ILLINOIS WATER ENVIRONMENT ASSOCIATION NEWSLETTER
Volume 25, No. 1 - Spring 2004

PRESIDENT'S FORUM

It is an honor and a privilege to serve as President of the Illinois Water Environment Association. I personally thank all our members for this opportunity. I also want to thank Mary Johnson, our Past President, for the outstanding leadership and hard work she and her committees provided last year. This leadership and hard work culminated with our outstanding 25th Annual Conference in Rockford, Illinois. Amanda Withers, Program Committee Chair, and her committee organized another great technical program that included a plant tour of the Rock River Water Reclamation Facility. The Local Arrangements Committee did an equally great job in organizing their conference activities.

Many of our other committees also contributed to the success of our conference including Marketing, Plant Operations, Water-shed Management, Young Profession-als, Biosolids, Awards and Laboratory. As he has done for many years, Herb Anderson, the Association Secretary, coordinated all the many hotel and registration details. Thanks to all for the great job! As you can see from the above list the reason for IWEA's success is the hard work and contributions of many dedicated people.

The number of conference attendees and exhibitors was the largest ever. The conference generated a profit of over $12,000.

The Association initiated two new committees in 2003, the Young Professionals Committee chaired by Mark Halm and the Student Chapters Committee, a joint activity with CSWEA chaired by Greg Cargill. Thanks Mark and Greg. The Young Professionals Committee organized a Meet and Greet at this year's annual conference. Many others also committed their time, effort and talents throughout 2003, which contributed to another great year for IWEA.

IWEA is on the move.

New and renewed initiatives as well as new directions are being planned and implemented in the coming year and beyond. Speaking of new directions, the planning has already begun for migrating south for our 2006 Annual Conference. Yes, I do mean 2006. Even though this Conference is 2 years off the planning is in full swing. The 2006 Conference will be held jointly with the Illinois Section of the American Water Works Association. The 2006 joint IWEA/ISAWWA Conference in Springfield, Illinois will be one of the largest Water and Wastewater Conferences in the state!

On April 16th a 2004 annual conference review assessment and future conference planning meeting was held. Several new initiatives resulted from this meeting. The 2005 Conference brochure will have a new look. A detailed assessment of our conference registration procedure is under way with the objective of streamlining that process. A new Annual Conference Oversight Committee is being created to coordinate all the conference planning and implementation activities.

IWEA is on the move.

Other initiatives will occur this year. The Operations Committee will hold two wastewater operations seminars in 2004. One of these seminars will be held in northern Illinois and one will be held in southern Illinois. Yes, we do mean southern Illinois. For those of you with limited knowledge of the geographic make-up of our great state this refers to south of Interstate 64, not I-80. And no, you won't fall off the edge of the world when you venture that far south.