Investment and Innovation grants are intended to build lasting private-sector and nonprofit-sector capacity to reduce waste through reuse, recycling, composting or energy creation from discarded materials in the Metro region. The grants strengthen local efforts to reduce the amount and toxicity of waste. They also advance the equity goals of the Regional Waste Plan by generating positive benefits for communities of color and other communities that have historically not benefitted from the garbage and recycling system.
Program grants are awarded to support personnel costs, operations and equipment associated with programming at for-profit businesses or non-profit organizations. Program grants require business applicants to provide a match of at least 20 percent of the grant amount in cash, in-kind support or both.
Eleven program grants received funding from Metro’s Investment and Innovation program in 2020, for a total Metro investment of $472,361, which will leverage an additional $93,070 in matching funds provided by the business grant recipients.
The 2020-21 Investment and Innovation program grant recipients are:
City Repair
Useful waste initiative
Grant amount: $24,420
Match amount: $0 (not required for nonprofit organizations)
Total investment: $24,420
City Repair will develop a process to guide architects and contractors to divert usable construction waste (mock-ups, which are small prototype structures of larger buildings) to provide homes for unhoused communities. As proofs of concept, a coalition of project partners will place three mockups into houseless villages that are primarily comprised of veterans and people of color. These placements will provide paid job opportunities and skills training to people in the houseless community. City Repair and PSU’s Center for Public Interest Design will develop a training to expand the network of people with knowledge to successfully divert mock-ups from the waste stream, and deliver it to architects, contractors, builders, developers and individual project advocates.
Community Cycling Center
Reusing and recycling salvaged bicycles and parts
Grant amount: $49,288
Match amount: $0 (not required for nonprofit organizations)
Total investment: $49,288
Community Cycling Center (CCC) will expand its reuse and recycling operation to increase recovery of used bicycles and parts. CCC anticipates doubling the annual amount of aluminum it salvages from 4,000 pounds currently to 8,000 pounds by the end of 2021, and increasing the number of bikes repaired and put back into operation for people who need them. This grant will support CCC in providing free bicycles to communities of color and other historically marginalized communities. It will also fund hiring and mentorship of 4 to 6 interns recruited from communities of color who will develop essential workplace skills.
Community Development Corporation of Oregon
East County food rescue shuttle
Grant amount: $47,250
Match amount: $0 (not required for nonprofit organizations)
Total investment: $47,250
This project will support the Rockwood Food Systems Collaborative’s efforts to reduce food waste and grow the capacity of businesses owned by people of color to produce and market culturally-relevant food products. The grant will fund a van and logistical support to pair BIPOC-owned food production businesses with food growers and producers with excess food that would otherwise disposed. Project partners will create a system to quickly and efficiently recover excess edible food and provide technical assistance. This opens new opportunities for BIPOC-owned businesses to “upcycle” excess food into culturally-relevant products and bring them to market, for example as suppliers to local restaurants and the Oregon Food Bank.
Cracked Pots
Integrating equity in Cracked Pots’ mission and operations
Grant amount: $37,442
Match amount: $0 (not required for nonprofit organizations)
Total amount: $37,442
Cracked Pots will contract with a local equity trainer to provide staff and volunteers training to implement diversity, equity and inclusion more fully into Cracked Pots’ organizational practices and interactions with community members. Following the training, Cracked Pots will hire an additional part-time gleaner, making a concerted effort to hire a person of color from the local community, to glean more materials from the Metro Central Transfer Station for resale at its Reclaim It store, which is located in a historically Black community in North Portland. Cracked Pots will convene an informal community advisory group to develop specific strategies for carrying out its waste reduction mission in a way that meets the needs of the neighboring community and advances equity.
Free Geek
2021 Electronic waste collection and recycling
Grant amount: $43,819
Match amount: $0 (not required for nonprofit organizations)
Total amount: $43,819
Free Geek will conduct 16 to 22 collection events to recover an anticipated 70,000 pounds of discarded computers and other electronics for reuse or recycling over the grant year, a substantial increase over the fewer anticipated events they would conduct without this grant. Free Geek will partner with multi-family housing complexes and outdoor neighborhood cleanup events to make safe disposal of electronics accessible to community members. Events will be held in partnership with organizations serving communities of color and those in low-income neighborhoods. Through these events Free Geek will promote its other programs including access to free technology and classes.
