Chapter Chat

California Sierra ASLA

The chapter hosted a reception for the Great Valley Center, recipient of this year’s ASLA Olmsted Medal, on September 12, 2007. Many members attended, with more than 100 guests celebrating the occasion. ASLA President Patrick Caughey, FASLA, remarked that it is rare for a president to personally visit the recipient of ASLA’s highest awards except for the brief national awards ceremony.

Various local and state elected officials were on hand,  including University of California at Merced Chancellor Steve Kang. The evening was highlighted by a presentation on Frederick Law Olmsted by students of landscape architecture at the University of California at Davis. The students also provided logistical support during the evening.

Landscape architecture students from University of California at Davis with President Patrick Caughey, FASLA.

Great Valley Center founder and president Carol Whiteside (second from left) with California Sierra Chapter members. Monica Perrone, ASLA, event coordinator, is at center. University Chancellor Steve Kang is in the background in tan coat.

Florida ASLA

The formal establishment and publication of a 2008 Florida Chapter ASLA Strategic Plan that identifies the priorities of the chapter's leadership and the means toward their accomplishment is moving forward. Since a priority without the means for its accomplishment is a wish rather than a goal, the priorities of the chapter will be purposely limited in number.

The selected priorities will have a reasonable timetable for success; they will identify costs; they will be designed to encourage "champions" to volunteer from the chapter's membership; and they will use paid staff and consultants who will provide resources for volunteers at the section level.

The 2008 Florida Chapter ASLA Strategic Plan embraces three foundational principles of a successful volunteer organization. First, explicit, structured, and objective means by which chapter officers review and evaluate the performance of all staff and consultants will be in place by January 2008. Second, accounting of all chapter funds with a strict adherence to proper budgeting and auditing procedures will give guidance to committees and members using chapter funds, which protects the financial strength of the chapter. Third and most significant, all elected positions will benefit from the concept of a leadership ladder that insures that the current officeholder has the past and future holders of that office as leadership resources.

The formalization of this three-tier approach to leadership, already in place for the president's position within the chapter, will assist both development and retention of leadership volunteers who currently find themselves in positions that have neither institutional knowledge nor healthy prospects for continuity beyond their tenure. Leadership burnout is too common a phenomenon at all leadership levels in the chapter, and it extracts too great a toll on the chapter's potential for even greater accomplishments.

Envisioning a future can be an invigorating and exciting endeavor. However, the evolution of a vision to a plan for action generates less enthusiasm and considerably more stress on the part of all involved. Compromise and negotiation have to occur between competing visions, and a final consensus that brings all participants together must be achieved. A strategic plan that builds upon past successes, recognizes and accepts current challenges, and puts into place discrete and reasonable tasks for all participants using identifiable resources will provide the most probable route to a satisfactory and workable 2008 Florida Chapter ASLA Strategic Plan.

FLASLA Members Building Hope
On October 27, students from Florida A&M's School of Architecture, members of Florida Chapter ASLA, and Leadership Tallahassee took park in a playground construction project for the HOPE Community located in Tallahassee.

Students from the landscape architecture program and Wood + Partners Inc. partnered with the Big Bend Homeless Coalition & HOPE Community to develop a vision and master plan for HOPE's campus during the fall of 2007. The effort on the 27th is the first of two construction phases for the playground, which will be completed later this month. The students were led in this effort by Assistant Professor C.L. Bohannon, ASLA.

Charles R. Perry Construction Yard Green Roof
In early 2006 and as a part of the University of Florida's national leadership in sustainability, the M. E. Rinker Jr. School of Building Construction proposed a green roof for the new Charles R. Perry Construction Yard. The design expertise was provided by university faculty Glenn Acomb, ASLA (Department of Landscape Architecture), Mark Clark (Soil & Water Science Department), and PhD student Sylvia Lang (Soil & Water Science Department).

With grants for the green roof provided by the Florida Department of Transportation, Kimley-Horn and Associates Inc., and the Florida Chapter of ASLA, the Charles R. Perry Construction Yard Green Roof was completed in spring 2007 as a 2,600-square-foot "extensive" green roof, with a media depth of five inches. American Hydrotech Inc. provided the system of products including the waterproofing, root barrier, drainage, and media. The green roof is designed to reduce the roof's stormwater runoff by as much as 90 percent. To read the full report on this important project, click here.

Washington ASLA

Castle Rock-Lexington Trail Loop Charrette

The Castle Rock-Lexington Trail Loop Charrette was conducted on November 2-3, 2007. The charrette was the seventh charrette conducted under the partnership agreement between the National Park Service Rivers, Trails, and Conservation Assistance Program (NPS RTCA) and the Washington Chapter of the American Society of Landscape Architects (WASLA). Additional co-sponsors for this event were the Oregon Chapter of the American Society of Landscape Architects (OASLA) and Cowlitz On the Move (COTM), a group promoting healthy lifestyles. A local volunteer trail committee also participated in the charrette planning and activities. The main charrette product was to prepare a conceptual plan for a 12-mile trail loop connecting the City of Castle of Rock and unincorporated Lexington (north of Kelso), linking local and visitor recreation areas and activities along the Cowlitz River.
 
Participants included members of WASLA and OASLA, students from three universities (Universities of Oregon and Washington and Washington State University), local community members, and local agencies. The group of WASLA and OASLA and student participants was the largest group of participants for any of the seven charrettes. This charrette was also shorter in duration than past charrettes (1.5 days instead of 2.5 days) and was the first multistate charrette collaboration.
 
The charrette began on Friday afternoon (Nov. 2) with a site tour, introduction of the team members to the five design teams, followed by a dinner on Friday evening with speakers representing the Department of Health, a local state representative, Cowlitz County and Castle Rock, and the National Park Service, as well as WASLA and OASLA. The design teams were Safety, Coordination, and Transportation; Natural Resources/Park Programming; Cultural Resources/Interpretation; Infrastructure/Maintenance; and Access/Recreation. On Saturday (Nov. 3), the teams prepared an overall conceptual plan with additional supplemental drawings and data related to each  team's area of focus. The conceptual plan and supplemental data were presented to the community at an open house on Saturday evening.
 
The next steps in the process will be for the agencies and local community members to draft an overall plan with recommended actions and then to adopt and implement the plan. It is hoped that adoption and implementation will occur by Earth Day in April 2008.

High Point Named One of Five Global Award Winners

ULI Seattle is delighted to announce that the Urban Land Institute has awarded its most coveted award—the ULI Global Award for Excellence—to High Point, the Seattle Housing Authority's mixed-income, sustainable community in West Seattle. High Point is one of only five projects to win this award; the others are in Philadelphia, France, Poland, and Hong Kong.
 
Click here for more details on the project and award.