Keynote:
“Landscapes, Legacy, and Livability: The Next 30 Years of Land Use in Oregon”

Mr. Bob Stacey, AICP, Executive Director, 1000 Friends of Oregon
Bob Stacey, Executive Director of 1000 Friends of Oregon, has a long history with 1000 Friends and with land use and growth management.  He worked as one of 1000 Friends’ first staff attorneys from 1975 to 1986, and served on the board of directors from 1996 to 2000.  His professional career includes work as Director of the Bureau of Planning for the City of Portland; Senior Policy Advisor on Urban Growth Management to Oregon Governor Barbara Roberts; attorney in private practice representing developers and other clients at the Portland law firm of Ball, Janik LLP; Executive Director of Policy and Planning at TriMet (the regional transit agency in the Portland area); and Chief of Staff to Congressman Earl Blumenauer.  He is a graduate of Reed College (BA 1972) and the University of Oregon (JD 1975), and was a Loeb Fellow at the Harvard Graduate School of Design for the 2000-2001 academic year.

Designing for People
“New Perceptions in the Post-Oil Peak Landscape: Integrating Social Trends & Design Thinking”

Robert Thayer, Emeritus Professor of Landscape Architecture, University of California, Davis
Robert L. Thayer is Emeritus Professor of Landscape Architecture and the founder of the Landscape Architecture Program at the University of California, Davis.  During his thirty-three year academic career he has written two books and over 100 academic journal articles and papers in the field of landscape architecture. Thayer was chair of the Department of Environmental Design from 1988-90, and past chair of the national Landscape Architectural Accreditation Board.  He has been a member of UCD graduate groups in Ecology, Geography and Community Development and has guided numerous Doctoral and Masters candidates.  In 2004 he was the first Education Foundation Scholar of the New Zealand Institute of Landscape Architects.

Thayer has received nine awards for his research and writing from the American Society of Landscape Architects, including the 1994 President's Award of Excellence for his book, Gray World, Green Heart:  Technology, Nature, and the Sustainable Landscape. His most recent book, LifePlace:  Bioregional Thought and Practice, published in 2003, won the Sierra Club’s “Best Environmental Book” Award for the California Mother Lode Chapter in 2004.

Thayer been licensed as a landscape architect in the State of California since 1974, and was elected as a Fellow of the American Society of Landscape Architects in 1989, at the age of 42.  In June-July of 2004, he became the first Education Foundation Scholar of the New Zealand Institute of Landscape Architects. Currently, he is Beatrix Farrand Visiting Professor in the Department of Landscape Architecture and Environmental Planning at UC Berkeley.

Robert Thayer’s professional practice includes sustainable design theory and methods, wind energy facility siting, bioregional planning, and applications of user perceptions and community needs to site design.  He lives in Village Homes, a world-renowned solar community in Davis, California.

Social Capital in Action
“Building Social Capital Through Community Placemaking”

Jan Semenza, Ph.D, Professor, Portland State University, Department of Community Health
Jan C. Semenza, PhD, MPH, was trained in molecular cell biology in Zurich, Switzerland and Cambridge, UK and subsequently in public health at Berkeley, CA.  He was part of an epidemiologic task force at the CDC in Atlanta, investigating disease outbreaks nationally and internationally and then served on the faculty at the Medical School at UC Irvine, CA.  He is currently Associate Professor of Community Health at Portland State University and Associate Professor of Public Health and Preventive Medicine at Oregon Health & Science University.  He is interested in a wide range of environmental health issues such as urban health, climate change, cancer and environmental exposures.  On the board of directors of the City Repair Project (a local non-for-profit organization in Portland, OR) he has helped implement urban improvement projects; these artistic community interventions are intended to reverse social isolation and chronic health conditions in urban settings and he has applied innovative epidemiological methods to quantify these benefits.  Dr. Semenza regularly collaborates with the World Health Organization and spends several months a year in developing countries including Sudan, Brazil and Haiti.

Community and Sustainable Design
“Green Infrastructure for the Twenty-Second Century”

Patrick Condon, Professor, University of British Columbia
Professor Patrick Condon holds the UBC James Taylor Chair in Landscape and Liveable Environments. In that capacity he has organized a series of round table multi party planning and design processes in British Columbia and the United States. These efforts share the goal of creating more sustainable new and retrofitted communities. The work has produced approved and workable plans for providing thousands of new housing units and job sites in sustainable community contexts.

