Stewardship Messenger

ing Spr 6 201

Puget Sound – Gray to Green

A Chat with Molly Sadowsky

Salmon-Safe in the City

Snoqualmie Strengths

Puget Sound Leaders Solve Stormwater

A Mission to Support Salmon-Safe Flowers

Google & Vulcan Team Up in Seattle

Working Together to Enhance the Valley

Stewardship Messenger Volume 1 / Issue 1

Board of Directors Chair Chris Bayley

Former King County Prosecuting Attorney

Vice Chair Alice Shorett

Founder Triangle Associates, Inc.

Treasurer Will Hartmann IT Consultant

“Stewardship Partners’ unique approach helps people from all walks of life care for the environment while caring for their community.” Dave Upthegrove King County Councilman

Secretary J. Bowman Neely Attorney Neely Law

Kenan Block

Block Media & Communications

Eugene Carlson

Dow Jones & Co. (retired)

Peter Dykstra

Partner Plauche and Carr

Cal McAllister

CEO Wexley School for Girls

Steven Patneaude

Director, 787 Systems The Boeing Company

Kitty Craig

Deputy State Director The Wilderness Society

Mark Wolfram

Vice President Channel Partnership and Sales, Azuqua

Staff David Burger

Emma Vowels

Aaron Clark, Ph.D.

Geoff Bough

Executive Director

Project Associate

Rain Gardens Program Manager

Restoration Technician

Chris LaPointe

Project Associate

Snoqualmie Stewardship Program Manager

Ellen Southard

Salmon-Safe Urban Outreach Manager

Palmira Figueroa

Developement Director

Rebecca Sayre

Kirby Johnson Amelia Bahr

Project Associate

Drew Wilkinson Project Associate

Gavin Walton

Habitat Restoration Technician

Communications Manager

Contributing Photographers Sarah McDevitt Deborah Austin Roddy Scheer

Alan Sandercock M. Mkef David Burger

Spring is the season of awakening and it always leaves me with a feeling that things are new. In this spirit, we are excited to bring you our refreshed Stewardship Messenger. Our new format is thanks to our friends at Seattle agency Wexley School for Girls–big shout-out to art director Derek Vander Griend for his hard work! We hope you enjoy this content-rich and eye-pleasing newsletter. We all have an innate connection to the natural world, and at Stewardship Partners we tirelessly create and share tools and resources that support landowners who are seeking solutions to environmental challenges. We believe that by working together we can ensure that the land,

waters and people across the diverse communities of the Pacific Northwest will thrive for generations to come. Join us as we celebrate recent successes and the momentum that flows from them. We hope the stories and images on these pages inspire you to take action in your own way. Buy fresh Salmon-Safe flowers, food and beverages, build a rain garden, or adopt a buffer and support local sustainable farming and habitat. We are all Stewardship Partners and we are stronger together.

David Burger Executive Director

Puget Sound — Gray to Green Puget Sound leaders solve stormwater As part of a truly fantastic team, Stewardship Partners pulled together a first of its kind cross-sector, multicounty, collaborative solution-making summit on February 24th, 2016. Attended by nearly 200 leaders from the .com, .org, .edu and .gov sectors of our region, the Summit convened at the Mountaineers in Seattle to connect the insights, challenges and opportunities faced by those leading the green infrastructure movement across Puget Sound. Common goals included understanding the work currently under way to green our infrastructure and to catalyze strategic partnerships. Throughout the day we fostered a powerful green infrastructure coalition, inspired ourselves to pursue innovation and intersectional green solutions to polluted water, and found a broader horizon of opportunities than we knew existed for funding approaches. Our solutions are on par with the scale of the challenge. The day began with the creative vision of urbanist and landscape architect Jason King and closed with a call to action from Seattle Mayor Ed Murray. Panelists and speakers included Steve Shestag from Boeing,

(above) Seattle Mayor Ed Murray with Stewardship Partners staff.

and the University of Washington’s Kathy Wolf, Craig Holland from the Nature Conservancy’s “NatureVest” program, Innovation guru Egils Milbergs, Puget Sound Partnership’s Bruce Wulkan, and Sudha Nandagopal, City of Seattle Equity and Environment Manager as well 16 notable others. “The Summit was a career highlight for me and a realization of a long-held dream to bring so many of these inspiring humans doing amazing work together in one place, but it is also just the beginning,” said Aaron Clark, 12,000 Rain Gardens Program Manager. The Green Infrastructure Summit will become an annual occurrence, and has already created a network and coalition of cross-sector partnerships. The Summit would not have been possible without the heavy lifting delivered by our host-committee: The Nature Conservancy of Washington, WSU, City of Seattle, MIG/SvR and WEC. Sponsorship was provided by the Boeing Company, the Russell Family Foundation, TNC, King County WTD, WEC, Cascadia Consulting and our other sponsors.

