A new outdoor garden space being created by the Wonder Workshop Children's Museum in Manhattan, Kansas was the winning project in Toro's second annual Green Spaces Make Great Places contest.

With nearly 4,000 votes cast and counted, Toro recently announced the grant recipients in its second annual Green Spaces Make Great Places program, which awards funds to communities and non-profits seeking to improve outdoor environments across America.

The recipient of the most votes and the $7,000 first-place grant is the Wonder Workshop Children's Museum in Manhattan, Kansas, which is working to create a new outdoor garden space that is healthy and green. The program's goal is to teach kids how to grow healthy foods, and give them a safe and fun place to play outdoors.

The second-place, $4,000 grant recipient is Unity Charter School in Morristown, New Jersey. The school recently relocated to a larger building in a semi-industrial area with a lack of green space but using funds raised by the parents in the community, a playground and small turf field were created. There are also plans to transform an additional area to serve as an outdoor classroom for students.

The two remaining finalists, Growing Solutions and the Irmo Arbor Day Commission, each will receive a $2,000 grant.

The Julie+Michael Tracy Foundation and Growing Solutions Farm, located in Chicago, took a barren 1.5-acre city plot and are converting it into a vocational therapeutic garden to help young adults with autism learn life and career skills.

The Irmo Arbor Day Commission is raising funds to complete major beautification projects at local schools and in other areas around the town of Irmo, S.C. In addition to creating green areas for kids, funds raised by the organization have helped beautify a new veteran's park and facilitated the planting of crepe myrtles along the railroad tracks that run through the town.

"All of the finalists shared a compelling story in their efforts to help others through education or by improving green spaces," explained Judson McNeil, manager of Toro Giving.

The four finalist organizations each submitted a video explaining their proposed initiative and how the grant would help further efforts to improve green spaces. Public voting determined the grant level awarded to each group.