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may 2023 News Brief

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Grants Spotlight 

Wood River Land Trust

The Orchard at Colorado Gulch Preserve

Nestled off Red-Feather Way within the Colorado Gulch Preserve is the Wood River Land Trust’s 9-acre Community Orchard, a complete outdoor community environmental education hub designed to engage with student groups, volunteers, and other partner organizations.

According to the Wood River Land Trust’s Lands Program Director Keri York, the goal of the orchard is to bring people together around food production and show how conservation and agriculture can coexist. Since its inception in 2021, the orchard has become a spot for residents of all ages to learn about planting and pruning. It also serves as a real-life model of how birds, insects and other wildlife benefit from orchards.

“The orchard is part of our vision to create a different kind of space for people to experience the outdoors, and also the historical aspect of fruit tree production,” York explained.

Keri York

The Land Trust first planted two rows of apple, pear, plum, apricot and peach trees in 2021, contracting with Bellevue-based fruit tree nursery Branching Out to help with layout, irrigation and planting.
“We really wanted to get trees that were old enough to produce fruit the first year, which is why we decided on a bigger-scale irrigation system,” York said.

Thanks to the Wood River Women’s Foundation’s $2,500 partial grant received in 2022, the Land Trust was able to move ahead with planning the second phase of the orchard featuring native edible shrubs. The new phase, to be implemented this summer, will include weaving rows of elderberry, golden currant, salmonberry, gooseberries, serviceberries, blackberries and raspberries, inspiring people to snack as they walk.

According to York, the Land Trust is planning to add elements of native flowers around the orchard, in the near future, and will also install two more lines of irrigation, fencing and brush piles for bees along the perimeter of the orchard.

“We have a nearby pollinator meadow that is close enough to the orchard that bees are able to fly back and forth,” she said.

Eventually, the organization hopes to plant other food crops, such as asparagus and corn, and add an herb and scent garden as well as a composting facility.

“Every year we’re continuing to do a little more,” York said.

Grantees in the News

The Advocates

WRWF Grantee The Advocates for Survivors of Domestic Violence, a nonprofit based in Hailey, is hoping to raise funds to expand its housing and overall operations to keep up with an increasing demand for services.

“Our shelter has been so full at times we have had to put people in hotels,” said Advocates CEO Tricia Swartling. “We have wait lists for our apartments and more property adjacent to our existing property. We have the capacity to expand.”

Swartling said there was an 80% increase in the use of The Advocates emergency short term housing from July 2022 through March 2023 compared to the same period the previous year.

The expansion would help to address an affordable housing shortage that has kept some clients longer than expected in transitional housing, which is meant to prepare them for financial independence.

Bloom Truck & Community Library

For their 7th year, The Hunger Coalition and The Community Library will continue their collaboration to deliver books and healthy food for kids all across the Wood River Valley this summer!

The library focuses on maintaining kids’ reading and learning retention during their summer off-months, while The Hunger Coalition provides cost-free lunches to help kids maintain balanced nutrition when school lunches are not available.

The truck stations itself in five accessible locations from Carey to Ketchum all summer long, from 6/12 – 8/24.For the Bloom Truck and Hunger Coalition’s “Lunch in the Park” schedule click Here. Retrieved from Idaho Mountain Express.

Committee Corner – Finance
Finance Committee Chair Trinka Dyer

The Finance Committee’s charge is to provide direction and oversight for WRWF financial management. This includes reviewing the budget and monthly financial reports, performing an internal audit, and oversight of financial and investment policies and procedures. Thank you to the dedicated and skilled Finance Committee members, Karen de Saint Phalle, Kathy Edwards, Jodi Goodheart, Gail Landis, Courtney Jelaco and Patti Zebrowski.

As Sandy previewed in her April President’s Message, we are in the process of launching a new database management platform which will greatly simplify our financial and membership processes. I wanted to give an update on what you can expect.

In the past, all membership renewals were due by December 15, regardless of when a member had joined or last renewed. Moving forward members will renew based on their membership anniversary date. Don’t worry if you don’t remember when you joined; we will send all members an email informing them of their anniversary date. We will also give you the option to change your anniversary date if you would prefer to renew your membership at a different time. Members will also have the option to set up auto renewal payments using a credit card.

We hope that this new system makes the annual renewal process easier and more straightforward for our members. Your annual contributions create our grant pool and are so important to the community. More specific details about the process will be coming your way.

The Finance Committee welcomes new members who have experience in finance, accounting, or investment management. Please contact Trinka Dyer, trinka@gmail.com if you are interested in joining our committee.

