Building Tomorrow... Today

BUILDING TOMORROW... TODAY INFRASTRUCTURE

COLLABORATING THROUGH PUBLIC-PRIVATE PARTNERSHIPS

REVITALIZATION OF THE TSC GLOBAL DAHLMAN AMERICAN TOBACCO CAMPUS ROOFS FOR THE WORLD

ROSE & CO.

CONVERTING REFINERIES TO DUKE UNIVERSITY

COMMUNITY TERMINALS

& McKINNEY

OPINION: WHY ARE OUR BRIDGES MADE IN CHINA?

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TRADE

CENTER

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table of contents

July – September 2011

In this Issue 4 Letter From The Editor 6 Letter From The Publisher 8 Inspirations 10-12 Advisory B oard 14-15 Opinion 16 Making Air Waves 86-90 Collaboration Close Up 92 Thank You

TSC Global Roofs for the World

T

he Challenge January 12, 2010, 4:53 p.m. just west of Port-au-Prince, a 7.0 magnitude earthquake ravaged Hispaniola’s poorer half. Nineteen months later, some 634,000 survivors—40 percent of those Haitians

displaced by the original quake—are still virtually homeless. Residing in tents distributed by the United Nations High Commission on Refugees (UNHCR) is proving punitive, as the tents swiftly become useless tatters.

Continued on pg.66

Metropolitan Denver Breaking Barriers With Multi-modal Transportation Infrastructure pg. 60

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» "Utah is the only

state to double exports in the last five years, and we’ll double them again in the next five." « - Lew Cramer

Quote worthy pg.18

CH2M HILL’s successful track record on projects in the Middle East, the Panama Canal and others highlighted its ability to drive successful projects to completion, often shaving millions in costs and years of time off of highly visible complex projects Cutting-edge Engineering in Every Corner of the Globe pg.42

GOVERNMENT

18 World Trade Center Utah

Connecting International Business at the Crossroads of the West

Academia

26 The University of Colorado Dental School The Expansion of Inter-

Professional Education, Research and Service

20 Public-Private Partnerships

30 The Human Side of Infrastructure

22 It’s Time

34 The Revitalization of the

Benefitting the Community as a Whole

for Leaders to Lead and Voters to Press for Decisive Action

The Infrastructure Debate

BUSINESS

Collaboration for the 21st Century

American Tobacco Campus

A Successful, Collaborative City Development by Duke University and McKinney

36 Global Energy Management and The Art of Human Capital

COMMUNITY

38 Rebuilding Our Infrastructure

Collaborating Through Public-Private Partnerships

42 CH2M HILL Cutting-edge Engineering in Every Corner of the Globe

46 Alstom Chat•ta •noo• ga 48 Building for the Future Komatsu Equipment Company

50 Pipeline Infrastructure Campos EPC -

Engineering America’s Fuel Transportation

52 Converting Refineries to Terminals Creative Infrastructure Transactions Turn Inoperable Refineries into Growth Centers For Communities

56 Water Infrastucture A Paradigm Shift

74 Wildlife Bridges

First-Ever International Competition Develops Innovative & Cost-Effective Design Solutions for Safe Passage of Wildlife Over Superhighways

76 Colorado Women Building

Infrastructure Both In Business and In Life

80 Taking Care of Business Colorado Capital Congress

60 Metropolitan Denver

Breaking Barriers With Multi-modal Transportation Infrastructure

64 TAKRAF

Heavy Equipment for Extreme Infrastructure

66 TSC Global Roofs for the World 70 Infrastructure for Dominant

Low-Cost Electricity Dry Forks Station – Will it be the Last Coal-Based Power Plant?

84 Creating a Future by Design

Perspectives from Jacque Fresco and Roxanne Meadows

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LETTER FROM the editor

ICOSA Is More Than Leadership

- It’s Leading!

FOUNDER AND PUBLISHER Gayle Dendinger

PRESIDENT & EDITOR-IN-CHIEF Jan Mazotti

VICE PRESIDENT & EDITOR-AT-LARGE Kim DeCoste

MANAGING EDITOR: Annette Perez STAFF writers: Keenan Brugh, Michael Connors, Emily Haggstrom, Maria E. Luna, Annette Perez, Tammy Schmidt

CONTRIBUTING writers: Niccolo Casewit, Jennifer Cook, Karen DeBartolome, Matt Edgar, Eric Ferreri, Kathleen Kennedy-Townsend, Elizabeth Leake, Janet Lee, John Ma, Marshall Palm, Eric Reamer, Rebecca Saltman, Judy Taylor, Adam Wooten COPY EDITORs: Maria E. Luna, Laura Rothenfeld

ART DIRECTOR: Nick Heckman - EKMN creative PHOTOGR APHY and design: Andrew Thompson, Shelby Soto, Maria E. Luna

VIDEOGR APHY: Blake Rubenstein, Tammy Schmidt Social Media: Annette Perez, Eli Regalado

Advertising inquires: Please contact Jan Mazotti at janm@icosamag.com

M

ost of you have been readers of ICOSA since our inception. At that time, just over two-and-a-half years ago, we were three people with a dream who wouldn’t take “no” for an answer. We knew that we could make a magazine about great connectors and collaborators meaningful and valuable to the reader.

Since that time, we have grown a lot and have adjusted to “magazine life.” Today we have four employees and an amazing coalition of more than 100 regular volunteer collaborators.

We have grown to more than 10,000 subscribers, roughly 5,500 Facebook friends, and have just launched a newly designed web presence, which has regular visitors in more than 25 countries.

Moreover, three months ago we had the distinct privilege of partnering with the Experience Pros radio show to share stories from ICOSA here in the Rocky Mountains.

In that short period of time, we have grown from few listeners to just over 100,000 in our time slot. Because of the richness of the stories, the radio show is expanding as well. Starting September 6, 2011, Connect and Collaborate (4)

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with ICOSA will begin broadcasting five days a week in 17 states, including Colorado, New Mexico, Arizona, Wyoming, Nebraska, Kansas, Missouri, Alabama, Georgia, Mississippi, Tennessee, Arkansas, Illinois, Southern California, Oklahoma and the Texas Panhandle. Please tune in Monday through Friday from 11:20 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. (MST) to learn from these amazing collaborators.

So, to all of the connectors and collaborators — academic, business, community, and government — we say “thank you” for the guidance and support of the ICOSA movement. We will continue to spread the message and we will continue to DO! Because we know that it is more than leadership — it’s leading!

Join the movement and DO something today!

All the best,

- Jan Mazotti

ICOSA® welcomes editorial submissions from its readers. Whenever possible, submissions should be sent in electronic format. All unsolicited materials should be submitted to the publisher at the address below. Items not sent electronically will not be returned. The publisher reserves the right to decline use of materials at their discretion and assumes no liability for unsolicited materials.

ICOSA® (ISSN1938-2081) is published four times a year. No part of ICOSA® may be reproduced without written permission from the publisher. ©2011

ICOSA® CORPOR ATE HEADQUARTERS 4100 Jackson Street Denver, CO 80216 Office: 303.333.3688 Fax: 303.333.4832 Email: janm@icosamag.com Website: www.icosamag.com All third-class postage paid at Denver, Colorado.

To view an electronic copy of ICOSA® (ISSN1938-209X) or to get your free subscription, go to www.icosamag.com.

Friend us at ICOSA Magazine® on Facebook or check the ICOSA® Channel on YouTube at http://www.youtube.com/user/ICOSAmagazine.

The title ICOSA® is an analogy for great connections and collaboration. An icosahedron, the strongest of the polygons, combines 20 equilateral triangular faces together. We use this analogy because we believe that if we all work together and collaborate, we too can become stronger – just like the triangles.

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Learn more about natural gas and Encana at www.encana.com

LETTER FROM the PUBLISHER

I Am Fascinated

By Bugs

I

n previous articles, I have referenced bugs because of their metaphoric symbolism. ICOSA exists at the intersection of resources, vision, transformation and continuity as represented by the spider as infrastructure.

Collaboration creates value by maximizing these different characteristics.

The past 13 issues have focused on Competitive Advantage, Corporate Social Responsibility, Education, Energy and the Environment, Global Trade, Conscious Capitalism, Sports, Women, the Biennial, Collaborative Leadership, Big Ideas Smart People, Growth and Innovation and now Infrastructure. In the last issue, I discussed how we were progressing as a company to get the magazine where it is today. I also spoke about the Native American culture inspiring me to look at creatures in a metaphorical state.

Future issues of ICOSA are going to focus on creature characteristics; hence this issue is on infrastructure. As you flip the page, you will see how the spider uses its web to develop its infrastructure and how that is a basis for a model for organizations.

We have found that collaboration is all about building on the strengths of others to create endless possibilities. Potential doesn’t just appear; it is found-and sometimes even created – by those who seek to expand their horizons. Even people who excel at completely different tasks can find a way to work together and create value. In fact, most collaborative opportunities are the result of circumstance, not intricately calculated planning.

Future issue topics will be on resource management, vision, transformation and continuity. Our goal is to show the importance of creating potential through infrastructure (spider), a resource management system (bee), and a vision (dragonfly), then transforming (butterfly) it all into actual accomplishment and continually (snail) improving upon it.

However, just because a strong and organized infrastructure is in place does not mean that imperative resources are automatically shared.

A collaborative organization must have a means to store, organize, and easily access the resources. Bees are the representation of (6)

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resource management. Bees show us that there must be one universal method for information sharing so that the information is sustainable, consistent and uniform.

