2025 Safer Portland Grant recipients

Background

The 2025 Safer Portland Grant is an opportunity to help prevent and reduce violence: principally, gun violence through collaborative community-based prevention efforts. The grant prioritizes the following Portland neighborhoods, including: Cully; Hazelwood; Eliot; Powellhurst-Gilbert; and/or areas known for high rates of violent incidents and gun violence.

Applicants supporting efforts in all neighborhoods, even those outside the priority areas, were encouraged to apply. 

The Portland Office of Violence Prevention received 72 applications for the $1,000,000 grant and was unable to award funds to many organizations doing important gun violence prevention work in the community. A selection committee reviewed each application. 

The following organizations received funding to help reduce gun violence through community-based prevention efforts:

Breaking Cycles, Word is Bond - $100,000

Rising Leaders is a dynamic three-year leadership incubator program that is part internship, part rite-of-passage program. Participants advance through Rising Leaders in leadership cohorts, consisting of young Black men from across the city of Portland, beginning the summer after their freshman year of high school. 

Level Up runs from September through and connects participants with mentors, resources, tools, and workshops that help them achieve their goals and freedom dreams. All Level Up events are free to young Black men in seventh grade through high school.

The Rose Response, Royal Rose Foundation - $50,000

The Rose Response is a culturally-specific violence prevention program providing youth-led workshops, peer mentorship, and healing-centered social activities for Black and Brown youth in East Portland. Through trauma-informed sessions focused on overdose prevention, conflict resolution, identity development, and leadership building, the program creates safer pathways for youth ages 13-24 most impacted by community violence. 

Lents Youth Initiative, Rose Community Development - $50,000

The Lents Youth Initiative (LYI) program's spring Youth Empowerment Series (YES) includes training in de-escalation, self-defense, and conflict resolution, alongside leadership development, career exploration, and environmental service learning. Following the training, participants are placed in paid summer internships with local nonprofit and government partners, where they gain hands-on experience, mentorship, and exposure to career pathways.

Life Skills Program, Project 48 - $30,800

The Life Skills Program supports foster youth and young adults, ages 17-23, as they transition to independent adulthood, often without stable housing, family support, or financial resources. Delivered in six-week, citywide cohorts, the program provides job readiness training, financial literacy instruction, and one-on-one case management. Participants also gain access to housing support, healthcare enrollment, and vital benefits.

Safer Portland, POIC & RAHS - $100,000

POIC Street Level Outreach is a resource to address and interrupt violence and firearm-related incidents before they occur. The services are tailored to the unique needs of at-risk youth and families in these neighborhoods, aiming to reduce the risk of violence. Additionally, outreach workers provide a comprehensive range of wrap-around support programs serving high-risk, low-income people of color. 

East Connect, New Avenues for Youth - $99,999.60

New Avenues for Youth's East Connect program delivers early-intervention services at schools, hotspot apartment complexes, parks, and other public spaces in Cully, Hazelwood, Eliot, and Powellhurst-Gilbert neighborhoods. The program connects youth to a wide range of wraparound supports (including behavioral health services, crisis supports, shelter and housing, family mediation, case management, education, job training) and holds community-building activities to help young people make positive peer connections and access resources that build stability and well-being.

Business of Sports, Michael Holton Inc. - $24,000

 Business of Sports is a prosocial youth initiative by Michael Holton, Inc. that fosters career exploration, mentorship, and skill-building through behind-the-scenes access to the sports industry, empowering youth impacted by trauma and poverty to choose futures of opportunity over violence. Key objectives include hands-on exposure to the business side of sports, exploring roles in marketing, HR, social media, sales, and more, using the Portland Trail Blazers as a real-world model. The program highlights non-athlete careers while building communication, leadership, and teamwork skills.

Brushes Not Bullets, Medicine Bear - $25,000

Brushes Not Bullets is a youth-led artist apprenticeship program that uses mural-making, cultural storytelling, and community events to prevent gun violence and promote healing. Youth work alongside professional artists, engage in mentorship, and participate in trauma-informed workshops. The program builds bridges between youth, Multnomah County, the City of Portland police, and culturally specific nonprofits like NARA NW and Latino Network. Taking place in high-risk neighborhoods, the project transforms public spaces while fostering trust, self-expression, and community resilience.

Soldiers of Love 2025, Love is Stronger GV - $100,000

Soldiers of Love 2025 is a youth-led violence prevention and healing initiative for youth aged 12-24 focused on Cully, Lents, Central Eastside, Eliot, Gateway, Interstate, and Downtown. The program offers consistent prosocial gatherings, trauma-informed mentorship, and neighborhood-specific strategies. 

Milpa, Latino Network - $100,000

Milpa, named after a field used in traditional agricultural practices of the indigenous peoples of Central America, is a three-tiered community responsiveness gun violence reduction program. This program works to provide culturally specific services to Latinx youth age 13-19 and families impacted by gun violence as well as individuals at risk of being impacted by gun violence. Milpa also offers mentorship programs for youth at risk of gun violence, or who have been affected by gun violence, to help them overcome their challenges and provide a safe space.

SKY Breathwork, International Association for Human Values - $45,000

SKY Breathwork delivers evidence-based sessions and trauma-informed community support to 6th-12th grade aged youth in East Portland. Through monthly wellness, mentorship, and life-skills programming at school and community-based locations, IAHV and Lionjevity will provide emotional regulation tools, food access, stipends, and individualized care coordination to prevent violence and stabilize youth in crisis. 

Culturally Specific Gun Violence Prevention, IRCO - $84,500

IRCO's culturally specific gun violence prevention program provides violence prevention through social activities for African Immigrant and Refugee and Pacific Islander communities. The program offers:

• Youth and adult mediation and mentoring (via individualized mentorship, including positive adult role models/credible messengers, systems navigation, and working with court and parole officers to support families navigating justice systems).
• Preventative events, programs, and workshops (e.g. culturally and linguistically specific workshops), prosocial activities (e.g., open gyms, sports programs, future orientation)
• Arts, culture and recreation programs (e.g., arts, music, culinary arts, cultural celebrations).

Voices in Bloom, Free Arts NW - $28,480

This four-phase visual and storytelling arts program empowers teens to become creative leaders and agents of change. It begins with surveying the community to understand local needs and identify interested participants. Next, a core group of teen leaders explore gun violence, justice, healing, and self-expression using the Vision Quilt curriculum. In the new year, teens will apply their skills by mentoring younger children through arts-based activities that address social issues. The program culminates in a public showcase of youth-created art, performances, and stories.

BEEF-Fi, Day One Tech, LLC - $100,000

The BEE-FI Project is an innovative community initiative by Day One Tech S.T.E.A.M. designed to transform public spaces in East Portland and Gresham into connected, empowering environments for youth and families. By combining free Wi-Fi access with engaging pop-up recreation, mentorship, and resource hubs, BEE-FI reduces barriers to access and strengthens the social fabric in underserved communities 

Workforce Development, Cultivate Initiatives - $100,000

Cultivate Initiatives' Workforce Development Program addresses a critical gap: too many neighbors facing houselessness, reentry from incarceration, or deep poverty are ready to work but locked out of traditional employment pathways. Through paid internships, workforce teams, and job readiness support, participants not only earn immediate income but also gain the skills, confidence, and credentials needed to transition into permanent employment.  

Friends of Noise, All ages Music - $48,040

The Sound Squad Supreme is a workforce development program for youth that teaches live sound engineering and event production skills. The program offers paid training and work experience via concerts, events, and client gigs, providing technical skills in the music industry as well as soft skills that ensure our participants are workforce ready for any career path.