Broadview Collaborative, Inc.
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After three years of planning (thanks COVID19!), the national Stormwater Summit finally convened in Minneapolis two weeks ago. Originally planned for 2020, and then for 2021, the in-person version of this annual event finally landed. The Twin Cities, as well as Minnesota as a whole, have much to showcase but in true Midwestern style, they often keep their lights under a bushel. Finally, the region was able to throw open the doors… Read More
June is a lovely month to get married. Really. And couples like my cousin and her fiancé who had their June 2020 wedding plans bumped to June 2021 (dang pandemic!) deserved every bit of that June loveliness. But between the forces of nature, and the frailties of local road construction, there were moments when it wasn’t clear whether any of the guests would actually be able to get to the wedding. By… Read More
I hate seeing things go to waste. I am a dumpster diver from way back, regularly pick up aluminum cans and other recyclables while walking with my dogs, and am always looking for ways to drive down our household energy use. It is no surprise then that I am also an enthusiast for rainwater harvest, both personally and professionally. I recently had a chance to share my experiences and perspectives as a… Read More
As a non-resident fellow with the Brookings Institute, I have the honor of collaborating with some of the best policy minds in the country. A recent piece by my colleagues Joe Kane and Ranjitha Shivaram, “As flood risks intensify, stormwater utilities offer a more resilient solution” offered compelling insights on the regional variation in how stormwater is approached. Being a relatively new resident of Minnesota, I was surprised to see that it leads the… Read More
When WEFTEC descends, bringing up to 25,000 people and six football fields worth of exhibits, it’s hard for a city not to notice that water geeks are in town. But in recent years, organizers have begun to ask the question “What’s left after we go?” Undoubtedly we leave tons of landfill material behind, much of which could be avoided, but that’s another blog for another time. On a more positive note, the water industry’s… Read More
We’ve lived in our house nearly fifteen years, which is the exact amount of time that I’ve wanted to make our driveway smaller and my garden larger. Previous owners expanded the driveway to make for better basketball, something my sons appreciated when we first arrived. But given that the driveway is in the sunniest portion of our Wisconsin yard, through the years I’ve been slowly encroaching on that space with an expanding… Read More
Last Friday I, along with about a dozen others affiliated with The Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, was treated to a tour of some of Madison’s stormwater control projects, hosted by Greg Fries, the principle engineer for the City of Madison’s Storm and Sanitary Sewer Section. I’ve seen a lot of rain gardens in my day, but I was especially interested in hearing from Greg and seeing… Read More
Fall is always a busy season which, for me, generally includes a disorienting amount of travel and meetings, all of which is intensified by the exciting conversations and insightful people I meet along the way. Fall 2012 is no exception, with this year’s season kicking off in late September with a White House convening entitled “Municipal Stormwater Infrastructure: Going from Grey to Green.” The all-day meeting of about 80-100 people focused on… Read More
I recently returned from one of those magical summer vacations, this one catalyzed by the goal of reconnecting with Ingrid and Signe, our exchange student ‘daughters’, in their home countries of Norway and Denmark. I’m embarrassed to say that, with our family’s hectic schedules, the only advance planning we did focused on fundamentals like plane tickets and passports. The rest of our research was done literally ‘on the fly’, hovering over the Atlantic… Read More
I’ve had the pleasure and fortune to spend my summer working at the Johnson Foundation, where for the last two months I’ve accumulated a great cache of hands-on learning experiences to take with me when I go. But last week I was able to take experiential learning to a new level when the subject of a Wingspread Briefing, stormwater, came literally flooding into my life and home. On Wednesday the foundation hosted… Read More
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