BLOG/NEWS

On March 29th, 2017, about one hundred participants spanning academia, nonprofits, government, health, funders, business, and community-based organizations gathered for a day-long convening to explore how a more robust and strategic regional collaboration among public and private partners c

By Sarah Titcomb

(Fighting a wildfire near Chelan, WA. Wildfires and droughts are expected to become more common due to rising temperatures from climate change. Photo Source: Ben Brooks from Fife, WA)

On May 2nd the American Farmland Trust speaker series on farms and food will continue with "Re-Imagining Local Grains." The talk will be given by Dr. Steve Jones, a professor, wheat breeder, and Director of the WSU Bread Lab. 

When: Monday, May 2nd from 6 to 8pm.

Where: Stone Way Cafe (3510 Stone Way N, Seattle, WA)

There are two new grant opportunities for those working within or around the health industry. The first is sponsored by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, and focuses on their Cultural Health Leaders Program.

By Sarah Titcomb

(Example of a "high-complexity" street with greenery and a variety of facades. Photo Source: Tony Webster from San Francisco, CA.)

(Photo Source)

By Sarah Titcomb

By Nancy Rottle
(Photo Source: King County Sheriff's Office)

The City Project is a nonprofit organization based in Los Angeles, California that works on equal access to parks and green space, transportation, and related issues at the intersection of social justice, sustainable regional planning, and smart growth. The State of California requires county and city general plans as well as proposed new development projects to address environmental justice matters.

By Sarah Titcomb
(Photo Source: SMacAfee)

By Sarah Titcomb

Urban sprawl follows a predictable pattern. As populations rise, the pressure to expand developed areas outside of the congested urban core and into the seemingly empty rural areas, also grows. In a dramatic role reversal earlier this week, 150 acres that had been previously platted and permitted for subdivision in Arlington, was actually developed into a farm.

Point Defiance Zoo & Aquarium ZooLights: November 27 - January 3, 2016

Puget Sound Green Infrastructure Summit: February 24, 2016

AND

By Rachel Gregg

For information on our Executive Committee Meeting from Decemeber 1st, please go here. And to see the given presentation, please go here.

Within the Central Puget Sound Region lies Kitsap County, where ROSS’s efforts are heavily focused. And this November, the area is putting on a number of events that relate directly to open space and the five regional challenges.

Celebrate the Return of Salmon

The first will be held on Saturday, November 14 on Chico Creek. Participants will be able to watch and learn about migrating salmon – a topic greatly linked to the region’s biodiversity. The event is free and will be held at two different locations.

On September 24, twenty-two members of the Executive Committee came together to hear updates on current ROSS projects, learn about Pierce County’s sustainability efforts, and better understand Earth Economics’ valuation of open space services in the Puget Sound.

By Sarah Titcomb
(Photo Source)

By Sarah Titcomb & Andrea Mojzak

Around the world, September 18 marked PARK(ing) day. This is an international event where residents, artists, planners, architects, and designers work together to temporarily transform metered parking spaces into small urban parks and open spaces. And here in the Puget Sound region, we couldn't help but participate.

By Matt Chadsey 

Anyone who lives in the Central Puget Sound Region can recognize that the open space around us has value.  The mountains -- even just the views of them -- rivers, parks, and working lands provide benefits. However, quantifying those benefits is hard.  What is the value of a rushing river, or the shade provided by a street tree on a sunny day, or a salt marsh, or wetland during a storm?

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contact: Matt Chadsey, Project Leader, Earth Economics

The Our Green/Duwamish Team has been very busy during the project’s Listening Phase. The Listening Phase represents the first steps in the three-phase process to develop a watershed strategy for the Green/Duwamish Watershed, connecting many ongoing efforts in a more comprehensive way. The Listening Phase has included focus groups, open houses, and an online survey.

The term biophilia, coined by Edward O. Wilson, describes what he thinks is our innate connection to the natural world. Wilson and other like-minded scholars have taken this concept further to suggest that, in fact, humans cannot thrive in the absence of this connection to nature (mentally, physically or spiritually). Given this vital connection, it’s no surprise that social scientists and economist, in particular, have been developing credible techniques for estimating the monetary value of the benefits humans receive from nature or other compelling metrics.

