Love, Portland’s
First Funding Opportunity
Our vision is a Portland where, together, everyone’s needs are met.
Love, Portland has opened our first funding opportunity:
$1.5 million in unrestricted funding for one five-organization cohort over three years.
The cohort will bring together experience across five interconnected areas:
keeping people housed, substance use disorder treatment, domestic and family violence services, foster care services, and youth mentorship.
Love, Portland was born from a question:
What is possible if we organize our resources, relationships, and wisdom differently?
Extraordinary work, knowledge, relationships, and resources already exist across Portland. We believe bringing them together creates possibilities none of us can reach alone. Our vision calls for more than incremental change. It calls for transformation in how we collectively meet people’s needs.
Applying as a Cohort
Five organizations will apply together, collectively bringing experience across all five interconnected areas.
One cohort will be selected.
Each organization in the selected cohort will receive $100,000/year for three years.
The application will ask:
Why these five organizations? What could working together make possible that you could not accomplish independently?
Things to Note:
New and emerging relationships are welcome. The starting point is enough connection and shared interest to want to explore what working together could make possible.
Love, Portland also supports what collaboration requires: time, resources, facilitated space, and three years to build relationships and trust. Love, Portland is creating the conditions for organizations closest to the work to help determine what comes next.
There is no predetermined answer the cohort is expected to produce. The work may lead toward stronger services, deeper coordination, systems change, new approaches, larger investment opportunities, or combinations that emerge through the cohort itself.
Five Interconnected Areas
We’re starting across five interconnected areas intentionally chosen as critical intervention points where meeting needs earlier can help prevent homelessness:
Each represents a critical intervention point on its own. Each also brings a distinct vantage point into what people need and where needs go unmet.
Together, they reflect how people actually experience life: across interconnected needs and systems, not within a single funding category.
The starting point is what participating organizations already know about the people and communities they serve. What can these organizations make possible together that they cannot alone? What might need to shift further upstream for more people’s needs to be met?
Grant Details
Funding + Facilitated Time
$100,000 per organization, per year, for three years
$1.5 million total in direct, unrestricted grants from 2027-2029
Facilitated cohort time throughout the three years
One cohort of five organizations will be selected
Facilitated Cohort Time
That time will create space to:
Build relationships and trust
Connect knowledge across interconnected areas
Learn from different kinds of community, service, advocacy, and systems expertise
Strengthen approaches that already work and explore what might become possible together
Build knowledge that can inform larger philanthropic and public funding
Impact Now + Learning
Over Time
The model is designed to respond right now and into the future.
Love, Portland will learn what $100,000 a year in unrestricted, committed funding makes possible for each organization and the communities they serve today.
Over three years, collective work will also reveal what is working, what is missing, where stronger connections could make a difference, and where larger philanthropic and public funding could have greater impact.
Interested in Learning More?
There will be a virtual information session on 9/15/26 from 12-1pm PST
Learn more about the opportunity, what Love, Portland is looking for, the cohort experience, and the application process. The session will be recorded for anyone who cannot attend.
Sign Up for
Grant Updates
Eligibility:
Apply together as a group of exactly five nonprofit organizations*
Serve people in the Portland tri-county area: Clackamas, Multnomah, and/or Washington counties
Be a 501(c)(3) nonprofit or have a fiscal sponsor that is a 501(c)(3)
Collectively bring meaningful knowledge and experience across all five focus areas:
1. Keeping People Housed
2. Substance Use Disorder Treatment
3. Domestic and Family Violence Services
4. Foster Care Services
5. Youth Mentorship
Commit to actively participating in the cohort meetings for all three years
Affirm Love, Portland’s values
*Please note: individual organizations may only apply with a maximum of two proposed cohorts
Organizations may provide direct services, work to change policies or systems, organize communities, advocate, build networks, or bring other approaches grounded in their missions and communities.
The five organizations do not need to approach their work in the same way. The opportunity is in what they might learn, strengthen, connect, and create together.
Stay Connected
This is Love, Portland’s first grantmaking process, and we expect to learn along the way. When details are updated or questions arise that could help other applicants, that information will be shared broadly here and through the Love, Portland Grant Opportunities mailing list.
Have a question? Email us at info@loveportlandoregon.org
Timeline
Grant opportunity opens
Review the opportunity and eligibility requirements. Begin talking with potential cohort organizations and submit your eligibility screening when your group of five is ready
Rolling eligibility screening
Eligibility screenings will be reviewed on a rolling basis, with a response within approximately 3 business days. You do not need to wait until November to submit.