The dragonfly teaches us to use our vision of the past and present to make deliberate plans of action for future projects and by moving forward using smaller goals; a collaborative effort will be more responsive to challenges in the path and changes in tactics, making a long-term goal more attainable. This is represented by the dragonfly’s eye. Members of the infrastructure focus on their areas of expertise. Resource management systems that are centralized and organized greatly facilitate resource storage and location. A clear vision, along with a detailed plan of implementation, eliminates wasted effort. By building on past accomplishments and constantly working to maintain systems, an organization’s potential and accomplishment will build exponentially as seen in the transformation of the butterfly.

The snail represents continuity.

Continuity allows projects to build on one another instead of starting over each time.

By reusing and rebuilding infrastructure, resource management systems, and resources, collaborative organizations have a vantage point. In order for an organization to

build wisely for the future, it must first reflect on what it already has established.

Smart organizations build on established infrastructure, resources, and vision from the past as the basis for the next round of projects.

This combination allows collaborative partners to multiply their own core competencies, provide consumer benefits and increase competiveness. It also enables leveraging of strong contacts and expertise.

The five creature characteristics (infrastructure, resource management, vision, transformation and continuity) are instrumental in making collaboration possible. When two organizations join together to work on one project, they have to combine their two infrastructures, two visions and two sets of resources into one shared infrastructure, one shared vision and one set of shared resources. We are excited about the endless possibilities this magazine has created and will continue to create for our collaborative partners.

- Gayle Dendinger

Nature of Collaboration

Infrastructure

ICOSA exists at the intersection of resources, vision, transformation and continuity as represented by the spider as infrastructure. Collaboration creates value by maximizing these different characteristics.

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inspirations

grow and retain businesses; increase access to capital; create and market a stronger Colorado brand; educate and train the workforce of the future; and cultivate innovation and technology with a focus on the three E’s of good government: efficiency, effectiveness and elegance.

This has solidified my belief in blueprints, plans, and infrastructure.

ecently, when Governor John

Hickenlooper was sworn into office, he signed Executive Order 3 – implementing a statewide economic development strategy for the state of Colorado. It was unveiled to the public on July 20th after six months of research from a variety of citizens (5,000 citizens in all 64 counties of Colorado) across the state, “We hope you will stay involved in our collective effort to develop economies across Colorado. Success breeds more success, and communities that embrace collaboration will reap the benefits,” says Hickenlooper. This blueprint highlights six key areas for the state of Colorado: build a business-friendly environment; recruit,

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Infrastructure is the basic physical and organizational structures needed for the operation of a society or enterprise, or the services and facilities necessary for an economy to function. The term typically refers to the technical structures that support a society, such as roads, water supply, sewers, power grids, telecommunications, and so forth (see sidebar for more examples). An effective infrastructure in the business world must permit the organization to operate today, and provide flexibility for the future, create potential opportunities, and manage the risks of the business.

I view a spider’s web as a new model to achieve sustainable growth, to create a functional model for entrepreneurship/ business, to create synergies, and to develop systems thinking. I have never been fond of spiders myself, but by learning more about them and what they contribute to the ecosystem, I have learned to accept

• Airport • Bridge • Broadband • Canal • Critical • Electricity • Energy • Freight/Shipment • Hazardous Waste • Hospitals • Port • Mass Transit • Public schools • Rail • Road • Telecommunications • Utilities • Water system • Bank • Engineering • Legal • Logistics • Project Management • Air traffic control • Brownfield • Bus rapid • Carbon footprint • Containerization • Congestion pricing • Ethanol fuel • Gas tax • Groundwater • High speed rail • Highway Trust Fund • Hybrid vehicles • Just-in-time (business) • Land use planning • Mobile data terminal • Pork barrel • Program thermostat • Recycle • Renewable Reverse Osmosis • Smart Grid • Smart Growth • Stormwater • Urban sprawl • Traffic congestion • TOD • Vehicle efficiency • Waste-to-energy • Weatherization • Wireless technology • Architecture • Civil, Electrical, Mechanical engineering • Public economics • Public policy • Urban planning

spiders as a part of the natural world that people must learn to live with. Most spiders are harmless to man. Spiders are actually beneficial insects because they cut down on the population of insects that spread disease and are pests for humans. There are over 30,000 identified species of spiders, and only 60 of these species are considered dangerous to humans. Spiders teach us to maintain balance, and everything you do now is weaving what you will encounter in the future.

The odds of a spider successfully catching its prey depend greatly on the size, strength, and design of the web. Common sense tells us that sturdy, tightly woven webs catch more prey than weak webs with large gaps. A spider’s survival is contingent upon its first act, the building of its web. That first project paves the way for the rest of the spider’s existence.

Not only does this design work well for the spider, but provides a great model for us two-legged creatures as well. The simplicity of structure and intricate detail of the spider’s web is something every organization should aspire to achieve. A sturdy, well-designed base allows both leaders and workers to find a quiet vantage point. A spider must have a sturdy, tight web; the web’s design, size, and strength increase its chances of survival. The intricate connections between strands are what support and strengthen the web.

The infrastructure of a plan, road, telecommunications, water supply, etc. serves the same purpose as a spider’s web by helping the collaborative effort to acquire essential resources. If you get an opportunity to review the Colorado Blueprint, you will notice that much thought and effort was put into the plan, and many collaborative state government organizations participated (www.colorado.gov). I applaud the efforts of the group who worked on this to create such a strong “web.” Not only is the state of Colorado making strides in infrastructure, but the stories that you will read in this issue are also making advances.

Blueprints are necessary to build our dreams into real accomplishments.

They are what will give us direction and greater purpose. Being committed to visionary goals is the “blueprint” of the future. The Colorado Blueprint is a shining example of connecting in such a way that everyone within the system is properly supported.

Michael Porter says it best in Clusters of Innovation, “A strong physical and information infrastructure is a baseline requirement to establish and sustain a prosperous regional economy: Good quality roads, highways, airports, railroads, water, and power support the efficient movement of people, goods, and services as well as the quality of life of citizens.”

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Advisory board

Jay C. Allen

I

n business, the the saying goes, “It’s who you know.” Most business people will tell you that the hard part is meeting the people you want to know.

For high profile senior executives with heavy time commitments, sitting on another committee or board or paying high-priced memberships in clubs isn’t always a practical or preferable option.

In a business landscape awash with leads groups, seminars and other catch-all networking events, Jay Allen has created a new paradigm in peer-to-peer networking among influential people that helps them efficiently build, manage and leverage other influential relationships.

In 2001, Jay Allen and several other senior officers from various companies sketched out their vision of an ideal networking organization for highprofile executives and local leaders. The concept was driven by the key elements the executives wanted to see in the organization: • No vendor sponsorship or participation • Membership only offered to those meeting pre-determined qualifications • A n informal setting with no committees, seminars or heavy time commitments • A reasonable membership cost – no exorbitant fees As they began to evangelize the concept among their peers, there was an overwhelmingly positive response. They began with a few private lunch meetings, and within six months, over 100 executives were participating, and CXO was up and running.

“It all grew by word of mouth,” explains Allen. “We have never advertised. All communications are via email, phone or direct conversation among members and those they wanted to include.” CXO is open to C-Level executives of companies with at

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Jay C. A llen President & Founder CXO 770 W. H ampden Ave . Suite 340 Englewood, CO 80110 Phone: 720.981.3570 Mobile: 720.984.8424 Email: jay@cxo.org Website: www.cxomembers.com least $50 million in annual revenues and other local influencers (nonprofit, private equity, political leaders, etc.).

“We do the hard part of seeking out and aggregating those people with whom executives want to network and who would like to network with them,” says Allen. “We handle the details, so they never walk away from a CXO event without having received the networking value they were hoping to

obtain.” The group meetings have grown very popular as more executives have told others about the informal yet powerful atmosphere of CXO’s gatherings.

CXO’s popularity is rooted in its simplicity. There are no attendance requirements; members pay for their own meal at meetings (no sponsors), and their staff facilitates introductions during the events. The strength of the concept lies in the ability of attendees to meet each other and share information without having to hear sales pitches or irrelevant presentations.

Allen says the hardest part of running CXO is turning away people who do not meet the membership qualifications. “The exclusiveness of this organization is what makes it special, but it can be hard excluding great people with the wrong qualifications.

We have tried over time to both broaden the span of people we include while maintaining an environment which provides even the most influential people access to people they want and need to meet.”

In an effort to expand the ability for more executives to participate, in 2008 CXO merged with Executives Network.

Today they manage three networking organizations with over 5,000 executive members in 10 major markets: •C XO: C-Level executives of $50mil+ companies and other influential leaders •E XO: C-Level executives of $5mil - $50mil companies and director/ vice president level in larger companies • Th e Executive Talent Board (XTB): CXO and EXO level executives in the job search Probably the most remarkable thing about the organization and Jay Allen is that he does not take a salary from the organization. The organization dues (under $500/yr) are used to pay for technology and the administrative and event management staff that organize and manage the network and events.

Allen puts himself in the same shoes as the other members – making a living off of the significant business opportunities provided by being a part of a large network of influential people.

To learn more about CXO, go to www.cxomembers.com.

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MATT EDGAR BROKER/OWNER

Advisory board

Tamara Door

T

other public and private business leaders. This inclusive amara Door is the president and CEO public-outreach process resulted in feedback from over of the Downtown Denver Partnership, a 2,000 individuals in the Denver community and was 55-year old business organization whose mission is to create an economically healthy, formally adopted by City Council in July of 2007. It is now in its implementation phase. Door serves as cogrowing and vital Downtown Denver. The chairman of the 2027 Committee, which is responsible for focus is on place-based economic development. The three driving implementation of the plan. primary pillars are people, place and business.

