Nicole Brodeur / Times staff columnist
From black coffee to a green cause

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He takes his coffee black, with room not for cream but "for walking."

This makes all kinds of sense, for despite decades of hard work crunching numbers for movers (two transportation companies), shakers (two governors) and, since 1990, Starbucks, Orin Smith doesn't have any plans to stand still. Rather, when the coffee icon's president and CEO retires next March at age 62, he will head a $1 billion fundraising effort for Conservation International (CI). The Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit works to preserve the world's ecosystems through economics, policy and community participation.

While a CI dinner in Seattle the other night drew the likes of Harrison Ford and more than $1 million, it was Smith who emerged the star.

The shy, longtime bean counter at the big-deal bean company is finally coming out of the back room to wander — and fight for — the world's rain forests.

"I am starting to like asking people for money," Smith said the other day. "When you believe you are doing the right thing, it makes it a lot easier."

Smith's new role is the natural next step in a longtime collaboration between Starbucks and CI. The company pays coffee farmers "the highest prices in world," he said, in exchange for their agreement to preserve habitat. CI monitors the pact.

Smith's role at Starbucks has allowed him to see both the farmers and their surroundings firsthand, which will inform his work — and make up for a relationship the Chehalis native never really had with the Great Outdoors.

"I never had the kind of affection for the environment that some people who have spent a lot of their time hiking do," Smith said. "That's not where the passion comes from, but from the recognition that what we're doing in the world today is not sustainable."
 
Government is somewhat to blame, Smith said, for our society's wasteful ways. And he acknowledged that the current administration hasn't made the environment a priority.

Still, he believes government's role should be limited to regulation.

"Conservation really starts with us as citizens," he said. "We are well past the time when we can continue to make excuses that we can't do anything about these things.

"It isn't somebody else's problem."

So Smith has vowed, in the next phase of his life, to become more aware of the resources he uses at home on Capitol Hill, with an eye to preserving resources around the world.

"In the end, we have to change ourselves," Smith said. "And I haven't done that."

He's not sure how he will, whether it's buying a Prius, or a bike over at REI.

"I probably should," he said with a laugh. "It would be good for my health."

Smith could afford to rest on his fortune and reputation. But he chooses to keep moving.

And it isn't just the coffee.

"The changes I have made in my life ... ," he said. "While sometimes they created a lot of anxiety and a little fear, you always end up growing."

Nicole Brodeur's column appears Sunday, Tuesday and Thursday. Reach her at 206-464-2334 or nbrodeur@seattletimes.com.

She'd never put Harrison on hold.