{"id":239129,"date":"2026-07-09T07:46:09","date_gmt":"2026-07-09T07:46:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/239129\/"},"modified":"2026-07-09T07:46:09","modified_gmt":"2026-07-09T07:46:09","slug":"bezos-earth-fund-to-support-franklin-park-upgrades","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/239129\/","title":{"rendered":"Bezos Earth Fund to Support Franklin Park Upgrades"},"content":{"rendered":"

Allentown is one of eight urban areas to receive a grant from the Bezos Earth Fund\u2019s<\/a> Greening America\u2019s Cities initiative. The Allentown Parknership<\/a>, the city\u2019s charitable partner for parks and recreation, has received a $4 million grant out of $100 million in total investments.<\/p>\n

Other grant recipients include Atlanta, Cleveland, Little Rock, Los Angeles, and more. Funding will be used to create community-designed parks, large scale green spaces, and immersive outdoor areas.<\/p>\n

In Allentown\u2019s case, the funding is expected to positively impact thousands of lives. Franklin Park, a 1.1-acre neighborhood space between Chew and Turner Streets, will see a comprehensive regreening and renovation. The City had already allocated $725,000 in federal funding toward the project.<\/p>\n

Mayor Matt Tuerk listed this project as an example of making changes residents want, noting that Franklin Park had spent years being treated as a forgotten \u201cpatch of concrete in a rapidly changing Allentown.\u201d<\/p>\n

Now it\u2019s forgotten no more. Franklin Park, which serves more than 16,000 residents, is set to receive newly-planted trees and shade structures, dedicated child play areas, intergenerational gathering spaces, a community garden, a basketball court, restrooms, and much more. The neighborhood\u2019s park has been a safe haven for generations of residents and a shared space for community to grow.<\/p>\n

The Bezos Earth Fund was created by Jeff Bezos, founder, executive chairman, and former CEO of Amazon, in 2020 with the goal of \u201cprotecting and restoring the natural world.\u201d This is the initiative\u2019s second round of grants, with a total of $150 million in funding provided so far and a commitment to invest a total of $400 million.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Allentown is one of eight urban areas to receive a grant from the Bezos Earth Fund\u2019s Greening America\u2019s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":239130,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[119,121,120],"class_list":["post-239129","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-allentown","tag-allentown","tag-allentown-headlines","tag-allentown-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/239129","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=239129"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/239129\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/239130"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=239129"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=239129"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=239129"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}