Heritage Customer Offers Place Where Youth Feel Seen, Supported & Inspired

BY JOHN STEARNS

The Boys & Girls Clubs of Emerald Valley (BGCEV) is a gem for youth in and around Eugene, Oregon, as demonstrated in numbers and smiles.

The nonprofit club served 739 individual youth last year in grades one through 12 and averaged about 200 visitors per day across its sites, whether after school or all day during the summer. It also served those kids more than 56,000 nutritious meals and snacks in a partnership with local school districts. Nine out of every 10 club members live in financially strained households, according to the club’s 2024 impact report— proof of its services’ value.

The club works with kids from early in their elementary school years, helping get them to graduation and establish a plan for the future, said Shelly Ivey, executive director of the nonprofit organization that became a Heritage customer when the bank opened its Eugene branch in 2022.

“That’s really what we’re doing, and coming alongside and saying, ‘We care so much about you,’ and giving them the tools they need to succeed, but also making it so fun with youth voice and choice, and giving kids an opportunity to just be themselves when they walk through our doors,” said Ivey, who joined the club in 2020 as site director of its main Eugene clubhouse, then became executive director in April 2024. She has overseen the club’s quadrupling of locations.

The club, part of a national network of Boys & Girls Clubs of America, provides several programs in the arts, education and career development; sports and recreation; and connection—all in safe and supervised spaces.

Thanks to its donors, BGCEV is able to provide programs for youth no matter their families’ ability to pay. Many families have one or two working parents, but the rising cost of living in the Eugene-Springfield area makes it increasingly difficult to make ends meet, Ivey said.

“We are here for families and kids that don’t really have any other choices; they cannot afford a $400-per-month after-school program, as much as they want to, and they want to give that to their child,” she said. “The reality is, a lot of those kids, if they didn’t have the club, they would be left unsupervised at home or having to be placed with an older sibling or relying on a family member and doing the best they can…and so those are the families we’re here for.”

The club offers after-school and summer programs for a fraction of what it costs to provide them, making them affordable.

“We really tried to remove all those financial barriers to keep our costs subsidized for every single kid that walks through our door,” Ivey said.

If they can, families are asked to pay $40 per month, or $60 if multiple kids are enrolled. The club’s cost, however, is about $400 per month per youth.

“That’s why it’s incumbent upon my team, our board of directors and our broader community to help raise these funds so that we can give kids a safe place to be when school is out,” Ivey said.

“That’s the delta; that’s the difference between the $40 we’re asking and the $400 we need to run,” she said. “That’s the work we do and that’s why we go out to the community and we find amazing partners like Heritage Bank to say, ‘This is important for our community. If we give kids what they need in these formative years, our community is ultimately going to be better because we’re going to have fully equipped adults, once they reach that point, to be part of our community because we’re giving them the meals, the mentorship, the lifechanging programs that they need to learn.’”

The BGCEV’s biggest fundraiser is its annual Field of Dreams dinner and auction held on the field at the University of Oregon’s baseball stadium, PK Park. This year’s event, held

August 14, was expected to raise about $300,000, enough to sustain the club’s after-school program for a year, Ivey said. The club, which has a 2025 budget of roughly $1.7 million, has about 45 full- and part-time staff in summer, when programs run from 8 a.m. to 5:30 p.m., and about 30 to 35 staff during the school year, when programs run in the afternoons.

Heather Gabbert, primary contact for BGCEV and its deposit relationship at Heritage, sits on the Field of Dreams event committee and said supporting the club is rewarding in many ways.

“The Boys & Girls Club doesn’t just support kids—it lifts up our entire community,” said Gabbert, vice president-relationship banking officer in Eugene. “It’s a place where youth feel seen, supported and inspired. They’re learning how to lead, how to show up for others and how to believe in themselves. Whether it’s through mentoring, school support or just having a safe place to be after class, the club is helping raise a generation that’s more connected, confident and ready to make a difference. The fact that we can help support Shelly and the team at Boys & Girls Club in any way makes our role as a financial partner even more rewarding. We show up with our team to volunteer, we raise funds, and we ask, ‘How can we help support this important work to make a difference for these families in our community.’”

Four locations, more capacity to help

The club’s four Eugene locations are comprised of its main clubhouse on West 22nd Avenue; the Arts & Technology Academy next door; its new Bethel Club site at Clear Lake Community Center on Barger Drive; and its River Road Club site at River Road/El Camino Elementary School on West Hilliard Lane.