Calendar

Meet & Mingle

Date: May 25 
Time: 5:00-6:30 pm
Location: at the home of Laura Rose-Lewis
advance RSVP required

may

FieldTrip! to support Girls on the Run 5K

Date: June 3
Time: 9:15 am
Location: Community Campus

june

BoardWalk

Date: June 23
Time: 10:00 am
Location: Democrat Gulch in Hailey

june

Annual All-Member Meeting & Celebration of Grantees

Date: August 2
more details to come

august

Legacy Giving Information Session

Date: August 23
Time: 3:00-5:00 pm
Location: The Community Library

august

event recap

May Meet & Mingle


Sonya Wilander from Men’s Second Chance Living

 

Late April in Ketchum can prove to be a sleepy time of year, also locally known as “slack”. The ski mountain has closed, the snow has begun to melt, and many have taken an opportunity to seek warmer weather. Thankfully, our dedicated members showed up for the April 20th Meet & Mingle!

Hosted at the Sun Valley Golf Club, members had a chance to catch up over a lovely spread of appetizers provided by Sun Valley Company. We were joined by grantee guest speaker Sonya Wilander from Men’s Second Chance Living (MSCL). Sonya shared important statistics about addiction. Although often viewed as a moral decision, it is a complicated disease that takes time and is challenging to treat. She spoke to the group about the holistic, full circle approach MSCL takes to support men in addiction recovery.

A special thank you to our dedicated team of volunteers who organize these events, and to Sun Valley Company for their support.

New WRWF Summer Intern! 

We are happy to welcome the new summer WRWF intern, Emily Boettger. Here she shares a bit about herself:

With both of my parents being nonprofit executive directors, I have been raised to greatly appreciate and prioritize philanthropy. I feel incredibly blessed to have been brought up surrounded by generous people passionate about making positive impacts, which has only become more resonant when I moved away to college.
From a young age, I took pride in my parents’ involvement in the community and wanted to emulate it myself. It is quite possible that many of you saw me as a child helping out at the will-call desk for Sun Valley Museum of Art concerts or waving from the Wood River Land Trust 4th of July parade float. As I grew older, more sophisticated ways to get involved always caught my eye, with one of my favorite high school extracurriculars being the WOW Youth Philanthropy Initiative; through which, I felt so empowered and enthralled by the opportunity to review and allocate grants.
I sought out similar experiences when coming to Boston College and was selected to be an allocation panelist for the United Way chapter in Plymouth County for their most recent grant cycle. Due to the personal growth and satisfaction these experiences allotted me, and the impact I have seen WRWF have on the valley, the opportunity to help facilitate and participate in your work is very exciting to me.
My most recent internship experiences have allowed me to hone many professional skills such as effective writing and communication, organization, dependability, teamwork, and time management. But, as I begin to near the end of my college experience, and envision what it is that I want in this next chapter of my life, I have come to realize that I will need more from my work than personal advancement. I want to feel a part of a place, truly invested in its community, and that my contributions matter beyond myself.

Stop by to meet Emily and introduce yourself when she works from June 5th – mid August:
Mondays 10am-12pm
Tuesdays 10am-2pm
Wednesdays 10am-2pm

Welcome, Emily!

new members

We are delighted to extend a warm WRWF welcome to new members who joined this month!

Nina Clark Ericson
Bobbi Hunt
Joy Prudek

New WRWF members are invited to provide photos and a bit of information about themselves to share in the News Brief. We have so many interesting members and it is fun to read about everyone’s background. Thanks so much and we look forward to meeting you soon. Welcome!

BFF! Membership Initiative

Calling all WRWF members! We’re here to remind you about our new membership initiative program “BFF! – Bring Forth Friends!”

If two new members join WRWF under your encouragement, you will be thanked for your recruitment efforts with either a $25 coffee card or a bottle of wine. This is an opportunity to continue growing and strengthening our collective membership through our personal and unique networks. Remember, there is no limit to how many rewards you can receive in a year. Be sure your BFFs give you credit when they join so we can track your success towards a reward! The starting date for BFF! is retroactively set to January 1, 2023. Keep spreading the word about WRWF and our mission! This reward is being underwritten by a generous WRWF member.

New Member Spotlight

We are happy to welcome new member Nina Clark Ericson. Here she shares a bit about herself:

I am excited to be a part of WRWF! I joined because I want to support and learn about local nonprofits, and meet some great women.

I am a psychologist with a private practice in Ketchum. In addition, I do Equus® Coaching, which is coaching partnering with horses. I have a Ph.D. in psychology and a Master Facilitatorship in Equus® Coaching.

I love having an abundance of great outdoor adventures in the Wood River Valley! My list of favorite activities includes alpine skiing, hiking, and riding horses. In addition, I enjoy reading books, having dinner with friends, going to plays, the ballet, musical performances, and connecting with my two adult children!

All-Members Survey Update
A big shout out and thank you to the 193 members who participated in our recent all-member survey. This is a record response rate! The results of your valued feedback will be featured in an upcoming edition of the News Brief. Stay tuned!

THANK YOU TO OUR sponsors!

We are grateful for our sponsors and extend a hearty WRWF thank you to Graybird Foundation, Little Caesars and Zions Bank!

THANK YOU TO OUR contributors

Carol Hoffman, Trinka Dyer, Emily Jones, Heidi Marcus, Sandy McCullough, Rebecca Ybarra Palma, Karissa Price Rico, Sarah Shepard, Renee Spooner