In February, I spoke at the School of Community and Regional Planning (SCARP) Symposium at the University of British Columbia (UBC) on Planning for Resilience in the Pacific Northwest. I organized my remarks around five core principles for planning and managing land and water that I believe can help move us toward more resilient urban regions. Those actively participating in the Regional Open Space Strategy (ROSS) may find these principles familiar, they guide our process. We believe that planning with these principles will lead to a truly resilient urban region.

 For full presentation, click here.

To read a summary from the Executive Committee Meeting, go here.

For additional information on Coordinated Investment: What does it take to reverse the trajectory of ecosystem degradation within a human ecological community? Click here.

Are you or the other members of your organization looking to connect with others passionate about the Green-Duwamish watershed? Consider volunteering at the Duwamish Alive! restoration event on April 18th to join the hundreds of volunteers cleaning up over a dozen sites throughout the area.

Not only is our team joining the 2015 National APA Conference, we are excited to share that several of our partners and friends will be in attendance! Sunday morning will kick off with the opening keynote speech from Ron Sims, the Chair of the ROSS Executive Committee. We look forward to hearing his current perspective on sustainability and health - and we plan to arrive early to ensure we get a seat! The day begins at 8am on April 19th at the Washington State Convention Center.

Continue reading for the list of our other committee and task force members presenting or participating on panels during conference sessions.

The American Planning Association's Annual National Conference is coming to Seattle this weekend and the ROSS team is excited to participate! Several of us will be in attendance and our very own Nancy Rottle from the University of Washington’s Green Futures Research and Design Lab will present the ROSS project to the planning community. Steve Whitney from the Bullitt Foundation, who provides leadership for the ROSS, organized and will moderate this session. Read more to learn about the session and our co-presenters from the Intertwine Alliance and the Georgia Strait Alliance.

We look forward to seeing other the conference attendees there!

It is a well-established fact that Washingtonians love our great outdoors. In the Summer, we flock to Paradise on Mount Rainier for idyllic adventures, drive out to Granite Falls to ride on horseback, or hop on our bikes to enjoy our regional trail network. During the Winter, many of us head for the hills with our snowboards, sleds, skis, and snowshoes with dreams of fresh powder. But sadly, warm temperatures and low snowpack has kept most of that winter equipment in the garage this year. Read more to find out why this matters to the ROSS.

This winter was short, mild, and left many mountains bare that are normally snow-capped. In response to these conditions and the potential impact on water resources, Governor Jay Inslee declared drought in three regions across Washington State last month: the north Olympic Peninsula, a large region east of the Cascades, and the area around Walla Walla.

Continue reading for the ROSS take on the current drought and a discussion on conditions in our region's watersheds.

The Kitsap Forest & Bay Project is a landscape-level effort to conserve up to 6,700 acres of forest, wetlands and shoreline surrounding Port Gamble Bay in north Kitsap County. The Project is a once-in-history opportunity to help sustain our region's quality of life, environmental health, and economic vitality. It has the potential to shape the future of the entire Kitsap Peninsula and has been championed by a broad coalition of partners including Kitsap County, Port Gamble S’Klallam Tribe, Suquamish Tribe, Great Peninsula Conservancy, Forterra, Pope Resources and the community at large.

We are Excited to Introduce the New ROSS Team!

The beginning of this year saw transitions in the ROSS team, as long-time staff have moved onto new, exciting opportunities and new staff was welcomed to the team.

After much anticipation, we are proud to announce Ikuno Masterson as the new ROSS Senior Planner. Ikuno has been involved in both public and private sector planning in the region for over 25 years. She has dedicated her career to integrating the built environment with the natural environment and is looking forward to continuing to do so through her leadership on the ROSS.

Continue reading for an brief introduction to the rest of the team!

