة East Multnomah Soil and Water Conservation من منح شركاء في الحفظ (PIC) لعام 2025 منحًا تبلغ قيمتها الإجمالية 1,322,681 دولار أمريكي في شكل تمويل جديد. Our PIC grants provide financial support for projects that improve water and soil quality, restore fish and wildlife habitat, expand community gardens, and create job opportunities in agriculture and the natural resources economy. They specifically benefit communities experiencing disparities in environmental health and provide access to nature and the land. This year, EMSWCD funded 29 nonprofits, Indigenous organizations, schools, and local government organizations. The list of PIC 2025 grantees is below.
1000 أصدقاء ولاية أوريغون، $ 20,320
مبادرة قيادة استخدام الأراضي 2025
This grant will support the 2025 Land Use Leadership Initiative (LULI) in the Portland Metro region. LULI broadens and diversifies support for and participation in land use decisions that shape our cities, our natural working lands, and our community resilience. LULI focuses on a specific geographic area and brings together 20-25 community leaders for 9 sessions over 5 months to gain technical knowledge about land use decisions, learn about the most pressing land conservation and development issues in their community, and equip participants with resources and relationships to leverage as they engage in land use issues that matter to them. A major goal of the program is to build power among a diverse, grassroots network of advocates who continue working together after the cohort has ended.
Adventist Health Portland، $ 30,000
Adventist Health Portland Community Garden
Adventist Community Garden partners with Outgrowing Hunger to provide a 40,000-square-foot garden located in outer Southeast Portland serving low-income families who are primarily Nepali and African refugees. The project will expand the garden, increase visibility, and make upgrades that support long-term sustainability.
Black Oregon Land Trust، $ 20,000
Sacred Waters, Restoring Riparian Habitat
This grant will engage the community through environmental education, and hands-on restoration activities that empower marginalized communities as stewards of land and water.
City of Wood Village، $ 12,000
Wood Village Community Garden
Over the last few years, there has been renewed community interest in creating a community garden. The City Council and Parks Commission both approved creating a new community garden located behind the Wood Village City Hall and Civic Center. The new garden will begin with 12 raised beds with opportunities for growth based on community interest. The City is exploring community garden management options through external organizations equipped with the expertise and staff to do so with the hope of building a culturally responsive community garden with opportunities for not only growing food but also for building community connections.
كولومبيا لاند ترست، $ 50,000
الحد من الحواجز وإشراك المجتمعات منخفضة الموارد في مقاطعة إيست مولتنوماه
Backyard Habitat Certification Program has a multi-pronged approach to engaging community members in regreening landscapes where they live and gather, such as partnering with culturally specific groups on ongoing, long-term projects. With partner Verde, the program will enroll and install free raingardens or naturescapes for low-income households in North, Northeast, and East Portland neighborhoods. Site visits, site-based guidance, and ongoing support are provided for people stewarding the land where they live and gather, prioritizing low-income, BIPOC, immigrant, and disability community members. The program will also provide enhanced support to equity-focused community sites for their on-the-ground restoration efforts. Engagement with community liaisons will help incorporate feedback and determine needs and future ideas for new projects.
كولومبيا ريفر كيبر، $ 70,000
مشروع تعليم ومراقبة نهر كولومبيا
The grant will fund projects in two of Columbia Riverkeeper’s program areas: Stopping Pollution (environmental justice at the Bradford Island and surrounding waters Superfund site) and Engaging Communities (job training and water quality monitoring). Together, Columbia Riverkeeper will work with Yakama Nation to engage diverse communities fishing near Bradford Island and surrounding waters; monitor harmful algal blooms and E. coli at nine popular beaches (sharing results in English and Spanish) and offer job-skills training to paid interns. The two projects tap into their experience working with Tribal Nations, public engagement, toxic pollution, applying DEI practices in recruitment, hiring and training, and water sampling.
