Annual Conference Summary

AWWA IMS 2016 Annual Conference
By Bryon Elwell, Director, ABS Consulting

We had another successful AWWA IMS Annual Conference in St. George in September.  The conference theme of “Destiny of our Water – Preservation, Protection & Planning” included a variety of activities and opportunities for professional development and networking with our industry peers.

From the start of the conference at the New Member & First Attendee Breakfast on Wednesday morning through the Awards & Closing Lunch on Friday, there were a lot of exciting and interesting things that took place at this year’s Annual Conference.  The Opening General Session titled “A Date with Destiny: Charting a New Course for Water” started the technical program off with a panel of four of Utah’s Water System General Managers representing CUWCD, JVWCD, WBWCD, and WCWCD, who presented their involvement in the Utah Governor’s and State’s water planning initiatives for the next 50 years.  This was followed by over 55 technical presentations held over the 3 day conference with 5 tracks on Wednesday and Thursday, and 4 tracks on Friday.  There was also an Operators track on Wednesday entitled “Water System O&M” that provided operators and others with valuable training to help maintain operator certifications that are so important in our industry.  Professional CEUs/PDHs were available for both Idaho and Utah water professionals with all but 4 of the technical sessions being approved in advance as eligible for Idaho operator certification credit.  There was a range of technical topics to choose from such as Capital Improvement Planning, Water Rates, Water Conservation, Water Loss Control, Source Water Protection, Water Quality Issues, SCADA & IT, Project Success Stories, Risk Management, Insurance & Emergency Funding, Water Quality & Treatment, Water Utility Management & Sustainability and several others.

Wednesday night was capped off with the annual Fun night, which lived up to its name with a team competition identified by representation of different countries playing on the recent 2016 Summer Olympics that preceded our Annual Conference.  In addition, there were snacks and goodies including a chocolate fountain.  The Water Taste Test challenge was also held during Fun night, which allowed everyone interested in sampling the different drinking water sources represented with that opportunity.  This was one of the best turnouts both in water systems submitting entries and in people sampling and rating the different water samples.

The Exhibitors that attended and who support the IMS-AWWA and our Annual Conference did a great job with their booths again as we have been accustomed to over the years.  There was a variety of products, materials and services for conference attendees in the exhibit hall and the layout, spacing and flow of the hall appeared to be improved over past years.  There was even a lounge area with comfortable chairs and couches to encourage attendees to relax and network with others.  We want to thank all of our vendors and exhibitors for their participation in the conference, for without them we would not have a successful annual conference with their sponsorships, contributions and attendance.

There was an excellent variety of activities for this year’s Thursday afternoon including a Scholarship Benefit Golf tournament, a Snow Canyon Group Hike, and a class on Introduction to Negotiating Deals and Disputes.  The conference was very successful with the Scholarship drive that included over half of the golf tournament proceeds going to the annual scholarship fund as well as donations made with the tournament.

The conference concluded with the Awards & Closing Lunch, which was excellent as well and had a very well planned and orchestrated presentation of the various awards as well as a look ahead to next year’s conference location in Sun Valley, Idaho.  I think the awards presentations at this year’s conference were probably the best that I have seen in the last 7 years that I have been associated with the Annual Conference Committee.  Special thanks to Ted Mickelson and his Awards Committee members for an excellent awards program for this year’s annual conference.  Also, thanks to Alane Boyd and her team that put together the excellent video presentation during the Awards & Closing Lunch.

Finally, I want to give special thanks to our Annual Conference Committee members who worked hard to make this year’s annual conference a success as well as our IMS-AWWA staff.  I also want to thank those volunteers that served as Moderators during the technical sessions and others that volunteered to help with the many activities and events that were held during the conference.  We will be starting the planning for next year’s Annual Conference in November 2016 and are pleased to announce that we will be returning to beautiful Sun Valley, Idaho in 2017.  The conference will be held a little later next year with the dates already set as October 11 – 13, 2017.  You will be seeing the call for papers in January 2017 with abstracts due towards the end of March 2017 and selection of speakers/presentations for the technical program by the end of April 2017 (See IMS-AWWA website for more details).