Networking Activities

The best decisions depend on complete, accurate and place-based information.  EPA strives to make this information readily available, and your input can help shape the tools so they serve you best.   In this session, you’ll hear how web-based tools and citizen partnerships helped two communities explore solutions related to their environment and human health, and hear about other useful EPA tools.  You will learn how these can help with questions such as:

• What areas are vulnerable to flooding?
• Where can we plant trees to capture multiple health and functional benefits like cleaner air and reduced noise?
• Which populations may benefit most from expanding transit?
• Where should we avoid developing to protect valuable ecological services?  What are those? Why are they important?
• Who lives close to our expanding roadway?

Bring your breakfast here, to learn and opine!

Rural communities and small towns across the country are implementing approaches that help their communities strengthen their economies, protect the environment, and enhance quality of life. Do you already work on smart growth issues in a rural region or small town, and want to know what others are doing? Are you interested in learning more about implementing smart growth in your town? Are you an urban dweller interested in rural towns near your city and the role rural places play in your urban economy? If you answered ‘yes’ to any of these questions, then this networking session is for you! The session will be a “marketplace of ideas,” with small group discussions on economic diversification, demographic change, rural-urban connections, and will build on the themes discussed in many of the rural/small town sessions taking place during the conference. Please join us to contribute and learn from these rich conversations, and to connect with others working in small town and rural contexts.

Come meet your colleagues working on health and built environment issues around the country!

• Discuss your experience integrating smart growth strategies into your work as a health professional or how you’d like to get started.
• Exchange information with other health professionals about their experiences in smart growth practices, what worked, what didn’t, and insights gained.
• Hear how to use local data to drive policies that create a healthy built environment.
• Participants will walk away with new ideas and a network of health professionals to call on for technical assistance.

Download the Flyer PDF

This discussion will focus on the incorporation and implementation of Health in All Policies (HiAP) Strategies at the local level.  Population health outcomes are directly linked to community planning and development or redevelopment, which is why it is important to consider health in all decision making processes. We encourage all HiAP practitioners to attend this discussion to talk about your personal experience with HiAP. We also encourage anyone interested in learning more about HiAP and its connections to smart growth to join our discussion. The goal of this discussion is to gain insight into HiAP practitioner’s experiences as well as share information on the role of the National Association of County and City Health Officials (NACCHO) in HiAP research and implementation at the local level.

Photo Credit: NACCHO

Portland’s reputation as the nation’s leading city for locally brewed beer is well deserved. This session/tour will involve a 20 minute walk or bus ride to a local micro-brewery on Portland’s East Bank where we will discuss how the micro-brewing industry came to be AND the role played by Oregon’s unique statewide land-use planning law passed in 1973 and how the aspirations that went with it were an integral part of the journey.

We will hear from a hop farmer based in the heart of the Willamette Valley’s hop vineyards;  a representative from McMenamin’s brewing chain (empire, really) which is known for renovating historic buildings into microbrewery event centers;  founder of Lucky Labrador Brewing which 20 yrs ago opened its first location in a quiet inner industrial neighborhood which is now a watering hole mecca for urban planners, bikers, indoor soccer teammates, hipsters, and everyone’s dogs;  and from a city planner who will explain the interrelationship between good urban planning and farmland protection and the successful micro-brewing industry in Portland. And, possibly, from Congressman Earl Blumenauer, one of the nation’s leading spokesmen for smart growth, and surely the Congressman with the highest concentration of micro-breweries in his District. If you want to understand one of the core ingredients of this conference host town’s unique culture, this is the event that will shed some light.

After the initial meeting point where the presentation will take place, conventioneers will be provided other nearby beer-tasting options to pursue on their own, or in spontaneously-organized groups. Additional details will be posted closer to the conference regarding transportation options.