Meyer Memorial Trust in Portland, Oregon, has announced that CEO Michelle J. DePass has decided to step down by the end of February.

DePass, who joined the trust in April 2018, led efforts to reexamine its approach to grantmaking, advance racial equity, and launch, in July 2020, Justice Oregon for Black Lives, an initiative co-created with Black communities that includes a redoubling of MMT’s support for several Black-led organizations in Portland. In 2021, the board unanimously approved putting racial and gender justice at the center of the organization’s work.

“[W]hile we have weathered the past two years’ cavalcade of challenges, we have also done some of the most consequential work in Meyer’s nearly forty-year history,” wrote DePass in a message to staff posted on the trust’s website. “Now, as I find myself taking stock of what is needed to move the work forward, I am also thinking about where else I need to show up, lead, and care for. And what I know now with total certainty is that my family — my parents, my husband, and my young and growing boys — need me now in a way I can no longer put off.”

“[DePass’s] impact on Meyer and on the communities and organizations we serve and partner with cannot be overstated,” said board chair Janet Hamada in a statement. “The trustees and I thank Michelle for her vision, her energy her focus, and her leadership toward racial and gender justice in Oregon.”

(Photo courtesy of Meyer Memorial Trust)