Door was honored with the Colorado Black Chamber Door manages a $9 million budget dedicated to Strategic Partner Award. She was selected by both the building downtown holistically. The focus is on retention Denver Business Journal and Crain’s Detroit Business and attraction of corporate headquarters and companies, as one of the Forty Under Forty in the local business urban planning and development, retail attraction and community, and was included in Denver’s Powerbook List, retention, public policy, transportation and housing compiled by the Denver Business initiatives. The Partnership also Journal. She is a member of the funds initiatives within Skyline Young President’s Organization and Civic Center Park to ensure and the Colorado Women’s Forum. they are properly developed, Prior to joining the activated and maintained. The Downtown Denver Partnership, Partnership is funded by the Door spent eight years as the private-sector. In addition, executive vice-president of the the Partnership manages the Detroit Regional Chamber, the Downtown Denver Business nation’s largest regional chamber Improvement District (BID), of commerce. She also served which is responsible for cleaning, for eight years in the banking maintenance and safety within the industry as a vice-president of a 125 blocks of the BID. tri-state division of retail banking In addition, the organization and alternative delivery systems produces popular community for a national bank. events that bring more than Among others, Door serves on one million people downtown the following committees / boards: each year, including A Taste of •A uraria Higher Education Center Colorado, the 9News Parade of Board of Directors – Chairman Lights, New Year’s Eve Fireworks • 2027 Committee – Codowntown, the Southwest Rink at Chairman Skyline Park, Downtown Denver • Colorado Black Chamber of Employee Appreciation Week and Commerce Foundation – Board many more. amara oor Member The Partnership’s efforts are • Citywide Banks Board of based on a detailed 20-year plan.

President & CEO Directors – Director The organization, in partnership Downtown Denver Partnership • Metro Mayors Caucus for with the City and County of 511 16th Street Suite 200 FasTracks – Committee Member Denver, led an18-month process Denver, CO 80202 • Coalition for SmartTransit – to create a 20-year vision for Phone: 303.534.6161 Executive Board Member downtown, the Downtown Area • VisitDenver – Board Member Plan. Door served as a Downtown www.downtowndenver .com • International Downtown Area Plan Steering Committee tdoor @downtowndenver .com Association – Board Member member along with roughly 50

T

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D

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Join the Colorado Women’s Chamber of Commerce

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opinion

Why Are Our Bridges

Made In China?

By Kathleen Kennedy Townsend

S

n my first blog post for The Atlantic, I talked about the breakdown of our infrastructure based on my experience with the Washington, DC Metro: the broken escalators, the slow Orange line, the unscheduled stops in the middle of tunnels. Today I'd like to add my complaints about the MARC computer line, where delays are not uncommon, and Amtrak's Acela, which sustained a speed of 0 mph for two straight hours in New York’s Penn Station on one of my recent trips.

I choose the quiet car, because I don’t want to hear the curses that greet one delay after another. But then I think, is passivity really the American way? Aren’t we supposed to take action, do something, get the job done?

Americans solve problems. What's going on when I read that China is launching a new line of fast trains and we aren’t even able to get our slow trains going?

So I took it personally when Congressman John Mica, a Florida Republican and head of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee-rather than embracing the idea of an infrastructure bank that had the backing of John Kerry (Democrat) and Kay Bailey Hutchinson (Republican), the Chamber of Commerce, and the AFL-CIO-proposed to decrease infrastructure funding even beyond what Paul Ryan had proposed. Mica wants a 40 percent cut to outdo the Tea Party's cut of 30 percent.

The Republicans say they want to create jobs. But making it difficult to get to work is not the right path. And it's tough to get a job when you can't get to an interview on time. On the delayed Acela, one of my fellow passengers complained (despite being in the quiet car) that he was going to miss his meeting with a potential client. As we sat in the station, unmoving, he became increasingly agitated and depressed. "In this bad economy, I really can’t afford not to meet him," he said.

In contrast, a friend just back from Europe described fast, efficient trains that don’t break down, are reliable, and are a source of pride.

Our trains were once that way, too. A sign in Union Station boasts that when it

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» What's going on when I read that China is launching a new line of fast trains and we aren’t even able to get our slow trains going? « was built in 1907, it was the grandest train station of its time. We were the best. But now infrastructure is seen by too many Republicans as government spending and therefore bad, or as better left to the states.

Where would that have left the railroads that crossed our country in the mid-19th century, or the interstate highway system launched by Dwight Eisenhower? Nowhere.

America's infrastructure quality has fallen to 23rd place in the world, according to the World Economic Forum. The American Society of Civil Engineers estimates that it will take about $2 trillion over the next five years just to repair it. We spend 20 percent of what we used to spend on infrastructure 40 years ago, yet our population is much larger today.

Now some economists argue, "Well, that was because we were building it then. We don’t need it now." But we do. Roads and bridges have to be maintained, as do trains and city transit systems. Most critically, as in past centuries, America should be on the cutting edge of new types of transportation. A nation works when it can transport goods and people easily and efficiently. And highways are not built magically.

People are employed to build them.

At a time when many of the unemployed are in fact builders, painters, electricians, ironworkers, sheet metal workers-an American infrastructure bank would be a boon if used wisely and well. Proposed many times over the years, and again this spring by Senators Kerry and Hutchinson, such a bank would provide

» America's infrastructure quality has fallen to 23rd place in the world, according to the World Economic Forum. The American Society of Civil Engineers estimates that it will take about $2 trillion over the next five years just to repair it. «

loans and guarantees for infrastructure projects by leveraging hundreds of billions of dollars in private funds along with a relatively small initial federal investment.

But don't tell that to those who see low taxes as the be-all and end-all and who are outsourcing jobs to China because they can be done cheaper there.

One of the most stunning articles I've read recently described the construction of the new east span of San Francisco Bay Bridge

by China's biggest heavy machinery maker.

According to the reporter visiting China, "The last four of more than two dozen giant steel modules-each with a roadbed segment about half the size of a football field-will be loaded onto a huge ship and transported 6,500 miles to Oakland. There, they will be assembled to fit into the eastern span of the new Bay Bridge." "They’ve produced a pretty impressive bridge for us,” said Tony Anziano, a program manager for the California Department of Transportation.

As a country, we have to decide what our values are. Do we really want to be a nation that funds our spending spree through the Chinese, who then make our goods and do our work while we go into debt and remain unemployed? Work is more important than saving tax dollars. Jobs are critical. Work, not an unemployment check, is what makes people feel they are worth something.

The Republican focus on wealth, not work, has reshaped our politics in a way that is unhealthy for our people and our country. In the current issue of The Washington Monthly, Paul Glastris gives many examples of cultures where the rich refused to pay their share of the taxes and their nation was soon destroyed: the Han Dynasty in China in the third century AD, Hungarian barons in the Middle Ages, the 16th century Spanish monarchy, the Ming dynasty in the 17th century.

In their crusade to reduce the size of government, Grover Norquist and his taxpayers group are shrinking our notion of what it means to be an American. Rather than seeing ourselves as workers, builders, creators, and visionaries, we're reduced to the role of people who fill out IRS forms. Norquist’s crabbed conception hurts our nation and our future.

I hope the combined forces of politicians, the unions, and the Chamber of Commerce will eventually overcome the resistance to the infrastructure bank. We need to create jobs, and we need to rebuild our roads, railways, sewage systems, and water systems. Most of all, we need to revive our sense of energy and excitement-the deep fulfillment that comes of making things we can touch and feel, things that really improve our lives.

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making air waves

Experience Pros Radio

Kindness Is So Simple

™

Starting A Revolution in How People Treat People in Business By Eric Reamer & Angel Tuccy

W

ho wouldn't love a 20-second KISS? That's the question that we're posing to people coast-to-coast here in America and around the world via the syndicated Experience Pros Radio Show. We're not talking about locking lips with that special someone, though. We're talking about the movement that we call, "Fan-Braggin'™" that is summed up by the acronym, KISS (Kindness Is So Simple™).

When the radio show moved from an Internet platform to mainstream terrestrial media, Angel Tuccy and I (owners of

Experience Pros, LLC) made a conscious decision to present a 100 percent positive talk-radio experience for listeners in the Denver, Colorado market. Little did we know that our witty alliteration, "Fan-Braggin'™ Fridays" would quickly snowball into a national movement, something akin to the beginnings of the "Pay It Forward" concept.

Fan-Braggin'™ is simple. It only takes 20 seconds to either write 2 sentences on our Facebook page (www.Facebook.com/ ExperiencePros), or call-in live during our radio show from 10-Noon MDT to share a story

about whom you love in business and why.

It could be anyone with whom you have done business—and would do so again. We're looking for stories of what we call Extreme Customer Service, where the power of your simple kindness triggers a chain reaction of goodwill and in-kind response.

When you say something nice about someone else—THEY WIN because it's them you're talking about. And YOU WIN because it makes you feel good!

And EVERYONE WINS because now we know where to go when we need a similar service!

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The best way to feel warm and cozy on December 6th?

Give back to Colorado.

Colorado Gives Day is an initiative to raise money online for Colorado charities in just one day. So let’s see how warm and generous we can be. Join partners Community First Foundation and FirstBank to give where you live. Simply donate to the charity of your choice online at GivingFirst.org.