Patrick was born and educated in Massachusetts, practicing there first as a landscape architect and then as director of Community Planning for the City of Westfield Massachusetts. In 1985 he joined academia, teaching first at the University of Minnesota, then, in 1992, joining the faculty at the University of British Columbia.

He has become well known for producing alternative models for walkable and complete communities-communities that work with, not against, the natural capabilities of the site, and doing so with the people involved - the citizens and stakeholders of the area. The community design strategies that have emerged
from this work have received widespread attention throughout the United States and Canada and are provoking a fundamental re-examination of how we plan our neighborhoods and, importantly, how we can most effectively and efficiently provide the urban infrastructure necessary to serve them.

His unique experience as both a landscape architect and a planner and as both an academic and a community design consultant give him unique insights into how to make more sustainable communities a reality.

The work of his research center can be accessed at:

http://www.sustainable-communities.agsci.ubc.ca/

Other projects of interest can be reviewed on the web as follows:

The Damascus Community Design Workshop, organized by Professor Condon

The Civic Alliance Planning and Design Workshop for Lower Manhattan, team leader with RPA

Smart Growth on the Ground, Maple Ridge Project. Initiated Program

The East Clayton Sustainable Community Headwaters Project. Initiated project. Community under construction now in Surrey, BC

First developers project

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Art in the Landscape & Community Involvement
"A Fine Threaded Revolve Is a Slow Evolve"

Buster Simpson, Artist

Buster Simpson has been active as an artist working in the public since the 1970s. His work ranges from stand alone sculpture to integrated and/or collaborative works. All of his work incorporates ecological, historical, social, and aesthetic considerations, contextualizing them into the site specific values of place. His art, its medium and product will vary, but the methodology and underpinning conceptual approach are consistent. All aspects of the public realm become part of his palette; the landscape, the built environment, and the social and economic engagement. Simpson has stated, “I prefer working in public spaces. The complexity of any site is its asset; to build upon, to distill, to reveal its layers of meaning. Process becomes part and parcel to the art of the place.” He prefers to be brought in early on a project in order to realize the full potential of a collaboration with that site.

Simpson has worked on major infrastructure projects, site master planning, signature sculptures, museum installations, and community projects. Some of these include a $14 million light rail bridge collaborative over the Salt River in Phoenix (now under construction) and art master plans for urban centers and watersheds that integrate community, ecology and art. Simpson’s work has taken form in mediums which range from rotting wood in Host Analog to the highly technical in Brush with Illumination. The recent installation Incidence at the International Museum of Glass illustrates his efficient and poetic use of natural phenomena to engage the space with the viewer. A more comprehensive viewing of his work can be seen by visiting his web site at www.bustersimpson.net.

SELECTED PROJECTS
The Monolith
Levee as Armature
Portland South Waterfront Greenway
Art Master Plan: Brightwater Treatment System
Arts Master Plan: Bainbridge Island

Moderator:  April Baer, Morning Radio Host, Oregon Public Broadcasting

April Baer followed her curiosity to Portland in winter of 2004. Prior to serving as the local host of Morning Edition for OPB Radio, she hosted a local news public affairs call-in show at Cleveland's NPR affiliate, and anchored a similar morning shift.

She credits public radio for having made possible the most interesting days of her life - eating doughnuts with day laborers, standing in with psych nurses in the ER, watching biologists race cockroaches, and having conversations with Robert McNamara, Susan Sontag, Meshel N'degeOcello, among others.  She thinks it would be great if people paid as much attention to local and international events as they do national politics.
 
She likes city neighborhoods, rural diners, and nearly everything about Oregon.  Her proudest accomplishments include a half dozen features produced for NPR, and one really dubious green sweater that took a year and a half to finish.

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Carol Mayer Reed, FASLA, Partner, Mayer/Reed

Carol Mayer-Reed, FASLA, is partner-in-charge of landscape architecture and urban design at Mayer/Reed.  Mayer/Reed is a 15-person Portland-based design firm providing landscape architecture, urban design and visual communications services for the environments in which we live, work and play.

