Advocacy Day 2016 marked our 5^th annual event at the State Capitol.  Attendees from St. Louis and Prairie Gateway met with legislators to share the following facts about landscape architecture in Missouri.

•          Landscape architects plan projects that benefit communities with safe, attractive amenities and create positive economic impact for its constituents.
•          Licensure allows landscape architects to practice in other states and bring the revenue back to Missouri.
•          A vast majority of landscape architects are in small firms.
•          Licensure ensures vibrant competition for work in the design community, keeping costs down for clients.
•          The Licensure Law ensures that licensure does not impact the green industry such as landscape contractors and home builders.
•          The Missouri Board for Architects, Professional Engineers, Professional Land Surveyors and Professional Landscape Architects or APEPLSPLA is revenue neutral and runs at a surplus due to our payment of fees.
•          Landscape architecture licensure protects the public from unqualified or incompetent individuals that engage in professional practice.
•          Landscape architects graduate from a 4yr+ LAAB accredited program and practice under a licensed practitioner for 2-3 years.  Landscape architects also must complete 24 CEU’s in a two year period.
  
  

Why is this Important?
Many practitioners enjoy licensure which allows them to practice in all fifty states.  What would landscape architects do without licensure?  An important fact is that in the last five years, licensure has been challenged three times in Missouri and there is a nationwide trend in many other states to remove licensure.  The annual advocacy day event is an ongoing effort to educate the representatives about landscape architecture and reduce the threat of deregulation.

How Can You Participate in the Process?
The year 2001 marked a hard won effort to obtain licensure for the practice of landscape architecture in Missouri. You can help us be proactive in retaining licensure by designating an advocacy liaison from your firm to make the annual trip to Jefferson City to talk with legislators.  

Remember, St. Louis ASLA spends a lot of time and resources each year to defend licensure and promote the profession.  Please consider becoming a part of advocacy and a supporting member of ASLA.  Contact Susan Maag, VP of Advocacy [email protected] for more information and thanks for your support!

2015 Mid-Year Trustee Report: Stephen Ibendahl, ASLA
Greetings from Washington DC! I was excited and ready to go to ASLA Mid-year this year!  Not only had I studied our advocacy materials, I caught up on 'House of Cards' to make sure I knew the ins and outs of DC (I did stay further away from the Metro platform edge). There's so much to report from ASLA mid-year, this will be a two part Trustee report.

Advocacy
We had a great day on the Hill talking with our Congressional delegation.  Our three topics this year were:  TAP (Transportation Alternative Program), Land Water and Conservation Fund (LWCF) renewal, and support of the National Parks Service centennial. We were able to share great local examples of work where TAP and LWCF benefit the St. Louis region. We were able to meet with Senator McCaskill directly, and had good meetings with staff from the offices of Blunt, Wagner, Clay, and Shimkus.  The cumulative effect of ASLA's work makes a huge impact and plays a crucial role for funding for programs such as TAP, which is only 2% of the overall transportation bill. 

Center for Landscape Architecture
I'm excited to report that the Center for Landscape Architecture continues to make great progress.  Schematic design has been completed and fundraising has been strong.  ASLA members and firms have already pledged over 80% of the initial goal. With the strong fundraising, the board of trustees authorized an increase in our fundraising goal.  With fundraising, in-kind vendor donations, and a new mortgage, we will be investing $6 million dollars into the renovation and upgrades of our headquarters. I gave an update and overview of our headquarters becoming the 'Center for Landscape Architecture' at the winter awards party in February. Look for additional details from ASLA this spring and summer. As always, feel free to contact me with any questions or would like more details. Also, thanks again to those St. Louis members and firms who have already pledge contributions. 

Trustees Beat Chapter Presidents in First ASLA Kickball Game
We took a short break to have a good-natured rivalry of kickball between Chapter Presidents and Trustees on the National Mall. I happy to report that the Trustees pitched (or rolled) a shutout over the Chapter Presidents 3-0! And luckily no one got hurt, especially some of the older Trustees who took tumbles.  It was a fun way to for some additional team building. Click here to view some photos of the game. 

Sneak Peak of Part 2
Look for the final wrap-up the ASLA midyear trustee meeting in part 2 including:  focus on emerging professionals, special recognition for St. Louis, and a sneak peak of the ASLA convention in Chicago.

Thank you for the privilege to represent St. Louis as your Trustee. You can always reach me at 314-265-3178 or by email at [email protected].

Stephen

Landscape Architecture Advocacy Day 2015
Advocacy Day 2015 marked our 4^th annual contiguous event in the Rotunda at the State Capitol. Landscape Architects from the St. Louis Chapter and Prairie Gateway Chapter met in Jefferson City on February 4 to educate Representatives about our profession.  A total of thirteen ASLA members walked our Capitol’s hallways to distribute information and talk with Representatives about the positive economic, social and environmental impact landscape architecture has in our State.  This was a pro-active event to help Representatives identify landscape architecture as an allied design profession.

A total of forty-seven Representatives were visited which included thirty-seven House members and ten Senators. By comparison, a total of thirty-eight Representatives were visited last year.  Representatives highlighted in yellow were visited last year, so many that we talked to were new contacts. 

