TWST Blog

Photo at left: the view from Columbia Gorge Community College

I enjoyed a picturesque drive through the Gorge today to meet up with Sally Yee for a TWST meeting in The Dalles.  The Dalles is home to one of my family's favorite museums, The Columbia Gorge Discovery Center, where my daughter loves dressing up in the Kids Discovery Room (see photo below).

Our meeting was hosted at Columbia Gorge Community College, which has distractingly breathtaking views from most areas of the campus (see above).  The turnout was strong, with dozens of representatives from organizations ranging from museums to health clinics to mediation services to senior centers.  Almost everyone in the room knew each other, thanks to the work of Paul Lindberg and the Gorge Nonprofit Collaborative , which assists organizations in the region through brown bag lunches, trainings and networking opportunities.

This lively group kept us on our toes and raised many good questions about the Trust’s application process, areas of interest, and types of support.  We realized that no matter how hard we strive to make our process as open and detailed as possible on the website, there is still much mystery about what actually happens behind the curtain after the “submit” button is pressed on the application forms...  Hopefully we were able to clear that up!

For me, the best part of the meeting was finally putting faces to the names I’ve been corresponding with by email over the years.  It’s good to get out from behind my desk in Portland, and I will definitely try to do that more often.

Finally, a big thank you to our fabulous host, Dan Spatz, Chief Institutional Advancement Officer at Columbia Gorge Community College, and thank you to all the wonderful attendees who provided feedback about their work and the issues addressing their community.