Who led the charge

Sammie Baker, CPM®, RPA®, LEED Green Associate is a Senior Property Manager with Parkway Properties, Inc. and has managed Frost Bank Tower since September of 2005. Thanks to her efforts, Frost Bank Tower was the first downtown high rise office building in Austin to earn the LEED Gold O&M Certification in December of 2010. Sammie earned her LEED Green Associate designation from the GBCI at the same time. Since earning the LEED Gold rating, Frost Bank Tower also earned the BOMA 360 Designation and was a local BOMA TOBY recipient.

Frost Bank Tower, Austin, TX                                           Commercial Office - 569,345 sq. ft.

The first step to making a set of smart changes is finding good data, so after some lackluster results on their first try, Sammie’s team got creative in their data collection: laptops and iPads were placed in the building’s lobbies, and incentives like breakfast burritos, granola bars, and fresh coffee were used to generate essential tenant participation in surveys. With this information, the team was able to launch a successful lamp purchasing plan, implement smoking and green cleaning policies, begin an indoor air treatment program as well as an indoor integrated pest management plan, and introduce a Green Tenant Improvement Guide. Because of the unique set of challenges facing buildings in Texas, Sammie’s team streamlined procedures that led to more efficient data collection and reporting, making it easier to share best practices and other techniques with other buildings in the area. It also led to greater data transparency, as well as a reduction in time and effort when staff implemented these new changes.

Sammie Baker reduced the Frost Bank Tower's average yearly electricity consumption by enough to power an average Texan household for 34 years!

"By simply taking advantage of some of our low-cost opportunities and bringing awareness to our tenants, we were able to document our existing efficiencies and implement new policies, which enabled Frost Bank Tower to achieve our LEED Gold rating."