علم البيئة في الفصول الدراسية وفي الهواء الطلق، $ 34,012
Aves Compartidas: Engaging Latinx Students in Habitat Conservation
The Aves Compartidas program engages approximately 270 students from two dual-language schools: Lent and Alder Elementary. Building on our proven success, we will refine lessons using new insights and reintroduce off-site field experiences to local natural areas in partnership with local organizations, providing students with real-world experience in ecology and restoration. In addition, we will integrate engagement opportunities with environmental professionals such as arborists, hydrologists, and biologists, enriching learning and inspiring students to envision future green careers. By refining lessons and forging stronger partnerships, this program enhances student learning and stewardship while strengthening ECO’s capacity to implement large-scale restoration projects in the future.
Ecotrust، $ 50,000
Green Workforce Academy: Building Environmental Justice in Portland’s Green Sector
This funding will support the Green Workforce Academy, a 5-week paid training program designed to increase Native and Black participation in green industry jobs in Portland. Offered two to three times a year, each session engages up to 12 Black, Indigenous, or other participants of color in 120+ hours of learning experiences in the classroom and in the field. Class days focus on culturally specific environmental education developed and taught by educators who are Black and/or Native. The classroom sessions are paired with hands-on experience with green industry partners. This combination of classroom and fieldwork provides a comprehensive view not only of green job pathways but also connects students with potential employers, internships, and continuing education opportunities.
شركة ELSO، $ 63,633
ELSO Inc: Tappin’ Roots Program Expansion
Created in 2019, Tappin’ Roots is a collaborative internship program that provides 15 Black and Brown high school youth in Oregon with paid work experience, mentoring from Black and Brown experts, and a 7-part Symposium series and training week to build leadership skills, job connections, and hands-on experience with STEAMED concepts. Tappin’ Roots exit interviews in 2023 revealed that more than 85% of participants developed an increased desire to pursue STEM majors and/or career paths because of participating in this program. A grant from EMSWCD will allow ELSO to expand our current program partnerships, improve our Culmination event, and provide additional resources to better engage our interns in outdoor education.
أصدقاء مزرعة زنجر، $ 70,000
School and Community programs, Farm internship program
تسعى Zenger Farm إلى زيادة عدد المزارعين المتنوعين من خلال تدريب الجيل القادم من منتجي الأغذية المحليين ومن خلال توفير برامج تعليمية يسهل الوصول إليها للشباب والأسر لبناء مسارات لـ BIPOC والنساء والمزارعين غير الثنائيين في منطقة بورتلاند متروبوليتان في المستقبل. عبر البرامج، سيوفر منهجنا بيئة تعليمية شاملة ومستجيبة ثقافيًا وتركز على العمل المناخي لأربعة (4) متدربين من المزارعين المبتدئين، وستة (6) متدربين في المزرعة، و600 طالب من طلاب الصف الخامس في منطقة مدارس ديفيد دوغلاس، و5 شخص مشاركين في عائلتنا برمجة.
مزرعة اللطف، $ 49,500
Kindness Farm: Environmental Stewardship and Education for Youth, Immigrants and Refugees, and Underserved Communities
This program works to address health and wellness disparities in youth, adults, and seniors from underrepresented communities by providing: ongoing, experiential environmental education of regenerative, holistic practices (including understanding of the interconnectedness between our actions, the environment’s health, and our health); access to a safe, inclusive natural space for communal gathering and for this learning to take place; access to the experience of growing food; and access to the tools needed to build food security and sovereignty. Through partnerships with schools and various immigrant and refugee groups, and experiential community learning days, we work with our community to build an equitable and resilient foundation that will serve all of us for years to come.
أصدقاء حديقة ليتش، $ 50,050
The Back 5 Habitat Enhancement Project
The Back 5 Community Habitat Enhancement Project is a collaborative project to restore a 5-acre portion of Leach adjacent to our main 12-acre campus. The Back 5 was acquired in 1999 as an educational/community science site. Planning began in 2017 and 2018, with active restoration and monitoring efforts beginning in 2019, partnering with organizations primarily serving underserved and BIPOC youth. With the first two acres opening to the public in Spring 2025, Leach seeks funding to support the ongoing development of Back 5 programming for participating organizations, youth, and the public.
