Environmentalism

Our firm takes its responsibility as an environmental steward seriously. From donating used building materials to recycling unwanted tech gear, we do everything we can to reduce our environmental impact and preserve our beautiful Northwest surroundings for generations to come.

Kitchen Initiatives

SK&H has received a lot of attention for our in-house chef, but few are aware of the steps we take to reduce our kitchen’s environmental impact. Our kitchen recycles and composts all of our food waste and recycles as much packaging waste as we legally can. We eschew disposable plates and utensils, and are proud to use cloth napkins along with reusable dishes and glassware to cut down on refuse. The compost and coffee grounds get turned into rich soil for the garden beds at our Vancouver office. When we’re not eating food grown in our garden, we buy locally whenever possible, to support the local economy around our offices and to reduce the carbon footprint of our meals. The chickens we raise in our Vancouver garden provide our eggs weekly.

FREE GEEK

Our IT department donates all our used tech gear, including computers, monitors, printers, and more to the tech nonprofit Free Geek. First we wipe the hard drives, and then the team at FREE GEEK uses Department of Defense standards to wipe our hard drives again. They then they sell what they can in their thrift store or donate it to volunteers, helping low-income Portlanders get access to technology. Anything that can’t be reused, FREE GEEK recycles with Oregon E-Cycles.

Bend Office Renovations

When we renovated our Bend office in 2006, we didn’t want to waste anything that was still of use. From the molding on the doors to the screws in the walls, our contractors carefully dismantled the old building and donated as many building materials as possible to Habitat for Humanity.

Recycling

All of our offices try to eliminate the amount of waste sent to landfills. We separate our paper into shredding and recycling, and we also recycle glass, metal, cardboard and plastic.