Carol’s 27 years of experience represents a wide array of project types, in both the public and private sectors.  Projects include sustainable and green urban infill projects, waterfronts, natural water systems, parks and recreation facilities, and corporate and higher education campuses. 

Notable projects include:

•  The Walk of the Heroines at Portland State University:
•  The Mark Building at the Portland Art Museum;
•  The Washington State University Vancouver campus;
•  The Rain Garden at the Oregon Convention Center Expansion:
•  Nike World Headquarters North Campus Expansion; and
•  The Eastbank Esplanade, which has won a number of local and national awards for design

Carol is currently working on three high-density mixed-use blocks in Portland’s South Waterfront District.

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Dennis Wilde, Senior Project Manager, Gerding/Edlen Development

Mr. Wilde has been active in construction and real estate development since 1967.  He has extensive construction and design management experience.  Prior to joining GED as a senior project manager, Mr. Wilde was the vice president of a large regional construction company.  He has had direct management experience with projects exceeding $100 million in direct construction cost.  His responsibilities include feasibility studies, management of the pre-construction and construction process, tenant improvement coordination, and overall project management.

He is the Senior Project Manager for the complete renovation of the historic Fuller Company building in Portland’s Pearl District which is now the world headquarters for Wieden & Kennedy.  In addition to office space, this mixed-use project includes 32,000 sq. ft. of retail space and parking.  Renovation of this six-story, 240,000 sq. ft. building began in April 1997 and was completed in September 1999.  It is registered as a historic structure and was rehabilitated in accordance with the National Park Service’s Historic Preservation program.

Mr. Wilde is currently involved in several other historic landmarks in the Pearl District in Portland, including the Pacific Coast Biscuit Company building, an 80,000 sq. ft. building which was built in two phases in 1891 and 1905.  He was also active in the 5 block Brewery Blocks project and is currently active in the South Waterfront project where he is managing over $250 million in projects.

In addition to his construction background, Mr. Wilde has more than twenty years of experience in urban planning and design.  His education includes master’s degrees in both city planning and architecture from the University of Pennsylvania.  Mr. Wilde is also active as the president of the board of Oregon Natural Step Network, is on the Board of Directors, Cascadia Chapter, US Green Building Council and is on the Board of Directors of Caldera, an arts and environment educational foundation for at risk youth.

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Bruce Warner, Executive Director, Portland Development Commission

Mr. Bruce Warner, Executive Director for the Portland Development Commission, has more than 30 years of directorial experience in a broad range of public works, public administration, economic development, land use and transportation.

As Director for the Oregon Department of Transportation (ODOT), Warner led and managed a biennial budget of more than $2 billion and a workforce of 4,600. 

Prior to joining ODOT, he served as Chief Operating Officer and Director of Regional Environmental Management at Metro. He has also served as a Regional Manager for the Oregon Department of Transportation; Director of Land Use and Transportation for Washington County; City Engineer/Building Official for the City of Hillsboro; and as an environmental engineer for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

Mr. Warner is a registered professional civil engineer. He holds a B.S. in Civil Engineering from the University of Washington, where he has also completed graduate studies in sanitary engineering.

In addition to his role at the Portland Development Commission, he currently serves on the Board of the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO); serves as Chair of the AASHTO’s standing committee on highway traffic safety and a member of the Public Works Association. He also served as a board president at Stop Oregon Litter and Vandalism (SOLV).

Don Rood, Principal, The Felt Hat

Northwest native and Cooper Union alumnus Don worked for six years with Heidi and Robin Rickabaugh at Principia Graphica, a small design consultancy recognized internationally throughout the 70's and 80's. Don worked on corporate identity and branding, book design, and consumer packaging. He left in 1988 to found his own solo firm until rejoining long-time collaborator Paul Mort to form Rood Mort Design.
 
Since co-founding the Felt Hat he has worked on a myriad of strategic design efforts, ranging from retail environments for Nike to worldwide brand creation for PacifiCorp subsidiaries to consumer packaging and experience design.  

The Felt Hat's work extends beyond their regular multidisciplinary practice. They have made a priority of consulting with educators, government leaders and the business community about Design Thinking as an emergent pan-disciplinary strategic tool, uniquely positioned to address policy-level issues in both private and public endeavors.