Professional Engineer for Clean, Sustainable Water & Energy
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Editor’s note: For more information see the ABC Associated Press Video Footage from January 30, 2024
On January 10, 2011, my sales representative left me at the Pensacola airport and headed home to Birmingham, Alabama to hunker down. This sales trip was scheduled for Mobile, Opelika, and Montgomery then onto the Atlanta area for the last half of the week.
At 9:00 am, I reported in. My boss refused to let me buy a same-day ticket and abandon my trip as the ice storm started crossing into Alabama and Georgia. I was ordered to keep the rest of my itinerary and get to Atlanta.
I rented a car and headed up towards I-65 on the US highways. It was starting to freeze and the roads were slippery. I watched the groups of truckers tracking in in each other’s ruts. I fell in behind one of them, at a respectful distance. I understood that they would set the safest pace, and while my tires didn’t track perfectly in their ruts, I had two wheels in a good place in the lane.
I drove the next 250 miles moving from I-65 to I-85 in Montgomery, Alabama, and was approaching the Atlanta area near sundown. I found an Atlanta radio station carrying the traffic report, and it warned of gridlock conditions on the beltway and in downtown. I exited I-85 10 miles short of the beltway and connected with to US 29 to US 41 to US 19 and then up to Sandy Springs.
At 8:00 pm, my sales rep was quite clear to me that no one was going to be in the office for the next several days and I should just find a hotel. Sandy Springs and Five-Points were all booked. Hilton, Marriott, Holiday Inn, Motel 6, all booked. I called home for internet help.
With help, I was able to book an independent motel room, unfortunately near the airport. At 11:00 pm I checked into the Regency Inn, a pretty humble place, but it was warm, clean, and it had a bed.
The next day I turned in the car at the airport, found a better hotel near a MARTA station where I settled in for the next few days until I could take my regularly scheduled flight home on Friday, January 14th.
I have as much bad-weather winter driving experience as anyone could want. Growing up in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, going to college at Michigan Tech, in Houghton, Michigan, visiting Ogden, Utah grandparents by car over the continental divide on I-90, and now this experience gave me more than my share. During that week, I had plenty of time to reconsider whether it was worth it to risk my life like that for a job.
It wasn’t.
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It’s a privilege to finish a career in water and have the opportunity to move on to the next chapter. As I do, I want to thank the people and organizations that came to me with challenges that we’ve solved together. Michigan Technological University opened a new world for me. There Dr., John C. Crittenden and Dr. David W. Hand saw my potential and, with funding from EPA, invited me to join in the challenge to take all the pollutants out of the environment that my chemical engineering peers had put into it. 35 years later, I am astounded how they set me on a path that would take me across the globe, across the periodic table, and through the list of most every synthetic organic contaminating our environment.
I’d like to thank the Minnesota Cities of St. Louis Park, Hutchinson, Mankato, as well as the communities of Minneapolis, Brooklyn Center, Eden Prairie, Grand Rapids, Hibbing, Le Sueur, Northfield, New Ulm, Stillwater, St. Cloud and St. Peter and the Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe (ML Wastewater Management) for purchasing technology through me or hiring me to improve the quality of life or improving the sustainability and resilience of your communities.
I would like to thank the Minnesota agencies of the Metropolitan Council Environmental Services, Department of Transportation and Department of Military Affairs for their patronage, and thank the Department of Health, and Pollution Control Agency for decades of collaboration.
Nationally, the experience from serving the United States Departments of Air Force, Army, Navy, Energy, and EPA has been stellar, and I’ve valued the opportunity to serve the Department of Justice and to bring new technology to the United Kingdom with permission of Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Pollution.
Communities in Wisconsin, Florida, Connecticut,
across the United States, and overseas – Thank You!
