Report from Grassroots 2021
By Kathy Austin and Curt Wilson, on behalf Amy Vohs, Kaley Fought, Colin Dean, and Sam Uccello

AIA Grassroots 2021 is occurring this week as a virtual conference from Feb 16 to 18. The AIA Oregon delegation includes board members from each section; Amy Vohs (President, Portland), Kaley Fought, Treasurer, Salem), Colin Dean (Director, Eugene), Samuel Uccello (Director, Southern Oregon), Katherine Austin (Director, Bend) and Curt Wilson (EVP, Eugene) This is our collected update on the highlights.

Grassroots 2021 is AIA’s premier leadership and advocacy event for chapter staff and volunteers. The theme, “Bring It Home,” will address critical issues facing the architecture profession, including COVID-19, racial injustice, and climate change.

Day 1 – Feb 16

Federal Legislation. Grassroots Day 1 is when AIA members from across the country take over the halls of congress to advocate on behalf of issues important to architects. This year we invaded, through Zoom, the apartment of congressional staffers working from home. Meetings were held with all seven of the Oregon delegation, although Rep. Susan Bonamici was the only elected official that was available. Nonetheless, it was an impactful day to discuss our priority of Green Building Infrastructure. This is an initiative that aligns climate action, COVID response, and a boost to the economy to dedicate infrastructure spending on buildings and to prioritize projects that meet IECC Reach Code goals.

Day 2 – Feb 17

Design Thinking. The day kicked off with a keynote presentation by Dan Roam, an author/speaker that focuses on visual and design thinking. We participated in a diagramming exercise based on the question “As an AIA chapter leader, what do you want to accomplish in 2021”. This was a super fun session as we were exposed to a wonderful format of organizing our thoughts through diagrams. See below for some of the results.

EDI and Belonging. The midday session was a presentation by the inspirational event headliner, Stacey Abrams, on Equity, Diversity, Inclusion and Belonging. Having interacted with Architects when Stacy worked in the Office of the Mayor of Atlanta, she identified our profession as better suited to understand the needs of underrepresented communities more than anyone. As Creatives, we are in an ideal position to address the health safety and welfare of marginalized communities and move to find solutions that benefit all.

One of the afternoon sessions focused on organizations in our profession with initiatives addressing the intersection of the pandemic and social justice. Most of us are aware of NOMA, but it was a good overview of their Project Pipeline Mission to “..empower young people to affect change in their community through design”. We also learned about an organization dedicated to helping members of our profession are that limited by little to no hearing, World Deaf Architecture, and the activities of the American Indian Council of Architects and Engineers (AICEA). This group is most active in the Southwest, but looking to connect with students and practitioners in the Pacific Northwest.

Day 3 – Feb 18

COTE. The day started off with Katherine Hayhoe, Internationally renowned climate scientist from Texas addressing the critical issue of communication. She identified that everyone has certain values and that just identifying facts will not change minds. The urgency of today's problems from Covid-19, keeping one’s job and home, feeding one’s family, to freezing to death in Texas are all connected to Climate Change. To engage everyone to agree on the need for action we must address our shared values.…

C3 Architects as Climate Activists. This was a densely packed breakout session with multiple excellent presenters from Philadelphia and Berkeley California. All were members of COTE at the local and national level. All spoke about the many ways each were reaching out to their members, advocating at the local and state level. Highly recommend watching the recording when it becomes available, there was simply too much to summarize. We can all take action and work together to improve our built environment on many levels.

Equity sessions

The last session of the day was an update on the Regions Task Force Report. The AIA Board of Directors is recommending that we move from a Regions-based governance model to a State-based governance model, and we expect to vote on this change at the June 2021 business meeting. It the resolution is successful, we can expect some of the changes will happen before the end of this year, including selecting the AIA Oregon Strategic Council representative. Our transition to a single state chapter means that the transition to the state governance model should be fairly smooth for us. If you want to learn more, contact Curt Wilson at cwilson@aiaoregon.org.