BVSPCA event

^{Members of the MGKF team and their four-legged friends support community events,}^{including this 5K run/walk for the Brandywine Valley SPCA.}

Community Service

MGKF is known for its professional, yet down-to-earth and collegial culture. In addition to encouraging the professional development of our attorneys, technical consultants, and paralegals, we have a strong tradition of encouraging participation in environmental, energy, and other civic programs and community activities outside of the office.

The firm's professionals serve in many capacities such as adjunct professors at law schools; officers and board members of recognized environmental, energy, and community organizations; lecturers and course planners for numerous trial advocacy and other educational programs; and as elected and appointed governmental officials. MGKF professionals are active in the general community as well participating in sporting activities, theater and the arts.

Service Spotlight

Garrett Trego
Board President, Friends of the Wissahickon

Wissahickon Valley Park was an unknown for me until Valley Green emerged at the halfway point of a group marathon training run. I saw the wide creek, the tall trees rising from the deep valley, the centuries old inn and the stone walls and bridges that surround it. Having moved to Philadelphia from Virginia after law school, I loved the urban life of a bigger city but missed the immediate connection to the outdoors. The Wissahickon is so much more than I imagined I’d find within city limits. The creek, the schist, the flora and fauna, the history, the trails, and the balance of competing human and wild uses in the park make it a highlight of my life in Philadelphia.

Friends of the Wissahickon (FOW) is an organization dedicated to supporting this balance of uses and maximizing the community’s enjoyment of the park. Through just about a dozen staff members and enthusiastic volunteer network, FOW stewards the 1,800-acre park. I joined the board of directors in 2017 at the suggestion of our firm’s founder and longtime Fairmount Park board member, Joe Manko, and I became the board president in 2023. I’m proud of using my role on the board to help facilitate community programming, habitat restoration projects and infrastructure projects like the Forbidden Drive stabilization project, stormwater improvement projects, and the upcoming Valley Green Run pedestrian bridge project. In 2023, FOW restarted the Wissahickon Trail Classic race, adding to its slate of annual programming and fundraising events. In my time on the board, the organization has grown in size and impact; it has improved operations; and it has become more financially stable.

This year in 2024, FOW is celebrating is 100^th anniversary, and Manko Gold is proud to be among the initial sponsors of the centennial celebration events. Among the most important accomplishments of the first century, the Friends helped preserve the area around this stretch of the lower Wissahickon Creek and keep Forbidden Drive from becoming a motor vehicle roadway. We are enjoying the fruits of that work today, and FOW is sure to help maintain and improve the park for another century or more!

^{Trego (center) prepares with friends for FOW’s 2024 Wissahickon Trail Classic.}

To see our past service spotlights, click here.