Sustainability is the future
McWhinney wants bottom line to include profit, people and planet
By CHRISTINE McMANUS
ChristineMcManus@coloradoan.com
McWhinney Enterprises executives have been out of the office a lot the past several months.
Leaders at one of Northern Colorado's largest land development companies have been gallivanting across the U.S. to study the work of 30 other developers.
They're looking at "sustainable" developments. And their search for a "triple bottom line," one which considers profits, people and the planet, started last year.
Findings from those field trips are expected to affect everyone from executive-level employees to engineers, land planners, administrators and eventually businesses and residents at the 3,300-acre Centerra development.
The Loveland development company is creating its own definition of sustainability by redefining how it does business. Ideas range from wastewater-recycling irrigation and primary job creation to a community designed to help prevent childhood obesity.
Webster's defines sustainability as "a practice that sustains a given condition, economic growth or a human population, without destroying or depleting natural resources, polluting the environment, etc."
But the task is much larger than creating a pithy mission statement for the development of 3,300 acres in Loveland, said brothers Chad and Troy McWhinney, COO Doug Hill and Centerra president Rocky Scott. They introduced the new mission, which is in its embryonic stage, at a Jan. 17 press conference.
"There's still a lot of fleshing out to be done," said Scott. "We've already started doing things we think are important, but we're ready to take it to the next level."
Throughout Centerra, McWhinney already has done things such as plant drought-tolerant grasses and install drip-irrigation for common area landscaping.
McWhinney worked together with McStain home builders to build more energy-efficient homes at High Plains Village. Plans are being drafted for 1,000 similar houses on the west side of Houts Reservoir and Equalizer Lake.
Construction scheduled to begin next month on the Rangeview III building is expected to meet silver standards in LEED ratings - the Leadership and Energy in Environmental Design standards of the U.S. Green Building Council. Recycling a majority of construction waste is a big part of the rating.
McWhinney plans to continue growing as a company for the next 20 to 30 years. According to the Urban Land Institute, developers of future communities ought to consider building projects that incorporate housing, shopping and workplaces instead of building separate housing developments.
At the institute's recent conference in Denver, McWhinney execs picked up that how a community is built affects how people live, Scott said. For example, healthy families need places to exercise, both indoors and outdoors. Shopping centers that cater only to cars keep people in their cars.
Centerra is 20-25 percent built out, Scott said. Most of that work has been done the past several years, surrounding The Promenade Shops at Centerra and Medical Center of the Rockies.
Sixty-two employees work for McWhinney. That number is expected to increase by 20 percent in the near future.
"As a growing company, we have time to put more resources into executing the kind of environment we want for our kids and our grandkids," Scott said.
Time will tell if the thousands of dollars spent on consultants and field trips across the United States prove to be more than a marketing scheme.
Success will be defined by the percentage of market share, Scott said.
"We want to get a high market share, over 50 percent," Scott said. "If we provide the products that people want, the business side and selling side will take care of themselves."
