Our History

In 2013 the City’s Sustainability Program was proposed as an item that could be eliminated because of budgetary pressures. Additionally, the Sustainability Advisory Board was aware that to effectively fulfill the part of its charter to “Educate and engage the public in efforts to make the community of Lake Oswego, including residents, businesses, and institutions, more sustainable,” significantly more people than a small city board needed to get involved. A group of citizens met and discussed how to address the need to bring more public and visible community support for sustainability. In October 2013, the organizers held the first public meeting to discuss the challenges that faced the community in regards to sustainability and to see if there was an interest in forming a network to address sustainability. Through our discussions, we found that one of the results from convening this group was to share the substantial work that was being done within our community that supported the goal of having a more sustainable community.

Once it was established that there was interest in forming a network, the second public meeting was held in December 2013, where the attendees were able to hear from some of the leaders of the Corvallis Sustainability Coalition, a highly successful organization, about how they got started and what their challenges were as they grew. Attendees agreed that there was much that could be learned from the Corvallis effort, with some modifications to reflect the different needs of Lake Oswego.

 LO Writes (2016 Community Project)

In 2016, LOSN partnered with Lake Oswego’s LO Reads program asking the community to envision what Lake Oswego would look like in 50 years if we were to be successful in addressing climate change. 

Check out the inspiring stories here.