Marianne Nelson contacted our organization just over a year ago after moving to Portland from Illinois where she ran a successful land trust.  She came in with limitless enthusiasm for the Gorge and was eager to help.

If you were to come into our office on any given day in a week, you may find her helping with mailings, organizing newspaper articles or coordinating our hiking season.  Marianne drove to Salem last year to spend a day lobbying the Oregon legislature on the importance improving gorge air quality.  On every call to action, she writes a personal letter and attends every key hearing. Marianne has taught herself the flowers of the Gorge and, as a shepherd in our hiking program, she shares this knowledge with others.

Perhaps most amazing, Marianne took the lead in creating a detailed photo-archive system from scratch.  This means sorting through thousands of photos, organizing them by location, labeling them and then putting them on-line.   For this organization, visuals are EVERYTHING and this new photo archive system will allow staff to better incorporate fantastic Gorge photos into emails, newsletters and publications. This job would have cost us thousands of dollars in consulting fees. 

Thank you Marianne for all that you do for the Gorge!