Portland's Parks & Recreation system has a scope, ambition and vitality most cities can only dream of. The green spaces, gardens, forests, swimming pools and playing fields are truly the city's backyard. Neighborhoods affectionately borrow their names, and identities, from the parks they adjoin. Every year, kids aged 1 to 100 attend over 12,000 after school, evening and summer classes through Portland Parks & Recreation, mastering everything from computers to kazoos.

Behind the numbers, of course, are the stories. Of fathers and sons finding common ground on a ball field. Of little girls learning not just to swim, but believe in themselves. Of at-risk kids finding a passion instead of a gang. Of all of us reclaiming sanity in the saving grace of a wooded trail.

By all yardsticks, Portland's parks work. We use them. Cherish them. They teach us. Bring us together. Draw new business and national acclaim through the quality of life they provide.

But our parks have always depended on visionaries. Even at the outset, when Portland itself was largely wilderness, there were those setting aside green spaces to enjoy in perpetuity.

Today, the system faces both short and long-term threats. Despite the best efforts of a passionate staff and volunteers who orchestrate miracles daily, the underlying problems can't be ignored.

Many community centers are outdated and serve purposes for which they were never intended. Critical maintenance is going undone for lack of funds. The city is divided into have and have-not sectors, leaving some families rich with opportunity and others high and dry. Park expansion is lagging frighteningly behind growth. Since 1970, the population has increased by 50% and active park space only 5%.

And we can't serve many of those who need us most. Currently, we have scholarships for a small fraction of those low-income families who require them. Vast Spanish-speaking communities are excluded for lack of bilingual staff. And for every team that gets playing time on our courts and playing fields, others are turned away.

Enter the Portland Parks Foundation, established in 2001 on the recommendation of the "Parks 2020 Vision," a study of the 20-year needs and objectives of Portland Parks & Recreation. Our goals are twofold: To create a parks expansion fund to ensure that all neighborhoods have access to parks and green spaces. And to provide financial aid to low-income youth in the face of shrinking public funding.

Portland was named America's Most Livable City by Money Magazine in 2001. Where will we rank twenty years from now if we let the Portland parks decline? We owe our parks to the generations before us. Now it's our turn to care.

For more information on how you can assist the Portland Parks, please email Linda Laviolette.