DEC/JAN 2002

Thoughts in the Presence of Fear
Wendell Berry

The Prospect of Peace
Daisaku Ikeda

The US Department of Peace

Reducing Dependence On Oil Will Ensure America's National Security

US Civil Rights in Serious Jeopardy
Michael Ratner

Engineering Consent on the Domestic Front
Danny Schecter

The Emperor is Naked
Don Kyhote

Green View of Fundamentalism vs. Modernism
Kelpie Wilson

The One Eternal Truth
John Darling

World Trade Organization Continues to Fail
Danila Oder

McKenzie River Gathering: Funding Change for 25 Years
Richard Seidman

Dreams and Visions: The Fountain of Wisdom
Royal D. Alsup, Ph.D.

From Survival to Serenity
Ianna Bredal, MBA

Environmental Film Festival Coming to Ashland
Barry Snitkin

Herbal Help for Winter Weather
Chanchal Cabrera, MNIMH, AHG

How to Make the Most Out of Your Therapy
Julie Weber, MSW

Taking Aim at Blame
Peter Moore, MFCC, CGP

Understanding Problem Behaviors of Animals
Jocelyn Y. Whidden

The Christmas Presence
Peter Melton

Cosmic Calendar
Salina Rain

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McKenzie River Gathering

Funding Change For 25 Years

By Richard Seidman

Over a summer weekend in 1976, thirty activists met at a cabin near the McKenzie River east of Eugene. These veterans of civil rights and anti-Vietnam war struggles wanted to find a way to support local groups working to address the root causes of social inequity and environmental degradation. They wanted to help grassroots organizations in Oregon become more effective and more self sufficient, to fund change, not provide charity. And they wanted to accomplish this in a way consistent with their values of democracy, openness, and non-elitism.

With such aspirations, these friends decided to create a charitable foundation, pooling together $500,000 of inherited wealth to launch it. To remember the circumstances of its inception, they called their new creation the “McKenzie River Gathering Foundation.”

Twenty-five years later, after having dispersed more than $6.6 million to hundreds of groups around the state, the foundation these activists conceived on the banks of the McKenzie continues to gather force, flowing into the lives of thousands of Oregonians, including many in Southern Oregon.

Despite the passage of two and a half decades, the spirit and values of the founders continue to infuse the organization.

Susan Remmers, MRG Foundation’s current executive director, says, “We are far from a traditional foundation. We seek to educate our community base of support and directly involve them in local efforts, not just take money from them. Also, MRG Foundation is willing to take risks on groups more mainstream foundations won’t touch. For example, we consistently support new and emerging groups.”

The MRG Foundation does more than just give groups money. “We also do leadership development,” Remmers says, “helping groups and people develop the skills they need to be successful. For example, we’ll teach them how to write a successful proposal and get funding.”

One feature that distinguishes MRG Foundation from more traditional foundations is that local activists themselves sit on the Grantmaking Committee, and make the difficult decisions of which groups will receive funding. Southern Oregonians who have served on the committee include George Fence of Selma, Penny Lind of Roseburg, and Sheila Canal of Ashland.

Many groups in Southern Oregon have received support from the foundation over the years. Recent grantees include the Klamath Siskiyou Wildlands Center in Williams, Rogue Valley Oregon Action in Medford, Theater Ikcewicasa in Ashland, and Unete al Movimiento de Conciencia Popular in Medford.

The Klamath Siskiyou Wildlands Center used their $7,000 grant to run a Public Lands Over-sight Campaign to force federal land management agencies to comply with environmental laws.

Oregon Action re-ceived $5,000 from the MRG Foundation to cultivate leadership among low-income mo-bile home park residents whose homes are threat-ened by developers.

Theater Ikcewicasa keeps Native American culture alive through stories, theater, dance, poetry and song, per-forming at schools and community events through-out Southern Oregon.

The MRG Foundation’s $6,000 grant to Unete al Movimiento helped the group develop leaders among farmworkers to defend their rights and address issues such as immigration, labor camp health and safety, pesticide use, and better wages.

