Mike Houck

After heading up the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry’s Community Research Center and teaching biology at Oregon Episcopal School, Mike Houck found his life-long calling as an advocate for urban greenspace protection in 1982 when he launched the Urban Naturalist Program at the Audubon Society of Portland. In 1999 Mike founded the Urban Greenspaces Institute to continue his work at the local and regional scale to ensure the integration of nature into the urban fabric.

Since 1982, Mike has actively pushed for the creation of a metropolitan wildlife refuge system. Such advocacy helped launch Metro’s Metropolitan Greenspaces Program (now Parks and Nature). He continues to work for the expansion of the Portland-Vancouver region’s system of parks, trails and natural areas — the Intertwine. Mike serves on the City of Portland’s Planning and Sustainability Commission, The Intertwine Alliance board of directors and The Nature of Cities board. He is an advocate for integrating the natural and built environments through the protection of natural green infrastructure and creation of built green infrastructure. Mike also works locally and regionally to ensure the city and region adopt policies that mitigate and adapt to climate change. Mike has been recognized locally, regionally and internationally for his work.