The City of Silverton, Oregon has found a unique way to turn a liability – Sewage – into a tourist attraction that literally smells like roses.

Oregon Garden is more than a world-class public botanical garden that will attract 200,000 visitors this year. It also offers an innovative solution to a wastewater problem, a new wetland, and the promise of some much needed research on the potentials of plant material for restoration and remediation.

The Oregon Nurserymen’s Association had been passing resolutions since 1947 to establish a botanical garden in their state. According to the Garden’s director Rick Gustafson, “The Oregon Garden was actually a dream of the nurseries for years. Nursery people here in Oregon, particularly in the Willamette Valley, are the third largest producers of nursery material in the United States, after Florida and California. Their plants are hardy; the Florida and California material won’t survive in the northern part of the U.S., so Oregon is really the major supplier for the whole northern U.S.”

But it wasn’t until 1994, under the leadership of Clayton Hannon, that the Oregon Nurserymen moved from talk to action. “Clayton finally challenged the Nursery Association to either put up or shut up,” says Rick.

“They started to search for a site and look at how to raise the money for this. They challenged the industry to come up with money and they went out and raised close to $2 million dollars without a site, just on the prospect that they could form a garden.” With that money in hand, they had selected a site in Wilsonville, when the City of Silverton entered the picture.

“Essentially Silverton had a problem with their sewer system, and they were under instructions from the state to stop discharging wastewater into the river in the summer. So the city manager thought, ‘Maybe we could convince the garden to come here and we could use that water on the garden and not put it in the river, and solve our environmental problem and get some economic development in our community.’”

Says Rick of the decision about where to site Oregon Garden, “It wasn’t hard. Silverton offered $5 million dollars toward the purchase of the land. So the garden got this huge boost right from the first to get started.” In exchange, the Garden committed to using Silverton’s treated wastewater to irrigate the Garden. In addition, the Garden includes 16 acres of newly created wetlands, which Silverton slated to mitigate wetlands destroyed in construction projects.

June 1997 was the groundbreaking at the site, a former horse ranch surrounded by giant oak trees, with a view of the Willamette Valley. Today the 240- acre spread includes a dozen different gardens that feature the best of Northwest-grown flora. The only house in Oregon designed by Frank Lloyd Wright was relocated to the Garden, and a grass amphitheater hosts events and concerts. There are four major water features, including a waterfall and a water garden.

“We built this garden in very small pieces. At one point, I think we had 26 different projects going on at the same time on the site. We spent $25 million at about $100,000 a contract. We had 26 landscape designers who contributed in some way or another to that garden and design. With all those designers, all those different players, there were surprisingly few grievous errors. That was a big surprise to me.”

There were challenges, however. It turned out that the flow of water from Silverton’s wastewater system didn’t match the Garden’s irrigation needs. Spring and fall flows are much higher than in summer when irrigation is most needed. “We were also informed we could not use the water for fountains and stream flows as we were planning. The more limited use of water required us to think more. The result was a much more sophisticated approach to handling the water system.” The Garden is working to increase its use of the treated wastewater, and is developing tools for controlling algae and reducing water temperatures.

Rick was originally hired to help find a site for the Garden; he later became the Garden’s project manager. He is a partner with Shiels Obletz Johnsen, a project management firm in Portland with experience in public-private partnerships and construction projects. In 1998, with Rick’s help, the Garden hired an executive director with a degree in horticulture. He lasted just six weeks. Says Rick of his departure, “It was a good move on his part, because the priorities of the organization at that time were to organize a 30 member board, and to raise $20 million to build a garden. He didn’t have experience doing those things.”

“Good public relations always says that you announce really bad problems by presenting the solution. And so I became the solution; as the project manager, they named me executive director.” Rick calls his work with Oregon Garden his day job, because he also works on other innovative public-private partnerships like the Portland Streetcar.

Rick doesn’t have a background in horticulture, but he knows how to manage complex partnerships. “We’ve got ventures with the forestry industry and agriculture and nursery and federal agencies, so we’ve got all kinds of partnerships working on the Garden. The hardest part is focus. When your mission is broadly defined, it’s easy to get distracted. We have all these supporters and we have to create the channel for them to exercise their enthusiasm and passion, without it taking away from the foundation of the organization. It’s about structuring that partnership, and then maintaining the confidence and trust.”

Says Rick, “There’s no question that our focus with the garden is to attract visitors” and he hopes to build the Garden’s membership from 4,600 to 15,000 households. But for his part, Rick is excited by the research potential of the Garden, “We want our garden to become an international center for the use of plant material for sustainability. That’s our vision – whether it’s breaking down hydrocarbon from surface oil on parking lots, carbon credits, water uptake systems, or performance of plant material in wetlands.”

Describing a current research need, Rick says, “Eighty-five percent of mandated replacement wetlands fail, mostly because the plant material is not established properly. It’s taken over by weeds and area grass. It doesn’t function, because created wetlands need a level of maintenance that is difficult to achieve.”

The Oregon Garden is experiencing its own challenges as it matures and grows. Although the Garden created its wetlands with the intention of mitigating acreage to be developed for a new industrial park in Silverton, the industrial park was never built. That may be fortunate because the state has decided that the Garden’s wetlands are not an acceptable replacement because they do not go dry in the summer like natural wetlands.

This presents its own problems. Says Rick, “We can’t control our bullfrog population. Normally, when the wetlands go dry, the tadpoles die.” The issue became acute when the endangered Western Pond Turtle appeared in the Garden wetlands. “Bullfrogs think Western Pond Turtles are caviar.”

The gardeners continue to adjust their management. “Just like almost any scientifically-based activity, the amount we know is so little in relation to what’s actually going on and why it’s going on,” says Rick. “It is the classic case of ‘everything is connected to everything.’ I think it’s fascinating.” And as they learn, Oregon and the Northwest are sure to benefit.

Contact
Oregon Garden
879 W. Main Street
Silverton, OR 97381
503.874.8100
www.oregongarden.org