When should I renew my membership?

There is no wrong time to renew your membership. Whether you renew on October 28, 2026, when we open for 2027 membership, or on the deadline of April 30, 2027, your membership will expire on the same date: April 30, 2028. 

How much do I give?

We offer tiered membership contribution options ranging from $300 to $5,000. Members choose the amount based on what they consider personally meaningful, understanding the bigger our pool of money, the bigger our grants and the greater our impact.  

Important: If you want to participate in the April 3 Letter of Interest Workshop, you must renew your membership by Saturday, March 27, and if you want to be on a Grant Review Team, you must renew by Saturday, April 17.

Get ready to vote!

As a member of ninety-nine girlfriends, you get a vote for our Impact Awards. Your vote matters, and we want to make it easy (and fun) to get informed before you cast your ballot.

• On Thursday, October 8, Girlfriends across the metro area will host Meet the Finalists watch parties - a way to connect with Girlfriends while streaming the finalist videos. (All parties are full, but you can join a wait list if you still want to attend.)

• That same day, you’ll receive an email with two key resources: the Meet the Finalists Playlist (if you choose to watch it on your own) and our Voters’ Guide with finalist websites, facts, and statements from our grant review teams about why these organizations rose to the top. The link to vote will be in that email and in the Voters’ Guide.

• Voting opens the evening of October 8 and closes just before midnight on October 18. Make sure to set aside time to review, reflect, and cast your ballot.

What are Meet the Finalists videos?

A few days before voting begins, we’ll email everyone a YouTube playlist with videos of our Impact Award finalists. You can either watch the videos alone or together with other Girlfriends at a Meet the Finalists watch party on Thursday, October 8! Watch parties are a fun way to build community in a small group. The videos give you a chance to hear directly from the finalists. (PLEASE NOTE: The finalists do NOT have to make a brand new video. In fact, we encourage them to use something they already have so they won’t have to use their valuable limited resources on a video for this one purpose. Keep this in mind as you vote.) The Meet the Finalists videos and the Voters’ Guide should provide you with everything you need to be an informed voter. Voting begins on Thursday, October 8 and wraps up on Sunday, October 18.

What is racial equity?

"Racial equity is about applying justice and a little bit of common sense to a system that's been out of balance. When a system is out of balance, people of color feel the impacts most acutely, but, to be clear, an imbalanced system makes all of us pay." ~ Glenn Harris, President, Race Forward and Publisher, Colorlines

Learn more about why we center racial equity thanks to Race Forward.

See you in mid-August!

As an all-volunteer organization, we take our recharge time seriously. After a busy first quarter of learning and grant review, we're stepping back for six weeks. We'll be back in mid-August, and we can't wait to see you then! If anything comes up during the break, email us and we will respond—we just might be a little slower than usual.  

The difference between Member Updates and ninety-nine news

We issue two different publications: Member Updates and ninety-nine news. The first is for members only and comes out every other week except when we are on break. The latter is for Girlfriends AND the broader community and comes out three or four times a year with important announcements. Both have value, so please be sure to check them out when they hit your inbox.

Get more out of our website!

Take a brief tour of the important information on our website:

• ABOUT is great for sharing and recruiting

• GRANTS explains who we fund and how

• JOIN tells how to become a part of our community 

• MEMBERS gives info about our Fellows and events, and has a link to the directory

• NEWS tab is where you can read our public announcements

• EDUCATION is where you learn all about our educational arm and access archives

• DONATE tab is where to make an even greater impact

Follow us on social media

Are you following ninety-nine girlfriends on social media? If not, you’re missing some fun posts. This month we’re highlighting famous Asian and Pacific Islander women in Oregon’s history, to honor Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month. You’ll learn about brave Chinese pilots Hazel Ying Lee and Leah Hing, architect Edith Yang, writer Takami Fukuda, dancer Sahomi Tachibana, and Miyo Iwakoshi, the first female Japanese immigrant in Oregon, just to name a few. Check us out on Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn! 

Making retirement contributions: a smart strategy for giving and tax savings

Did you know you could designate part of your retirement funds directly to ninety-nine girlfriends? 

Individuals who are 73 or older must withdraw required minimum distributions (RMDs) from traditional IRAs and certain retirement accounts. These withdrawals are taxed as ordinary income, which can increase your tax bill and push you into a higher bracket. However, you can turn this obligation into an advantage by donating your RMDs directly to a nonprofit through a qualified charitable distribution.

A qualified charitable distribution transfers directly from your IRA to an eligible nonprofit like ninety-nine girlfriends. When done correctly, this transfer counts toward your RMD but is not included in your taxable income, helps you support causes you care about, and may prevent impacts to your Medicare premiums. If you intend to use this strategy, speak with a financial advisor or tax professional to ensure it’s executed properly and fits your broader retirement plan. 

How to volunteer with your Girlfriends

Interested in sharing your skills or learning new ones through volunteering? Be sure your profile in the member directory lists your interests so we know to reach out to you. Look for opportunities in the Member Updates where we ask for help. Or email us and we will schedule a call or a chat over coffee to learn more about your skills and interests. Volunteering with ninety-nine girlfriends is joyful and rewarding. You’re already making a difference with your membership contribution. Double the impact by bringing your skills to the circle!

