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Minnesota Section–AWWA
Stew Thornley
MN Department of Health
P.O. Box 64975
St. Paul, MN 55164-0975
651-201-4655
Notes from Chairperson Peterson:
I want to welcome you to the official website of the MN Section of the American Water Works Association.
The website is one example of how we in the water industry are adapting our approach to reaching out to the people we serve and the people we work with to provide helpful information related to drinking water. This is direct alignment with our mission statement:
“Our Section will provide information, education, and networking opportunities to the drinking water community to promote public health, safety, and welfare.”
The Minnesota Section has been a strong and active organization due to the hard work and dedication of our members. In an effort to show how important volunteerism is to our section, a Volunteer of the Year Award was recently established. The section chose to honor Chris Voeltz from St. Peter this year, for being, ‘exemplary in volunteering time to the Minnesota Section through active participation in programs or service on a committee, council, or district.’
Volunteerism has always been important to the success of this organization. If Scott Anderson had ‘Toot Your Horn’ as a theme for his term, then I’m asking you to ‘Get Active and Volunteer’ as the theme for my term. There are an infinite number of reasons to volunteer, but I came across a list of reasons that you just might relate to…
To show commitment to a cause
To help a friend or coworker
To learn something new and be challenged
To be needed and share a skill
To network and be part of a team
To give back and gain leadership skills
Along with a few other reasons that almost made the list…
To act as therapy (cheaper than a therapist)
To remedy guilt (applies across all denominations)
To improve your quality of life
Volunteerism can improve your quality of life and actually help keep you healthy. In fact, experts have found considerable health improvements related to insomnia, strength of immune systems, surgery recovery, chronic pain, depression, and heart disease among those patients that have volunteered, and those health improvements increased along with the number of hours spent volunteering (within reason, of course).
ACE 09 San Diego, CA
Plan to attend next year's ACE- the most comprehensive and diverse water conference in the world! The dates are June 14 - 18, 2009. This is the 128th conference.