A supporting document to Pocono Review’s reporting on the PPP NEPA Gives fundraiser.
Article: Is People’s Playground Project Inflating Donations Made Through NEPA GIVES?
This document accompanies Pocono Review’s reporting on the People’s Playground Project’s June 2026 NEPA Gives fundraiser. It lists the donors on PPP’s public NEPA Gives page who have documented ties to the project, the Wayne County Community Foundation, the Wayne County Arts Alliance, borough or county government, or the families of the people running the project.
It does not list every donor. The roughly three dozen donors with no identified connection to the network are not included — they gave to a community fundraiser and are not part of this story. What follows are the donors whose presence on the list raises questions of disclosure and self-dealing, organized by how they connect.
Every connection below is drawn from public records: the NEPA Gives donor page, borough and county records, WCCF’s own published materials, the WCAA’s public roster, and documented media coverage. Donors are grouped by tier of certainty. Confirmed means the connection is established in the public record. Probable and possible mean the pattern is documented but one link remains open — these are flagged as questions, not conclusions.
THE NUMBERS
Fundraiser: NEPA Gives 2026 — online only, donations made through nepagives.org
Dates: June 4–5, 2026, 7:00 PM Thursday to 7:00 PM Friday (24-hour window)
Fund recipient: Friends of the Honesdale Parks, Central Park Playground Fund, held at the Wayne County Community Foundation, Honesdale, PA
Documented total on the public donor list: $8,343.80
Total displayed on the NEPA Gives fundraiser page: $15,834 raised by 88 donors — the platform’s own running figure, never itemized
PPP’s self-published figure: ~$15,000, on a single Facebook infographic
Unexplained gap: $7,490.20 between the $15,834 displayed and the $8,343.80 documented — 47% of the displayed total. Even crediting the full $884 Stretch Pool bonus, more than $6,600 has no visible source.
Total entries on the list: 93 (including 19 anonymous entries and the Stretch Pool bonus line)
Confirmed insider donors: 20 people. Eighteen carry visible dollar amounts totaling $2,821.30 — 33.8% of the documented total. The other two (Heather Hogan-Spencer and Kristin Benavides) are confirmed insiders whose entries show no amount. (Kimberly Fisch appears as two separate donor entries totaling $100 but is one person.)
Including probable and possible ties: 31 people, roughly $3,500 — about 42% of the documented total.
The share of traceable money: Of donations attributable to a named person, insiders account for more than half — 53% among confirmed insiders alone, and past 65% once probable ties are included.
Anonymous entries: 19 of 93 — better than one in five. Two of them are the largest single donations on the entire list: one of $1,000 and one of $500. Whether any anonymous donor is also an insider cannot be determined from the public record.
HOW THE PLATFORM CAN INFLATE A “TOTAL RAISED”
NEPA Gives runs on Mightycause, a national giving-day platform. Two mechanics matter for understanding PPP’s numbers.
The matching grant. A matching grant is money a nonprofit arranges in advance — from a board member, business, or sponsor — pledged to match donations as they come in. On Mightycause the matching tool is, by the platform’s own description, for display and reporting purposes only; it does not move money. A default setting, “include match value in page metrics,” makes the public “total raised” figure climb by the match amount as donations trigger it — before the matching donor has paid anything. The platform’s own example: a $1,000 match plus a single $5 donation displays $10, half of it money no one has yet given. The match funder is expected to pay later through a fulfillment link, but the platform does not require it. A displayed “total raised” can therefore include pledged match money that has not been — and may never be — delivered.
The Stretch Pool. NEPA Gives awards a competitive bonus, the Stretch Pool, based on unique donor count rather than dollars raised. As WCCF CEO Ryanne Jennings described it in a May 2026 Radio Catskill interview: “The more donors you have, the more money you’ll get out of that stretch pool.” The platform counts a unique donor by email address, so every name on the list is a unit of competitive leverage. PPP received $884 from the Stretch Pool — sponsor money, not a community donation.
Taken together, a headline “total raised” can stack match money, bonus money, and other sponsor dollars on top of actual community gifts. The two figures PPP and the platform have put out — $15,834 on the fundraiser page, ~$15,000 on PPP’s Facebook infographic — have never been itemized, so which of those categories they include is unknown. WCCF co-hosts NEPA Gives and holds PPP’s fund; every insider below is both a donor and a unit in the count that set the bonus. WCAA’s own building-fund campaign ran on the same platform under the same structure: the $75,000 it had to raise was the trigger for a Wayne County Community Foundation matching grant — a grant the foundation described publicly as a grant, but which WCAA’s IRS filings record as a $75,000 loan with no corresponding mortgage in county deed records (previously reported).