A chat with Molly Sadowsky A mission to support Salmon-Safe local flowers Whycoordinatesmall-businessflowergrowers? Since 2011 Seattle Wholesale Growers Market (SWGM) has worked with farmers who specialize in cut flowers, greens and ornamentals from 16 Washington, Oregon and Alaskan flower farms because it is hard for them to compete within the larger industry otherwise. Our mission is to foster a vibrant community marketplace that sustains local flower farms and provides top-quality products and service to the floral industry of the Pacific Northwest. Larger farms have an advantage in many ways – the second largest flower – auction in the world is in British Columbia, creating a lot of price pressure. So many flowers are imported, and this has driven down pricing over the last 20 years.”

What does the Growers Market/Cooperative provide growers? The co-op provides staff and a central urban location to sell grower product. Staff manage market operations, which entail customer outreach and special orders, product care and merchandising,

(above) Wonderful, wild & local Salmon-Safe flowers.

and marketing. The market provides its grower members with a large channel for their product and allows them to focus on growing.

Why is the Growers Market Salmon-Safe? A lot of our farms are on waterways and our farmers have a deep personal connection to the land, plus they are personally handling what they sell. Being Salmon-Safe aligns with our values. SWGM flowers and plants can be found at Town and Country Markets, floral designers listed on Slowflowers.com and many other business locations throughout Washington. See what’s at the market on Instagram @seattlewholesalegrowersmarket and find out more at seattlewholesalegrowersmarket.com.”

Molly Sadowsky SWGM Market Manager

Salmon-Safe in the City

(left) Graphite Design Group’s rendering of the Google campus.

Google teams up with Vulcan to show us what is possible We are committed to working on projects that enhance urban ecology and educate the public. That is why we are thrilled by Vulcan Inc.’s recent announcement that it is working with Google to design four new office buildings in South Lake Union. This development is targeted for both SalmonSafe and LEED Gold certification with construction beginning in 2017 and completion expected in 2019. The project will include 607,000 square feet of office space for Google. Vulcan will separately develop approximately 14,000 square feet of retail space for restaurants, shops and services. All buildings will feature below-grade parking. The design will include courtyard plazas and open green space. “South Lake Union is a thriving hub, and we’re excited for our new space,” said Clyde McQueen, Site Lead for Google Seattle. Graphite Design Group is designing the project and Runberg Architecture Group is consulting on the residential portion. GLY Construction is the Salmon-Safe-accredited general contractor. Part of Vulcan’s ongoing commitment to Salmon-Safe practices is ensuring all of their contractors achieve this level of rigor in their practices. This project demonstrates how Salmon-Safe complements LEED by going beyond its requirements to achieve higher ecological function in an urban environment Salmon-Safe program.

Weaving ecology into design also involves expanding community dialogue. We were able to successfully do just that with our 2016 Salmon in the City event held on January 28 with keynote by NOAA’s Nat Scholz, PhD. We looked at emerging research about the impacts of stormwater on salmon populations. The gathering highlighted the need for Puget Sound communities to be more strategic with urban ecology in the built environment and sparked creative rethinking about the way we build our urban landscape. The highlight of the evening was the “Hero of Salmon” awards given to those who are leading the charge on developing urban construction sites that ensure clean water for salmon. 2016 Hero of Salmon awardees include King County GreenTools, GLY Construction, Jason Twill, with a special surprise award given to our own, Ellen Southard, Salmon-Safe Urban Outreach Manager, for her dedication and vision. Salmon in the City would not have been possible without our sponsors and speakers: Weber Thompson, KPFF, Dr. Rich Horner – Salmon-Safe Assessor, Beneficial State Bank Foundation, The Bullitt Foundation, King County GreenTools, International Living Future Institute, The Mountaineers Foundation, Finnriver Cider, Duke’s Chowder House, Central Co-op & Watermill Winery.