Trust-based philanthropy: It's how we roll

We practice trust-based philanthropy in our grantmaking. That means we center the needs of nonprofits and the communities they serve, and we intentionally reduce the paperwork, reporting, and bureaucracy that often come with grants. Rather than closely monitoring our grantees, we focus on being supportive partners. This means we do not require detailed plans for exactly how funds will be used, and we keep both the application and reporting process as simple as possible.

We’ll be sharing more about trust-based philanthropy and how it guides our work throughout the year. To learn more, here’s a short three-minute video, along with an additional resource.

Be in the know with calendar updates

Bookmark this page on our website, and check back frequently to see what we’ve added. All the important dates for grantmaking are available now, and membership and member education dates are coming soon. We will also add them to the Member Updates as the dates near.

Why do we have Meet the Finalists watch parties?

Once upon a time, we held an annual in-person Meet the Finalists event. The finalists did live pitches onstage, sharing why they should receive an Impact Award. Many Girlfriends loved this event, until the finalists told us it made them feel like they were performing and it wasn’t equitable. Gulp. We took this learning and changed how we did things. We began paying for finalists to make pitch videos so they could use those videos for our event and other purposes. Once again, we didn’t have it quite right. We had chosen an amazing professional to work with them, but it wasn’t necessarily how they wanted to work or when it worked for them. Once again, we adjusted based on what we’d learned.

Fast forward to now: We ask finalists to create videos that follow certain guidelines (amount of time, a few prompts they can consider) and submit it to us by the deadline. Then we take these videos and put them together in a watch list. Girlfriends volunteer to host you in their homes to watch the videos together. This is Meet the Finalists 2025.

FAQs about the event:

Q: Can I just watch the videos on my own?

A: Absolutely. The watch parties enable you to connect with your Girlfriends but the videos are the same whether you watch them alone or together.

Q: How do I get the link?

A: The link will be emailed and texted to everyone a few days before the watch parties.

Q: Do I have to watch the videos to know how to vote?

A: No. Our voter’s guide gives you information from the organizations and grant review teams, and if you prefer that to the videos, you can vote based on the guide. We encourage you to watch the videos to hear directly from the finalists why they think you should choose them.. 

Q: Can I watch the videos more than once?

A: Definitely. They are available for you to watch as many times as you like.

Q: Can I reach out to the finalists with questions?

A: Please don’t. Use the resources we have shared with you to make your decisions. 

We support our volunteers—with free Tech Training

Did you know that volunteering on one of our teams or committees means you gain access to free tech training? It’s true. We use Google Drive, Google Calendar, Zoom, and MembershipWorks in our daily work, but we don’t exclude you from volunteering if you don’t have those skills – we help you learn them! 

Contact Tammy to take advantage of this perk of being a Girlfriend.

Get ready to vote!

As a member of ninety-nine girlfriends, you get to vote for our Impact Awards. Your vote matters, and we want to make it easy (and fun) to get informed before you cast your ballot.

• Meet the Finalists Together: On Thursday, October 9, Girlfriends across Portland will host Meet the Finalists watch parties. These gatherings are a great chance to connect with Girlfriends while streaming the finalist videos. These parties are always popular, so register early!

• Your Voter Toolkit: That same day, you’ll receive an email with two key resources including the Meet the Finalists Playlist. You can watch it on your own if you can’t make a party.                                                                                      Furthermore, you'll receive the Official Voters Guide. The guide is packed with finalist websites, facts, and statements from our grant review teams about why these organizations rose to the top.

• Mark Your Calendar: Voting opens the evening of October 9 and closes just before midnight on October 19. Make sure to set aside time to review, reflect, and cast your ballot.

Join us at the price that works for you

One of the ways we embed equity into our operations is to offer a sliding scale to paid events:

• Member + Help Another: for people who want to pay it forward and do a bit more          

• Member (I could use a little help): for those who’d like financial assistance

• Member or Fellow: tickets for members and Fellows

"Create inclusion with simple mindfulness that others might have a different reality from your own." — Patti Digh

From vision to action: our structure

Wondering how our all-volunteer giving circle stays organized? This chart shows you all of the committees (pink) and teams (teal) that keep things running smoothly. If you want to reach any of the committee chairs, just reply to this email and we will connect you.

Membership status: what you need to know

Our membership year runs from May 1 through April 30 of the following year. You can renew whenever it works for you, but the membership year remains the same for everyone. Some of you paid for 2025 in November or December, and others of you paid on April 30. You all enjoy the benefits of ninety-nine girlfriends until April 30, 2026.

No contribution is too small (or too big)

You can show up for ninety-nine girlfriends in so many ways, and every one makes a difference. Join a committee, help plan an event, share your perspective in a meeting, or just renew for 2025! Each action adds to the strength of our collective. If you're new, you can find out how you can contribute at our New Member Welcome and Volunteer Info Session.

Get more out of your membership and VOLUNTEER!

Ninety-nine girlfriends is totally volunteer run, thanks to your generosity. You will connect with other Girlfriends and benefit from giving back when you volunteer. Our volunteer needs range from leadership positions to one-time tasks. Whether you have 30 hours or 30 minutes to spare and bring professional experience or want to grow your skills in a new area, your help means we can help more of our community members!