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Learn more at GivingFirst.org/COGivesDay

GOVERNMENT

World Trade Center Utah

World Trade Center Utah Connecting International Business at the Crossroads of the West By Adam Wooten

T

he California State Legislature is the greatest economic developer Utah could ever hope for,” quips Lew Cramer, founding president and CEO of the World Trade Center Utah (WTC Utah). As California’s government increases taxes and regulations, companies in Silicon Valley and the rest of the Golden State are increasingly looking to move to the business-friendly Silicon Slopes of Utah.

Ask Cramer about what the WTC Utah does and he will list the many virtues of Utah’s business-friendly economic policies in regulation, taxes and education. The state has recently won many accolades in this area, including Best State for Business (Forbes, 2010), #1 for Best Business Climate (Business Facilities, 2011) and #2 Pro-Business State (Pollina Corporate, 2010).

Press him for more specifics about what his WTC Utah team does, and he will highlight successful corporations that excel in worldwide markets because of the advantages they gain operating from within Utah. For example, IM Flash Technologies, a joint venture between Intel and Micron Technology, chose to base its manufacturing in

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Lehi, Utah. In five years, the company’s flash memory market share has risen from zero to 15 percent, making its exports the majority of Utah’s nearly $2 billion in computer and electronics exports.

“Utah is the only state to double exports in the last five years, and we’ll double them again in the next five,” says Cramer.

After listening for only a few minutes, one can see Cramer is also showing– not just telling– exactly what the WTC Utah does. Some of the organization’s principal roles include increasing the world’s awareness of the Utah business community and connecting local businesses to private and public international and local resources for international business development.

» "Utah is the only state to double exports

in the last five years, and we’ll double them again in the next five." « - Lew Cramer

Cramer’s cheerleading for Utah industry recently helped the state win a widely coveted role with the World Bank. Elizabeth Goryunova, executive vice president and chief operating officer for WTC Utah and director of international relations for the Salt Lake Chamber of Commerce, is now also one of the nation’s six private sector liaison officers to the World Bank Group. This means the WTC Utah has insiders’ knowledge to connect local companies with procurement opportunities through the World Bank and other international financial institutions.

“The World Trade Center Utah is uniquely positioned to bring together many international organizations,” explains Cramer. “We are a catalyst for international trade, often introducing businesses to resources like the Gold Key Matching Service offered by the U.S. Commercial Service.” This service uses a vast network to introduce U.S. companies to potential business partners in other countries. During Utah’s recent trade mission to China, the WTC Utah helped facilitate many of those Gold Key introductions to local companies.

For the state’s same trade mission to China, Utah’s governor Gary Herbert wanted to bring some gifts. Cramer, who has formerly taught international marketing at Georgetown University and directed the U.S. Foreign and Commercial Service, is savvy about international etiquette and became personally involved. He facilitated a connection with Greg Miller, owner of the Utah Jazz and a member of WTC Utah’s board of directors, who generously contributed several autographed basketballs. As Cramer had anticipated, the gifts were a big hit thanks to the rapidly increasing popularity of basketball in China.

“We are a small organization in a small state,” he said after meeting with the entire organization in a small 15 square-foot conference room. “Therefore, we must make the most of our assets and communicate, collaborate, and cooperate. However, we are nimble, quicker to respond to opportunities. There is no bureaucracy here!”

This cooperative spirit means that others are sometimes credited for the help provided by Cramer and his staff. As long as it means Utah businesses and exports are growing, Cramer has no objections. “In fact, sometimes companies don’t want us to communicate their successes at all. One businessman, for example, will return thanking us for helping to guide him to excellent business opportunities in Japan. However, he will half-seriously joke, ‘Please tell everyone that business in Japan is terrible so that my competition does not join me.’”

Business is good for both sides in international trade, and after cheerfully telling about great opportunities overseas, Cramer will quickly return to enumerating the strengths of business in Utah.

“We’re always trying to encourage the government to adopt businessfriendly policies in regulation, taxes and education. The state of Utah consistently does so, and that is why so many companies are enticed to move here from California and elsewhere,” says Cramer.

These policies also help foster business that originates and stays in Utah. “For 150 years, Utah’s primary exports – minerals – have come from the mines in our western hills. Now, a close second are the high tech exports that come from the minds in our eastern hills,” continues Cramer, referring to the respected schools like Brigham Young University and the University of Utah on the eastern sides of major Utah cities. “Now the University of Utah is launching more tech startups than any other U.S. academic institution, including MIT!”

» "We must make the most of our assets

and communicate, collaborate, and cooperate. However, we are nimble, quicker to respond to opportunities. There is no bureaucracy here!" « - Lew Cramer

Cramer notes that the state’s location “at the crossroads of the west” also makes it an enticing location for enterprise. In addition to the rail lines that gave Utah the crossroads name, the state also has an international airport that makes international travel and shipping quite convenient. The state also has thousands of miles of pipelines and is centrally located for trucking, with what the Utah Department of Transportation reports to be the highest percentage of highway truck traffic in the nation. This means Utah-based businesses can get their products to market faster and cheaper than many businesses located elsewhere.

Any venture considering Utah as a business opportunity in Utah should visit Cramer, Goryunova and the rest of the WTC Utah staff.

It is not their passion that makes the opportunities sound great; it is actually Utah’s many spectacular business opportunities that generate so much enthusiasm.

Adam Wooten is director of language services for the Utahbased translation technology company Lingotek. He also writes a weekly column on international business, language and culture for Deseretnews.com. Contact Adam at awooten@lingotek.com Twitter: @AdamWooten.

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GOVERNMENT

Public-Private Partnerships in City Development

Public-Private Partnerships Benefitting the Community as a Whole By Judy Taylor

T

an excellent complement to the 16th Street Mall,” said Tami Door, president & CEO of the Downtown Denver Partnership. “Consistent with the vision of the 2007 Downtown Area Plan, 14th Street will truly be a magnet for pedestrians, which will benefit residents, business owners and the overall community.”

here is little doubt that downtown Denver is a vibrant area with numerous, outstanding destination sites including the Denver Center for the Performing Arts Complex, the Colorado Convention Center and several newly constructed nearby hotels.

And, situated along 14th Street in downtown Denver is another area bustling with activity.

Former Deputy Mayor and Manager of Public Works, Bill Vidal, called the project and area a multi-modal corridor. “The project is unique in that in addition to the Better Denver Bond funds, we have property owners contributing to the improvements, and we are thrilled to see this public-private partnership moving forward.”

The 14th Street project came about after a 2009 election vote and the formation of a general improvement district. This innovative publicprivate partnership includes commitments from the private property owners to contribute $4 million to the overall $14 million cost while the Denver Better Bond Program provides the remaining $10 million for the project.

One of the goals of the expansion is to encourage outdoor seating, ground floor shopping and dining. And, as a result of this initiative, sidewalks are being expanded and about 200 trees are being added as well as flower planters along the street. Improved pedestrian lighting, crosswalk bulb-outs, decorative street corner monuments and bike racks are all part of the renewal of the area as well. And while a dedicated bicycle lane will be added in the street, on-street parking will be retained.

New signage and the addition of corner monuments add to the visible changes.

Twelve 20-foot-tall pillars will clearly assist pedestrians and drivers through the downtown area between Market Street and Court Place. At night, these signs, will light up along the 12-block stretch.

And, because of the innovations and improvements, 14th Street is becoming known as the Ambassador Street due to the diversity of visitor-oriented uses found along this corridor. “With the completion of this ambitious plan, 14th Street will serve as ( 20 )

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» 14th Street will truly be

a magnet for pedestrians, which will benefit residents, business owners and the overall community. « - Tami Door

Meeting and consulting with property owners in the district was a four year process, assumed by the City of Denver, the Downtown Denver Business Improvement District and the Downtown Denver Partnership. A consultant team including Parsons Brinkerhoff, CRL & Associates and studioINSITE assisted with design and consensus building services.

“We are glad we could contribute to a greater ‘sense of place’ along 14th Street,” said Josh Fine of Focus Property Group. “As property owners in the area, we recognized the opportunity we had not only to improve the value of what we own, but the type of experience people have when they’re here.”

Altogether, $1.5 billion in public and private investments have been made along the corridor since 2002. Completion for the project is planned for fall 2011.

The Downtown Denver Partnership, Inc. is a nonprofit business organization that creatively plans, manages and develops Downtown Denver as the unique, diverse, vibrant and economically healthy urban core of the Rocky Mountain region. To see more of the 14th Street project plans, visit http://youtube/CVekBHpPOUM.

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GOVERNMENT

The Infrastructure Debate

It’s Time for Leaders to Lead and

Voters to Press for Decisive Action The Infrastructure Debate By Kim DeCoste

L

more nimble orientation in general. More projects leads to improvement in local economies and jobs, proponents suggest.

ately, conversation about debt ceilings and credit ratings in the United States have left politicians struggling to say anything good or positive about one another or about any real progress they are making on tough issues. There has been a fair amount of traditional media attention paid to large international public and mass transportation projects. Citizens are seeing renewed pressure for legislators and voters to consider such options in the United States.

One might be surprised at the sharp divides that persist not only along obvious party lines, but there is also a fundamental difference of opinion about how Americans can orient ourselves on a path for success in this area and what the priorities should be.

In a large country where states must not only weigh in on infrastructure issues but also ultimately support them, objections are continually raised. There is one area where promising bipartisan conversation had been occurring and where, if politicians chose to so focus, we could see real progress to make people feel a bit better about U.S. political leaders and their ability to get things done. That centers on the idea of an infrastructure bank or guarantee fund that would help underwrite certain projects to expedite them, cut out the need for Washington involvement on the approval process, and arguably give the projects a

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Of course, nothing is ever as simple as it appears to be.