My thanks goes out to other communities where I have had the opportunity to help deliver technology to solve their environmental problems or make them more efficient and resilient:
Aiken South Carolina, American Bottoms Treatment Plant Illinois, Ames Iowa, Augusta County Virginia, Bedford Heights Ohio, Boynton Beach Florida, Burlington North Carolina, Cape Fear North Carolina, Cedar Rapids Iowa, Chicago MWRD Illinois, Chocowinity North Carolina, Cincinnati Ohio, Clearwater Florida, Collier County Florida, Columbus Ohio, Council Bluffs Iowa, Creston Iowa, Cross City Florida, El Paso Texas, Davie Florida, Estes Park Colorado, Fayette County Georgia, Fountain Hills Arizona, Gautier Mississippi, Great Lakes Water Authority and it predecessors, Greenville North Carolina, Highland Park Illinois, Holland Michigan, Hollywood Florida, Indianapolis Indiana, Jessup Maryland, Kalamazoo Michigan, Lake Zurich Illinois, Lantana Florida, Lathrop California, Los Angeles County California, Los Angeles Department of Water and Power, Medina Ohio, Miami-Dade County Florida, Mobile County Alabama, Morehead City North Carolina, Mount Holly New Jersey, North Olmsted Ohio, Oakland County Michigan, Palm Beach County Florida, Passaic Valley Sewerage Commission, Pembroke Pines Florida, Purcellville Virginia, Sarasota County Florida, Seminole County Florida, Sioux Falls South Dakota, Toho County Florida, Vernon Connecticut, Wayne Water Districts North Carolina, West Salem Ohio, White Pine Tennessee, Yorkshire Water UK.
Companies and Industries Served – Thank You!
I would also like to thank the companies and industries that came to me to improve their water management, sustainability and resilience: 3M, ABB Lummus Crest, Air Liquide, Alcan Canada, Alpha Cellulose, Amoco, Arco, Bharat Petroleum Corporation LTD India, Blandin Paper, BNSF, BOC Gasses, Boise Cascade, Bostik, BP America, C.S. McCrossan, Canadian Pacific, Cargill Foods, Champion, Chiquita, Computing Devices International, Dairyland Power, Dakota Barge, Darling Ingredients, Dead Sea Bromine, Deere, Doe Run Company, DOFASCO, Dupont, Eastman Kodak, Edward Kramer Sons, Esso Canada, Exxon, Fabricom Belgium, Flint Hills Resources and Koch Industries, Fort Howard Paper, Frigidaire, Froedtert Malt, GlaxoSmithKline, Graco, H B Fuller, Hach Company, Hawkins, Hennepin Paper, Hickson Welch UK, Honeywell, Hurd Millwork, ICI Americas, International Dioxide, Johnson Controls, Kennecott, Lake Superior Paper Industries, Larsen Toubro India, Lignotech, Lombardia Italy, Madison Gas Electric, Marathon Ashland, Merck, Minnesota Beet Sugar Cooperative, Minnesota Explosives, Minnesota Malting, Allete – Minnesota Power, Minntech, Monsanto, Mosaic, Nalco Div of Ecolab, Nature Energy, Niigata Japan, NKT Denmark, North Star Steel, Northshore Mining, Novartis, NRG Energy, Xcel Energy, Nucor Iron Carbide Trinidad, Outokumpu Ecoenergy Finland, Pall Gelman Sciences, Phillips 66, Rahr Malting, Rhône-Poulenc, Rockwell Automation, Rockwell Avionics, Rohm Haas Company, Sheldahl, Sterling Organics UK, Superior Recycled Fiber Industries, Taiwan Union Chemical Laboratories, Tampa Electric, Tenant Company, Tennessee Eastman, UOP, Upjohn Div. or Pfizer, Veolia, Virchow Krause, Vulcan Chemicals, Waste Management, Westinghouse Hanford, Westinghouse NSP Cottage Grove, WestRock, Wisconsin Electric.
We understood undergraduate hunger. Campus had 3,000 dormitory students normally up until 1 or 2 am and a food service that closed down tight at 6 pm. Hunger was going to happen. Eating was going to happen.
