January 2018

Michael Schmidt2018, News

PRESIDENT’S REPORT

I want to start out this year’s first letter to the Chapter to thank all of the firms that signed up and renewed their commitment to be “Member Firms” in support of PGASLA.  In December, we essentially doubled the number of firms from last year’s total of five – and we celebrated by having the 1st Annual PGASLA “Spare Time Challenge” event at NKC’s AMF Pro Bowl Lanes.  ANOVA served as the title sponsor of this fun inaugural event, and provided food, drinks, and bowling – as well as a traveling trophy won this year by Jeffrey L. Bruce + Company (David Stokes and Spencer Sneller).  We had some pretty ugly sweaters as well, with the team prize going to Confluence.  In all – we had 35 attendees, at least 22 gutter balls, and several folks vowing to win the trophy next year.  Thanks again to all who participated.

See below for a brief update on other Chapter initiatives:

Central States Conference:  Plans are progressing on many fronts simultaneously – with lots to do to get ready for our visitors in April:

  • Conference Website – Stacy Ernst continues to keep things updated, and our registration is now LIVE! (www.aslacentralstates.org).
  • Sponsorships – If you know of any vendors that are interested in participating in the conference, please be sure to send them a note. Booths get assigned at the end of January, and early bird registration rates last through February 15th before increasing.
  • Speakers – We have nationally-renowned LA and illustrator Chip Sullivan from Cal Berkeley as our keynote luncheon speaker on Thursday, April 12th (immediately prior to leading our Sketch Crawl). We also have Ashley Hand as our keynote luncheon speaker on Friday, April 13th.  She is co-founder of the urban change management advisory firm CityFi based in Los Angeles, advising cities and the private sector on a more human-centered approach to smart cities.  Concurrent educational sessions will also provide options for educational content throughout the conference.
  • Awards – The call has been officially placed for both Central States and PGASLA awards submittals – all are due on February 24th.

Central States Awards will be distributed at the awards luncheon on Friday, April 13th, and PGASLA Awards will be distributed at our Awards Gala held that evening at 6pm at the Downtown Marriott. Use the Conference Registration site to purchase tickets for these events (http://www.aslacentralstates.org/2018-register/).

Advocacy:  Brian Roth continues to lead our Chapter’s efforts to proactively reach out to our representatives in Kansas and Missouri, and is working with both ASLA National as well as the St. Louis Chapter to coordinate our efforts for Missouri.  PGASLA plans to be in the Capitol in Topeka on February 16th, and in the Capitol in Jefferson City on March 6th.  We need several KC area project images and volunteers to assist these efforts, so please mark your calendars and let Brian know you can attend.

Many thanks go out to all members that are helping our Chapter with these and other initiatives.  I’m so impressed with the abilities of those who’ve volunteered their time to help thus far, including regular LINKS events and planned social activities. We can achieve great things by working together, and my hope is that more of you will get involved in achieving our Chapter’s true potential this year.  Please don’t hesitate to connect and offer your insight to make this organization even better moving forward.

Onward and upward – and Happy New Year to all of you.  Let’s make 2018 our Chapter’s best year yet!


Wm. Christopher Cline, PLA, ASLA
President, Prairie Gateway Chapter

CENTRAL STATES ASLA CONFERENCE

Registration is open!
So register now and prepare for 3 terrific Kansas City days and these exciting speakers, streetcar tour and CEU opportunities. Submit your best work for regional awards recognition during the Friday conference luncheon on April 13, 2018.
Hurry!
Early Bird rates expire on Wednesday, March 21.

CALL FOR ENTRIES

PGASLA Awards | Call for Entries

The Prairie Gateway chapter of The American Society of Landscape Architects is pleased to issue this formal Call for Entries for the 2018 Awards. Winners will be honored at an event on April 13 at the Downtown Marriott Hotel Kansas City.

Participation in the awards program will help broaden professional boundaries, increase public awareness of the role of landscape architects, raise the standards of the discipline and bring recognition to organizations and individuals who demonstrate superior skill in the practice and/or study of landscape architecture.

NOMINATION CATEGORIES
Professionals and Students may submit in the following categories: Design (Built), Design (Unbuilt), Planning and Analysis, Research, and Communication.

ENTRY AND DETAILS
Please find the attached Call for Entries and Instructions. The Entry Form and PowerPoint Templates are available through the PGASLA website.

All entries are February 23.

Click here for Submission Requirements.

Central States Awards | Call for Entries

The Prairie Gateway Chapter of the American Society of Landscape Architects is pleased to issue this formal Call for Entries for the 2018 Central States ASLA Awards Program. Professional and Student Award Winners will be honored on Friday, April 13st, 2018 at the Downtown Marriott Hotel Kansas City, Missouri during an Awards Luncheon.

