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Oregon Microenterprise Network aids small business development By WENDY SIPOREN Meyer Memorial Trust backs others The Oregon Microenterprise Network is one of three Southern Oregon organizations to receive grants from the Meyer Memorial Trust. The other two are: St. Mary's School. A $250,000 grant will enable St. Mary's to begin the second phase of an $8 million expansion project. The funds will go toward the construction of a two-story building that will house a library/media center, three science labs and eight humanities classrooms. The school nearly has raised the $2.5 million needed for this aspect of the project. The school currently enrolls 345 students in grades six through 12. The addition will allow the school to expand to 600 students. Future plans call for the addition of a student commons with kitchen and a performing arts center and chapel. The school already has completed construction of a parking lot, playing fields and eight-lane track. Options for Southern Oregon. This non-profit organization serving adults with severe mental illness was awarded $100,000 for the renovation of the old Roosevelt School building on G Street in downtown Grants Pass. The $842,000 project will expand, remodel and repair the 1922 building that houses the organization's administration, day program and New Hope Bakery. The organization already has received $40,000 from the Collins Foundation and $10,000 from the Carpenter Foundation and is awaiting the results of a Community Development Block Grant. As a testament to the growing interest in grassroots economic development, an eclectic group of small business development organizations across the state has banded together to promote entrepreneurship among non-traditional populations. A three-year operating grant of $180,000 from the Meyer Memorial Trust will launch the Oregon Microenterprise Network, or OMEN, which consists of 11 organizations from Portland to Roseburg that serve very small businesses. "Microenterprise has been slow to develop in Oregon, but it's really starting to grow," said Mary O'Kief, Southern Oregon Women's Access to Credit director who helped organize the network. "People want to figure out a way to make a living income. I think they are frustrated by the lack of well-paying jobs," she said. She referred to a recent study done by the Northwest Policy Institute which found that 47 percent of all available jobs in Oregon do not provide a living wage. "There's people out there that have a lot of talent, skills and ability and they have often dreamed about self-employment. Now there's someone out there to help them," O'Kief said. With the creation of the microenterprise network, now there will be someone to help the helpers, too. When SOWAC launched its business training programs in 1990, it was one of the first microenterprise development programs in the nation. It wasn't until a national conference in 1997 that O'Kief became aware of similar organizations working in Oregon. "It was really the first indication that we were doing something others were doing," said O'Kief. Most of the member organizations are very small and do not have the staff resources to devote to a larger organization, she said. With the receipt of the grant, the network will be able to hire an executive director who will help the member organizations with networking, policy and legislative support and outreach to communities interested in offering similar services. Members of the Oregon Microenterprise Network often draw from a population disenfranchised from traditional business circles. For the Neighborhood Pride Team, a coalition of three programs serving outer-southeast Portland, business development means neighborhood development. "We build a community not by servicing their needs, but by building the assets of a community," said Ben Seigel, who coordinated the Neighborhood Pride Team's advanced technical training program. "The poorer the neighborhood, the more ideas people have for starting their own businesses -- maybe the greater the desire." Other member organizations include the Umpqua Community Development Corporation; a partnership in Lane County consisting of Saturday Market, OUR Federal Credit Union and the Lane Community College Business Development Center; Mercy Corps International, serving immigrant groups in Portland; and Cascadia Revolving Loan Fund. Other affiliated organizations include the Association of Oregon Community Development Organizations, the city of Portland, Neighborhood Partnership Fund, the Oregon Economic and Community Development Department and the Oregon Housing and Community Services Department. Men and women interested in learning more about microenterprise business services in Jackson and Josephine counties may attend a free SOWAC orientation Dec. 4 and 9 in Medford and Dec. 4 and 11 in Grants Pass. For more information, call SOWAC at 779-3992. Today's Business Index Mail Tribune Copyright � The Mail Tribune 1999, Medford, Oregon USA