Curt Wilson, AIA
AIA Oregon EVP

Portland CFA Status

We’ve had a long winter indoors (and with Zoom) and I’m happy for Spring and getting outdoors more. Late March for my wife and I is the beginning of the mowing season on our property west of Eugene, which is oddly exciting this year.

The focus of this message is on the status of our lease for our main office in Portland, the Center for Architecture. Our lease, the original lease signed in 2006, expires at the end of this year on December 31, and we have had been unable to negotiate a suitable lease extension with the building owner. I apprised the AIA Oregon Board of Directors of this on at the March 19, 2021 board meeting, and we are preparing to move forward.

How’d we get here? AIA Portland took control of the space in 2006 as the future Center for Architecture in Portland. Other larger city chapters were also creating spaces that not only served as the operational headquarters for their AIA chapter with meetings, social events and educational programming, and space to support programming for architecture, design education and advocacy intended for the public at large. Planning and design of the CFA occurred in 2007 and 2008, which was impacted by the Great Recession, and construction was completed in 2009. The CFA was a vibrant place with a classroom, gallery space, meeting room, and staff offices in the heart of the Pearl District. AIA Portland was a generous host for AIA Oregon (the former state council) meetings, which I attended regularly. I also made many trips from Eugene for the Friday Education (FRED) series. I love the space and was excited to work there when I took over as EVP/CEO in July 2019.

From my perspective as EVP, I saw a different side of the CFA. The ceiling throughout our 5,000 sf space was damaged during an unusual weather event in February 2017 and the dispute with the building owner over responsibility remains unresolved. The lease terms place AIA Oregon at risk for repairs to the building systems and other repairs that I feel is excessive for a tenant. In addition, the costs of occupancy, including rent, tenant improvement loan payments, utilities, insurance, etc. were approximately one third of our 2020 operational expenses. While we are addressing the needs of the CFA, we need to consider the context of our transition to a single state chapter, and the need to equitably service members across the state.

In 2020, AIA Oregon President Amy Vohs and I convened a Facilities Task Force. Bill Hart, AIA and I co-chair the facilities task force, and the participants include board leaders, representatives from all sections, and members from the AIA Portland Section. Click HERE to read the 11/11/2020 Message from Bill Hart about the purpose of the Facilities Task Force.

The Task Force was asked to evaluate the CFA in Portland and the Octagon in Eugene, to discuss our spatial needs to support engagement, education, design advocacy, and operations across the state, to consider revenue/expense considerations, and to make a recommendation to the Board regarding our future occupancy in the CFA. Keep in mind that this occurred during the work-from-home environment of the pandemic when the CFA was last open in late March 2020.

The Task Force summary report to the Board presented at the December 2020 board meeting includes:

Our facilities planning should be based on physical presence in all sections and should reinforce the single state chapter-local section model.
The operational budget should incorporate equitable funding for the space in all sections.
Our long-term commitment to space should be nimble.
The CFA is the central location for operations, socializing, advocacy, and education. These functions are vital to our organization, but do not need to happen in the same location.
Our presence in all sections should be associated with cultural institutions that support design, architecture, and community. A university campus is located in each section center.
The main office for AIA Oregon should remain in Portland, and be conveniently located to as many members as possible.

The task force recommended that AIA Oregon not exercise the 5-year extension in the current lease, but instead negotiate new terms with the building owner for a shorter duration, and shift more of the responsibility for the repair and maintenance of building systems to the building owner. The Board agreed at the December 1, 2020 board meeting, and a letter was sent to the owner later in the month.

Efforts through our commercial broker to negotiate new terms with the building owner have not been successful, and the Facilities Task Force recommended to the Board to terminate negotiations and to focus efforts on finding a future home. This discussion occurred at the March 19, 2021 board meeting and we are moving forward accordingly.

As we move forward, we are organizing our related efforts into three tracks.

Track 1: Find a new space for AIA Oregon. This will be a Facilties Task Force lead effort.

Track 2: Address the lease-required repairs to the CFA before the end of the lease. This will be an EVP lead effort.

Track 3: Prepare to vacate the CFA by the end of the year. This will be a staff lead effort.

As we search for new space, we want input from as many members and partners as possible. As we all quickly pivoted to a new way to work and engage in response to Covid, the Facilities Task Force believes that we’ll engage, learn, advocate, and support our communities in new ways, and our commitment to physical and digital space should reflect this. We need your help. We need more perspectives guiding our decisions.

If you are interested in participating on the Facilities Task Force, or have comments to share, please contact me at cwilson@aiaoregon.org. In addition, we expect to provide updates through Thursdays@Three articles, and discussion sessions through the Thursday Roundtable venue.

We are working with Doug Carter, our broker with Norris Stevens, for advice on the Portland real estate market and to scout out potential space for us. Our initial direction to Doug is:

Look for 3,000 to 5,000 sf of space.
Focus on locations in areas of Portland near concentrations of members.
Consider locations near architecture schools and/or other cultural institutions in Portland.
Focus on transit corridors.

As we plan for the remainder of the year and the transition to our new EVP/CEO, I strongly recommend that we find ways to celebrate the Center for Architecture at 403 NW 11th in the Pearl District. I’m generally sad that one of my last significant tasks of my tenure is to report to you that we will not remain in the space, but I’m confident that it is the best long-term decision for our chapter. If you have comments, concerns, or want to understand more details involved in the decisions that got us to this point, please reach out to me at the email address listed above.