Early Registration Underway for 2005 Sustainable Landscapes Conference at Utah State

Early registration is underway for the 2005 Sustainable Landscapes Conference to be held Tuesday, Apri1 5, at Utah State University. Landscape Cycles: Connecting People to Place Through Agriculture is the theme of the sixth annual gathering, which features lectures by nationally renowned speakers, along with workshops and discussions led by local experts.

 

Early registrants for the day-long conference receive discounted tickets of $30 per person if purchased by March 15. Tickets are $40 after March 15. Cost for students with current ID is $10. Tickets purchased in advance include access to all conference sessions, a conference guide, continental breakfast and lunch. A complete conference schedule and registration forms are available online or by calling 435-797-0500.

 

The conference is sponsored by Sustainable Landscapes at Utah State, a student-led organization that seeks to provide a forum for discussion of sustainable issues, especially those particular to the Intermountain West.

 

“This year’s gathering explores the connection between food and human life cycles to better understand how people are connected to the places in which they live,” said Lori Porreca, conference co-chair.

 

Political commentator Jim Hightower is keynote speaker for the gathering, to be held in the Eccles Conference Center on the Utah State campus. Described as a “modern-day Johnny Appleseed,” Hightower is author of the New York Times best-seller Thieves in High Places: They’ve Stolen Our Country and It’s Time to Take it Back. He will present the conference’s opening address, “Beyond the Kitchen Table: Connecting Local to Global.”

 

Other featured speakers include Kami Pothukuchi, a geographer and urban planner from Wayne State University; Ecologist Laura Jackson of the University of Northern Iowa; and Bob Budd, director of land management for the Nature Conservancy of Wyoming.

 

Local experts will offer workshops on such topics as permaculture, citizen empowerment, farmland preservation and revitalization of local food systems.

 

Hightower will also speak at a pre-conference fundraiser Monday, April 4, at 7 p.m. in the Eccles Conference Center auditorium. Utah State’s College of Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences (HASS) sponsors the lecture, which benefits the Sustainable Landscapes organization.

 

Tickets for “An Evening with Jim Hightower” on April 4 are $10 in advance or $15 at the door. Tickets for students with current ID are $5. Tickets are available at the Taggart Student Center Customer Service Center, room 212, on campus, the Spectrum Ticket Office and Fuhriman’s Framing and Fine Arts, 75 S. Main, Logan.

 

Parking for both the lecture and the conference is available in the university parking terrace at 850 E. 700 North. The Eccles Conference Center is a short walk from the parking terrace and the Veterinary Science building bus stop on 700 North on Logan Transit District Route 4.

 

Conference sponsors include Utah State’s colleges of HASS, Natural Resources, Agriculture and Business, and the Office of the President; Utah State University Extension, USU Ecology Center, Utah State’s departments of Environment and Society, Plants, Soils, & Biometeorology and Sociology, Social Work & Anthropology; the Utah Chapter of the American Society of Landscape Architects and Sustainable Agriculture and Research Education, a USDA competitive grants program. Additional support is provided by Utah State’s Student Organization for Society and Natural Resources.