2025 HDR Foundation Annual Report

Every month, volunteers from our Portland office serve warm meals to community members in need at the Blanchet House, a nonprofit that provides essential aid with dignity. 

Recognizing an opportunity to build upon his colleagues’ volunteerism, Sean Larkin sponsored an HDR Foundation grant that will truly transform lives. The grant funded a new metal shop at Blanchet Farm, a sober transitional housing program helping men build essential job skills that will provide life-changing opportunities. 

“Sometimes saying yes to a small good can snowball and blossom into something so much bigger than you would have imagined,” Sean said.

Garrett Reinsfelder made some of his favorite childhood memories on the baseball diamond, growing up in the North Hills outside of Pittsburgh.

Now an environmental scientist at HDR, he still reminisces about the friendships he made: the feeling of the bat connecting with the ball, and hearing family and friends cheering. And Garrett thinks about what it would be like to miss out on those moments because you have special needs. 

That motivated Garrett to volunteer at Casey's Clubhouse, a baseball league for kids and adults with disabilities. As an MVP, or most valuable partner, he served as a buddy to young athletes, helping at the field during baseball season and lending his expertise as a strength coach in the winter. 

“I’ve watched athletes walk into the room a little unsure of themselves and leave standing taller — literally and figuratively, over the course of several months,” he said. “You can feel the pride when someone accomplishes something they didn’t think they could.”

Garrett sponsored an HDR Foundation grant that will help Casey's Clubhouse continue to move the mission of inclusion forward. 

“We’re not only an employee-owned company,” Garrett said. “We want to do more. We want to give back.”

“A group of us visited the Croydon Hub, and we immediately fell in love with the place,” said Ghada Elsheikh, associate electrical engineer, describing her first visit to Legacy Youth Zone. “You could just see the children's faces light up as they walk through the doors.” 

The community hub offers more than 2,900 young people opportunities for fulfill their potential through positive educational and wellness activities. 

Ghada was introduced to the charity by Jay Amin, human resources director for EMEA and APAC, who sponsored a 2024 HDR United Kingdom Fund grant to fund a year of junior club sports activities, regardless of socioeconomic background. 

Inspired by the impact, Ghada sponsored a second grant last year that will provide a year of weekly training kitchen sessions for kids ages 8 to 12. Training activities include hands-on cooking, nutrition education, kitchen safety, and life skills development. 

“I am so proud of us at HDR, for coming together and helping the HDR Foundation make a positive impact in communities across the globe,” she said. 

Through a grant from the HDR Foundation, Garfield Community Farm’s mobile market is back on the road, making stops in parts of the community with limited access to fresh produce and experiencing food insecurity. Nick Burdette, Northeast region bridge lead and board member at the farm, describes the mobile market “like an ice cream truck for veggies.” He added, “It's wonderful to be at a company where people care this much about doing good.”

The HDR Foundation's largest employee-sponsored grant was announced with a bang. Several, in fact. Teachers at Oklahoma Connections Academy thought they were gathering for a typical holiday party. Then Mike Walters, compliance business class manager, walked out with a giant check for $212,374. Confetti cannons punctuated the moment. The grant funded the Exploration Station — a customized bus with virtual reality headsets, forensic science kits, electronics and other science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) activities to bring an experiential science classroom to online students across the state. 

Volunteers from HDR's Boise office have collectively worked more than 345 hours since adopting a section of the Boise Greenbelt. 

Their efforts received the support of an HDR Foundation grant to City of Boise Parks and Recreation. Sponsored by Alesha Willis, project accountant 2, the grant funded the purchase of native shrubs and forbs, seedling protection tubes and gardening equipment to revegetate an area disturbed by construction, reducing the likelihood of erosion and water quality problems.

The Foundation for Hospital Art is dedicated to involving patients and volunteers to create colorful, soothing artwork donated to hospitals to help soften the often-stressful hospital experience. 

Through an HDR Foundation grant, Olivia Childress transportation hydraulics EIT, organized a group of her colleagues and family members to create art that will bring joy to hospital staff and patients for years to come. "Hospitals are places for healing, and I think it's really powerful to have artwork brighten up that space,” Olivia said. 

The Idaho Shakespeare Festival School of Theater program brings the inspiration of live theater to approximately 50,000 students in urban, rural, remote and often underserved areas throughout Idaho each year.

Through an HDR Foundation grant sponsored by Kâren Sander, area business development leader, a new truck for the program is transporting set pieces that transform cafeterias and gymnasiums across the state into temporary and magical theatrical worlds full of haunted libraries, troubled kingdoms and the wonders of Shakespeare. “I think the reason that the arts education is so important is that it opens your mind to new possibilities,” Kâren said.

With the support of an HDR Foundation grant to Friends of Des Moines Parks, the City of Des Moines Parks and Recreation has introduced adaptive soccer, flag football, basketball and baseball for youth of all ability levels.

The grant funded adaptive sports equipment to launch the program, giving youth new recreational opportunities that build confidence and bring the joy of playing sports with other kids. 

“It really does change the community and makes a lasting impact,” said Andy McCoy, computational fluid dynamics lead, who sponsored the grant for new adaptive sports equipment. “It makes me proud of the company I work for.” 

Every grant from the HDR Foundation and our global philanthropic funds begins with a cause close to an employee's heart. Girls on the Run is a nonprofit dedicated to improving the physical and mental well-being of girls through a fun after-school program that enables them to navigate life experiences successfully. After learning about the organization, Kâren Sander, HDR area business development leader, was inspired to co-found the Treasure Valley chapter to bring the program to girls in her Boise, Idaho, community and beyond.  Kâren sponsored an HDR Foundation grant to Girls on the Run Treasure Valley that provided the curricula books, lesson materials and resources for 40 sites offering the program during the school year.