A Look Back: Sage Park Apartments

In December 2015, the Sage Park Apartments officially earned LEED-Homes Gold certification. We are honored to have administered the LEED-Homes certification process for the 90-unit affordable housing project in Gardena, CA. This groundbreaking project was the first of its kind, representing a public-private partnership between BRIDGE Housing, the project developer,  the Los Angeles Unified School District, and the Los Angeles Housing and Community Investment Department. Specifically built to house LAUSD employees and their families, the project is made up of one-, two-, and three-bedroom units. We anticipate the communal amenities and healthy design elements will provide an outstanding location for county employees to raise their families for generations to come.

For more details about the project and to listen to KCRW's story about the development, click here. In addition, this is the link to BRIDGE's press release, this is the link LAUSD's article, this is the link to the architect's (Steinberg) press release, and this is the link to Affordable Housing Finance's article about the development. 

Please reach out to us at (310) 826-4947 to see how we can help collaborate on your next multi-family housing project! 

CPC is an Enterprise Green Communities Technical Assistance Provider!

Collaborative Project Consulting is pleased to announce that we have once again been selected to join the Enterprise Green Communities Technical Assistance Provider Network based on our long history of proven expertise in high-performance building practices. Enterprise Green Communities is a national leader in the effort to create healthy, sustainable, affordable housing by administering a set of criteria specifically tailored to address the unique needs of the affordable housing sector.

As a Technical Assistance Provider, Collaborative assists local housing developers, builders, and non-profits in the areas of Integrative Design Process, Design Review, Data Analysis and Benchmarking, Water Harvesting, Renewable Energy, Green Training, and Operations and Maintenance practices. We look forward to continue working with organizations in the Southern California region to increase the stock of high-quality, affordable housing available to our community. 

Municipal Green Building Conference & Expo Highlights

This year's MGBCE on April 23 was extremely informative and, as always, very entertaining. CPC team members Mark Klein and David Dimond had a blast representing the LA 2030 District booth and shared the District's vision for a high-performing downtown district with fellow MGBCE attendees. Booth visitors played Mark's Earth Day Trivia game and won organic plants seeds, drought-tolerant succulents, and even some cash prizes!

Among other things, the afternoon keynote presentation outlined Mayor Garcetti's recently unveiled sustainability plan, pLAn LA, the first ever for our city. The pLAn, "is both a roadmap to achieve back to basics short-term results while setting the path to strengthen and transform our City in the decades to come." We encourage everyone to check out the pLAn LA website for more details and valuable information.

Other MGBCE highlights included presentations on the WELL Building Standard, sustainability in affordable housing, and a breakout session on "Achieving Net Zero Water in Severe Drought: Santa Monica's New City Hall," which outlined Santa Monica's plans to build a Living Building Certified addition to City Hall. This ambitious project is targeting net zero energy and water use by implementing a number of cutting edge sustainable building technologies, including sophisticated passive heating & cooling systems and compostable toilets. 

Collaborative Team Members Join Build It Green

Collaborative Project Consulting staff have officially joined the Oakland, CA-based nonprofit Build It Green, which works to "promote healthy, energy- and resource-efficient building practices in California through outreach and education." Build It Green oversees the GreenPoint Rated program, acting as an independent third-party to verify homes have met the required minimum program standards of energy efficiency, water conservation, indoor air quality, resources conservation, and community objectives. To date, there are more than 31,000 certified GreenPoint Rated homes in California, making it the most prolific residential 'green building' rating system statewide. 

David Dimond in our office is quickly on his way to becoming a certified GreenPoint Rater and should be fully certified by June. For more information about Build It Green and the GreenPoint Rated program, visit here. If you would like to find out more about how to certify your home as a GreenPoint Rated residence, please give us a call!