A jury of qualified professionals from a separate ASLA Chapter will review each submittal and determine winners in each award category. Nomination Categories Professionals and Students may submit in the following categories: Design (Built), Design (Unbuilt), Planning and Analysis, Research, and Communication. Only Professionals may submit in the Community Stewardship category.

All entries are February 23.

Click here for Submission Requirements.

CALL FOR VOLUNTEERS

Hello PGASLA Membership! We are committed to jurying Tennessee Chapter’s 2018 Award Submissions, in return for their kindness in jurying our chapter’s awards. Tennessee’s awards submittals are due on Monday, March 12th, which means that we will need to have a jury in place by that date in order for us to return our award selections and jury comments to their contact person by Monday, April 2nd. This will give our jury a 3-week window to schedule our jurying session. Brian Roth and I will chair the committee, but we need additional jury members, so please let me know who is interested ASAP. We will also be looking for someone to take diligent notes on all of the jury comments, because we will need to send that to the Tennessee’s Chapter along with the selected award recipients. In addition to a dedicated person taking notes – we are looking for an odd number of jurors, somewhere between 3-7 total jurors.

For all who are interested in participating, please email me at dstokes@jlbruce.com. We are thinking that our assembled jury should convene some evening after business hours, but we will settle on a date and time that works well for everyone. We will also provide food and refreshments to those that participate in the jury…..ONCE AGAIN – FREE FOOD!

Thank you,

David Stokes
PGASLA – Immediate Past President

SOCIAL CLUB

February we will kick off the 2018 year of PGASLA Social Club events! The committee is currently looking at a Mardi Gras themed event for this first get together. More information will be released in the coming weeks. Keep an eye on your inbox for the announcement, and check out our Facebook page for other updates and events.

LINKS

February LINKS: Sustainable SITES Initiative Deep Dive

On February 13th, join us in Kansas City for a webinar featuring two practitioners as they dive into the SITES v2 rating system, the first rating system that is available to the public for use on any project to pursue certification as a sustainable landscape. The presentation will walk through the basic principles of the SITES system, review a few v2 certified projects, and discuss recent experience utilizing the rating system on a Federal project.

This will be an in-person lecture in Minneapolis, with video availability for those in the West North Central Region. In Kansas City we will view the presentation together via WebEx at the Center for Architecture and Design, and this event will be co-hosted by the Central Plains USGBC and the Prairie Gateway Chapter of ASLA.

Following the presentation will be a brief introduction to the kick off for the USGBC West North Central SITES Collaborative group.

Presenters:
Erica Christenson, SITES AP, Senior Landscape Architect, LHB
Theodore Lee, SITES AP, Senior Landscape Architect, Associate Vice President, HGA Architects and Engineers

Register Here | $10 for Members | $20 for Non-members

TRUSTEE REPORT

Submitted by David Contag
January 20, 2018

Hope all of you are off to a great start of a new year 2018! Our Prairie Gateway Chapter has our Legislative Advocacy meetings coming up in Kansas and Missouri. Contact Brian Roth at BRoth@land3studio.com if you can join us in Topeka at the Statehouse in February. This is where we show our elected state lawmakers that Landscape Architecture does effect and promote Health Safety and Welfare. You can bring an example of a recent project to best communicate our involvement on projects in the public realm. We will also be going to the Missouri Capitol March.

Please contact me at dcontag@dlrgroup.com if you have any questions. The following is an update from ASLA national from January 11, 2018:

Executive Offices

The ASLA Executive Committee will be meeting at the Center for Landscape Architecture Friday and Saturday for its winter meeting. Agenda items include review of 2017 program and budget performance, strategic planning, and diversity training/discussion. For questions, please contact CorporateSecretary Curt Millay, ASLA.

President Greg Miller, FASLA, and President-Elect Shawn Kelly, FASLA, were at the Center for planning meetings before the holidays to meet with each department to review 2018 plans and goals. President Miller gave a presentation to the staff about himself and his practice. Following longstanding tradition, Miller and Kelly also served as judges for the office holiday décor contest and participated in the employee length-of-service awards ceremony. Four staff received five-year awards: Sarah Strelzik, Karen Grajales, Gregg Boersma, and Curt Millay. Four staff received 10-year awards: Keith Swann, Roxanne Blackwell, Les Blackmore, and Alice Klages.

Corporate Secretary Millay and Manager Linette Straus, ASLA, provided a tour of the ASLA Center and an update on the Chinatown Green Street Demonstration Project to attendees of the Transportation Research Board conference being held in Washington this week.

Pledges to the Campaign for the ASLA Center for Landscape Architecture now total $1,300,766 or 86.7 percent of the campaign goal. ASLA continues to reach out to firms, individual practitioners, and companies providing products and services to the profession to raise the balance needed to complete the campaign. Please click on ASLA Center Honor Roll to see who has already given.