The sound of three thousand rumbling stomachs was the sound of opportunity.
My university club needed a fundraiser, and we convinced a local grocer to let us have his grocery store deli after hours. The grocer asked us to keep inventory of what we used and he would donate it to our cause.
We wanted to provide a fast food fix. We decided that the simplest approach was a sub sandwich. We chose ham and cheese, beef and cheese, turkey and cheese, no subsitutions. We could price it compellingly since our ingredients and labor were donated. We limited open hours from 9 pm to midnight, Thursday, Friday, Saturday. We put up ads on Tuesday.
Thursday evening, we prepared a set of coolers filled with subs and stationed a car in a lot central to all the dorms. 9:00 pm came. The phones started ringing. The deli would take the call, radio town to the waiting car (yes a while back) and the dorm team would deliver subs to the doorstep.
Our delivery time was 2-4 minutes from the call. The customers were shocked, delighted…hooked.
Friday came and the business was four times Thursdays, we added people at the deli, added a runner car to do nothing but run coolers of subs down to campus.
Saturday came and we added a second runner car. We marked our count on a sheet but didn’t have time to look at it until it was over on Saturday.
350 subs on Weekend 1. Weekend 2 was 750 subs. Weekend 3 was 1,300. Weekend 4 hit almost 2,000 subs.
We had blown past our goal in Weekend 2, but kept going to see where it would go. We were tired, had seen way too much of each other, and with homework starting to suffer we decided that we were going to call it quits.
On Monday, following Weekend 4, walked into the student council office. Oh, I was also a sophomore representative in the student government. The student body president, we will call him Wayne, was on the phone with a rather angry vice president of finance and operations.
Wayne repeated the comments – the local sub shops and the local pizza shops were seeing a fraction of their normal business. Someone was running an unlicensed food business on campus and it had to stop.
The student body president held my eye as he was repeating this. I scribbled a note to him quickly with the words “WE QUIT ON SATURDAY.” Wayne confidently assured the VP of Finance and Operations that he would personally see to it that it was stopped immediately. The call ended and Wayne held out his hand and congratulated my club for singlehandedly wiping out the sub and pizza business in town. Wayne also asked me to assure him that we’d not start it up again.
Good governance is essential to organizational stability and sustainability. Governance refers to the processes by which organizations are operated, guided and held to account. Good governance applies authority, leadership, direction and control in an organization and holds itself accountable. Good governance keeps our community, our associations, our local, state and national governments functioning soundly, inclusively, equitably, and sustainably.
There are two main components of governance, (1) measurement of the organization’s benefits to its members, advisors, customers and suppliers (stakeholders), and (2) planning improvements to the effectiveness and relevance to stakeholders. Measurement requires oversight of the conformance to the corporations Declarations and Bylaws, the performance of contractors, value of insurance, and the effectiveness of the investment of resources. Planning is a cyclical process that uses measurement, benchmarking, innovation and culminates in plan adjustments.
Governance itself adds no value. The governance has to be ‘GOOD’ in order for it to be beneficial to its stakeholders. Good governance requires both efficiency and effectiveness. Effective means doing the right things. Efficiency means doing things the right way. The complexity of governance procedures and practices varies according to the size and function of the organisation. However the principles of good governance are essential for the long term viability of the organization.
Good governance requires, (1) having defined goals, (2) transparency in decision making, (3) sound framework of procedures and policies, (4) defining roles and responsibilities, (5) strategic planning, (6) risk management, (7) legal and statutory responsibilities, (8) review and monitoring of performance, and (9) ethical standards and codes of conduct.
Good governance is very important as any organization functions in a society and good governance means giving back to society in whatever means possible (value added performance, including the intangibles). We need good governance to act well within the requirements of law, act and demonstrate that we’ve acted for the benefit of members and stakeholders. The major benefit of good governance is the organization remains viable and sustainable and does not enter the decline stage in the PLC-curve. Good governance offers security to all stakeholders.
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