We did it!

We would like to share our heartfelt thanks to everyone in our community who donated in our "final push” playground fundraising campaign during the month of June. Thank you for responding to the matching challenge opportunity with this final boost of support! Thanks also to Tomi Lahdesmaki and Katie Freathy for once again contributing the proceeds from sales of Tomi’s beautiful Mt. Tabor print, and of course thank you to our generous anonymous donor for making this matching campaign possible.  

In addition to these efforts, the playground committee has received some very exciting news!  Glencoe’s playground project has been awarded a grant by the Nike Community Impact Fund of Oregon Community Foundation for $14,000!!! We would like to share our special thanks to everyone in the community with Nike connections who stepped forward in support of our application. Thank you!

Little did we know that the amazing “final push” effort would combine with Nike’s grant award to propel us past our goal. Thanks to this new influx of support — and thanks especially to the hard work and generosity of this amazing community — we have officially surpassed our $100,000 goal!  In fact, our final fundraising result is now over $110,000. Truly incredible!  The sky is the limit for what we can do to improve our playground and every penny will be used to make it as wonderful as possible. 

What happens next?

Over the next few months, PPS Facilities will remove the old metal climbing structures and replace them with a new climbing obstacle course structure, purchased by the PTA. PPS Facilities will cover the installation costs for this first phase of improvements, which they estimate will be completed in early fall. We are so excited to see our planning and fundraising efforts become a reality!  

Our remaining funds will be used for a second round of improvements to expand our existing playground with new equipment (play mound, spinners, musical instruments, etc) and other natural elements. In the meantime, the Playground Committee continues to pursue environmental grant support from the City of Portland that would help us depave, make stormwater improvements, and plant more trees. We will know if these efforts are successful by early fall, at which point the second phase of improvements will begin.