A Challenging and Fruitful Roller Coaster Ride

This month is literally the precipice for me. Since starting, I had March 1^st pegged as the day that begins what should be a challenging and fruitful roller coaster ride culminating in October. In two weeks we will be in DC attempting to secure support for NEPPA’s position on several key issues. The link for these issues can be found on the NEPPA website. Meanwhile back in Littleton our new building will be probably getting external walls. Scott Edwards and Savas Danos at Littleton have the construction crew humming. You can see a photo from two weeks ago below.

The NEPPA Board will be meeting in March and reviewing the progress on the building and some key initiatives that we have been undertaking in our training programs. The one I can mention at this time is that our two full-time trainers (Steve Socoby and David Fabrizius) have been standardizing the course descriptions for all of our offerings and mid-summer we will be releasing a permanent course catalogue of our offerings. We will have additional subjects from time to time, but it will make it easier for everyone to understand the full spectrum of training.

If you haven’t seen it yet we have released the spring brochure for ourPublic Utility Management Program. It will be at the Cranwell Conference Center from April 11-13^th. This year we have gone back to the core principles of what utility managers need to know. I believe that it captures the essence of the key issues facing today’s managers.

In May, we intend to add some important bells and whistles that will make our training facility the premier training facility in the US.

June will feature our rodeo in Pascoag. For years the good folks of Pascoag Utility have hosted this great competition and as this is the final year with them we plan to make it memorable.

We will officially move our training facility and set up the yard and other training areas in late July and early August at Littleton. We plan to run our first Apprentice class there at the end of August. In August and September, prior to our annual conference, we will host a General Foreman’s Roundtable at the new facility.

This year’s annual conference will be truly special. The committee has been working hard and secured a great feature speaker who we will be announcing shortly. We will conclude the wild ride by moving our offices to Littleton in October.

NEPPA will continue to deliver all of its regular services and functions during this chaotic period and I will continue to reach out to meet with members to better understand individual circumstances and needs. In the coming months, we will keep you apprised of our move and building process. I will be writing about the status and seeking assistance for some of our planned improvements. So stay tuned.