معمل حدائق التعلم، $ 70,000
Learning Gardens Lab
This grant will support reinvigorating the Learning Gardens Lab (LGL) and its long-standing garden education programs for K5 and middle school students, fostering ecological literacy, food security, and climate resilience. This multifaceted program integrates experiential, holistic gardening and Next Generation Science Standards-based science education through after-school sessions, field trips for PPS students in the EMSWCD area, and student-led projects. By re-establishing this program, we will engage youth in ecological systems while building a sustainable and inclusive food system for the Portland community. The garden not only contributes to the development of sustainable food systems and closed-loop agricultural processes but also serves as an ecologically rich community site.
مركز الشباب والأسرة الأمريكيين الأصليين، $ 69,808
Wapas Nah Nee Shaku (NAYA food sovereignty garden)
Wapas Nah Nee Shaku provides urban Native people a place to gather on land, deepening relationships to place by growing healthy traditional foods, traditional medicines, and land-based healing through ceremony. This grant will resource a Native Food Sovereignty Internship to equip aspiring Native farmers and land stewards with Indigenous Traditional Ecological Cultural literacy and farming skills. Interns will maintain three project areas: the First Foods, Medicine, and Organic Market gardens. Interns will receive training from experienced farmers, culture bearers, and green workforce staff. This experience will build the interns’ skills in ecological food production, soil health, Indigenous Traditional Ecological and Cultural Knowledge, medicine tending, seed saving, and career pathways.
فيلق شباب الشمال الغربي، $ 68,398
NYC Inclusive Youth Stewardship Project
NYC Inclusive Youth Stewardship Project will engage 48 Portland teens and eight leaders, from diverse backgrounds during the summers of 2025 and 2026. Crews will carry out habitat restoration and conservation on nine acres of plants installed by Friends of Trees in East Portland neighborhoods; eradicate invasive species; install deer fencing; sheet mulch; help harvest and plant at the 2.5-acre Kindness Farm; and complete noxious weed removal and other activities on four acres at the Dharma Rain Zen Center. NYC is also exploring how crews can collaborate with Depave on a small project. After each workday, the crews earn academic credit through environmental education to understand that they play a role in protecting wild plant and animal species and their habitats.
حدائق قريتنا، $ 50,000
Building Food Resilience Through Community Garden and Growing Projects
This grant will support the impact and reach of Our Village Gardens’ Growing Projects, including the Seeds of Harmony Community Garden, Fruits of Diversity Community Orchard, and the Neighbor-to-Neighbor Veggie Share Box initiative. These programs build community resilience and provide access to green spaces and fresh, healthy, and culturally relevant food. This year’s priorities of capacity building, enhancing growing spaces, and promoting culturally diverse practices are efforts that amplify growing projects and community organizing initiatives in Oregon’s largest affordable housing neighborhood, New Columbia.
تجاوز الجوع، $ 25,000
Hand-Scale Farmer Mentoring and Support
This project will continue to increase sustainable agriculture skills and help achieve business viability for a cohort of 35-40 immigrant and refugee farming entrepreneurs. These growers come from Southeast Asia, Africa, Eastern Europe, and Central America bringing widely varying sophistication and practice, but all aspire to make their livelihoods through mixed-veg and small animal farming in the outskirts and forgotten corners of the Portland Metro Area. Grant funding will provide dedicated staff time for in-language mentoring, skill-building workshops, and on-farm demonstrations of techniques that increase soil health, build biodiversity, and reduce irrigation and fertilizer use while supporting an abundant harvest.
العب تنمو تعلم، $ 70,000
برنامج التوجيه الزراعي 2025
Play Grow Learn is continuing previous environmental education, workforce development, and conservation-oriented agricultural and nature programming throughout east Multnomah County through paid youth stewardship, conservation, and restoration internships at Nadaka Park; organizing and hosting partner-led environmental and ag internships; operation of a farmers market, and outreach and engagement of low-income and communities of color to develop more self-sufficiency through agricultural skill building.