Donations to the 2017 ASLA Fund currently total $50,881, an increase of 68 percent over the same period last year. Thank you letters to all donors to the Campaign and the Fund in 2017 will go out over the next two weeks.

Finance, Meetings, and Business Operations

CFO Mike O’Brien, Hon. ASLA, and the Accounting staff are closing out December 2017 and reporting the results at the winter Executive Committee meeting later this week.

The 2018 LAM advertising contracts now total 65 percent of the budget.

The 2018 EXPO booth sales reached 73 percent of the floor space either sold (61 percent) or reserved (12 percent).

Members of the Sales and Marketing staff are in Orlando participating in the International Builders Show.

Meetings Director Joyce DePass is attending the Professional Convention Management Association (PCMA) Annual conference in Nashville this week.

Government Affairs

Our parks need your help! Due to years of under-investment by Congress in aging infrastructure, our national parks are plagued with a $12 billion maintenance backlog. Recently, a bipartisan group of senators and a group of House legislators introduced the National Park Service Legacy Act (S. 751, H.R. 2584) that aims to reduce the maintenance backlog at the National Park Service by establishing a dedicated backlog fund. Under this legislation, $11.3 billion of the approximately $12 billion maintenance backlog would be eliminated by 2047. Tell your lawmakers to cosponsor the National Park Service Legacy Act today!

Legislation has been introduced in Virginia, HB.555, which would eliminate landscape architecture licensure and replace it with optional certification. The bill also proposes limiting title protection to the term “certified landscape architect” and removes restrictions on the practice of landscape architecture by unlicensed persons. The Virginia Chapter, with support from ASLA National, is developing an advocacy response strategy. Additionally, State Government Affairs Director Elizabeth Hebron is assisting the Illinois Chapter in developing a legislative proposal for a practice act in Illinois.

Landscape Architecture Magazine

The February issue of LAM went to press this week. The features include pieces on a new woodland design for the Fernbank museum in Atlanta by Sylvatica Studio; the rippling landforms around the MAX IV National Laboratory in Sweden by Snøhetta; and the lengthy process of restoring Olana, the estate of the painter Frederic Edwin Church, in the Hudson River Valley of New York, by Nelson Byrd Woltz. Departments include a Materials piece on specifying dimensioned stone products; a new master-class program in Japanese garden design in Portland, Oregon; and placemaking at the Kopupaka Reserve in New Zealand. In the Back is a photo essay on an antique garden tool collection belonging to David Rubin, FASLA, and a review of the new book by Laurie Olin, FASLA, Be Seated. Also, check out new items on LAM’s website, and alert Spanish-speaking colleagues to our new series of translated articles.

Editor Brad McKee is in New York today and Thursday serving as a judge for the National Magazine Awards, held by the American Society of Magazine Editors at Columbia University.

JSTOR has begun the process of gathering archives of LAM from various sources in preparation for scanning the 108-year archive.

The next LAM Lecture will be Tuesday, March 13, at 7 pm at the Center for Landscape Architecture. The speaker will be Bradley Cantrell, ASLA, the chair of landscape architecture at the University of Virginia.

Public Relations and Communications

ASLA convened its 2018 Public Awareness Summit in Austin, Texas, on January 5-7 with 46 of 49 chapters represented. The summit featured presentations from ASLA staff on implementing the rebrand, public relations, and web design. Some attendees presented case studies on student outreach, promoting the work of members, and working with a chapter to redesign a website. Representatives also participated in three group discussions regarding World Landscape Architecture Month, implementing the rebranding, and how ASLA can better help chapters with local public awareness efforts.

Education Programs

The Landscape Architecture Continuing Education System™ (LA CES™) has 251 active providers offering 1,301 courses. There is one new provider application pending review.

LAAB Immediate Past Chair Ned Crankshaw, FASLA, Manager Kris Pritchard, and Director Susan Apollonio met with Distance Education Accrediting Commission (DEAC) Executive Director Leah Matthews to discuss and draft standards for online landscape architecture programs on January 4.

Manager Pritchard attended the Council for Higher Education Accreditation (CHEA) meeting for a discussion of accreditation and the Reauthorization Bill, Promoting Real Opportunity, Success, and Prosperity through Education Reform (PROSPER), H.R. 4508, and the implications for the accreditation community.

A Call for Presentations reminder for the 2018 Annual Meeting and EXPO in Philadelphia was sent on January 11. The deadline to submit a session for consideration is January 31.

ASLA staff met with representatives of the ACE Mentor Program and STEM Premier to discuss potential partnerships to increase participation in the ACE Mentor program and raise awareness of landscape architecture as a career path.

Professional Practice

The ASLA Fellows Class of 2017 has been added toASLA’s Fellows Database. Fellows from previous classes are reminded that they can update their information in the database themselves or send changes they wish to see to the ASLA library.

