This spring, social justice nonprofit MANAUS announced that 2024 will be its last. MANAUS, formerly the Manaus Fund, has spent the past two decades piloting community-led and co-designed projects and nonprofits throughout the Roaring Fork Valley.
At the end of 2023, MANAUS’s staff, the board of directors and partners convened to discuss the future of the organization. In the spring of this year, the organization published a bittersweet letter announcing the decision to dissolve in September in order to make way for other organizations and driven individuals to lead future community efforts.
MANAUS’s legacy
In the span of 20 years, MANAUS has helped coordinate over 12 community projects and launched four nonprofits.
In 2005, the late George Stranahan founded the Manaus Fund to address social inequities in the Roaring Fork Valley by investing in local nonprofits. A quote from Stranahan still adorns every page on MANAUS’s website as a declaration of its enduring goal:
“Traditional charity tends to be doing it TO them or doing it FOR them. MANAUS is building a model where we do it WITH them. The model may not be entirely sin-free, but there is a conscious effort to build a partnership of equals.”
In 2010, MANAUS made one its most significant marks on Carbondale by helping launch the Third Street Center, developed in partnership with the Town of Carbondale, Alpine Bank and local sustainability experts.
Three years later, long-time Valley resident Rob Pew joined MANAUS as director of the board. With a background in design, Pew brought a philosophy of user-centered design to MANAUS.
In the spirit of Stranahan’s guiding statement, user-centered design prioritizes the needs and experiences of individuals being served by a nonprofit and fosters a sense of collaboration rather than charity.
In 2016, MANAUS launched the multigenerational education nonprofit Valley Settlement. Initially funded by a grant from the W.K. Kellogg Foundation in 2011, MANAUS employed community organizers to conduct 300 one-on-one conversations with low-wage immigrant families in the Valley and found that these families felt disconnected to education. After developing a “whole-family” educational approach and a trio of mobile preschools through its El Busesito program, Valley Settlement continues to reach hundreds of families.
In 2019, MANAUS launched Mountain Voices Project, bringing together local educational, faith-based and nonprofit organizations to develop core teams of civic leaders intending to better place democracy in the hands of the people.
During the pandemic, MANAUS recognized disproportionate difficulties experienced by undocumented and mixed-status families living in the Valley. Sydney Schalit — who became executive director of MANAUS in April of 2020 — recalled the sheer volume and urgency of their work during this time. “I think most of the community, and especially community leadership, had no idea of the financial straits that a lot of immigrant and mixed-documentation families were facing.”
In response, MANAUS collected and disbursed $3.2 million in emergency funding via LaMedichi, a savings and credit club. LaMedichi then evolved into a program designed to increase proficiency in the U.S. financial system and in 2021 launched as the Savings Collaborative.
In response to national cries for undoing systemic oppression, MANAUS initiated its Equity Action Project around the same time, providing diversity, equity and inclusion training for local nonprofits and government institutions, as well as a speaker series and symposium open to the general public. MANAUS was also a founding sponsor of Sol del Valle in 2021, dedicating a small grant to help The Sopris Sun launch a Spanish-language news resource in print.
Looking forward
Recently, MANAUS reinstated the Roaring Fork Community Development Corporation (RFCDC) for the transferring property ownership of the 3-Mile Mobile Home Park in Glenwood Springs to its residents. The RFCDC had initially been organized around the Pan and Fork Mobile Home Park in downtown Basalt for the same purpose, but had ceased operations after Pan and Fork had been purchased for a city redevelopment project and its residents messily evicted.
MANAUS purchased and now operates 3-Mile but has found that the park is in dire need of costly infrastructure repairs. According to Schalit, property operation is far from MANAUS’s wheelhouse, and preparations are underway for RFCDC to function independently in the hands of specialists to both keep the space operational and help residents buy a mortgage.
The Confluence of Early Childhood Education, another project currently in MANAUS’s hands, is set to operate under the Aspen Community Foundation in accordance with the wishes of its coalition members.
Sunset celebration
On Sept.11, MANAUS will be holding its last-ever event, all day at TACAW.
From 9am to 7pm, MANAUS will work with members from design firm IDEO.org to share with Valley residents and leaders the same design tools and principles that MANAUS has used throughout its lifespan. A catered lunch will be provided, and the night will end with cocktails as well as a retrospective video celebrating MANAUS’s achievements.
You can register for $5 at www.manaus.org/sunset-celebration