High Speed Rail Recent coverage on NBC Nightly News touted the launching of a new high speed train in China.

The first report filed presented a “no-brainer” argument on why the U.S. should follow the Chinese model and push forward with a similar approach. They did note that challenges would face the U.S. that the Chinese do not have: 1) the need for bipartisan support 2) full governmental transparency 3) funding issues 4) environmental regulations in the U.S. that would not be overlooked but which do not exist in China, among them.

» There is one area where promising

bipartisan conversation had been occurring and where, if politicians chose to so focus, we could see real progress to make people feel a bit better about U.S. political leaders and their ability to get things done. «

The second report had a more U.S.-centric view of existing rail projects. There is the eastern corridor of the U.S. (Boston-New York-D.C.) line but it is a mixed model, relying in parts on regular rail tracks to convey the trains, thus slowing them. And there are the California and Nevada projects (Los Angeles-San Francisco-San Jose and Los Angeles-Las Vegas) in various stages of development.

The report also showed Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood extolling the economic development value of these and other prospective high speed rail projects that, like the U.S. Highway

project of the 1950’s-60’s, would connect the whole country in a more efficient manner. La Hood and others argue this is something we cannot afford NOT to do and that the economic impact would jump start the economy.

Meantime, governors from Wisconsin, Florida and Ohio have stood up in loud opposition. What is the underlying issue and what is the truth?

That’s hard to say. Somewhat surprisingly, this discussion is not a new one. There is good documentation on this issue going back more than a decade.

In 1992, The Boston Globe’s Steve Morrison published a succinct article that stated the following, “First, we live in a country with a lot of land per person, putting us 148th out of 208 countries in population density. Our 69 people per square mile is onefifth of Western Europe's 380 and one-12th of Japan's 850. Of course, there are regions in this country with high population densities.

Nonetheless, the National Research Council could find only one route—San Francisco to Los Angeles—on which a high-speed rail system could cover its cost, and then only if all existing air passengers switched from air to rail!”

The specific numbers have most certainly changed, but the point is well taken. The U.S. doesn’t have the concentration of people in

the concentration of geography that most other countries have.

Americans are well-known for their love affair with their individual vehicle use. Should car drivers change their orientation? Likely yes. Will they? Not likely until it becomes prohibitive from a cost standpoint.

There are special interest groups who advocate for one position or another. On issues from bike use for regular transportation, to oil independence for national security, plenty of Americans would do something other than drive their own cars, but this is a big country and for many, even if they could get from Denver to DC on a high speed train or San Francisco to St. Louis, once they got to their destination, they’d probably have to rent a car to get around. For a family of travelers, a road trip still makes more sense for many destination vacations.

Pragmatically, critics argue that the government subsidies that would be required to make the construction of a cross-country high speed rail network real are so substantial that any benefit (environmental or otherwise) would be offset and minimalized by the investment in tax dollars.

There are powerful administration resources pushing hard for high speed rail, as it is seen as a key to future growth and development.

An elaborate 20+ year plan and the expansion can be found

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GOVERNMENT

The Infrastructure Debate

on www.ushsr.com , the U.S. High Speed Rail site. The data supporting the idea of high speed rail lines are outlined clearly there.

For people interested in a multi-series point/counterpoint approach that presents both sides of this issue, there is a recent series of articles on a blog called infrastructurist. com (www.infrastructurist.com).

This series provides a complex look at this issue and discusses which U.S. voters should become informed about this topic. But it is a fundamental question about which U.S. voters really ought to inform themselves. All Americans deal with the challenges and setbacks associated with the relatively outdated infrastructure system. Whether it’s bottlenecks at overused regional airport hubs, traffic jams from coast-tocoast in the metropolitan areas Monday through Friday or tie-ups on recreational traffic corridors (such as I-70 in the Rockies during ski season), Americans must find a way to address the country’s need to move people and freight expediently and safely.

» "The National Research Council could find

only one route–San Francisco to Los Angeles– on which a high-speed rail system could cover its cost, and then only if all existing air passengers switched from air to rail." « - Steve Morrison

The Infrastructure Bank Funding these national economic, mutli-state initiatives often is at the center of the discussion.

Local (state) legislators cannot be involved in the decision other than voicing the opinions of their constituents. Until recently, Senator John Kerry (D-MA) and Senator Kay Bailey-Hutchinson (R-TX) put forth a proposal in March of this year that has not gotten as much attention as it probably should.

As suggested earlier in this article and after watching a recent episode of Meet the Press (8/7/11), several people, including Sen. Kerry himself, argued in favor of such a proposal which would establish a relatively small ($10 billion) fund to underwrite certain projects. The Obama administration has come out in favor of the idea and offered to augment the fund. Economic development and job creation concerns fuel the White House’s enthusiasm.

The idea is that the initial $10 billion dollar investment fund could swell, through private investment, to as much as $640 billion over a 10-year period. Hutchinson says such a “private public partnership would help us to address water, transportation and energy infrastructure needs.” This plan would allow the Federal Government to fund up to 50 percent of a project. This “out of the box” approach ( 24 )

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touted by Kerry and Hutchinson is garnering broad support from key stakeholders such as Thomas Donohue, President of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, as well as AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka.

Trumka and Donohue also advocate for “an appropriate increase in fuel taxes.” Here is where some may balk at supporting the ideas. The current tax on gas is at 18.4 percent and has not been altered since 1993.

But now does not seem to be a good time to increase taxes for many people. Further detractions come from many Republicans, going back to Bobby Jindal’s point in 2009. Jindal and others suggest the money is better spent on bringing our highways up to speed for safe and effective travel that would benefit more people (as opposed to just the train riders).

The dividing line is thus fairly clearly drawn for the Democrats and Republicans. There are major companies that would also like to see such development occur and some people advocating to let private industry come to the table with ideas, funding mechanisms and proposals to integrate their goods and services into the plan. In many cases, however, these are not U.S. companies, and the fear is that all the good economic development will flow out of domestic wallets into the hands of European Union or Asian manufacturers. There are provisions in place in several rail projects for high speed trains whereby only America goods can be used, including U.S. produced steel, before any foreign resources can be used.

Whatever the path looks like moving forward, it seems there is an opportunity on both issues, the high speed rail discussion and the infrastructure fund, for leaders to lead and for voters to press for decisive action. As a large industrialized nation, this country must face various challenges and make decisions, even if these decisions are incremental at this point. All options must be considered as citizens press for facts and voice opinions to state and federal officials. Much will be lost if this process is not done correctly, and infinitely more will be accomplished if clear measured steps are taken with an eye toward scalable and replicable decisions that reflect the best options.

Americans must apply clarity in these plans in order to find successful solutions to these growing problems.

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Academia

University of Colorado Dental School

The University of Colorado

Dental School

The Expansion of Inter-Professional Education, Research and Service By Maria E. Luna

U

ltimately the construction of a cutting the edge building project at the University of Colorado, Anschutz Medical Campus, one can find a deliberative and successful twist on what could have been a lost opportunity.

On a campus that fosters collaboration between students, researchers and clinicians stands one of the campus’s newest expansion projects, the School of Dental Medicine. The building’s extension will provide an additional 20,000 square feet and ( 26 )

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68 more dental operatories for both clinics to accommodate more patient care and increased educational opportunities for students. Dean of the School of Medicine Denise Kassebaum, D.D.S, M.S. and Associate Professor and Chair Daniel E. Wilson, D.D.S spoke with ICOSA on how, “Opportunities multiply as they are seized,” Sun Tzu. ICOSA: The school was in the process of growing. Part of that was going to be

accomplished by adding building space; however a game changing situation arose.

How did the funding for the first building expansion plan fall through?

Dr. Kassebaum: The School of Dental Medicine was in a public/private partnership.

We had a relationship and formalized partnership agreement with a particular entity.

Due to some business circumstances, it became evident that it would be most appropriate to terminate the partnership without cause. We

went forward from that point and haven’t looked back. We’ve had a lot of opportunities to move forward and reconsider some things.

ICOSA: What were your first thoughts, once the news broke, that there would be insufficient funding?

Dr. Kassebaum: When you think about a funding stream as a dedicated component of your revenue picture, then of course we thought, what do we do now? What steps would be appropriate now? We appreciated the partnership we had with this organization. We looked back and said what did we learn from it? What did we gain from it? We took stock.

When you move forward, you look at your opportunities. You have to look at yourself and say we are one of the most selective dental schools in the country. We have one of the most enormous applicant pools with great training programs. How are we going to take those next steps? We did look at best practices for resident training programs which are the advanced dental education parts of our operation. We said how do they do things? So we modified some of the ways we were doing things. We generated more clinical revenues in those programs and gained efficiency. As we’ve moved forward, we looked at that as an opportunity to change the way we did things.

Now we’ve accomplished a great deal since that time and feel very positive about it.

When you look at a dental school’s primary revenue stream, you have to think that there’s tuition from academic programs, there’s clinical earnings because we have advanced dental education programs as well as the doctor dental surgery program. We are providing care, gifts and other sources of revenue. Looking at those three components of revenue streams, we asked what could we do to enhance those and we looked at programmatic offerings. Can we change the programs a bit? Can we increase the amount of care we are providing? We did both of those. We looked at how we can increase offerings to students and also increase care we can provide to patients.

ICOSA: What next steps were taken?

