The Leach Botanical Garden in Portland, Ore., is a 17-acre park with tens of thousands of plants and trees.
Photo courtesy of Tamra Tiemeyer | Leach Botanical Garden
A beloved 17-acre park in outer Southeast Portland has raised enough money to stay open through June.
Earlier this year, the Leach Botanical Garden was on the brink of closure. Leach Garden Friends staff said inflation, rising costs and decreased city funding made it impossible for the nonprofit to continue managing this sprawling garden, where visitors can see more than 2,000 varieties of trees and plants.
Since that closure announcement in early February, Leach Garden Friends raised about $275,000 in donations and memberships. The garden also drew in extra visitors: About 3,000 people visited the garden in February, a more than fourfold increase from the same month last year.
The garden initially planned to raise about $50,000 per month for five months.
“I wasn’t expecting it would all happen so quickly,” said Eric Vines, the garden’s interim executive director. “We were all pleasantly surprised.”
While the sudden influx in funding is enough to buy the garden extra time, Vines said there’s still more to be done.
“We are operating now with reduced staffing and reduced services and reduced hours, and we can keep doing that for a while,” Vines said. “That’s not really what the public wants.”
Vines said his team is still looking for long-term funding options.
“People send us money to keep it open,” he said. “That’s the bare minimum, but to have a thriving garden, that’s going to require more. And so we’re trying to figure out how can we create a funding mechanism that would pay for that.”
Two people admire roses at the Leach Botanical Garden in Portland, Ore. The garden was on the brink of closure in February, but it has since raised enough funds to remain open through June.
Photo courtesy of Tamra Tiemeyer | Leach Botanical Garden
The city of Portland owns the Leach Botanical Garden, but the garden is managed by Leach Garden Friends. The city had historically helped fund some operating costs, but that funding ceased after a contract between the city and the nonprofit expired in June 2025.
That left an annual $350,000 funding gap in Leach Garden Friends’ budget.
Portland city staff said the contract was designed to gradually transition the garden toward greater financial self-sufficiency. For instance, over the course of the contract, the garden took on more maintenance and utility costs.
And the contract didn’t guarantee future funding because “future support is dictated by the City of Portland’s annual budget process.”
After the contract expired, Leach Garden Friends struggled to fill the funding gap left by the city.
Garden staff hope city leaders approve more funding in the next budget cycle. The Portland City Council is expected to vote on the city’s next budget in mid-June.
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