funding

Congratulations to our 2020 Award Winners!

When I saw the email from ninety-nine girlfriends announcing our 2020 Awardees, I smiled and for a few moments basked in positive emotions.

Gratitude: For all the members who worked so hard to redesign and shorten our grant-giving process, who reviewed all the applications, who designed and managed the voting process, who made the Meet the Finalists videos (below) and hosted the event, and everyone else who made this happen.

Hope & Awe: Every year, every month I find out more about the work so many amazing nonprofits do in our communities. They help people, help families, advocate for changes to increase equity and justice. And they do it day in and day out, in some cases 24 hours a day, every day.  

Agency: At a time when I often feel the challenges facing the world are so big that I don’t know if I can do anything to have real impact, our grantee partners and ninety-nine girlfriends offer me agency to help make real change possible.

Community: I have never met most of the ninety-nine girlfriends. And yet, I know there are 500 women standing beside me, who care deeply about our world and who stand with one another both in times of difficulty and celebration.

I would like to extend a deeply felt thank you to everyone. If you need a smile you can see the list of 2020 Awardees here.

— Kaye Gardner-O’Kearny

Another Way of Doing Things

“I’m learning how I want to give money,” says Diana Velene. “I feel like ninety-nine girlfriends has been my philanthropy grad school.” Diana, a fourth-year member, has been active on a Grant Review Team and as a Grantee Partner Liaison as well as participating in as many member education events as possible.

“I’ve loved being part of big, audacious projects, but from Portland Homeless Family Solutions I learned that helping someone out of an immediate financial crisis can make all the difference for them,” Diana said via email.

Several years ago, Diana met Cameron Whitten on an Albina District walking tour. She found him to be “a bundle of energy and passion, and a devoted activist.” Today he’s a Metro Council candidate and co-founder (with Salome Chimuku) of the Black Resilience Fund (BRF), an emergency resource that raises funds from non-Black allies to support Black Portlanders. In a short few months since its inception, BRF has raised more than $1,362,040 from more than 14,000  donations and that figure continues to climb.

As of July 30, BRF had funded more than $713,469 in immediate support of Black Portlanders. The effort has particular resonance as each day and night throughout the city, diverse groups of Portland residents gather to consider the implications of racial inequities.

“So many people in our community are at that point where it doesn’t take much for them to be in a precarious financial position,” Diana explains. “Add losing a job because of the pandemic, the trauma that comes from a lifetime of racism boiling over into the events of the last month and you’ve got the perfect, horrible storm.”

Individuals contact the fund with a need, volunteers conduct a 15-minute interview, and more often than not, BRF gives them money to cover their need. As Diana points out, “It’s truly a grassroots effort to bring money quickly to the folks who need it now.” 

— Tammy Wilhoite