Every month the President of RECSI invites you take a moment and share a few thoughts about the state of the chapter and promote a dialog that hopefully can help to grow and sustain our community of design and construction professionals.
WEBSITE
The biggest news for me is that the Board voted Monday to replace our current website with a CSI microsite. Among the several advantages is that it is free – no cost to RECSI. If you have any doubts or questions about the quality of these sites check out some other Chapter microsites for their depth and variety: http://metrony.csinet.org, http://fortlauderdale.csinet.org, http://tulsa.csinet.org. Microsites also provide the recognition that the Redwood Empire Chapter is affiliated with the national organization. As I emailed our request to National on Wednesday AM, Eric Kestler of National staff advised they are currently updating the site admin tools, and that we should sign up as soon as that process is complete. When our microsite is up we will broadcast the URL by email to all members and our general list. We will also redirect the current URL to the new site.
Just got another email from Eric:
“Our software vendor is now recommending that we go ahead and build your site with the current functionality; the upgrade will occur in the next few weeks. I will therefore be building your site in the next few days…however, I need to know what you have decided with regard to the site’s hostname: redwood.csinet.org OR redwoodempire.csinet.org OR?????”
Hooray! – No waiting to get out more EXPO publicity. We just need to decide on the host name. Wish I knew how to run Survey Monkey. And another from Rob. We are going with redwoodempire.csinet.org.
And Eric “OK, thrusters on “Full”, Warp Speed.
AWARDS
The Board voted on Monday to nominate RECSI members John Guill and Bryan Varner to CSI Fellowship. The Awards Committee chaired by Karen Collins will be preparing the applications for submittal to Institute. Fellowships are conveyed at the National Conference to be held in Tucson AZ this year on October 13 & 14. Fellowships are granted for outstanding service to the Institute and Chapter, which both of these nominees has certainly given.
DINNER MEETING PROGRAMS
Programs have been terrific and attendance has matched. January’s program on Construction Failures drew a near record crowd of 55 attendees. All in attendance were suitably informed and entertained with analysis of major construction failures by Morgan Griffith, PE, Managing Engineer in Exponent’s Buildings and Structures Group. Matt Cardle’s Tech Talk "Are You Smarter Than A Fifth Grader? Using Fundamentals To Defend Against Claims" was an excellent complement to the program. Really, when your work falls down, shouldn’t you expect a claim? I would like to see Matt’s presentation republished in the BARK as a service to all our Members who were not “present” at the meeting. “Present” as in mentally engaged too.
CONSTRUCTION EXPO March 7, 2012
Come to the dinner meeting February 2nd to hear President-Elect and EXPO Exhibitor Coordinator, Eric Ziedrich expound on how we can all support our greatest single program and maximize our personal benefits from the event. The exhibitor spaces are nearly sold out two (2) months prior to the event. I understand this is a record performance, and I have to hand it to Eric for leading and motivating us all to play and participate. None of us can do these things alone, and it takes a good leader to put it out there so we can all participate. It’s the kind of leadership that builds an organization. Look for more information on the about to be launched RW Empire CSI microsite.