Begin the full application
Eligible cohorts can begin their full application immediately. One application will be submitted on behalf of all five organizations.
Virtual information session
Learn more about the opportunity, what Love, Portland is looking for, the cohort experience, and the application process. The session will be recorded for anyone who cannot attend.
Evaluation rubric published
Love, Portland will publish the final evaluation rubric so you know how applications will be reviewed before the application deadline.
Applicant Q&A / office hours
Bring questions about the evaluation rubric, your application, or the process. Questions and answers that could help other applicants will also be shared publicly.
Eligibility screening deadline
This is the final day to submit the eligibility screening. Because screening takes up to three business days and the full application is due shortly afterward, we strongly encourage you to submit earlier.
Full application deadline
All eligible cohorts must submit their completed application by this date.
Application review
Love, Portland's Strategic Advisors will review applications and identify finalists by 5pm PST.
Finalist interviews
Approximately 3–5 finalist cohorts will be invited to an interview. Whenever possible, representatives from all five organizations should participate.
Applicants notified
Applicants will be notified of Love, Portland's final funding decision.
How funding decisions will be made
The people closest to the challenges should have real power in shaping what comes next. Love, Portland’s six Strategic Advisors bring lived and professional experience across the issue areas. Together with Love, Portland’s founder, they will select the cohort through a participatory grantmaking process, bringing community knowledge directly into decisions about where resources go.
Applicant FAQ
-
One five-organization cohort will receive three years of unrestricted funding and facilitated time to build relationships, connect what they know, strengthen what works, and explore what becomes possible through collaboration.
-
Each organization will receive $100,000 per year in unrestricted funding for three years.
-
Together. Organizations choose one another and submit one five-organization cohort application.
-
Yes, across the cohort as a whole. There does not need to be one organization for each focus area. Organizations may bring experience across multiple areas and may also do significant work beyond them.
-
No. The five areas describe the collective experience the cohort should bring. Organizations often work across issues, communities, systems, and approaches, and that breadth can strengthen a cohort.
-
Yes. Each organization must either have 501(c)(3) nonprofit status or be fiscally sponsored by a 501(c)(3) organization.
-
No. Start with what you know about the people and communities you serve: What do they need? Where are needs going unmet? And what might become possible if five organizations brought their relationships, expertise, and wisdom together? Homelessness is an intentional through-line and outcome of the investment, but the opportunity is larger.
-
No. Organizations may provide direct services, work to change policies or systems, organize communities, advocate, build networks, or bring other approaches grounded in their missions and communities. Different kinds of expertise can strengthen the cohort.
-
Eligible organizations must serve people in Multnomah, Washington, or Clackamas counties. Organizations do not need to be headquartered there and may also work elsewhere. The proposed cohort work should include and benefit people in the Portland metro area.
-
No. New and emerging relationships are welcome. The starting point is enough connection and shared interest to want to explore what working together could make possible.
-
A clear reason these five organizations chose each other, knowledge and experience across all five focus areas, strong community relationships, different perspectives and approaches, and genuine interest in learning and building together.
-
No. The cohort creates the conditions for the tried-and-true to meet the yet-to-be-imagined. Organizations can strengthen what works, connect existing work, explore systems change, develop new approaches, or discover other possibilities together.
-
Build relationships and trust, connect knowledge across focus areas, learn across different kinds of expertise, strengthen what works, and explore what might become possible together.
-
There is no predetermined answer the cohort is expected to produce. The work may lead toward stronger services, deeper coordination, systems change, new approaches, larger investment opportunities, or combinations that emerge through the cohort itself.
-
The cohort will include facilitated time together over three years. Specific participation expectations will be shared as they are finalized. [Sign up for grant updates.]
-
Six Strategic Advisors with lived and professional experience across the issues funded, together with Love, Portland’s founder, will select the cohort through a participatory grantmaking process.
-
September 3, when the eligibility screening and application materials become available.
-
Yes. There is an information session September 15 and a Q&A October 13. Questions and answers that could benefit all applicants will also be shared broadly.
-
-
Eligibility screening closes November 2. Eligible cohorts must apply by November 6. Finalist interviews take place December 1–11, final decisions are made by the end of December
-
Join the Love, Portland Grant Opportunities mailing list and check the grant webpage for current information.