Martha Kongsgaard, ROSS Executive Committee Member and Chair of the Puget Sound Partnership, recently co-authored a guest opinion piece in the Seattle Times about Orca whales and salmon with Ken Balcomb, Executive Director of the Center for Whale Research, and David Troutt, the Director of the Nisqually Indian Tribe Natural Resources. Continue reading to learn more about this article and the difficulty of steward the survival of two endangered species, when one eats the other.

Did you know the 8th Annual South Sound Sustainability Expo is happening this weekend? This event is a great opportunity to connect with private and public organizations whose work support environmentally sustainable practices. Learn more about the event here.

The Washington State Legislature is considering a $50 million budget proposal to fund projects following the Floodplains by Design approach. If approved, we could see more of our local river communities taking this ecosystems approach to floodplain management.  We recommend you read two local sucess stories for projects completed in Pierce and King County.

We are delighted to share with you a new study that looks at the contribution of outdoor recreation to Washington’s economy. Here are some of the results:

It seems like a perennial challenge to create well-utilized open space in urban settings! Many cities suffer from a lack of trees and green spaces. The street grid imposes limits on developing new open space. These challenges are even more profound in dense urban neighborhoods, like Seattle's First Hill.

The ROSS Team recently gathered with our Executive Committee to update them on our activities and the milestones we have achieved over the past six-months. We are always eager to meet with our leaders and partners, and the evening's meeting did not disappoint.

We highly recommend you read this thoughtful – and visually stunning – article about the impact of climate change on our beloved Mt. Rainier. From glacier melt to habitat shifts, the challenges of data prediction to the tension between human intervention, policy and practice, this article reveals the complexity of a changing climate on an iconic landscape.

At our recent ROSS Project Leadership Team meeting we asked our participating partners what the most important developments in open space have been for their organizations in 2014 and what they are looking forward to in 2015. We were excited and inspired by the great strides that have been made to protect and enhance open space in the Central Puget Sound and beyond over the last year. We know that the efforts mentioned are just the tip of the iceberg for these organizations and the region. While there is much more work to do to ensure and protect open space, we are delighted to celebrate these great achievements and look towards the future. Join us!

Have you seen this inspiring video from Green Duwamish/Central Puget Sound's Salmon Conservation and Restoration efforts? Watch "Green the Green" and be prepared to tap some deep local pride in this incredible green landscape we call home.  A celebration of our open space benefits and a beautiful, compelling call to action, this 3 minute video reminds us of the important efforts we must invest in to clean and protect our watershed to maintain our rich cultural and natural heritage.

The ROSS team is growing! With our great partnership with King County on the Green-Duwamish Watershed Strategy and upcoming launch of a Snohomish Watershed Open Space Strategy, we seek talented staff to lead and support this visionary, collaborative effort.

We are delighted to share the great efforts of the Mountains to Sound Greenway, Stewardship Partners and their Snoqualmie Valley partners for their visionary planning in the watershed. This beautiful "report card" reflects the thoughtful work they are doing to create a robust watershed plan to protect and enhance their forests, farms and rural lands that make up 96% of their land and provide essential ecosystem services for the entire Puget Sound region.

Did you fly Alaska Airlines recently? If you did, you might have seen the great article on the University of Washington’s Green Futures Research and Design Lab, where the ROSS project is housed. The GFL’s innovative Green Wall project is prototyping and monitoring growing food vertically as well as providing habitat for native birds, reducing heat island effect and reducing heating and cooling costs for adjacent buildings.

Issues like open space planning and salmon spawning don't often find their way onto late-night comedy programs. Frankly, we'll admit, we take the work we do pretty seriously. But when we saw this on Last Week Tonight with John Oliver, we knew we had to take a moment to share it with our friends and colleagues. We hope you enjoy the video as much as we did.

Ryan Mello, Executive Director of the Pierce Conservation District and Tacoma City Councilman is our first guest contributor in a series that highlights 2014 successes in open space and visions for 2015. Among other things the PCD has more than 60 years of history of providing agricultural assistance in the Puyallup watershed – one of the biggest producers of food in our region.

A recent op ed in the Seattle Times elevates the import of protecting and creating pollination pathways for bees in our cities. As Mark Winston shares, the needs of these small critters are often overlooked by more dramatic expressions of urban nature and development, but they are critical to a healthy ecosystem.  He shares key examples and future developments in this space.

