A nod to nonprofits: Siuslaw Vision

From KLCC Studios, this is Oregon on the Record. I'm Michael Dunn. Now is both a great time and a horrible time to be a nonprofit. Great because there is so much need and one's work is amazingly impactful. Horrible because widespread funding cuts at the federal level have imperiled so many organizations. Yet despite such existential challenges, the work of nonprofits gets done because of the staff and volunteers who keep it going. All this week, we're going to feature nonprofits in our community who may not be household names, but are nevertheless doing amazing work, sometimes with very little resources. Today on the show, we'll bring you the story of Siuslaw Vision and the work they do to improve communities on the coast and Siuslaw region. That's next on Oregon on the Record. Will Acosta, the director of Saislav Vision. Will, thank you so much for coming on and talking with us.

Thank you, Michael. Pleasure's all mine. It's exciting to be here.

Yeah, why don't you just tell our listening audience, what is Saislav Vision?

Absolutely. So Siusla Vision is a nonprofit organization here in the Siusla region, which is Western Lane County that encompasses the communities of Mapleton, Florence, Deadwood, Swiss Home, Dune City, Glenada. It's a pretty large region. out here in Westerlake County. We are basically building a better Siusa community together. Siusa Vision convenes, catalyzes, and connects individuals and organizations who want to improve the quality of life for people living out here. Our goal is to make sure that everyone living out here in these communities are working um healthy educated connected creative and active so we have our hands in quite a few different pots but um you know essentially we are just a community building non-profit that's what we're all about

okay maybe give us some details like how many staff people do you have how big is your board maybe talk a little bit about sort of um when when when you were founded those sorts of things

Absolutely. So CSO Vision was founded in 2018 after a community-wide survey really determined the need for a kind of a visioning group, right? So that led to a fiscal sponsorship and some funding and backing from the Ford Family Foundation and the Westerland Community Foundation and They really helped us get our feet onto the ground and kind of become established here as an official nonprofit, official 501c3. So we're a fairly small group. We have about seven board members. We recently just added Russ Pearson from Lane Community College. And then we have three staff members, myself and two other staff. We have an outreach coordinator here. Kate Hardity and then our connections coordinator, as we like to call her. Her name is Lindsay Phillips. They do fantastic work and have been here in the community for quite a long time. I myself have been living in a Swiss home just up Highway 36. for about two years now. So relatively new to the area, migrated over from Texas to escape some of the heat and really just fell in love with this whole place.

Yeah, yeah. You know, in researching your organization, it really looks like your organization is kind of a connector. Talk about the collaborations that you