Remember us? Don't know us at all?
We're Operation Pitch Invasion. After a year of lockdown, we're back spreading the love and the grass seed and the goal frames, and doing everything we can to keep Portland Soccer City USA.
OPI was conceived more than 12 years ago as the ultimate expression of the Team-Town-Timbers Army (& Riveters!) ethos: a means to pour the elixir of the TA into the soil of the town we love and grow the game that brought us all together. Our mission is to use the resources of the North End to build, restore, and maintain soccer facilities in parks and schools.
We are focused on bringing safe, quality playing surfaces to neighborhoods that are otherwise under-served with recreation resources; on building community through creating and caring for soccer and futsal pitches; on offering healthy activity spaces for children and adults; and on developing talent in the hope of seeing kids who play on OPI surfaces suiting up for the Timbers, Thorns, and Team USA on the world's greatest stages.
In our 10 years of operation, we have built one significant artificial turf project, five major futsal complexes, and 11 blacktop futsal courts, and we have done restoration and maintenance work in more than 30 Portland parks and schoolyards. And we'll be adding to those numbers this summer.
Since our first endeavors in 2011, OPI has touched every quadrant of Portland, as well as communities in Gresham, Woodburn, and Forest Grove. We've worked with the Timbers and Thorns, youth soccer organizations, local governments and school districts, a variety of corporate and private donors, and footy fans of all stripes. We were the very first charitable endeavor endorsed by the 107 Independent Supporters Trust, and we humbly consider ourselves a vital thread in the fabric of our local soccer culture.
We have three main initiatives:
Another happy, sweaty crowd at the end of a Friends of Fields day in a Portland park
FRIENDS OF FIELDS: Our original project, bringing the muscle and might of soccer supporters into parks and schoolyards to restore grass surfaces, repaint field lines, spruce up goal hardware, and make pitches more attractive and more playable. To date we have visited literally dozens of Portland parks and schoolyards, some multiple times.
At Robert Gray Middle School in Portland, one of our many Project Blacktop courts
PROJECT BLACKTOP: Putting futsal in schoolyards alongside basketball, four square, hopscotch, and kickball, and giving as many neighborhoods as possible a dedicated court where dreams of championships can start to take shape. Working with the support of the 107ist and the Portland Youth Soccer Association, we have installed courts at Col. Summers Park in Portland, at Astor, Arleta, Bridger, Lent, Kelly, Rigler, Robert Grey, and Woodlawn schools in Portland, and at Barnes and Beaver Acres schools in Beaverton. This summer, we will add Portland's Capitol Hill and Peninsula schools to the inventory.
Snake Court at Vance Park in Rockwood, the first Fields For All project
FIELDS FOR ALL: In partnership with the Stand Together community program of the Portland Timbers and Thorns, and a number of generous corporate sponsors, we build beautiful, long-lasting, dedicated futsal complexes composed of two new colorful asphalt courts inside full fencing -- true first-class destination sites. These beautiful courts can be found at King School/Park in Portland, Vance Park and the Boys and Girls Club in the Rockwood community of Gresham, Tom McCall school in Forest Grove, and Woodburn High School.
Bless Field, opened for play in 2014
We also built BLESS FIELD, a stand-alone artificial turf complex serving the New Columbia community, the Regents Boys and Girls Club, and Rosa Parks Elementary in North Portland.
Want to learn more, help out, or be part of this great enterprise in some way, shape or form?
Oh good! Opportunities abound!
You can also help support us financially simply by shopping. Make OPI a beneficiary of your Amazon purchases by opting into the Amazon Smile program, which donates a portion of every purchase you make on that site to the charity of your choosing.
Otherwise, subscribe to our email list (we won't bombard you, promise) to stay informed about our latest initiatives and projects, including volunteer opportunities. (We’re doing a Friends of Fields day at Ed Benedict Park in SE Portland on August 1, 2021. Details and sign up here.)
However best suits you, please join us in extending the energy, spreading the love, bringing the magic, and keeping Portland Soccer City USA, one pitch and court at a time.