December 22, 2010
PORTLAND, December 22, 2010 – The Meyer Memorial Trust has awarded a $250,000 grant to the Oregon University System for capital support to establish public spaces within the Oregon Sustainability Center, to be located next to the Portland State University campus. The grant will assist with completing outreach and education programming in conjunction with university-driven academic and student uses on the first two floors of the Center, which will include a ground floor action center and second floor conference facilities.
“We thank the Meyer Memorial Trust for this generous grant which will help mobilize support from other foundations, individuals and corporations to support the public programming of the Oregon Sustainability Center,” said Andrea Durbin, executive director of the Oregon Environmental Council, an OSC partner. Meyer is the first foundation to invest in the OSC.
Doug Stamm, CEO of Meyer Memorial Trust, said, “We are pleased to be an early supporter of the Oregon Sustainability Center. This project has the potential to not only change the built environment in Oregon and nationally, but will deliver best practices in sustainability, create new jobs, train a green workforce, and serve as a hub for collaboration between the public sector, higher education, businesses and nonprofits working on sustainability.”
The Center’s action center is envisioned as a gathering place for information, resources, and interactions on all aspects of a sustainable region and city. Programming will showcase land use and transportation planning activities, waste management development, green energy, local food, green economic development (including business innovation), and community development and equity. The action center may also be used to provide online tours, web-based teaching and learning resources, and other sustainability-related content to reach students and users across Oregon.
The second floor conference center will be devoted to education, training, and collaboration around sustainability. It will be available for trainings, meetings and conferences and will serve tenants, the nonprofit and business community, students and faculty, and visitors.
The Meyer grant request was submitted by the Oregon University System on behalf of a partnership between the Oregon Built Environment & Sustainable Technologies (Oregon BEST), Oregon State University’s Institute for Natural Resources, Portland State University’s Institute for Sustainable Solutions, the Portland Sustainability Institute (PoSI), the Oregon Environmental Council, and the coalition of Oregon Living Building Initiative nonprofits and businesses.
A public meeting to review schematic design alternatives for the OSC will be held Tuesday, January 18, from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. at the PSU Smith Memorial Student Union Ballroom, 3rd floor, room 355, at 1825 SW Broadway.
The Portland Development Commission serves as OSC project manager. The project team is led by Gerding Edlen and includes SERA Architects, GBD Architects and Skanska Construction.
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Oregon University System (OUS) comprises seven distinguished public universities and one branch campus, reaching more than one million people each year through on-campus classes, statewide public services, and lifelong learning. The Oregon State Board of Higher Education, the statutory governing board of OUS, is composed of twelve members appointed by the Governor and confirmed by the Oregon State Senate. For additional information, go to www.ous.edu.
