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COVER Delta College StuDentS tour Detroit WWtP MWea iS an aFFILIATE oF tHe WATER enVironMent FeDERATION (WeF) VISION: TABLE OF CONTENTS The Mission (Aim) of the Michigan Water Environment Association is to be the recognized authority on and Volume 2, Number 3 - Fall 2006 advocate for preserving, restoring and enhancing Michigan’s water resources. TO CONTACT THE MWEA: DePARTMENTS Questions or comments regarding this magazine can be directed to: president’s message ................................................................................ 4 MWEA P.O. Box 397 committee news ........................................................................................ Bath, Michigan 48808 8 Phone: 517-641-7377 Fax: 517-641-7388 EDUCATION OPPORTUNITIES ..................................................................... 12 Email: [email protected] Website: www.mi-wea.org MWEA key member profile .................................................................... 16 Copyright© 2006 news in brief ......................................................................................... 22 Michigan Water Environment Association PROFESSIONAL DIRECTORY ....................................................................... 59 Statements of fact and opinion expressed are those ADVERTISER’s INDEX ................................................................................. 62 of the authors and MWEA assumes no responsibility for the content, nor do they represent official policy of the Association. MWEA in no way endorses the products or services FEATURES of their advertisers. Advertisements are included as an educational service to our members and are capital consUltants/designworks a|e reviewed by the editor before publication to ensure their relevance to the water environment and the celebrates 40th anniVersary ............................................................. 18 objectives of the Association. delta college stUdents toUr detroit wwtp ........................................ 19 Membership application available online at MWEA membership directory .................................................................. 29 www.mi-wea.org MWEA bUyers’ gUide ................................................................................ 52 19 29 Managing Editor: Cole Kelman Layout & Design: Tracy Toutant Sales Manager: Linda Bloomer Phone: 866-985-9780 Fax: 866-985-9799 Email: [email protected] www.kelman.ca www.mi-wEa.org FaLL 2006 my view - MWEa PRESiDENT’S mESSAGE committee activities show depth and diversity n September 28-29, the Board of liaisons are to be the communication link Directors met with the Committee between the committees and the Board. The OChairs at an Association Retreat. Not communication is intended to be two-way only did we share and exchange valuable communication. For example, the Board MWEA information, but we had fun in the would like to see every committee produce FRED COWLES process. President-Elect Ed Mahaney did an an article for Matters, and the liaisons President - MWEA excellent job of planning and executing the deliver that message to the committees. If event. The highlight was sharing committee a committee desires to adopt an association activity reports. The depth and diversity white-paper or policy statement, the of our committees’ activities are amazing. liaison would deliver the request to the Every committee was requested to prepare Board for action. The Board of Directors is an article for a future issue of Matters, so committed to improving communication hopefully, as you read these articles over the and has devoted time on every meeting next year you will also be amazed by all that agenda to review committee reports from we, as an association, are doing. the liaisons. Therefore, each committee Some information shared at the retreat, chair can look forward to a contact from I feel is important to share with the entire the liaison prior to Board meetings for association, so I will summarize it here. the purpose of preparing a three to five I do not mean to imply that this is more sentence summary of recent activity. important than the committee information. To further improve communication I just think that the committee chairs between the Board and the Committees, can do a much better and complete job we will begin sending both Board Meeting than I, so the future articles will have to Minutes and Agendas to the committee accomplish that task. chairs. A new form has been developed to Each committee has been assigned a aid committees in getting timely responses liaison from the Board of Directors. These from the Board when needed. The form will later be used to help record Board action in a manner that will be more readily retrievable. The MWEA Website has been greatly improved over the last year. Check it out for yourself at www.mi-wea.org. While the improvements have been quite dramatic, the website is still far from what I would like it to be. I am working to implement several further enhancements, but I am the least important person to satisfy, when it comes to webpage functionality. YOU are much more important. As I see it, there are basically three kinds of people using the MWEA website. First are people like me, the officers, staff, and committee chairs, who use the website as a convenient place to store information we either have elsewhere or we know how to get from other sources. The second are people like Joe goergen gives his report at the committee chair retreat. Continued on page 6 MWEa MATTERS: FaLL 2006 my view - MWEa PRESiDENT’S mESSAGE Continued from page 4 you, the members and acquaintances activities, etc. For example, you contact I need your help in making the webpage of MWEA, who want more information your legislator about your committee’s more functional. Please try using the or want to confirm information about activity or about a speaking invitation at webpage for something, then let me know MWEA. Details are important and they a seminar. The first thing the legislator about your experience. Did you find what need to be correct. The third kind of will do is ask an aide to find out you were looking for? Was it easy to find? users are people who have not heard something about MWEA. The aide will Was it accurate? Have you been contacted of MWEA before or who are not very Google ‘Michigan Water Environment by someone in the third group who familiar with it. These people want Association’ and scour the webpage for the tried using the website? What was their to know the basics: the mission, the basic stuff. experience? Please email your feedback vision, the size of membership, our With these three kinds of users in mind, to me ([email protected]) so I can see to it that we keep improving. In the previous issue of Matters I discussed one of the association’s challenges: the need for succession planning. I said, “Getting the next generation involved takes more than wishful thinking and talking about it.” Ed Mahaney, MWEA President-elect, took this to heart in planning the Committee Chair Retreat, and asked the chairs to invite others on their committees to attend. So the retreat became a leadership training meeting as well. This initiative appears to have been quite successful with several younger professionals attending. Finally, I need to mention the matter of money. MWEA has increased services to our membership by hiring staff, renting permanent office space, and purchasing office equipment. This has been done without significantly reducing our financial reserves. However, our reserves are less than one would wish, given our level of financial commitments. Vice President Keith McCormick has agreed to discuss this issue with the Strategic Planning Committee, then propose to the Board a target and plan for achieving an appropriate level of reserves. We expect to be able to do this through increasing revenue by increasing services and fees. One of the great things about MWEA is that we can increase revenues by fulfilling our mission. The seminars and events we sponsor provide training to our members as well as offer networking opportunities that are unparalleled in our field. At the same time we are able to generate the funds needed to operate the day-to-day needs of the organization. I appreciate your continued support of the MWEA and our vision to be a recognized authority on and advocate for preserving, restoring, and enhancing Michigan’s water environment. We do water, and water is life! 6 MWEa MATTERS: FaLL 2006 COMMIttee NEWS MWEA OpErAtiOns ChAllEngE Committee n behalf of the MWEA Operations Challenge Committee, I has a new format. The Challenge will allow individuals or more would like to thank the following for their participation in than one person from a plant to compete in the operations Othe 2006 Challenge. Thanks to the Collections, Maintenance, Lab challenge without having a four-person team to compete Practices, Process Control, and Safety Committees for their sup- (Established teams still welcome). Training on each event will port. Thanks to the industries that supplied money, equipment and take place on Tuesday at the annual AWWA/MWEA Joint people: The Safety Store, HRC Engineering, Bio-Tech Agronomics, EXPO and individuals will be teamed with other wastewater Kennedy Industry, Hach Co., and Godwin Pump. Thanks to the professionals from their region in the state to make a team. municipalities for their support: Bay City, Genesee County Drain Competition for the state title will take place on the following WWS and Midland. There is a lot of time,