Manager Straus is setting up stakeholder meetings with Design Workshop (DW) for the end of January. She is also working on an MOU and assisting Secretary Millay on RFQs for a construction manager, permit runner, and geotechnical surveys. Also in the works are the quarterly report due to the District Department of Energy and the Environment mid-January and updates to the content of the Chinatown Green Street Demonstration Project webpage.

As a member of the advisory board for The Trust for Public Land’s (TPL) new “Parkology” website, Manager Katie Riddle, ASLA, participated in a pilot test orientation of the new web tool. The tool will allow visitors to access exciting and relevant park-related data to support and build great parks in their communities. TPL is planning to launch the website in early 2018.

Member and Chapter Services

Several key communications were delivered to chapter leaders. On January 9, chapter past presidents received the chapter annual report questionnaire (due February 16). The monthly Membership Minute was distributed on January 8, providing tips on how to start the new year off strong. The monthly chapter renewal reports were sent on January 5.

Final 2017 membership numbers are now available. Membership continues to show a slight decline since 2015 and the full membership category, which accounts for two-thirds of all members, continues a trend of modest growth. Associate membership has dropped sharply, likely due to the decline student membership (and enrollment) of the past decade. However, student membership has remained steady since 2016.

Deadlines and Reminders

TheLeadership Calendarcan be accessed on the web.

PUBLIC AWARENESS SUMMIT

2018 Public Awareness Summit – Austin, TX

The 2018 PA Summit just wrapped up in Austin, Texas, January 5-7. This conference brought representatives from the 49 chapters together to discuss outreach and education opportunities, public awareness best practices, event success stories, and lessons learned. Several brainstorming sessions brought about new ideas for local outreach campaigns, and how National can provide resources for the chapters to realize these visions.

This was my first opportunity attending the conference and it was invigorating to say the least! So many passionate people, excited about broadening the knowledge and understanding of our profession to allied professions, the general public, and the next generation. There are many great programs being carried out by chapters throughout the country, some that I hope to bring home and share with ExComm and our membership.

I had the privilege of presenting one of our very own educational outreach programs (Explore Design!). If I have yet to pitch this to you, fret not! Over the next few months I plan to visit each firm in our metro to promote this and other programs to our local landscape architects.

ASLA National has exciting things in the works for this year. Keep an eye out for new resources that may be beneficial to you.

If you have an interest in helping with our local outreach, need help finding resources, or have an idea for new outreach/education, please feel free to reach out to me: mkilleen@land3studio.com

Michael Killeen, ASLA
Vice President of Public Relations

CALL FOR APPLICATIONS

Email kileyfellowship@gsd.harvard.edu for more details.

DIAMOND LEVEL SPONSOR

CENTER UPDATES

Center for Architecture & Design and PGASLA Needs YOUR Help with School Outreach Programs

We are happy to be teaming with our fellow organizations in the CFAD to continue to bring programs to local schools to teach students about design and careers in architecture, landscape architecture, urban planning, interior design and graphic arts. We have multiple programs that you can choose to volunteer for. Please click here for information on each program. The time commitment for each program is:

Introduction to Architecture – 1 hour
Introduction to Design Careers – 2 ½ – 3 hours
Explore Design – 1 ½ hours

If you are interested in volunteering for any of these programs, please email at tiffany@aiakc.org with your contact information, which organization you are with (AIA, PGASLA, IIDA, AIGA, APA) and which program you’d like to volunteer for. We will be having an information and training session on February 20, 2018 from 5:00pm to 6:00pm. Come and join us and learn how you can help with these exciting programs!

PGASLA NEWS

Please click here for the latest PGASLA News

LA’s In The News – PGASLA is looking for information regarding your activity in the community, especially if it is newsworthy. Or perhaps you or your firm have been in the news! Either way, please forward any information to the PGASLA president at president@pgasla.org. We will be happy to send news of your accomplishments to our media contacts.

ASLA Membership – ASLA National is offering a monthly installment option for payments of membership to ASLA. When your membership renewal is due, and if you are interested in this option, please contact the national office to receive details.

Job Opportunities – Click here for current job postings.

PGASLA is on Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter and Land8Lounge. Please join us for local professional and event discussions.

http://www.facebook.com/find-friends/browser/?ref=ler#!/PGASLA

http://www.linkedin.com/groups?gid=2475447&trk=hb_side_g

http://land8lounge.com/group/pgaslaprairiegatewaychapterofasla

ASLA Amazon.com Store

ASLA Amazon.com store. Check it out!

MEMBER LOGIN

Within the PGASLA website there is a members only area where you can register for events, see the chapter roster and view past history of your attendance at events. To log-in, each member will need to use their ASLA member number and a temporary password (eggplant). Once logged in, members will need to change their password. If you have any questions please contact info@pgasla.org.