Hygiene For All
Clothing and bedding exchange
Grant amount: $50,000
Match amount: $0 (not required for nonprofit organizations)
Total amount: $50,000
Hygiene For All will launch a pilot program for people experiencing homelessness to trade soiled clothing and bedding for clean items through a clothing and bedding exchange. St. Andrew’s Presbyterian Church volunteers will retrieve dirty items, launder them offsite, and return clean items to the hub where paid houseless ambassadors will promote their reuse among peers. This program will divert approximately 600 to 1,200 pounds of bedding and other goods from the waste stream each week. The pilot will demonstrate the environmental, human health and equity benefits of facilitating houseless residents’ reuse of clothing otherwise needlessly discarded due to cost, time, and lack of access to laundering facilities that currently makes it easier to throw dirty items away rather than reuse them.
James’ Neighborhood Recycling Service, LLC
Expanding neighborhood collection events
Grant amount: $49,417
Match amount: $47,430
Total amount: $96,847
James Neighborhood Recycling Service will expand its current collection program for non-curbside plastics such as Styrofoam blocks and plastic bags, and hold at least two collection events per month during the grant period. They are developing partnerships with organizations such as Trash for Peace and the Latino Master Recycler group Promotores Ambientales to provide services directly to communities of color and identify and secure locations for collection events in underserved neighborhoods. They plan to host a collection event in Hillsboro with PlanetCon, which would be free to participants and would remove a potential barrier for people with low incomes to participate. They are also exploring other ways to make their collection events free or donation-based. Grant funds will support a driver salary, a used box truck to transport materials to and from events and to recyclers, and a granulator for collected plastics.
Professional Business Development Group
Building a culture of reuse for minority contractors
Grant amount: $50,000
Match amount: $0 (not required for nonprofit organizations)
Total amount: $50,000
The goal of this project is to inform, incentivize and increase the reuse practices of minority and women operated subcontractors (e.g., door and window framers, carpenters). The Professional Business Development Group (PBDG) will conduct focus groups and surveys to gather data on minority contractors’ current practices and reuse philosophies. PBDG will develop a curriculum based on the research results and work with the Rebuilding Center to deliver a training to at least 30 PBDG subcontractors to familiarize participants with the variety of reclaimed materials available for their work and how to process and use them in their projects. Each participant will be provided a $250 gift card to redeem at the ReBuilding Center to incentivize their initial use of reclaimed materials. The training and incentive program will provide a first step in creating long-term behavior change of PBDG subcontractors choosing reuse and waste diversion.
Re-Use Consulting
Building up an industry that takes down buildings
Grant amount: $48,000
Match amount: $24,000
Total amount: $72,000
Re-Use Consulting will train and provide technical support to six already-identified minority and/or women-owned deconstruction contractors to help them overcome several key barriers to making deconstruction profitable: handling/selling inventory, remanufacturing, and developing a local network of buyers and sellers. Training will include hands-on completion of 10 to 12 deconstruction projects that are not subject to the deconstruction ordinance, with an impact of 200 to 250 tons of reclaimed building materials diverted from the waste stream. At the end of the grant, these six firms will be well-positioned to compete in the Metro region’s growing deconstruction sector.
ROSE Community Development
Multifamily composting initiative
Grant amount: $23,200
Match amount: $0 (not required for nonprofit organizations)
Total amount: $23,200
ROSE Community Development will expand culturally responsive access to composting food scraps for communities of color in their homes. This project will add collection bins for food scraps at each of its affordable housing communities and provide residents with in-home composting kits. ROSE Community Development will work with partners to deliver over 30 workshops on composting benefits and best practices. Pre-assessment surveys will be used to gauge residents’ experience and knowledge of composting, waste systems and recycling, and the results will be used to tailor the individual workshops. The results of this project will be developed into a case study that can be used by other community development corporations or multifamily developments that may be considering adding compost service.
Salvage Works
Expansion of high-demand product made from reclaimed fencing
Grant amount: $49,525
Match amount: $21,640
Total amount: $71,165
Salvage Works will expand its production of rustic wall paneling made with reclaimed fencing from the Portland metro area that would otherwise end up in the landfill. Because fencing often includes treated wood, it is rarely recycled. Salvage Works has been making this product for over five years and has been unable to keep up with the demand for its use in interior design. By having a dedicated material processor and driver who will pick up and break down the fencing, Salvage Works will increase its capacity for producing the wall cladding by 25 percent during the grant year with continued growth from increased sales after the grant ends. The grant will fund a new full time staff member (recruiting from the Native American Youth Association and Benson Polytechnic High School), a truck for fence pick up, and equity, inclusion and diversity training.