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WABO 2020 Annual Business Meeting - Zoom Conferencing

 ICC  Director, David Spencer, swears in the 2020/2021 Board of Directors 

WABO PRESIDENT’S REPORT -  by Kurt Aldworth, CBO, ACO 

Dear WABO members,
Welcome to a new year for WABO. On July 30th our Annual Business Meeting was held virtually for the first time in our organization’s history and as usual elections were held. I’m excited about the new transition of leadership amongst the Board members.

First of all, I want to thank you for giving me the opportunity to be your next WABO President. It is both an honor and a privilege to serve you and I am truly looking forward to the opportunities that lie ahead for us.

One of my goals as your next President is to promote, encourage and provide a way for emerging leadership within our organization. I think this can be achieved in several different ways such as strengthening and increasing our membership and encouraging membership involvement.

Dealing with the current pandemic has been a very difficult and challenging time both personally and professionally for all of us. The bright side to this that I have experienced, as I’m sure you have as well is that we have persevered as an organization…we have found a way to adapt! We moved the AEI and our business meetings to the virtual world, and in doing so I can’t help but look ahead and see opportunities for our membership’s growth and involvement by bringing more jurisdictions within our state closer together. This can be made possible through virtual chat forums, seminars and possible training through AEI to others outside the state, some of which in the past have been a hindrance do to either travel, time away from the office and ultimately cost.

I also believe it is important to continue with our business plan that has been set before us. WABO is a thriving organization that is fiscally sound, the membership is strong, and we have a great sense of purpose. I also believe it is very important to work collaboratively, continuing to build relationships with our stakeholders both on a local and national level.

I’d like to congratulate new 1st Vice President Lee Kranz (Bellevue), newly elected 2nd Vice President Andy Higgins (Seattle), and newly elected Executive Board member James Tumelson (Edgewood, Accreditation committee). Congratulations also go to re-elected Board members Micah Chappell (Seattle, Technical Code Development), Brian Smith (Bellevue, Certification and Registration), Todd Blevins (West Richland, Education), Tim Woodard (Blaine, Government Relations), Ray Cockerham (Puyallup, Emergency Management), Stacy Criswell (Monroe, Outreach), and Angela Haupt (Kirkland, Finance).

I’m also very honored to announce our esteemed Past President Board members; Immediate Past President Ray Allshouse (Shoreline), Past President Tom Phillips (Woodway), Past President Trace Justice (Snohomish County), and Past President Gary Schenk (retired).

A special thanks to Ray Allshouse for his dedicated service these past two years as our President. His leadership, commitment and guidance has been invaluable for WABO; not only for the board but for the membership as well.

Today, all of WABO’s programs have strong and vibrant committees that continue to strive for excellence and member satisfaction, all while providing outstanding service to our membership as well as our customers who utilize WABO’s services. These committees will have my full support and I will do my best, along with your help to make them even better.

Thank you for placing your trust in me to serve you. I will do all that I can to represent you well!

Respectfully,

Kurt  

Committee Reports

Emergency Management Committee - Chair Ray Cockerham, CBO

WA Safe -
WASafe operation guides are developed and being tested at the City of Puyallup.
Initial WAsafe badging has been distributed and organizations are working on finalizing any remaining responders that have pending issues.
SEAW provided a $600 donation to assist with badging costs for the program.

WE NEED WASafe – WABO Coordinators.
If you are interested in being a Coordinator please e-mail rayc@puyallupwa.gov Please note coordinator in the subject line.

Training- The Emergency Management Committee will fund travel and accommodations in accordance with WABO policies (please follow up with Ray or Tara for questions)  Currently trying to coordinate virtual training as an option during the pandemic.
EMD0001 SEOC Foundations Course training
Please go to their Training Calendar for more information and to apply: https://mil.wa.gov/training-and-exercise

Government Relations - Chair Tim Woodard & Amy Brackenbury

The Government Relations committee (GRC) met at the summer 2020 Virtual Annual Business Meeting and many topics were discussed.

  • Amy Brackenbury (WABO’s Lobbyist) provided an update on the current primary election results. Although republicans picked up a couple of seats in the house it was not enough to substantially change the political climate moving forward. This means we will likely see bills similar to what we have been seeing for the past few years. ADUs, Tiny Houses, and energy code will all be heavily debated topics.
  • The GRC debated adding a position to our current “Position Statement Paper” to address tiny homes as we don’t currently have one. In the end it was decided the majority of the issue has to do with land use and we will address any issues that do affect us one at a time based on that specific proposal.
  • The majority of our time was to discuss how the annual “Day on the Hill” will look this year.
    • Currently, the House has already decided to hold a virtual session and likely will not even be in Olympia. The Senate has yet to make an official decision; however, in person meetings by all accounts will not be allowed this year.
    • To adapt, WABO will be asking for a “Lead” for each district in which a Zoom Meeting or Conference Call will be set up for them. The lead will then be able to add all WABO members for that district that want to be present to the meeting. These leads will be a critical component to get WABO’s message out this year and will be established at the December 8th GRC Meeting.

Education Committee - Chair Todd Blevins, CBO

First, I would like to thank all of the committee members for attending our Virtual Education Committee meeting and all of the great input that you provided. To update everyone else, we recapped our very first Virtual Annual Education Institute, this was a tremendous amount of work,(not by me, A HUGE thank you to Tara and her staff) a few hiccups, but overall a great success. This may well be the future for education, but from our polling, most of our members still appreciate “ in-person classes”, myself included. As we put the 2020 AEI to bed, we started planning for 2021. As usual, many great class ideas from our committee, and our polling from the classes this year. Washington St Energy Code tops the list this year, along with Plan review, Bluebeam, and Washington St Amendments, to name a few. Again, I would like to thank the WABO staff for all the effort that they put into this, providing an excellent educational  resource for our members  and others. If you would like to be a part of this committee or have ideas for an educational class or opportunity, please contact myself or The WABO office, we would be glad to hear from you.