We Made It, I Think…

I am writing this article during the Big Event, and it appears the world will survive it. The rest of the Hetch Hetchy EOC crew and I are on the job, ensuring reliability of SF’s water and power system. It’s certainly been a quiet night. Fortunately we have CNN to connect us with the world as Y2K passes through time zone after time zone. I have entertained my self by grazing on the plentiful food prepared by our cook, Maxine Musante, and by stoking the fire in the huge fireplace of our 1924 vintage Administration building. I wouldn’t call it a New Years celebration, but it’s not a bad place to be to mark the passing from 1999 to 2000. We toasted each other with Apple Cider, took a picture and that was it: the power stayed on and the phones continued to work.

The year passed, as years seem to do these days, at unbelievable speed. Our new web site is looking better everyday as webmaster Bill Slenter relentlessly has gotten us to remember to submit our articles and flyers to him at the same time we submit them to the newsletter. He even managed to make our customer survey available via the site. Members can log on and make their opinions and suggestions known to us. No stamp, no envelope. The number of site visits recently passed 1000.

Our committees have worked diligently to keep interest and participation up in times when fewer folks are willing to fight the traffic to get to committee and dinner meetings. The Safety Committee hosted the year’s Northern Regional Training School at Woodland. The Public Education Committee has evolved into the Web Site Committee. The ever-productive Professional Development Committee has been taking a new look at their approach to seminars. Grace Chow of the Awards Committee fought hard and long promoting the Awards Program (some of you may still be wincing from having your arms twisted). The TCP Committee is going strong in spite of the fact that we lost Andy Stametelos, its longtime and beloved champion. John Williams has picked up the job and run with it.

My sincere thanks to all dedicated board and committee members for your hard work in 1999 sustaining the vitality and value of SF Bay Section of the CWEA. Best wishes to you for the new year.

Managers: For the new century please consider what your agency can do to support your local professional association. SF Bay Section is here through thick and thin, year after year. When regulatory changes are in the air or new technologies and solutions to old problems become available, we mobilize to provide the information via seminars, networking opportunities, presentations, articles, web site links. Our award program provides a great way to recognize your outstanding employees, facilities and programs.

Be sure to check out our web site at "www.cwea.org/sfb" for the latest events being planned by our energetic and effective committees. We ask that anyone who contributes an article to Sewer Club Ink to also eMail it to Bill Slenter at "bslenter@rmcengr.com".

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The Lab QA Committee In Action

It’s always nice to know what the various Bay Section committees are doing, especially one as obtuse as the Lab QA committee. I am sure your first question is why there is a Lab QA and a Lab committee when one should do. I can say that I don’t know the answer from a historical standpoint, but lab quality assurance is an immense subject all by itself and deserves more attention than it might get.

Our committee is comprised of several Bay Area quality assurance officers from some of the best labs around. They are: Ken Osborn, Anita Labossiere (yes, the editor of this newsletter), Diane Lawver, David Velasquez, Ron Block, Jo Andrade-Bunnell, Kathy O’Brien, Raj Gumber, and Carmelita Oliveros. And then there is me, Bill Ray, chair in perpetuity (not that I mind). I know that there have been many others that have come and gone that I have not mentioned here. If you’re one of them, let me know and I will add you back to our mailing list.

As committees go, we don’t follow the usual mold of meetings, meetings, and more meetings. We recognize that most lab people have more restrictions on their ability to go afield and so we tailor our gatherings to find available time slots and schedules. We meet, as a committee twice a year. We just finished our 2000 planning session and won’t meet again until June. This mid-year meeting is for course correction and status checking relative to the events we planned back in November of the previous year. We might meet again if things are falling apart, but our members are so good at keeping assignments that we have not had an emergency meeting in years. GOOD MEMBERS.

What sort of events do we plan? As I said, most lab people have serious schedule restrictions and we cannot plan very many whole day outings or long distance meeting locations. Lunchtime seems to work well for most so we set up a series of lunchtime meetings at various locations throughout the nine Bay Area counties. We use both the more formal restaurant lunch setting and the very informal Brown Bag setting. This allows lab people to schedule a few hours in the middle of the day and by employing the free Brown Bag concept, don’t ask attendees to always pay for lunch.

Pay or free, formal or informal, the venue is not the draw. Although our attendance has not be steady, we find that it is the topic that brings them in (or keeps them away). We have been blessed with speakers on such important topics as: national accreditation, privatized performance testing samples, and the ever-popular update on the laboratory certification program, ELAP. Of course, we have had our share of busts and even canceled meetings, but no system is perfect. We try to stay in touch with the lab community needs so as to provide timely, topical talks.

Topics for this year will include: ethics at the bench, internal auditing, and even a technology demonstration. Our calendar is posted in the Sewer Club Ink and notices are sent to those who have registered at previous meetings and via fax to all certified labs in the nine Bay Area counties. If we are missing you, let us know and we will add you to our mailing list.

Our next meeting is going to be on February 10th and will feature Ethics at the Bench presented by Ann Rosecrans. The location is Juan’s Restaurant in Berkeley. Our flyer will be out early January followed by the fax and e-mail notices in early February.

Want more info? Contact me, Bill Ray, at 916-657-1123 (voice); 916-653-8628 (fax);  rayb@dwq.swrcb.ca.gov.

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