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Letter
from the SFBS President, Sandeep Karkal
By the time you see this article, a major event will have passed by us. I refer of course to the Annual 2003 California Water Environment Association (CWEA) Conference in Ontario (April 22-25), where I hope the San Francisco Bay Section (SFBS) will once again have been well represented both in terms of attendees and statewide annual awards winners. It’s always exciting to attend this annual event, but it’s sweeter yet when your Section’s representatives come away with the awards. But I’ll save that for the next issue of the
Inkspot….
As I sit here trying to put mouse to screen, I rack my brains. Where exactly to start talking about a Section whose volunteers do so much, that its hard to start talking about any one event or committee without instantly being distracted by thoughts of another? And a thought comes unbidden to mind…may be this is where we talk about the SFBS membership committee.
As you all may know, sometime last year, CWEA took over the duties of membership renewals for all local Sections, a process that’s still ongoing and should be completed by this year. Since that time, our patient, long-term Membership Committee chair Randy Fiorucci, as well as yours truly, have received numerous calls from members confused about who pays what to whom, when, and for what service. All that we can reiterate at this point is that when you pay your annual CWEA dues, (which are basically a combination of CWEA as well as dues to any single local section), you will be automatically assigned to a local section, based on your zip code. If you should choose to belong to a section other than the one you’re assigned to by CWEA, please call the CWEA office at (510)382-7800 to switch to a local section of your choice, or if you have any other questions about your combined CWEA/SFBS dues or membership services. If you wish to be a “subscriber member” ONLY to the SFBS, contact Randy at (925)246-8000. Note also that being a SFBS subscriber member does not necessarily entitle you to any benefits from the CWEA organization.
While on the subject of membership and its benefits, one of the nice things about having your membership information being up-to-date in CWEA’s database is that you can receive breaking news and timely reminders of CWEA and SFBS events and seminars to help you plan your schedule better. With this in mind, please take a moment and be sure to verify that CWEA has the correct mailing and e-mail addresses where you can be contacted. Since the SFBS receives all its contact information for you from the CWEA database, you’re essentially double dipping when your membership profile with CWEA is current.
And finally, technology is a wonderful thing – well, at least until it fails. Around March 17th, SFBS members were greeted with a cryptic message from our Webmaster’s e-mail processing server. Needless to say, the intent of the humans behind the technology was neither to confuse or baffle, or for that matter, “spam” our membership. It has always been our Section’s intent to utilize our membership e-mail list in a responsible, productive manner as a tool of convenience for our members, and we will continue to do so. Our sincere apology for what we anticipate was a one-time technology related lapse. Special thanks to our Webmaster, Bill Slenter, and the computer folks at Raines, Melton and Carella, Inc. (RMC), for staying with the situation and resolving it.
That’s all for this month - please be sure to show up and support your local section at the next event, whether it’s an SFBS specialty seminar or the next monthly dinner meeting. Hope to see you there!!
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