APPLEGATE, OR (MARCH 11, 2019)—The Ford Family Foundation awarded Applegate Valley-based A Greater Applegate (AGA) a grant of $225,000 over two years for “Capacity for Connection, Visioning, and Action.” The grant recognizes AGA’s vision for building community across the Applegate Valley, including the launch over the past 12 months of a community website—Applegate Valley Connect (applegateconnect.org)—and the Applegate Valley Nonprofit Network.
This year, AGA will grow the organization and launch several community-building strategies, which include increasing the capacity of nonprofit organizations serving the area, launching an Applegate Valley Business Network to support local businesses, providing resources to the significant artist community, developing ways to connect neighborhoods across shared values, and creating opportunities for community gathering. These are community priorities that emerged in a “roadmap” process funded by Ford and also from AGA’s ongoing community surveys. In 2020, AGA will launch Applegate Valley 20/20, a community visioning process that will build on knowledge gained in 2019 and chart a course for future work.
AGA board chair, Seth Kaplan, said, “The Applegate Valley is a wonderful place to live, but it can also be a hard place for people with fewer resources, families with children, and seniors trying to age in place. Applegaters do much to help their neighbors now, and we expect this funding to help further by creating greater opportunities for collective understanding and engagement, both among ourselves and with others who are tasked with providing services and resources to this area.”
The mission of A Greater Applegate is to build community by sustaining and enhancing local connections that promote the environmental, economic, and social vitality of the Applegate Valley. AGA has been operating as Greater Applegate Community Development Corporation since 1994. It operated Cantrall Buckley Park for 20 years and now manages park improvement projects, including the recent installation of a solar array and the creation of the “Art in the Park” walk that displays metal sculptures by Jacksonville-based artist Cheryl Garcia. For more information, visit agreaterapplegate.org.
The Ford Family Foundation was established in 1957 by Kenneth W. and Hallie E. Ford in Roseburg, Oregon. Its mission: “Successful citizens and vital rural communities” in Oregon and Siskiyou County, California. A scholarship office is located in Eugene, Oregon.