TIER 1 — CONFIRMED INSIDERS
The project’s leadership and their family
Lisa Glover — $1,054.30. PPP co-founder. Manages the WCCF fund that holds PPP’s donations. WCAA board member. Domestic partner of Mayor Derek Williams. Largest named donation on the list. Her dedication frames the amount as $0.65 for each of 1,622 community participants; it does not disclose that she co-founded the project or manages the fund receiving the money.
Denise Glover — $222.00. Lisa Glover’s mother. Dedication: “in memory of Martin Glover, Sr.” The same family unit gave to the WCAA Building Fund under the identical dedication — the same family, the same memorial, across two separate campaigns tied to the same network.
Frank Blahuta — $100.00. Lisa Glover’s uncle. New Jersey family connection.
Jennifer de Leon — $20.00. Lisa Glover’s first cousin. Out-of-county family donor.
Kristin Benavides — no amount listed. Lisa Glover’s first cousin. (See note on no-amount entries below.)
The mayor’s family
Carolyn and Vannie Williams — $50.00. Parents of Mayor Derek Williams, confirmed through public records and prior WCAA and Roots & Rhythm sponsorship materials. Their son is the domestic partner of PPP’s co-founder and works for the foundation holding the money. Neither relationship is disclosed on the donor list.
The foundation’s own employees
Connor Simon — $25.00. WCCF Grants and Outreach Manager. Present at the WCAA June 2023 grand opening alongside Glover, Williams, Jennings, and Warren Schloesser. Donated to a fund his employer holds, through an event his employer co-hosts. Dedication: “Freedom of the Press.”
Crystal Satriano — $50.00. WCCF Development and Operations Manager — the second WCCF employee on the list. Neither she nor Simon disclosed their WCCF employment.
Borough government
Kimberly Fisch — $100.00 total, in two separate $50 entries. Honesdale Borough Council member and Council President Pro Temp. Voted in April 2026 to approve the PPP project. She appears on the donor list twice, as two separate entries. Because the Stretch Pool counts unique donors, two entries register as two units. Fisch is also former Board President of the Greater Honesdale Partnership, which holds its own fund at WCCF — a relationship not disclosed at the time of her vote.
The PPP campaign
Catherine Schmidt-Jones — $100.00. PPP committee member. Presented the project’s funding plan to borough council in April 2026, then donated to the campaign she organized and publicly advocated for. Publicly identified as “Kitty” Schmidt-Jones in the May 2, 2026 Tri-County Independent.
Lucas Green — $100.00. Confirmed PPP affiliate, photographed at a PPP meeting. Partner of Caitlin Cowger.
Caitlin Cowger — $500.00. Second-largest individual donation. Partner of Lucas Green; the two gave $600 as a household. Owner of Greenhouse 863 and Camp Caitlin. In September 2025, two months before the playground removal, WCCF CEO Ryanne Jennings personally introduced her to the president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia at her coffee shop.
Michele Young — $25.00. PPP affiliate. Dedicated her gift to “Kitty” — Schmidt-Jones’s nickname. Also appears as a donor in WCCF’s 2025 Annual Report.
The arts alliance and foundation donor base
Heather Hogan-Spencer — no amount listed. WCAA board member, seated alongside Glover on the WCAA roster. Owner of the Bodhi Tree Art Studio. Former teacher at Bethany Children’s House, the preschool near Central Park. Present at the WCAA June 2023 grand opening alongside Glover, Williams, Jennings, and Simon. Her board membership is documented; the no-amount entry means her donation’s completion is not verifiable from the public record (see note below).
Sandra Povse — $50.00. Present at the WCAA June 2023 grand opening alongside Glover, Williams, Jennings, Schloesser, and Simon.
Lisa Champeau — $50.00. Director of Communications and Development at Wayne Memorial Hospital. Roots & Rhythm board member from 2014 to 2017 and media committee member from 2008, serving as the festival’s press contact. Roots & Rhythm held its festival in Central Park — the same park at the center of the PPP project — with WCCF listed as a gold sponsor. Also appeared in March 2021 borough council minutes representing Wayne Memorial Hospital.
Joelle Dujardin — $50.00. Senior Editor, Highlights for Children, Honesdale. Confirmed as a direct colleague of Lisa Glover at the same editorial office — multiple Highlights masthead listings place both at 803 Church Street, Honesdale: Dujardin as Senior Editor, Glover as Crafts and Activities Editor. She donated to her coworker’s fundraiser. The professional relationship is not disclosed.
Alison Peck — $50.00. Honesdale resident. Appears as a donor in WCCF’s 2025 Annual Report, indicating an established foundation relationship predating the PPP campaign.
