2025 Partner Summit Recap

Type: Event Recap
Solution Areas: Adaptation & Resilience Art & Storytelling Climate-justice Education Electrification Finance & Economy Food & Agriculture Forests Governance & Leadership Inflation-reduction-act Land-use & Restoration Mental-health & Mindfulness Public-health Transportation Tribal & Indigenous Waste-prevention Youth

The Oregon Climate Action Hub (ORCAH) is an all-volunteer team on a mission to empower ALL Oregonians to take effective climate action. The ORCAH website helps users find positive ways to engage; helps organizers connect with each other’s work; and facilitates the flow of climate action opportunities to new audiences. By mobilizing climate concerned Oregonians and normalizing climate-positive engagement, ORCAH grows the climate movement’s reach and efficacy, for a just and livable future.

On April 10, 2025, the Oregon Climate Action Hub hosted its 2025 Partner Summit online, to support a range of partners from across the state. The event was made possible by a $20,000 grant from the Max and Marie Anna Richter Family Fund of Oregon Community Foundation, supporting ORCAH in engaging with BIPOC and Tribal organizations by introducing ORCAH’s new platform and mission, and building connections with allied organizations across the state.

Over our two-hour lunchtime gathering, we were joined by 38 representatives across 27 active and prospective ORCAH partner organizations.

Volunteers/presenters

Simone Crowe – Summit Lead and Moderator
Skye Morét – Collaborative Designer
Roel Uleners – Design Strategist
Rae Lieff Axelbank – Relationships & Culture
Britney VanCitters – ORCAH Advisory Board
David Hakan – ORCAH Advisory Board
Lena Karam – ORCAH Advisory Board
Frank Granshaw – ORCAH Team Member
Sal Orara – ORCAH Tech Team Convener
Diana Jones – ORCAH Co-Founder and Advisory Board Convener
Karen Wolfgang – ORCAH Co-Founder and Bridge Team Convener

Partners

Future partners

Alternative Youth Activities, Inc. (AYA)
Consejo Hispano
Mosquito Fleet
Oregon Citizens for an Environmental Rights Amendment (OCERA)
Oregon Rural Action
Pacific Northwest Biochar Institute
Portland Public Schools – Climate and Sustainability Team
Verde NW

Facilitated by ORCAH’s Summit Lead and Moderator Simone Crowe, the Summit was designed as a galvanizing event featuring guest speakers, such as ORCAH Advisory Board Members Britney VanCitters and Lena Karam, who shared their investments in ORCAH as an initiative for making a difference. Britney emphasized the hub aspect of ORCAH and advocated for practicing forgiveness – of others and of the self – for not always knowing intuitively what action to take or how; Lena spoke to the importance of community to effective activism and as its own desirable end.

Collaborative Designer Dr. Skye Morét was the keynote speaker for the Summit. Dr. Morét believes in the power of visualization and meaningful engagement in bridging the gap between two traditionally polar disciplines: design and science. Her work investigates the complex relationship between humans, technology and nature, aiming to engage broad audiences in understanding the natural world. In addition to this keynote, design strategist Roel Uleners provided visual note-taking to help illustrate the larger concepts throughout the keynote.

The keynote presentation applied collaborative design to climate action, describing the “kaleidoscopic background” that each individual brings to collective action and the tenets of implicit value and mutual respect. Dr. Morét lifted up the idea of designing with a population rather than for its constituents, from the outside. She enumerated the core questions of collaborative design – Why are we doing anything? What are we doing? and How do we do it together? – plus a bonus ORCAH question of How do we do that in the climate space specifically? Through real-time interactive short-answer surveys, Skye facilitated an exploration of this fourth consideration in practical terms.

The second half of the event included:

An update on the website by ORCAH Tech Convener, Salvador Orara. Sal shared the transformation that the ORCAH site has that the primary success metric of the initial build of the website is the RSVP event link.
A collaboration ideation session led by Relationships & Culture expert Rae Lieff Axelbank.
A recognition and appreciation of all of our partners by ORCAH Co-Founder, Diana Jones.
And a What’s Next for ORCAH announcement by ORCAH Co-Founder and Bridge Team Convener, Karen Wolfgang.

According to our participants, during and after the event, their greatest challenges are staff capacity and the current political landscape. Their goals for the Summit were to meet people and engage in shared campaigns. Moving forward, their goals are to keep growing ORCAH; find ways for partners to collaborate and connect with each other; and consider offering training sessions on subjects of interest (i.e. media). We love this feedback, and

Stay tuned for our upcoming regional events and more opportunities to collaborate on climate action. And in the meantime…

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