Description: Technology is reshaping how preservation professionals document, analyze, and plan for historic places. This webinar explores tools such as GIS, field data collection, mapping, and visualization to support preservation planning and adaptive reuse.

Attendees will learn strategies for filling critical data gaps, building actionable datasets, and using technology to inform planning decisions. While digital tools improve efficiency, successful preservation still depends on community engagement, local knowledge, and strong partnerships.

Land Use Case Law Update – Summer 2026

Description: Which recent court decisions might impact your local government’s regulatory or legislative efforts when it comes to land use and management? What trending topics might be impacting your agency in the near future? Join our panelists to learn more! This semiannual webinar will review recent court decisions as well as other legal and regulatory developments impacting planning and land use administration in Washington State. Our panelists will also provide practical advice and guidance to help local governments improve their land use regulation and prepare for potential changes.

Living on the Edge: Managing for Coastal Resilience in the Built and Natural Environment

Description: While data centers have been distinct land uses since at least the 1990s, their scale and speed of deployment have exploded in recent years due to cloud computing and the emergence of artificial intelligence (AI). This webinar will explore the multifaceted implications of data centers for local communities, focusing on environmental sustainability – particularly energy and water usage. Loudon County, VA Supervisor Mike Turner will cover lessons learned in the community with the largest concentration of data centers in the world, including developing trends in the data center landscape, possible future scenarios, and 15 best practices for local communities. Chris Dietz, Critical Infrastructure Analyst with the Idaho National Laboratory, will take a deeper dive into data center infrastructure requirements, impacts, and emerging technologies. Manny Patole, Assistant Professor at NYU’s Tandon Center for Urban Science and Progress, will conclude with thoughts on the broader implications of data centers and AI for planners and communities, including environmental justice and the role of technology in serving people. Links to a comprehensive set of resources on planning for data centers will be provided as part of the presentation.

Description: Local Public Finance for Planners: You may know a little about how local governments raise and spend money, but do you realize how closely aligned it is to planning work? We'll go over the basics of local public finance and talk about what it matters for planners. We'll talk about how budgets get created, how money is appropriated, and what happens at the end of the fiscal year. We'll also talk about state and federal grant and aid programs, and look at fiscal tools like Tax Increment Financing from a planning perspective.

Planning for the Energy Transition

Register: https://us06web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_ew6eN-cgS8uGhYKVnjnQqQ#/registration

Description: Local Public Finance for Planners: You may know a little about how local governments raise and spend money, but do you realize how closely aligned it is to planning work? We'll go over the basics of local public finance and talk about what it matters for planners. We'll talk about how budgets get created, how money is appropriated, and what happens at the end of the fiscal year. We'll also talk about state and federal grant and aid programs, and look at fiscal tools like Tax Increment Financing from a planning perspective.

Washington Planners’ Forums

The Planners’ Forums are a combined effort on behalf of the Department of Commerce, the Planning Association of Washington, and the Washington Chapter of the American Planning Association to educate and support planners throughout our state with new and important topics to planning. More information about Planners’ Forums can be found on the Department of Commerce’s website.

The following Planners’ Forum events are coming soon:

Southwest Planners’ Forum

Register: https://wastatecommerce.zoom.us/meeting/register/5i06D9LEQfqTrlWiZ719mA

Description: This forum will focus on Port Planning. Attendees will hear from Eric ffitch, Executive Director, Washington Public Ports Association, and Mike Bomar, Chief Economic Strategy Office, Port of Vancouver USA.

Eastern Planners’ Forum

Location: Online

Register: https://wastatecommerce.zoom.us/meeting/register/EHjGTuzTSXe_4wAvfPdN1Q

Description:

Topics for the Summer Forum include:

• Natural Resource Lands – Commerce
• Vernal Pools – Ecology

Explore more CM credit opportunities using the CM Search function on the APA website.

Stay Connected

For questions or to share ideas for future training opportunities, contact Katie Enders, APA WA Continuing Education Chair, at [email protected].