This year there was no legislation that affected landscape architects or licensure.  Our visits were informative and relaxed and provided a great opportunity to get to know our representatives better.  We concluded our day with a lunch meeting with our lobbyist, Sam Licklider, and recapped our visits, compared notes and discussed improvements for next year’s event. A follow up conference call will be set up to discuss a future meeting with the Office of Administration to change the language of State of Missouri RFP’s to include landscape architects. Advocacy 2015 was another great event and united landscape architects across the State to advocate for our profession.  Thanks and congratulations to everyone involved!

The St. Louis ASLA Chapter would like to request nominations for candidates for the 2015 Civic Stewardship Award and the Robert Goetz Award. These two awards represent a high level of achievement in the field of landscape architecture in the St. Louis area, and many prestigious individuals and organizations have received the awards in the past. Detailed descriptions and qualifications of each award follow, as well as documentation required for a nomination. 

 Nominations for both awards are due by Friday, January 9th, 2015 by 5pm.

Please contact Stephen Ibendahl with any questions about either award, especially if you are considering a nomination process for The Robert Goetz Award.  Please send a digital file of the nomination packet to
Stephen Ibendahl, Chapter Trustee • [email protected]
314-265-3178

The Civic Stewardship Award 
The Civic Stewardship Award is a pro-active award by the St. Louis Chapter to recognize an individual or organization that have raised awareness or shown stewardship of the natural or built environment. The recipient may or may not be a landscape architect. 

The Robert Goetz Award 
The Robert Goetz Award for Distinguished Career in Landscape Architecture acknowledges the career of a local landscape architect who has practiced the profession with integrity, recognition and excellence. The award is not an annual award, but rather will be awarded to worthy candidates as determined by the qualification submittals and by the discretion of the Executive Committee. 

If you are considering submitting a nomination, please contact the Executive Committee prior to beginning the nomination process.

For a list of past winners, click here. For a copy of the nomination form, contact Elizabeth Graff. 

Many members may be unaware that the St. Louis Chapter ASLA Executive Committee works tirelessly with the Missouri Association of Landscape Architects on advocacy efforts to keep landscape architects licensed with the State and seated at the table with our other allied professions. A brief recap of the major advocacy milestones follows.

Organized representation of landscape professionals began in 1962 with the formation of The Missouri Association of Landscape Architects (MALA). The mission of the organization was to represent landscape architects in order to gain landscape architecture licensure in the state.  After many dedicated years and volunteer hours, advocacy efforts led to the Landscape Architecture Title Act in 1989 which defined the profession and allowed the establishment of rules and standards regarding the profession.  In 2000, the Title Act was upgraded to the current Practice Act that recognized landscape architects as competent design professionals capable of protecting the public’s health safety and welfare.  In 2007, continuing education was added to the requirements for retaining licensure and allowed the Missouri Board for Architects, Professional Engineers, Professional Land Surveyors and Professional Landscape Architects (APEPLSPLA) to extract civil penalties from unlicensed professionals. 

Starting in 2012, the St. Louis ASLA Chapter and Prairie Gateway Chapter ASLA  began annual attendance of  Missouri State Legislative sessions to speak to representatives, advocate for our profession and fight deregulation efforts. 

The 2014 Jefferson City Advocacy Day at the State Capitol included visits to 38 district representatives.  Our talking points included:

•        Landscape architects creating safe, attractive amenities in communities
•        Licensure allowing landscape architects to practice in other states
•        Landscape architects creating small business
•        Landscape architects creating vibrant competition for quality, cost effective projects
•        Licensure protecting the public from unqualified or incompetent practices
•        Licensure being revenue neutral to the State

Most Representatives had some knowledge and understanding of our profession, which suggests that visibility and perception about landscape architecture is experiencing positive change through our advocacy efforts in the State. 

Five bills, important to the landscape architects of Missouri, were watched in the 2014 Legislative Session.  The only one passed and signed by Governor Jay Nixon this summer was Senate Bill 809.  SB809 modified provisions of law regarding licensing of architects, professional engineers, professional land surveyors, and professional landscape architects.  The following is a brief synopsis of the provisions related to landscape architects.

1.      The Professional Landscape Architect (PLA) designation became official and in effect on August 28, 2014.  PLA replaces the Registered Landscape Architect (RLA) designation previously used by licensed landscape architects in the State.
2.      An applicant for a professional landscape architecture license must make a passing grade on each examination, and a passing grade shall be fixed by the board, but shall not exceed the passing grade determined by the Council of Landscape Architectural Registration Boards (327.612).
3.      The act repeals provisions of law which provide that the board may license without examination any landscape architect certified in another state or territory of the United States when qualifications are met (327.623). Provisions regarding the refusal to issue or renew a license have also been repealed (327.631).

Your membership does matter!  Your membership supports our efforts to retain licensure and enjoy the benefits of associating with our other allied professionals.  If you are not a member, we hope this clarifies your understanding of the benefits of membership and that you are encouraged to join.  If you are a member, thank you so much for your continued support!

 Join us for St. Louis Advocacy Day!

Landscape architects are on the move and impacting how our region designs its public spaces.  During the week of November 10-14 we will be asking you to set up an appointment to meet personally with your state representatives at their offices.  Our goal is to share the value of including landscape architecture in public space development.  Please contact Susan Maag at [email protected] or call 636-357-1890 to find out more.  We need you to represent!  The number of officials that we meet will depend on your participation.  It’s not difficult and we will help guide you through the process.  We really hope you will join us in this exciting and collaborative effort!