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Meyer trust awards $5.4 million By SUSAN JAY A program to safeguard stream flows for fish, employment training for the disabled in Grants Pass and a summer youth camp south of Ashland will receive an extra boost from grants recently awarded by the Meyer Memorial Trust. The trust awarded 38 grants totaling nearly $5.4 million to nonprofit groups in Oregon and Clark County, Wash., in February and March. The new grants brought the total funds awarded by the trust to nearly $26 million for this fiscal year, and is a new high in annual grant awards for the Trust, said board chair Debbie Craig. The trust's current fiscal year began April 1, 1998. Since its start in 1982, The Meyer Trust has provided more than $222 million to tax-exempt groups, mostly within the state of Oregon. Grants awarded in this latest round ranged from $2,500 to the Cascade Head Festival of Music in Lincoln City for office equipment to $2 million over the next four years to help the Portland Opera Association achieve long-term financial health. The following is a list of local Meyer trust grant recipients: $250,000 to SPARC Enterprises in Grants Pass to purchase, renovate and build a 33,000-square-foot building for a community employment training facility for people with disabilities, and Josephine County's recycling center. The new facility is at 310 Morgan St., in Grants Pass. $120,000 to the Oregon Water Trust, in Portland, to build local support in the Rogue and Umpqua basins for a project that acquires water rights to be held in a trust and used to enhance and establish adequate stream flows for fish. $50,000 to Wilderness Trails in Medford to finish building a 4,000-square-foot lodge at the youth summer camp on 160 acres off Dead Indian Memorial Road, 18 miles east of Ashland. The Christian camp for troubled youth provided outdoor activities for 350 young people in 1998. $12,000 to Winter Springs, Center for Living with Loss and Grief, Medford, to train local volunteers so they can help local residents who face life-threatening illness or the loss of loved ones. $10,300 to Ashland Parks Foundation to develop an educational program for students and the community to study the North Mountain Park Natural Area. Mail Tribune Copyright � The Mail Tribune 1999, Medford, Oregon USA