About

We bring a wealth of gardening, community organizing and wildfire prevention experience to our new home in West Linn. Having lost our home in the 1991 Oakland Hills Firestorm, we became avid wildfire prevention advocates. Almost immediately after the Firestorm, Gordon formed the Oakland Landscape Committee and built the Firestorm Memorial Garden and the Gateway Emergency Exhibit Center and Garden (https://northhillscommunity.org/gardens-community/). He maintained these two gardens, the Broadway Pollinator Garden, the Frank Ogawa Firescape Garden on a large City of Oakland open space area (and about a dozen school gardens) with the help of corporate, church and individual volunteers.  Sue founded and led the Oakland Firesafe Council (https://oaklandfiresafecouncil.org/) for eight years, providing wildfire prevention and advocacy not only locally, but statewide, as well. She served on the board of United Policyholders, (https://uphelp.org/), a national consumer nonprofit helping disaster survivors work through settlements with their insurers.

Since moving to West Linn, we are active members of the West Linn Garden Club (https://westlinngardenclub.org/), the Greater Portland Iris Society (http://greaterportlandirissociety.org/), the Pacific Northwest Peony Society (https://www.pnwpeony.org/), and the Hardy Plant Society (https://www.hardyplantsociety.org/).

With this as a background, we hope to expand our current landscaping into a climatewise garden that will help educate visitors to take steps to mitigate the impact of climate change in their own home gardens.