Welcome back Sierra Chapter Members! I am the incoming Sierra Chapter President and look forward to making the 2013-2014 year a great one. I would like to first thank Steve Greenfield for the fantastic job he did as President last year. His shoes are large ones to fill. I hope to take the baton and continue with his momentum.

Many of the benefits of ACEC membership are delivered at the state level, such as legislative review, legislative action, QBS, affordable insurance, and liaison committees, to name a few. But the Chapter is where the rubber meets the road, and I believe that we cannot have a strong state organization without strong chapters with active and engaged members. My goal for the year is to strengthen the Chapter by increasing meeting turnout, bringing great speakers of relevance to your work and interests, to better convey ACEC-CA benefits to Chapter members, and to engage the members. I will be reaching out soon to member representatives of firms that seldom attend meetings or events to find out what they would like to see from the Chapter and how ACEC-CA and the Chapter can better meet their needs.

We already have some great speakers lined up for our meetings. To start the year off, our September speaker is Mike Inamine, the Executive Director of the Sutter Butte Flood Control Agency, which is helping to lead the way in delivering better flood protection to the residents of the Sacramento Valley. Please note that this meeting is being held one week later than usual (on the 4th Wednesday instead of the 3rd). To change things up a little, we have decided to have a few of our meetings at lunch time. At our October meeting, we are planning to have the meeting on a Friday at or near a golf course, and encourage attendees to take advantage and both golf and network before or after the meeting. We have a local agency speaker on board, who will also be golfing.

I would not be able to accomplish my goal of strengthening the Chapter without strong support from the Board of Directors. I welcome and look forward to working with this incoming Board, which includes several new members. New Board members are Dana Remington and Landon Blake, who join returning Board members Paul Enneking, Chad Coleman, Mark Gilbert, Kelly Birkes, Harvey Oslick (Secretary/Treasurer), Tom Holdrege (Vice President), and your President. I also want to thank past Chapter President and long time, committed supporter, Marco Palilla, who will be stepping in as our Grassroots Chair. Without volunteers like these stepping forward at the Chapter level, ACEC-CA could not successfully deliver benefits to the industry that employs us and to which we have devoted our careers.
I look forward to seeing you at the September meeting.