Dr. Kassebaum: Decisions are made from being in a constant process of strategic planning and an analysis of data. All the decisions we make are based on evidence gained periodically. It was an opportunity to reflect on what had happened. We moved forward with the same level of commitment we had before. We’re going to get this done, and we’re going to do it fine. We combined the leadership strength of the dental school, plus the university was very supportive as well, and tried to work out a new business plan.

ICOSA: What new goals are /were reached by the completion of the alternative infrastructure, and if any, which ones were unfulfilled?

Dr. Kassebaum: I don’t think any goals were lost. I think when you look at how we decided we would increase revenues; it would instead allow us to increase things. We’re providing more care than ever before. We don’t look at goals lost; we look at goals and opportunities gained. So I think we moved forward with the intent to do more with less and to do better than we’ve ever done.

And it’s worked.

ICOSA: What is the perception of the dental school?

Dr. Kassebaum: Internally I think everybody is excited…if they see the construction, it is exciting. Our facility and students are excited about the growth. It is change and it’s exciting. The dental community around us – the Aurora community, they see this too and it’s pretty amazing- the number of cranes, the number of things going on. They’re excited by the development in this area. We look at it as good for the Aurora community.

We look at it as good for our students. It gives us a chance to offer more to the patients.

ICOSA: What are the positives and negatives of the development compared to the original plan?

Dr. Kassebaum: We accelerated the plan, and for me, I think of it as a win-win. I look at it as an opportunity to help the surrounding area. Think of the jobs that we create – just the number of people in our building in the wee hours of the morning because we try to get the construction done, a lot of it done, when we’re not here because it’s so noisy. We were actually benefiting from construction costs being lower in the amount of time the construction will take to complete and the decreased cost in actual personnel. We looked at this as seizing the opportunity. We can be a growth opportunity for the economic development around here. It will help us at the same time because it will be less outlay of funds to get the same amount of square yards.

Dr. Wilson: In reality we expanded the scope of the original process. Originally it was going to be a four floor addition, and we were able to do a renovation on the third as well, really with the same money we had budgeted.

That was a great opportunity for us. The third floor was a terrace and was underutilized for a number of reasons, so we boxed in the terrace.

Our building was staggered before, and it remains staggered; it just goes up one floor.

So we have a significant 42 chairs, plus office expansion on the fourth floor plus we pick up

» "When you move forward, you look at your opportunities.You have to look at yourself and say we are one of the most selective dental schools in the country." « - Dr. Kassebaum

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Academia

University of Colorado Dental School

educational opportunities for people to earn the doctorate of dental surgery degree. We have two very significant programs that end in the awarding of the D.B.S degree. Those are an essential component offered in the dental school.

24 more chairs and some support space on the third. So it’s a significant chunk of real estate.

Dr. Kassebaum: It really allowed us to think of new things that the fourth floor wouldn’t allow us to do with that expansion.

Now we have different programmatic ideas for the third floor expansion. It was the fourth floor and the third floor that we didn’t think earlier that we could afford to do.

ICOSA: How did you develop the strategy?

Dr. Kassebaum: We thought there are models out there that we want to replicate.

Or are we creating new things that people will eventually replicate? When you do best practices, I suspect it’s like in the construction industry, there are people who are doing things and you say that looks like a best practice- let’s adopt that. It’s the thing I referred to earlier; looking around you always want to be engaged in the community that you are a component of which is the American Dental U.S. System.

At the Anschutz Medical Campus you have all these innovative and creative programs. The excitement was about what we would do if we had more space! What kind of innovative and unusual thing would we like to put in that third floor area? Now we’re working with two different private donors.

Dr. Wilson: The reality is we pick up an economy of scale by doing this. With more space we can invite more students which also allows us to bring more professors with more diverse skill sets and so forth. In a sense we had a choice to contract, try to cut our way out of a problem. We’re trying to expand our way into ( 28 )

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a problem. I’m much happier to be expanding because I can lecture to 30 students and I can lecture to 60 students; it’s the same scale.

ICOSA: Working with the associations, did you find they were helpful, or did you find roadblocks? Is information open as far as from school to school and their strategic plans?

Dr. Kassebaum: Absolutely! When we talk about best practices, we talk about efficiencies.

The strategies you develop are really on your own. So with the best practices, I can think of more specific things – how does their clinic really achieve their specific goals? Strategically thinking, do we want this kind of operation on this particular floor with this number of students? Those are your own strategies. But looking at how other dental schools do things has been fun. They look at us often because if you look at this building, we are one of the newest dental schools. We host people to come in and see how we did our clinic. The beautiful light in the clinic is brighter than any other light in any other dental school that we have visited, and so we like the idea that people come to visit, and it gives us a chance to interact.

ICOSA: What services does the school offer?

Dr. Kassebaum: We have an advanced dental education where dentists become specialists. We have programs for orthodontics, periodontics and advanced general dentistry.

And then you look at dental schools and a very large component of what they do is created

ICOSA: And you offer services to the community?

Dr. Kassebaum: We offer a complete range from implants to orthodontics and all the general comprehensive dentistry, and in-between we do preventive things. We have a wide age range. Our oldest patient may be in their 90’s. Our collaboration with the Children’s Hospital allows us to make sure that if we have patients who come in with small children, then our dental students actually participate with a clinic over at the Children’s Hospital. We are dedicated to serving the entire span of the age ranges from infant to elderly.

Dr. Wilson: We have about 30 sites all over the state that are not owned by the university, but our students rotate out to public health facilities. It’s part of their education. It’s been kind of a unique part of this school for a long time. That would be one of the practices that other schools have copied a great deal. We were one of the firsts.

Dr. Kassebaum: We were one of the firsts to put them out at those sites, and it’s very fun because those sites have very few

» "Dental students are a significant component of getting more care to the patients in rural areas." « - Dr. Kassebaum

providers in their area, so the dental students are a significant component of getting more care to the patients in rural areas. It could just be a medically underserved area. Our dental students have been out for extended periods of their training historically, and we’re really proud of that. Other dental schools have tried to replicate getting students out across the state because that’s what all of us value now.

Not only for the experiences they gain, but they get something different if you’re out in a rural area than they gain in our metropolitan area. It’s also treating more patients than the providers out there could do alone. It’s a win-win. We have about 65,000 patient visits that we perform annually in this building.

And we have 25,000 more patients when you

» "Collaboration is the existing word on the campus. It’s a national model for collaboration." « - Dr. Kassebaum

talk about those external sites. And then we have a big mobile dental clinic that’s very cute and huge. It’s like a big RV and has some children painted on the side. And we go out to underserved areas. The front porch of it jets out and you have this operatory. And the students travel with a facility member who supervises all the activities. They have been out there 4 or 5 weeks, and we extended it by one more week because Gunnison wanted more service, so we decided to let the van stay one more week.

ICOSA: Do you do dental research?

Dr. Kassebaum: There are wonderful research opportunities here. If you look at the campus, I think one of the exciting things about Anschutz is this interprofessionalism permeates in all that we do.

That means dental researchers are in the same building as medical researchers and

many other of the health professions, so our researchers have a focus in cancer biology, dental materials and innovative materials that we can use in the oral cavity and in other parts of the body. The other thing we do is a lot of salivary gland and facial development research that we do on zebra fish which are a model we can use to learn more about the processes of a human.

I think collaboration is the existing word on the campus. It’s a national model for collaboration because this building, for example, doesn’t have classrooms. We have shared classrooms buildings with advanced educational spaces where we’re expecting pharmacy, medicine, college of nursing - all campus schools to use the same spaces with us. There are academic communities where clusters of students can meet and get together and share ideas. And then we participate in

educational programming where there are actually students in the same classes and doing the same activities. So it’s a very special way to train people to work in teams, later and it’s called inter-professional education. It’s oddly enough fairly new. Dental schools have been siloes and existed on their own. Medical schools are separate and PT, Nursing. There is this effort to have collaboration and to have interaction at student level, at facility level.

We really are a national model for this. The whole campus is an amazing demonstration of how professions can work together and research patient care and education. It was intentional in the design of the campus, and it’s carried out by the way the buildings facilitate that, so it’s really a special environment.

The expansion of the dental school sets the bar for other educational institutions.

Its success is no coincidence. In building infrastructure, having funding was not the main reason to build. Too many times initiatives are put forth with enthusiasm and good intentions, but without concrete strategy and analysis of data, they go nowhere. Due diligence is key in any practice of collaboration and infrastructure.

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Academia

Global Human Infrastructure Development

The Human Side of

Infrastructure Collaboration for the 21st Century By Karen de Bartolomé

M

y first job after graduate school was as a planner for a big infrastructure development organization in New York City. In the midst of a worsening recession, I was asked to research and recommend ways that our organization might put its vast capabilities and capital resources to work on behalf of the regional economy. My team worked hard to create a visionary strategy that connected large scale infrastructure with the human needs that were evident on every street corner. An early test of our intellectual stamina occurred when we presented our work to a notoriously tough skeptic in the front office. She read our report and had only one question: “What the hell is human capital?”

Infrastructure is ordinarily assumed to mean hard infrastructure, but it can also be soft. Historic achievements such as the Hoover Dam or the transcontinental railroad are constructed of concrete and steel, but they only exist because they were first conceived in a human mind. The organization of human endeavor to make such achievements possible is infrastructure of a wholly different—but no less important—kind.

In the 19th and 20th centuries, when the United States was developing its core of hard infrastructure for communications and commerce, we built soft infrastructure too.

We encouraged the development of innovative engineering schools; we rewarded creators of new materials and designs with patents and profits; and we engineered financing mechanisms like toll-roads and municipal bonds to pay for the public infrastructure we needed.