The club opened its first Bethel location in 2022 in Bethel School District’s Prairie Mountain School, a program funded with COVID-relief money the district had received and since used, Ivey said. That necessitated additional fundraising to ensure BGCEV could continue operating the Bethel site in perpetuity, plus serve the growing number of youth the club can now accommodate at its new Bethel home in Clear Lake Community Center. The club moved there in July to expand capacity; it can see 130 to 140 kids per day versus 70 to 80 at Prairie Mountain. Ivey hopes to include a full teen center at Clear Lake as a drop-in site for food, mentoring and other needs.

The club is more than extra space. BGCEV partners at Clear Lake with the NAACP, which has offices there; Preschool Promise, which offers preschool programs; Food for Lane County; and Bethel Resource Center. Clear Lake serves as one hub helping families and youth in the Bethel area, Ivey said. The River Road/El Camino Elementary School location is a partnership with Eugene School District 4J, which provides priority enrollment in the club for about 30 kids who need extra support with reading and math and are enrolled in what’s called the BEST Afterschool Program. The site can accommodate about 40 kids total.

Forty-five percent of BGCEV kids identify as youth of color.

“It really is interesting to see how much diversity is in our clubs and we really prioritize trying to hire staff, these development professionals who are also diverse, so that kids can see adults reflective in their life who look and act like them as well,” Ivey said.

Thanks to the 4J and Bethel School District partnership, everyone gets fed, too. After school, it’s a hot supper. In the summer program, youth get breakfast and a hot lunch. Food for Lane County provides two snacks for the summer program.

Gabbert called the club more than a program.

“It’s a game changer for youth and our community,” she said.

“I can still remember the pivotal individuals who shaped my life growing up—the teachers, coaches or neighbors who believed in me when I needed it most. Their support made a lasting impact. That’s why I can only imagine how much a place like the Boys & Girls Club would have meant to me: a whole community of caring adults, programs designed to build confidence and leadership and a safe space to just be a kid. The club is changing lives, one kid at a time.”

Heritage’s Eugene staff have volunteered at the clubhouse on bank-wide volunteer days, fielded a team in the “Family Feud”-style game show galas for the club, and the bank annually sponsors Field of Dreams. Staff also have participated in the Eugene Marathon’s Run for a Cause to benefit BGCEV.

Older kids in the club also want to help, especially as mentors to younger ones, Ivey said.

“It’s pretty amazing, once we start forming these relationships with kids in their younger years, they want to be here still; but when they get older, it looks a little bit different,” she

said. “We offer a robust teen program experience. Instead of Boys & Girls Club, it’s just ‘The Club.’”

Sixth- through 12th-grade youth can participate in Torch Club, BGCEV’s leadership group. Torch Club elects officers, functions independently, does fundraising and gives back to the community, including through tree-planting at parks, helping Food For Lane County prepare snack packs and more. BGCEV staff recently took the Torch Club to Oregon State University for a tour, then traveled to the Oregon Museum of Science & Industry in Portland, in part to expand their horizons beyond Eugene, Ivey said.

BGCEV this fall plans to launch a full workforce program to introduce youth to different career paths, hear guest speakers and get private tours of different manufacturers and businesses in the community.

BGCEV looks different for kids who are in sixth to 12th grade, “but we are still a spot that they love and care about,” Ivey said. “We care about them so much and our mentors are there to support them, whether they come every day or just drop by to say hello.”

It’s work that Heritage is ready to give, according to Ivey. In addition to providing what Ivey called “really wonderful rates” on the club’s certificates of deposit to help the club grow its reserves, Heritage staff volunteer their time at clubs.

“They’ve done cleaning projects inside, they’ve weeded, they’ve raked, they’ve spread bark,” Ivey said. “They’ve made our building look amazing for those kiddos.”

Added Ivey, “I have seen firsthand how Heritage Bank and their amazing team have just been in the community. They are truly about giving back and being part of it.”

She runs into Heritage Bank employees regularly, whether they’re giving back through different nonprofit events, hosting seminars in their branch about how to strengthen one’s nonprofit or helping connect business and nonprofit leaders. It’s all “pretty tremendous to see,” Ivey said.

The same could be said for what Boys & Girls Clubs of Emerald Valley does every day.

ABOUT BGCEV’S RELATIONSHIP MANAGER: HEATHER GABBERT

Heather has been in banking for more than 15 years. She works with commercial customers, nonprofit organizations and public and private schools to ensure their financial needs are being met. In addition to volunteering at Food for Lane County, Relief Nursery, Parenting Now, Habitat for Humanity and United Way of Lane County, she also serves on the Leadership Eugene Springfield Steering Committee, Eugene Imagination Library Advisory Board, Food for Lane County Programs, Education and Services Committees and Relief Nursery Auxiliary Board. In 2022, Heather was a winner of the 20 under 40 Rising Business Star award.