Jacqlyn Olecki — $25.00. Appears as a donor in WCCF’s 2025 Annual Report — twice. Her donation is dedicated “in memory of The Pocono Review.”
County government
Paul Meagher Jr. — $250.00. Wayne County Planning Commission member (appointed January 2022). Third-largest identified individual donation. The Planning Commission reviews land use and development across the county; the Meagher family also appears on the WCAA Building Fund donor page.
TIER 2 — PROBABLE TIES (documented pattern, one link open)
The Glover family cluster (extended). Three additional donors most likely belong to Lisa Glover’s family: nidya blahuta ($25.00), a Blahuta relative; Jeff Rembish ($25.00), who shares the maiden name of Glover’s late grandmother; and Joseph Birch ($25.00), whose gift is dedicated to that grandmother by name. If all three are confirmed, the family donor cluster reaches eight.
Jack Barnett — $100.00. Appears on the WCAA Building Fund donor page. WCAA giving-network overlap.
The Troop family — two entries, $75.00 combined. Sarah Troop ($25.00) and Troop Catherine ($50.00), the latter dedicated to “Bronson.” Beth Bronson Troop is the wife of Wayne County Planning Commission Vice Chairman William F. Troop. If these are family members, the donor list includes the families of two Planning Commission officials — the confirmed commissioner Meagher, and the vice chairman — for a project that could come before their commission.
TIER 3 — POSSIBLE TIES (institutional overlap, personal role undocumented)
These donors connect to institutions inside the WCCF network, though a direct personal tie to the project’s principals is not established.
Arrah Fisher — $25.00. Connected to The Cooperage Project, a WCCF grantee on whose board Jennings sits.
Jeanne Luisa Schwarz — $25.00. Possible connection to the Schwarz family, whose name is on a memorial fund at WCCF.
Lee Terwilliger — $100.00. Dedication references Bethany Children’s House, a preschool near Central Park that has received WCCF grant funding and where WCAA board member Heather Hogan-Spencer formerly taught.
Thomas Cowell — $75.00. Writer and director featured as a VIP performer at The Cooperage Project’s spring fundraiser, where he performed stand-up about Honesdale. The Cooperage Project is a WCCF grantee; Ryanne Jennings sits on its board. Cooperage affiliation places him in the same institutional network, though no direct tie to PPP principals is documented.
Joseph Nelson — $100.00. Shares a surname with Kendra Nelson (formerly Amick), confirmed as Honesdale Borough Manager as of April 16, 2026 — eleven days before the 5-2 council vote committing the borough to the PPP project. Nelson is an extremely common name and no family connection has been documented. The gift is above the median for this list. Whether Joseph Nelson has any relationship to the Borough Manager is an open question.
Goodenough Forrest — $100.00. Employed by Woodloch Resort, which holds an employee fund at WCCF.
THE ANONYMOUS ENTRIES
Nineteen of the 93 entries — more than one in five — are anonymous. The platform allows any donor to hide their name.
This is not a footnote. Any of the 19 could be another committee member, another foundation employee, or another official connected to the project — or none of them. There is no way to know from the public record. Two of the anonymous gifts are among the largest on the entire list: one of $1,000 and one of $500, together $1,500 from unidentifiable sources.
The one party positioned to identify the anonymous donors is WCCF, which co-hosts the platform that conceals them, holds the fund, and employs the mayor. The information that would answer the question sits with the party that benefits from the question going unanswered.
A NOTE ON NO-AMOUNT ENTRIES
Several entries — including Kristin Benavides and Heather Hogan-Spencer above — appear on the public donor page with no dollar amount. On this platform, a name can appear the moment a donation is initiated, whether or not it is ever completed. These donors’ connections to the network are documented, but whether their transactions were completed cannot be verified from the public record. Their presence is noted; their contribution is not assumed.
WHAT REMAINS UNANSWERED
Two disclosures, both within PPP’s and the hosts’ control, would resolve most of the open questions:
An itemized financial accounting would show whether the $15,834 displayed represents community donations or folds in Stretch Pool and matching dollars that the platform permits organizations to display as “raised,” and would confirm which listed entries reflect completed payments.
A statement from the NEPA Gives hosts would show the Stretch Pool’s rules and total size, PPP’s share of it, and whether the platform’s safeguard against counting a single donor more than once was enabled — the setting that bears directly on how one council member appears as two entries.
Neither has been provided. The project’s only public financial disclosure remains a single Facebook post.
All entries and connections in this document are drawn from public records: the NEPA Gives donor page, borough and county government records, WCCF and WCAA published materials, Mightycause platform documentation, and documented media coverage.
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