Portland All Nations Canoe Family، $ 20,000
Restoring Rocks and Habitat
This project will support research and community engagement about the historical and environmental connections between Johnson Creek and the Columbia Gorge. Portions of Johnson Creek are still constrained by a wall built in the 1930s by the Works Progress Administration. Per the City of Portland’s Bureau of Environmental Services, much of the material used to build this wall was sourced from the Columbia River Gorge during excavations to prepare for building the Dalles Canal and Dam. To create a plan for the restoration of Salmon habitat, project partners will research the WPA archives; learn from BES about their success in removing the wall elsewhere; and engage the community.
Portland Food Forest Initiative، $ 37,944
Hughes Community Food Forest
This project will convert Hughes Memorial Church’s 8000 sq ft lawn and neglected garden into a community food forest and native pollinator habitat. Stewarded by community members trained by PFFI, this site will function as an environmental educational site for Head Start students who are in school at the church as well as community members of all ages. Hughes is one of the oldest Black churches in Portland and many of its congregants have been displaced by gentrification. Beyond improving soil health, carbon sequestration, stormwater infiltration, native habitat, and food security, this project will revitalize the church’s historic community and provide important opportunities for community members to get hands-on experience and technical training in regenerative urban agriculture.
مشروع شجرة فاكهة بورتلاند، $ 35,275
Continued Commitment to Community Orchards
This support will allow deep investment in several community and school orchards that serve to educate, engage, and provide food for neighborhoods impacted by these spaces. By engaging volunteers, the community, educators, and other interested parties, we will spread knowledge of orchard care as well as awareness about these resources. Our work will increase the health, harvestability, and fruit yield of the trees in our urban orchard through pruning, pest and disease management, harvesting, soil improvements, and – of course – community education and involvement. In addition to being impactful, this project will be a source of community joy and connection.
مركز بورتلاند لتصنيع الفرص، Inc.، $ 40,000
مسارات الموارد الطبيعية: برنامج الفريق الأخضر
The POIC+RAHS Green Team is an environmental leadership program that works with a team of high school students on outdoor environmental projects throughout the summer. The program places youth in charge of projects including tree pruning, maintenance, surveying, and mapping tree health and mortality. It also supports student interest in pursuing living-wage careers in the natural resources sector. The Green Team supports and offers guidance to low-income students and students of color to help them play an active role in their community’s environmental health. This grant will support the Green Team over the summers of 2025 and 2026, expanding capacity by hiring a staff position to lead the program in place of the current volunteer position.
Rhythm Seed Farm، $ 29,997
McDaniel High School Garden Activation
In collaboration with McDaniel HS, Rhythm Seed Farm will help support the activation and development of an underutilized garden space and greenhouse on campus. Working alongside the Sustainable Agriculture CTE program, we will help to identify solutions and implement regenerative land-tending techniques to produce more abundant yields of food, medicine, and flowers. We will also support a summer student leadership program to support the garden through the summer months. These enhancements will improve soil quality, sequester carbon, reduce stormwater runoff, and create pathways for student climate justice on campus.
مزرعة Thimbleberry التعاونية، $ 50,000
Farm Education Programs
Thimbleberry Collaborative Farm prioritizes BIPOC and lower-income communities in East Multnomah County. A grant will help us expand education efforts to reach more people and deepen learning. From June 2025 through May 2026, TCF programs will introduce more East County learners to: small-scale urban gardening with regenerative methods; cooking with seasonal produce; environmental stewardship; and climate mitigation and resilience strategies. TCF will expand its K-12 offerings to reach 550+ local youth with gamified, hands-on, experiential learning during field trips and classroom visits. We will also grow our co-hosted workshop program for adults and families to engage 200+ residents. For both programs, we are focused on encouraging recurring participation to support a progressing curriculum that builds on past lessons.
