Building a strong community is important to a healthy functioning society. However, without the necessary tools such a feat can be a challenge.

The folks at Portland Community ToolBank offer the assistance and tools necessary to make building a strong community a reality. Since 2015, the Portland Community ToolBank has provided fellow not-for-profit organizations with year-round access to an inventory of tools for use in volunteer projects and for facility and grounds maintenance.

This non-profit is modeled after the highly successful Atlanta Community ToolBank, which has served greater Atlanta’s not-for-profit sector for more than 25 years. Both organizations are affiliated with ToolBank USA. There are currently nine cities under the ToolBank USA umbrella. Atlanta, Baltimore, Charlotte, Chicago, Cincinnati, Houston, Phoenix and Richmond (VA) are some of the cities involved in the national network of ToolBanks.

Portland ToolBank provides a 10,000 square foot warehouse/office space and an inventory comprised of more than 150 different types of tools and equipment in volumes large enough to equip thousands of volunteers at a time. Having access to ToolBank tools assists non-profits by eliminating the need to incur the expense of purchasing, repairing, and storing tools, reducing the costs associated with service projects and allowing these agencies to focus more of their resources on their mission.

The ToolBank offers a year-round inventory to charitable organizations such as:  tax exempt non-profits, Veterans groups, schools/PTAs and PTOs, neighborhood associations, faith-based groups, civic organizations, and government agencies.

The ToolBank also collaborates with dozens of disaster response organizations and government offices. The organization spent nearly three years exploring the role of tools in disaster response and recovery. From their research they discovered that the lack of tools and equipment consistently challenged their ability to engage volunteers.  In response to this ToolBank USA created ToolBank Disaster Services. This service is a mobile unit that expediently delivers tools to a disaster event in an effort to eliminate the distance between a disaster event and the nearest ToolBank.

If you’d like to volunteer or learn more about Portland Community ToolBank contact them here.

This week at Portland Radio Project we featured Portland Community ToolBank as part of our award-winning Community Voices series. You can listen below to interviews with key members of the organization:

Samantha Jordan, ToolBank Board of Directors President/Director of Business Development, Marketing & Estimating of Emetic Construction Co.

Zoya Kumar, ToolBank Executive Director

Steve Dearborn, ToolBank Board Director/President of Miller Paint

Trevor Parker, ToolBank Board Director/Vice President and Branch Manager of Foresters Financial Services, Inc.

 

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