The Portland school district is launching a new nonprofit to manage money raised by its 42 parent foundations and chase private dollars to complement those fundraising efforts.

All Hands Raised has served the former function since 1994, keeping Portland Public Schools Foundation money in what its officials call a lockbox of sorts, then doling the cash out to the district’s schools based on need. It did not take any cut of the money to do the work, instead offering its services for free.

On July 1, All Hands Raised will hand the keys to that lockbox to the district. Chief Engagement Officer Jonathan Garcia will oversee the new nonprofit, which will be known as the Fund for Portland Public Schools.

Garcia said he joined the district with a view toward building a philanthropic arm to solicit donations from donors with deep pockets, as well as corporations and organizations, to bolster fundraising efforts taken on by parent foundations.

All Hands Raised spokeswoman Jeanie-Marie Price said Superintendent Guadalupe Guerrero signaled as much when he took the reins at the state’s largest school district.

Last spring, leaders of the 42 individual school foundations met with All Hands Raised staff to discuss the handoff. District officials also spent months meeting with the nonprofit’s staffers to learn the ins and outs of managing foundation money.

“Our conversations have been thoughtful and they have been grounded in the idea that this should be seamless for parents,” Price said. “It’s really been about a graceful handoff to the new entity.”

Garcia said most changes will be “under the hood” and that parents who contribute to their school’s foundations won’t need to do anything differently. They’ll still hand checks to the same people. One-third of their donations will still go into a fund that distributes the money across the district’s schools based on need.

All Hands Raised collected about $4.7 million in foundation money last year alone, Price said.

“Our parents work really hard. They raise a lot of money,” she said. “Do we wish our parents needed to raise money to raise staffing? No. But we celebrate their efforts for going above and beyond.”

But some parents have signaled trepidation over the district taking over managing duties for those accounts. In mid-March, parents of Roosevelt High School students confronted the school board about promises to provide extra classroom space for science and technology programs.

After Portland voters passed a 2012 bond, school district leaders agreed to devote $5 million to build that so-called “maker space.” But those classrooms have not been built and, Willamette Week reported , the cash went to other schools instead.

An outside auditor also found intentional, unexplained low-balling of costs for construction projects that voters were told would tally $790 million when they approved another bond in 2017. Bidding based on more realistic cost estimates plus additional cost overruns could put the true price tag at more than $1 billion .

Although those decisions and accounting blunders were made by district officials who won’t be part of its new fundraising arm, the incidents still gave pause to some parents.

“Before I can get on board with PPS managing this, I would need more information,” Roosevelt Parent Teacher and Student Association President Sarah Carter Adams said. “Their track record just makes me leery.”

Garcia said the district is working to rebuild trust in the wake of such incidents by “being out there, trying to be visible.” He pointed to a $185,000 donation the district received from the Meyer Memorial Trust as proof that outside organizations, at least, have taken note of the district’s upward trajectory.

Garcia said other companies, organizations and individual donors, which he declined to name during an interview, have also been paying attention.

“Folks are really starting to see the North Star for the district,” Garcia said.

Beyond his desire to chase private donations to supplement parents’ grassroots fundraising efforts, Garcia said he hopes the move to establish a nonprofit proves to Portlanders that the administration is thinking long-term.

“This was a way for us to signal to the community that we’re here to stay,” he said. “We’re here to make a long-standing impact for our kids.”