Snoqualmie Strengths After a wet and, as we’ve started to say around the office, “floody” winter, spring’s blue skies have welcomed the hard work of farmers and our partners throughout the Snoqualmie River Valley. Everywhere you turn, folks are alive with energy as they begin to flex their farm muscle by cleaning and tuning machinery and tilling their fields to create another bountiful season. This winter and spring, our friends at the Mountains to Sound Greenway Trust facilitated a series of workshops entitled “A River Runs Through It,” which was born of the seven-year-old stakeholder process, the Snoqualmie Strategy. This eight workshop series focused on creating a regional identity for the Snoqualmie Valley as a means to generating a more connective and collaborative local economy. Workshops were held at multiple venues and included a launch party at Fall City Bistro. Workshop topics included Sustainable Tourism, Outdoor Recreation, Farms & Culinary Tourism, Cultural Heritage & Art, a Local First Campaign, Tools for Small Businesses and Building a Brand. With over 150 people in attendance, we are encouraged for the future of community engagement in the valley. Next steps will build upon this momentum, focusing on solidifying a regional identity/branding and fostering a more thriving Snoqualmie River Valley. In concert with the workshops, we are gearing up to produce the Snoqualmie River Valley Stewardship Handbook. It will serve as a tool for people who live, work

Here’s to healthy riparian buffers and a vibrant Snoqualmie River Valley!

and recreate in the Snoqualmie Valley to make better-informed environmentally healthy decisions. Another opportunity for people to help ensure a healthy future for the valley is through our Adopt-a-Buffer program. This new program provides an avenue for companies, groups and individuals to, in partnership with local landowners, invest time and money in stewarding a specific piece of the Snoqualmie riverbank. Thanks to the hard work of teams from Boeing, Microsoft, Starbucks, Patagonia and local sustainable seafood restaurant, Duke’s Chowder House, we managed to get 1.3 acres of riparian habitat adopted and cared for in this first year alone. This program was recently featured at the Snoqualmie Tribal Green Summit, a three-day conference hosted by the Snoqualmie Indian Tribe. We were thrilled to share the program and learn that there is community-wide enthusiasm for programs that connect people with the lands and waters of the Snoqualmie Valley. Throughout 2016 we are focusing on identifying new sponsors for Adopt-a-Buffer. We hope to bring together as many people into the world of environmental conservation as possible – creating successful nontraditional partnerships as only Stewardship Partners can! Now that the groundwork is laid, we are reaching out for new sponsors for Adopt-a-Buffer. We hope

10

Future Events

Feast on the Farm Join us for our 7th Annual Feast on the Farm featuring local sustainable food by Josh Henderson of Vestal and the music of Seattle musician, Kris Orlowski. Tickets go on sale on May 23rd at 10:00 am. www.feastonthefarm.org

July 21, 2016 Camp Korey in Carnation

3rd Annual Watershed Tour Save the Date October 13 – the Salmon-Safe Urban/Rural Watershed Tour is back! Salmon-Safe wine reception to follow at Tesla Motors. For sponsorships and more information about eligibility for your business or agency to participate, contact Ellen Southard [email protected] or call (206) 579-8645.

October 13, 2016. 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.

Stewardship Messenger would like to welcome: Board Members

Staff Members

Kitty Craig Kitty is currently Deputy State Director for the national conservation organization. The Wilderness Society, providing strategic direction, program delivery, operations and fundraising leadership for the Washington State program. Prior to joining The Wilderness Society, she led The Trust for Public Land’s Conservation Vision program, working to protect threatened landscapes through collaborative landscape planning.

Mark Wolfram Mark is a technology executive with over 20 years of experience at Microsoft in several key roles including GM Worldwide Partner Sales, GM M&A Integration and GM for the Pacific Northwest. He is currently VP of Channel Partnerships and Sales at Azuqua, a Seattle cloud integration start–up with funding from Ignition Partners.

Drew Wilkinson Drew joined the Stewardship Partners’ team in 2016, bringing with him five years of experience in environmental conservation and a passion for sustainable coalition building in the public sector. He has worked in a variety of fields to support the arts, youth empowerment and community organizing and graduated magna cum laude from Arizona State University with a BA in political science.

Gavin Walton Gavin joined Stewardship Partners in 2016 as a Habitat Restoration Technician. He has experience in wilderness management and natural resource protection as a seasonal ranger with the U.S. Forest Service in southwest Colorado. Graduating from Northern Arizona University with a BS in environmental science exposed him to conservation on local and regional scales.

1411 4th Avenue, Suite 1425 Seattle, Washington 98101 Address Service Requested Phone: 206.292.9875 Email: [email protected] www.stewardshippartners.org

Non-Profit Org. U.S. Postage PAID Seattle, WA Permit #627