In late September, the East Portland-based youth mentorship program HOLLA got a much-needed financial boost when it received its first grant disbursement from the Portland Children’s Levy.

The influx of funding comes as nonprofits like HOLLA have been scrambling, both in Oregon and nationally, to make ends meet after the Trump administration cut a number of longstanding funding sources. But it almost didn’t happen.

In early June, after organizations like HOLLA had been notified of their selection to receive grants from the Portland Children’s Levy (PCL), the Portland City Council made an unprecedented decision: voting to reject $70.9 million in grants the PCL allocation committee had awarded for the coming fiscal year and instead extending funding to the program’s current large grantees

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