Rich Rhode of Oregon Action says, “MRG has supported our work over a number of years. Because they have a grassroots network of activists all over the state, they are really aware of what the needs are on the ground in local communities. They know what groups are out there and who is doing effective work, and because of this, they are able to put their money where it’s needed most and where it will do the most good.”

Rhode appreciates that MRG provides resources not just money. He tells how the MRG Foundation helped Oregon Action undertake an assessment of the group’s technology needs. The foundation then helped Oregon Action buy new computers and printers, and trained many low-income activists how to use these computers to aid in their organizing work.

"MRG tailors its resources to fit the needs out there in local communities,” Rhode reports. “Many now well-established organizations got crucial early funding from MRG because the foundation focuses on small and start-up groups.”

Theater Ikcewicasa is one such start-up group. Its leader, Robert Owens, says, MRG gave us money two years in a row. This gave us a big boost and enabled us to prove ourselves, to show the community that we can successfully present native arts and artists on stage. I am really grateful for MRG’s faith in us.”

Spencer Lennard, Director of the Klamath Siskiyou Wildlands Cen-ter echoes this sentiment. “It’s hard for new non-profits to get started. Most funders want to see a track record before they will grant you money, but it’s difficult to establish a track record without getting money in the first place. MRG gave the Klamath Siskiyou Wildlands Center a grant when we were in our organizational infancy. This grant helped us create the track record that enables us to now receive support from large, mainstream environmental funders.

“Because MRG’s leaders are activists themselves, they clearly understand the problem,” Lennard says. “We didn’t have to convince them of the importance of what we were doing. They were willing to take a risk on us, and it’s really paid off.”

MRG Foundation’s network of local activist advisors helps the organization respond swiftly and efficiently when needed. The terrorist attacks of September 11th thrust MRG Foundation into a round of emergency grant making. Remmers says, “MRG Foundation has the ability to put grants into place immediately to respond to emergencies. We support development of local leadership to respond to times of crisis.”

Remmers says that the MRG Foundation has a long history of supporting local movements tied to international efforts for peace and justice. For example, the foundation has funded local groups working to end apartheid in South Africa, promote peace in the Middle East, and push for non-intervention by the U.S. in Central America, Cuba, and Columbia.

Now, in the wake of the 9/11 attacks, the MRG Foundation is needed more than ever, according to Remmers. The foun-dation recently awarded an emergency grant to Peace House in Ashland to increase mili-tary counter-recruiting, support peace groups in public schools, and to lead anti-hate and anti-militarization efforts.

Latinos Unidos Siempre, a group of Latino youth in Salem, are using their recent MRG grant to document attacks on Middle Eastern and South Asian students in local schools.

With the help of a MRG Foundation grant, the Middle East Peace Group in Eugene, comprised of Jews and Muslims, is trying to break down stereotypes about Muslim people and Islam.

Whether addressing immediate crises or long-term problems, MRG Foundation’s focus remains the same: to provide both tools and funding to help local groups develop effective leadership and address root causes of poverty, inequality, hate, and violence.

You, too, can be part of the gathering, part of the flow of this river for social change, says Remmers. “You don’t have to be a millionaire to be part of this foundation.” In fact, the entire amount of funds awarded each year, approximately $300,000, is raised in grassroots fashion. The Foundation is not fully endowed, which means that each year, the money for grants is raised from individual donations, ranging from $25 to $50,000.

If you would like to be one of the hundreds of people who contribute each year to the McKenzie River Gathering Foundation, or if you are part of a grassroots group working for social change that is interested in receiving funding, please contact the MRG Foundation at (503) 289-1517 in Portland or (541) 485-2790 in Eugene. You can also visit them on the web at www.mrgfoundation.org.

You can join the flow of this river for change, adding your efforts to those of that group of friends who gathered by the McKenzie in 1976 and all the many others since then who continue to believe in a better, more just, more whole society.

Richard Seidman is the author of The Oracle of Kabbalah: Mystical Teachings of the Hebrew Letters, and is the founder and former executive director of Friends of Trees in Portland, Oregon.

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