Portrait of Kas Kinkead

Kas Kinkead
President, PLA

Kas has 25 years of experience providing services in  landscape architecture and environmental planning. She has been involved with educational environments for the past 20+ years, first as an environmental education instructor and now as a planner and designer. Kas is the principal-in-charge of all educational facilities. She places special emphasis on using the school site as a learning tool and a meaningful part of  the curriculum. The overall goal for each facility is to create an educational  community where the staff, students, teachers and parents will have a sense of  ownership and stewardship, and will feel empowered to participate.

Kas is also involved with larger planning projects, including  large scale master plans. Kas has a genuine interest and concern for gathering input from citizens. Many of her planning projects have included public input, neighborhood involvement, and assistance for staff in presenting plans to city councils. The success of these presentations and public meetings have been  greatly increased by Kas’s writing and graphic skills and her ability to listen and concisely summarize issues.

Kas is known as an advocate for sustainable design and for Low Impact Development (LID) strategies and has brought those approaches to every project she works on. She has served on the technical advisory committee for the LID Technical Guidance Manuals by the Puget Sound Action Team (Version 1 and 2), led a session for the LID certification program, and has shared her “contractor tested” soil specifications freely with others in the interest of improving the success of these systems around the region. Additionally, Ms. Kinkead served on the OSPI technical advisory committee that helped to craft the Washington State Sustainable School Protocol.

Education

Master Landscape Architecture program, University of Washington
Landscape Architecture program, University of Minnesota
Bachelor of Art in Urban Studies, Vassar College

Accreditation

Licensed Landscape Architect, State of Washington