أخضر، $ 70,000
Verde’s Bilingual Urban Habitat Program
This grant will support Verde’s Urban Habitat Program, where we work alongside residents, youth, and young-adult interns to plan, install, and maintain naturescapes and rain gardens for low-income and/or BIPOC households in Portland. By creating green spaces, we enhance environmental sustainability and provide valuable workforce development opportunities for the next generation. Over the next two years, we will install 26 new naturescapes and rain gardens in North, Northeast, and outer East Portland. The new installations will create sustainable green spaces that capture rainwater and foster local biodiversity. Youth and young-adult interns will gain valuable skills in landscaping, environmental stewardship, and sustainable practices, helping to build future leaders in green industries.
مشروع Voz لتعليم حقوق العمال، $ 50,000
Semillas de Justicia: Building Green Skills for the Future
This grant will expand Voz’s sustainable agriculture and environmental education efforts to build economic resilience and environmental justice for day laborers and domestic workers. Through culturally grounded training, Voz members gain hands-on skills in sustainable gardening, irrigation systems, soil health, and climate resilience practices. Partnering with local organizations, we will establish community-centered workshops and workforce pathways that connect members to green job opportunities, while restoring cultural practices related to land stewardship. This project addresses the racial wealth gap and environmental disparities experienced by immigrant and BIPOC communities, empowering members to access livable wages and career pathways in natural resources and conservation fields.
ويلاميت ريفر كيبر، $ 26,744
Portland Harbor Superfund Habitat Outreach Program
The Portland Harbor Superfund Habitat Outreach Project will engage communities and landowners to support future habitat restoration in the Superfund area. This project will create a strategic outreach plan and educational materials, and initiate conversations with property owners to build awareness and identify resources for future conservation efforts, such as access to nurseries and contractors. By incorporating community input and expertise, the project will provide valuable feedback to enhance the EPA’s digital habitat mapping initiative and guide restoration planning. This collaborative effort aims to empower stakeholders and lay the groundwork for long-term ecological improvements in the Portland Harbor area.
حكمة الحكماء، $ 70,000
تنمية القوى العاملة الحكيمة: التدريب البيئي للمعارف البيئية التقليدية
يوفر التدريب المدفوع الأجر الذي تقدمه Wisdom Workforce Development التدريب على التعليم والمهارات الوظيفية لقطاع البيئة والحفاظ على البيئة. ويركز المنهج على المعارف البيئية التقليدية للسكان الأصليين. تقام الفصول الميدانية لمدة 12 أسبوعًا. توفر الحكمة خبرة عملية مع المنظمات الشريكة في منطقة بورتلاند مترو والممارسين الثقافيين وعلماء البيئة. تقام الفصول الميدانية في مواقع مختلفة بينما تقام أيام الفصول الدراسية يوم الأربعاء في مكتب الحكمة. تشمل المواضيع مفاهيم المعرفة البيئية التقليدية والعلوم والتكنولوجيا والهندسة والفنون والرياضيات (STEAM) بالإضافة إلى الفنون الثقافية للسكان الأصليين وتحديد النباتات واستخداماتها واستعادة الموائل والحفاظ عليها واستعادة الثقافة البيولوجية والمسارات المهنية البيئية.
مجلس السلمون العالمي، $ 20,000
مشاهدة السلمون
The World Salmon Council offers Salmon Watch programming to underserved youth in greater Portland, providing hands-on science education about local salmon populations and ecosystems. Through the story of salmon, participants gain a deeper appreciation for this culturally significant species and the ecosystems that support them. Salmon Watch includes field trips, service-learning projects, classroom visits, an online curriculum, and outreach events at no cost to students. On field trips, students observe the spawning salmon lifecycle and learn about their critical role in ecosystems. Four interactive learning stations, now featuring invasive species content, provide hands-on activities in salmon biology, macroinvertebrates, water quality, and riparian ecosystems.