We could do it all ourselves, and we did.

In the 21st century, however, we deal with global interdependence. Today’s challenge isn’t how to transport supplies across the Rocky Mountains or how to harness the mighty Colorado River to provide electricity for the growing population of California. Think of these challenges instead: the United States' current dependency on natural resources from unstable and illegitimate governments ( 30 )

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such as Libya, Tunisia, Egypt and countries involved in an Arab Spring; or the growing problems related to the need for new skills and ideas to solve health problems such as HIV/ AIDS, Ebola, and bird flu. How can we protect ourselves from cyber-attacks aimed at disabling e-commerce and internet communications?

(Think ILOVEYOU virus from the year 2000). There are many questions that must be considered about these future challenges. These include: • W hat does the world look like when illiteracy rates in certain spots reach 62 percent? (Think Somali pirates).

• W hat is the potential for the bottom 90 percent of the world’s population to benefit

from innovation when products are designed only for the pocketbooks of the top 10 percent? (Think digital divide).

• W hat happens to stability in our own neighborhoods if we can’t learn to live with the growing number of immigrants from extremely “other” traditions?

Solving problems like this cannot and will not be done within our borders alone.

Building 21st century human infrastructure requires collaboration between countries and across cultures. None of the problems above can be solved by one person or one organization in one country. At the heart of building 21st century infrastructure is the international exchange of people and ideas.

» The organization of human endeavor to make such achievements possible is infrastructure of a wholly different—but no less important—kind. «

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Academia

Global Human Infrastructure Development

Professional Exchanges

How is this done? How do people from one culture contribute to or benefit from the knowledge and ideas of another?

Academic Exchanges The movement of students around the world has exploded in the past couple of decades. International students in the United States (690,000; more than half in grad school) have grown 22 percent in five years. These students come in especially large numbers from Asia to study business and engineering and form a growing infrastructure of intellectual and commercial connections between the US and the rest of the world. There’s been growth in the numbers of American students going abroad for study as well (260,000; a doubling in the past decade). These experiences put students in unfamiliar situations and force them to see life from a different perspective at a very formative time in their lives. A 2009 study published by the American Psychological Association found a strong, positive linkage between living abroad and creative insight (visit http://www.sciencedaily.com/ releases/2009/04/090423105848. htm). Students and scholars return home understanding that diverse knowledge and perspectives exist outside their own national and cultural boundaries, to the great benefit of their careers and their societies.

With the growing cost of higher education, study abroad is outside the financial reach of many U.S. students. The Institute provides many opportunities for students to find needed aid (www.iie.org), and higher education institutional practices such as the University of Denver’s Cherrington Scholarship are also leading the way. But the U.S. lags far behind many other nations that send their students abroad.

For example, China sends about 130,000 students to study in the U.S. each year; only about 13,000 or one-tenth as many US students go to China. Washington has offered a plan to change that: the 100,000 Strong Initiative targets 25,000 U.S. students to go to China each year for the next four years.

To help make this possible, please visit www. diplomatsball.org to contribute to a fund that will help Colorado students participate.

Corporate expats, career military personnel and staff of non-governmental organizations can attest to the mindexpanding experiences they gain by working with colleagues overseas. The skills and networks they build can develop or strengthen economic and diplomatic ties among people that help nurture the development of human infrastructure.

Even short term professional exchanges can have substantial benefits. When a delegation of police officers and social workers from Copenhagen came to Denver a few years ago, they met with counterparts and exchanged practical tips for working with at-risk youth in changing neighborhoods. The exchange was so beneficial that it resulted in a return trip of two Colorado police officers to Denmark, where a different model of integration of social services and police work was taking place.

Another recent example: a Buddhist monk who works with orphaned boys in rural Cambodia was invited by the U.S. Ambassador to Cambodia to participate in the International Visitor Leadership Program, a public diplomacy initiative of the State Department. One of the four cities he visited on his three-week visit was Denver, where IIE staff arranged several days of meetings along with a visit to Rocky Mountain National Park. So inspired was he with the U.S. park ranger who led his tour that he has returned to Colorado twice to continue to exchange knowledge about the large mountain park he has since started in Cambodia, as a way to expose “his boys” to natural environments and create employment opportunities.

» Students and scholars return home understanding that diverse knowledge and perspectives exist outside their own national and cultural boundaries, to the great benefit of their careers and their societies. «

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Conclusion While we are unlikely to outlive our need for highways, water systems and energy transmission, the infrastructure of the future is human and global. The challenge we now face is how to organize ourselves to build it.

Academic and professional exchanges are two of the possible answers to this challenge.

Karen de Bartolome is the Executive Director of the Institute of International Education, Rocky Mountain Center. For more information about opportunities to build your own global human infrastructure, please visit www. rockymountainiie.org.

Baltimore, Maryland, Deep-Water Berth for New Panamax-sized Vessels

Baltimore’s Seagirt Marine Terminal is planning for the future NOW. Ports America Chesapeake will complete the new 50-foot deep berth by the end of 2011 and be fully operational with four super postPanamax cranes by August 2012. www.PortsAmerica.com

Academia

Revitalizing Cities through Public-Private Partnerships: Duke University & McKinney

The Revitalization of the American Tobacco Campus A Successful, Collaborative City Development by Duke University and McKinney

By Eric Ferreri

M

oments after Chairman and CEO Brad Brinegar told the staff of his advertising agency that it would be moving from Raleigh to Durham, six employees wary of Durham’s high-crime reputation asked him some version of, “Why are you giving me a death sentence?” He understood the concern. Durham didn’t have a stellar reputation, and huge swaths of downtown had fallen into disrepair.

But Brinegar saw promise on the horizon.

In response to his staff’s concerns, he pointed to Duke University, the anchor tenant in a fledgling redevelopment project that Brinegar’s McKinney was joining. “Duke can’t afford it being unsafe for its own people,” he told his workers. “They have to make it safe, or they have a big problem.”

In that moment, Duke was providing emotional security for Brinegar and his desire to move his hugely successful company to Durham. In subsequent years, Duke would provide other sorts of security to McKinney and the other businesses that made the leap and set up shop in the American Tobacco Campus.

As the huge university down the street, Duke provided the credit with which the American Tobacco project, the centerpiece of a series of downtown revitalization efforts, was able to blossom. Seven years after its opening, the sprawling complex is a resounding success, as are a series of other revitalization efforts in the area. But it didn’t come easy.

In the late 1990’s, downtown Durham was a shell of its former self. This small, southern city’s inner core once bustled with activity, fueled by the manufacture of Pall-Mall, Lucky Strike and Chesterfield cigarettes in a series of red brick warehouses clustered within a couple of square miles. The city literally smelled of the tobacco that wafted through downtown; but as the industry’s economic tides shifted, so too did the city’s fortunes. The tobacco industry, chiefly the American Tobacco Company and Liggett & Myers, stopped making cigarettes in Durham in 1987 and 2000, respectively. ( 34 )

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» Seven years after its opening, the sprawling complex is a resounding success, as are a series of other revitalization efforts in the area. But it didn’t come easy. « And following the industry’s demise, the huge, ornate brick warehouses dotting the downtown landscape sat dormant and fell into disrepair, a huge, very visible blot on the city.

The notion of redevelopment was kicked around from time to time, but little took hold until the early 2000’s, when broadcasting magnate Jim Goodmon, who owned several local media outlets, began rustling up tenants willing to gamble on downtown. While Duke had very few employees there, university officials, weary of the eyesore downtown had become, looked long and hard at investing in the space.

But there were warning signs.

“Initially, nobody thought it could be done,” recalled Tallman Trask, Duke’s executive vice-president. “There was a lot of inertia. There were these large structures that had just sat empty.” Because Duke didn’t want to exist in a bubble, and a healthier downtown would make it easier for the

university to recruit students and faculty, it first leased some space in West Village, a residential project championed by former Duke basketball players Christian Laettner and Brian Davis. Furthermore, some medical school facilities moved to Diamond View, a new office building Goodmon built overlooking the Durham Bulls ballpark.

But the big splash would be American Tobacco, the ragged collection of brick warehouses with the Lucky Strike water tower looming in the center. Goodmon was lining up potential tenants, including Duke. “We finally realized this was the one good shot to get something going at American Tobacco – the big, ugly eyesore,” Trask said. “Duke isn’t going anywhere, and the deterioration of downtown was not beneficial to us.”

Duke was an integral cog in the plan, promising stability and commitment on a huge scale. Unlike a for-profit company, Duke would

never go out of business or relocate its headquarters. But Duke couldn’t do it alone either, nor did it want to. The university didn’t want to buy property downtown. Because Duke is a nonprofit, buying downtown property would remove it from the tax rolls, eliminating revenue needed to support the roads and other infrastructure in the area. And the university, while wanting to help downtown improve, wasn’t in the development business itself, nor did it want to simply build a new campus. “We don’t want downtown Durham to be downtown Duke,” said Scott Selig, Duke’s associate vicepresident for capital assets. “That wouldn’t be interesting. We wanted an eclectic place with a broad economic base.”

So Duke didn’t agree to lease 100,000 square feet at American Tobacco until three for-profit companies agreed to lease, collectively at least that much space as well. Duke officials knew the project needed more than Duke; it needed large, healthy firms with large workforces.

Meanwhile, those for-profit companies, like McKinney, took the leap in part because of Duke’s involvement. “Duke became that creditworthy client that let us get so many other projects going,” said Bill Kalkhof, president of Downtown Durham, Inc., a nonprofit that promotes area revitalization. “Duke has easily been one of the most influential players downtown, and in terms of leasing office space, the most influential.”