Our friends at the Wilderness Society just shared the findings of an important study published in October that demonstrates that kids who spend time in nature, away from multi-tasking computers, express improved emotional intelligence compared to their peers. See the summary article here or read the study published in Computers in Human Behavior here.

Our region, the Central Puget Sound, is in the midst of a highly progressive and innovative regional planning effort to conserve and enhance the open space systems that provide direct inputs to the ecological, economic, social, recreational and aesthetic vitality of our region.

Everyone can get excited about building new parks, but the formation of Seattle Parks District indicates that our region realizes the importance of maintaining the legacy of green space we’ve already invested in. This complements government agencies like Metro Parks Tacoma and donation-based partnerships like King County Parks Foundation in providing a more reliable stream of resources so managers of park systems can be more effective in maintaining existing assets or building anew. The ROSS is working with partners across the region to enhance our collective impact to ensure the portfolio of our investments in open space enhance nature’s benefits.

Trees have a special place in our hearts and a productive place in our community. In urban areas, trees help us filter the air, manage heat island effects, and they are correlated with improved roadway safety and human health. Seattle ranks among those cities with a high percentage of urban tree canopy, but keys in on where there are major differences between neighborhoods. As we look at the link between open space and key regional challenges, the ROSS will investigate how different communities benefit from our natural system and how to address these disparities.

It has been a busy summer for us here at the ROSS. Not only have we been hard at work on our open space services work and entering into an agreement with King County and the City of Seattle for the Green-Duwamish WOSS you may have read about earlier this month, we’ve also been developing a new website.

Monday, September 9, marked a seminal moment in open space planning, as King County and the City of Seattle, in the presence of community groups, natural resource agencies and local news media, announced plans to develop a Green/Duwamish Watershed Strategy.

Big News! The ROSS is partnering with Earth Economics to perform an “Ecosystem Services Valuation” (ESV) of the Central Puget Sound region. The ESV will focus on the current value of open space services being identified by the ROSS Ecosystem Services Committee.

We’re excited to share news of a new partnership with The Trust for Public Land. Our Ecosystem Services Committee and ROSS staff will be working with their award-winning GIS team and Climate Conservation Program to explore how to map our region-wide open space system as well as identify and assess areas where open space can address key regional challenges.

Our June 11^th Executive Committee meeting concluded with a tour of The Bullitt Center and our first “Open Space Social” to provide a networking opportunity for colleagues from around the region. It was a fun, festive event – stay tuned for information on future Open Space Socials in the future. We plan to host more of them!

The Bullitt Foundation and The Russell Family Foundation have once again stepped up to support the ROSS Initiative. The work focuses on two primary tracks:

ROSS is in the planning stages of work for its next Watershed Open Space Strategy: the Snohomish. And thanks to the pioneering work of the Mountains to Sound Greenway Trust and a number of other ROSS partners, there is already a solid foundation of watershed-scale planning to build from.

The ROSS process builds from existing open space conservation work, but we also benefit from and offer a valuable testing ground through our affiliation with the University of Washington.  Students and faculty are integrating ROSS projects in their coursework, such as developing GIS databases through the UW’s Geography Department and contributing research on urban forestry in Puget Sound.

It has been an exciting several months for those of us involved in developing the Puyallup-White Watershed Open Space Strategy (WOSS). Thanks to the collaborative approach and broad participation from many of you, a vision is beginning to take shape. The WOSS process is emerging as a possible springboard for a Big Idea that has lived in the watershed for years: a coalition of organizations, businesses and agencies coordinating across a broad range of projects to ensure the watershed as an ecosystem is healthy and continues to deliver the broad range of benefits to the region.

Outdoor recreation is big business in Puget Sound and throughout Washington. But it’s about more than just industry retailers like REI and Outdoor Research. Access to hiking, camping, boating and other outdoor pursuits are a central part of the unique quality of life we enjoy – and a major selling point for non-outdoor businesses seeking to recruit new talent.