The New Frontier for Urban Ecosystem Management

On November 22, 2002, from 10:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. there will be a Metropolitan Washington Green Infrastructure Forum featuring presentations by Dave Eckert of Virginia Village Productions and Andy Lipkis of TreePeople. The presentations, “The New Frontier for Urban Ecosystem Management”, will feature two urban stream restoration projects—Forum Mile Run in VA. and the Sun Valley Watershed in CA. Ideas and case study examples will be presented that illustrate stormwater management, flood-loss reduction, natural area protection, community involvement, and wastewater management through a better understanding of living and cultural resources and their values and functions.

Dave Eckert is a film producer, director and writer for Virginia Village Productions in Falls Church, VA. Dave uses films to tell stories about the ecological and human ecology of watersheds, and how citizens and governments can regenerate streams and their communities. Dave’s film-making work is deeply woven into his stream conservation and community advocacy. His background includes helping to found the City Streams Task Force to revive the Falls Church sections of Four Mile Run. He also produces “Going to the Village” which is broadcast every Tuesday night on Falls Church Cable Access Channel 12.

Dave will highlight his movie “Four Mile Run: Reviving an Urban Stream”, which premiered in 2001, and talk about his latest stream restoration filming-making efforts in Northern Virginia.

Andy Lipkis is the President and Founder of TreePeople, a nonprofit environmental organization that has been serving the Los Angeles (LA) area for three decades. TreePeople staff and volunteers work in partnership with schools, neighborhoods, community groups and businesses bringing people and trees together to build stronger communities and improve the quality of the environment. TreePeople has planted and maintained over 1.5 million trees in the metro-LA region and pioneered more than 200 tree-planting groups worldwide.

Andy will tell stories, share pictures and describe the successes and pitfalls of a $150 million dollar urban stream retrofitting project that TreePeople is doing in cooperation with LA County stormwater management and public works departments and watershed communities.

This Forum will be held at the Hall of States, Suite 333, 44 North Capitol Street, Washington, D.C. from 10:00 a.m. until 1:00 p.m. ** Please note change in time and venue.

We are pleased to invite you to join us and add your unique perspective to this event. Please RSVP, by e-mail to: glenn_eugster@nps.gov, or blecouteur@mwcog.org, or call COG at (202) 962-3393 or NPS at (202) 619-7492. Please respond by no later than November 19, 2002.

The Green Infrastructure Forums are designed to act as an information exchange on technical topics and disseminate information on issues pertaining to green infrastructure programs, initiatives and innovations locally, nationally and internationally. They are part of a two- year Green Infrastructure Demonstration Project cosponsored by the National Park Service and the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments. The project is intended to demonstrate techniques for the conservation of forest cover, and the protection and management of park, recreation and open space land by local governments and private groups through the use of green infrastructure approaches.



Featured at the November 22, 2002 Forum will be:

Remarks by:

Remarks by Dave Eckert, Writer, Producer, Director, Virginia Village Productions, Falls Church, VA.

and

Remarks by Andy Lipkis, President and Founder, TreePeople, Los Angeles, CA.
http://www.treepeople.com/

Discussion with Speakers

Brief Status Report on the "Green Infrastructure Demonstration Project",
Including coming events and speakers.

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Green Infrastructure Coming Attractions:

On December 6, Anne Whitson Spirn of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology;
http://architecture.mit.edu/people/profiles/prspirn.html


On January 23, Gerri Spilka of OMG Center for Collaborative Learning; and Blaine Bonham, Jr. of the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society;
http://www.pennsylvaniahorticulturalsociety.org/


On March 13, Nanine Bilski of the America the Beautiful Fund, with six local practitioners, presenting community-based efforts that reveal the “Hidden Green Infrastructure”
http:www.america-the-beautiful.org/