McKinney was an early tenant along with Glaxo, the drug company, and Compuware, the software firm run by Peter Karmanos, who also owns the Carolina Hurricanes hockey team. Glaxo has since left, but McKinney and Compuware are still there along with about 60 other ventures.

Another sign of the mutually-beneficial relationship—as McKinney was negotiating its lease at American Tobacco, Duke was close to signing its own lease on office space there. “Duke stood with us to make sure we were happy with our lease before they signed theirs,” Brinegar said. “A lot of what we got wouldn’t have happened without Duke standing behind us.”

In its downtown Raleigh location, the McKinney ad agency occupied 42,000 square feet of clunky, inconvenient real estate on five floors which accommodates 147 people. But the space in Durham, by comparison, was

The buildings themselves played a crucial role. American Tobacco is a complex of more than a dozen century-old buildings, all used at first to manufacture and store cigarettes. Flush with money at the turn of last century, American Tobacco built them to last, with strong construction and distinctive detailing. They’re huge, wide and for the most part, rectangular—perfect spaces for a myriad of businesses. “These buildings worked 100 years ago, they work now and they’ll probably work 100 years from now because they’re big, open boxes,” Selig said.

While the largest and most visible downtown revitalization effort, American Tobacco is one of several success stories there. Duke claims space in West Village, an office, retail and housing project just off the downtown loop, as well as 50,000 square feet in Brightleaf Square, another funky retail/office complex nearby. Moreover, the university has 500 employees on six floors of the Durham Centre, where Duke runs the world’s largest academic clinical research organization. In all, Duke now has at least 1,800 employees from 15 or more campus units occupying more than 500,000 square feet of downtown space. Duke recently contracted to purchase its first downtown facility, the 114,000 square-foot Carmichael Building, where tobacco was once dried and stored.

At American Tobacco, there are nine Duke units among the 60 or so businesses occupying space in 14 gleaming buildings. Once decrepit and dreary, this complex now buzzes with activity, life and energy. A person can get a haircut, have a slice of pizza, throw back a brew at the sports bar, or learn to make a soufflé at the art and cooking institute.

Durham is both idyllic and urban, densely populated and serene. During the mid-day bustle, some employees and visitors stop to catch their breath and watch the lazy river built into the center of the complex as it meanders from one end to the other. Overhead, the stark, white water tower, still emblazoned “Lucky Strike,” keeps watch. Many of the visitors to Durham stop at Tyler’s Taproom for a beer or a burger. This restaurant, too, has Duke to thank for some of its success.

“Duke made a commitment to the area,” said Rusty Privett, general manager of the restaurant, which opened its American Tobacco location in 2005. “With the amount of space it took up, it was a signal to other business that this will be lasting.”

» In all, Duke now has at least 1,800 employees from 15 or more campus units occupying more than 500,000 square feet of downtown space. «

the same square footage but accommodated up to 217 people on 1.5 floors. The firm had one conference room in Raleigh; in Durham, it has 12, making it easier to create ad campaigns for heavy-hitting national companies like Nationwide Insurance and Sherwin Williams, and which gave the world the Travelocity gnome.

The addition of more creative space was just the right style so for our, “Left-brain and rightbrain people to collaborate,” Brinegar said.

“And we could configure it any way we wanted to.” What’s more, when Brinegar proposed his plan to move to American Tobacco, he was the sole employee living in Durham. Now, 100 McKinney employees and their families live in Durham, Brinegar said.

The American Tobacco redevelopment could have failed for many reasons. It required strong partnership with city and county governments, each of which ponied up one of the two downtown parking decks upon which local businesses and the steady stream of patrons to the four-year-old Durham Performing Arts Center are reliant. It required a flexible landlord. Selig, Duke’s real estate expert, credits Goodmon for working with individual tenants to make the best possible deals. And, the economy cooperated. Had the project come along in a rockier economic climate, like today, “It couldn’t have happened,” Selig said.

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Academia

Global Energy Management Program

Global Energy Management and The Art of Human Capital

By Michael Connors

G

reat economic hardship has a way of uncovering fundamental needs and weaknesses in a society that better times may have masked. What has become painfully clear over the last few years is that we must invest in the skills and knowledge of our people if we are to compete in a global market. We are in dire need of skilled human capital. Facing this challenge, educational institutions have recognized that past models and assumptions no longer apply; this is where the University of Colorado Denver (UCD) Business School steps in. Understanding that the energy industry is changing and undergoing constant transformation, Col. John Turner, Ph.D., executive director of the Global Energy Management (GEM) program ( 36 )

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at the UCD Business School, designed and implemented a curriculum that addresses some of the core needs in the industry. But he did not do this alone. Turner relentlessly pursued the involvement and input from leaders in the energy industry to create a flexible and dynamic learning environment that solves some of the industry’s core challenges. Like many other industries, energy is undergoing a generational shift that will ultimately result in the loss of much tribal knowledge, and there needs to be a way to mold talented workers into the leaders of the future. The solution, then, is a course designed to impart leadership skills and the ability to recognize industry trends for a generation of leaders in the industry. The result is a truly unique curriculum specifically designed with the needs of the industry in

mind, based on a collaborative infrastructure that informs and guides students to succeed in the energy industry.

Ideally, education should be inextricably linked to the world in meaningful ways, designed to identify challenges and needs within society and give people the skills to remedy those challenges and fill the need.

The UCD Business School has taken this philosophy to heart with the creation of the GEM program. Turner, a retired U.S Air Force colonel, is a man of action and knows how to move ideas into reality. When he crafted the program, he acknowledged that, “We want this to be a pragmatic degree that solves a problem in the industry and not an academic degree.” He began with help from the Canadian Consulate by calling on energy companies door-to-door, advancing the idea of a partnership between the UCD Business School and the energy industry. To achieve industry and educational goals, the program is designed around a synergetic model that is flexible enough to accommodate people in the midst of a career. Turner outlined the program thusly, “We do a 36 semester-hour program that takes 18 months to complete. It is a hybrid-online format where we bring the students and professors together at the start of each term for four days. In four days, they get 40 hours of instruction. They get to know each other, and in each class, the students do a group project on a current energy issue.”

The need for teamwork and collaboration is also highlighted in the course outline: “When you enroll in the GEM program, you will be part of a cohort, which means you and your classmates will progress through the program together. The GEM program requires that all students work in pre-determined teams each quarter.” Turner found that the hybrid approach has many benefits because

» Ideally, education should be inextricably linked to the world in meaningful ways, designed to identify challenges and needs within society and give people the skills to remedy those challenges and fill the need. «

it combines flexibility afforded by technology but also incorporates a social element that also helps students network with past graduates and people in the field. So not only was the program created in conjunction with the energy industry, it is implemented and administered in a truly reciprocal way.

The GEM program today is supported and endorsed by companies like Xcel, NREL, Pioneer Natural Resources, Bill Barrett, Colorado Oil & Gas Association, Blue Sun, and the Governors Energy Office, just to name a few. Representatives from these organizations sit on councils that help guide and assess the programs quality and relevance to the industry as well as the caliber of the content.

One of the initial supporters to help make GEM possible was EnCana Oil and Gas, a Canadian firm specializing in oil and gas production.

Rumor has it that Turner and Don McClure, EnCana’s VP of finances and business services envisioned the program over a beer. EnCana was an early contributor as well, donating $1 million to the initial development of office space and infrastructure. And with their help, the first class began in January, 2009.

Joyce Witte, community investment advisor for EnCana, assessed the importance of the program by saying, “The quality of the students coming out of the program is important for the industry as a whole because all ships rise with the same water. We feel that the industry will be led by younger people that have a keen business perspective and can make tough decisions in a global environment without the benefit of 30 years of experience under their belt.

When you can bring industry into the collaboration from an educational standpoint, you are looking at current challenges, real life scenarios, and future modeling in a way that is extremely relevant to current and future decisions that they would need to make in the business environment.”

Witte noted that academia is often based on theory and tends to have a historical perspective. Problems and models are examined, and solved and then those examples are taught over and over again. The GEM program

» The GEM program is based on an intuitive approach to the industry that assumes dynamic, fluid and ever-changing realities that face the industry, and this is GEM’s inherent value. «

is based on an intuitive approach to the industry that assumes dynamic, fluid and ever-changing realities that face the industry, and this is GEM’s inherent value.

Looking forward, Turner pointed out that it is not just companies in the traditional fuels arena interested in supporting the program. Several representatives from the renewable energy industry sit on advisory boards for GEM. When asked why supporters might be interested in establishing renewable energy courses, he remarked, “We’ve had people like Vestas (on the board), and we have used people from the biofuels and solar area. We are working with REpower, and the governor’s energy office. They have been a big supporter from the beginning. About 40 percent of our students are looking at careers in renewables and that number has been increasing. But it started with the oil and gas industry.”

Right from the get-go EnCana, Forrest Oil, Pioneer and Banko Petroleum all insisted that the curriculum balance traditional with renewables for two reasons: All of the companies are expecting that they will go into the renewables someday and they want their people to know the right stuff, and because, right now the traditional oil and gas competitors and the companies want to better understand what they do.

Essentially, the GEM program recognizes the capricious environment of energy, energy policy and production, and is designed to accommodate those changes and give its graduates the abilities to recognize larger trends in the industry. These skills help graduates move into higher positions within the company and guide their organizations through the energy mine fields. Consequently, it is no wonder 45 percent of GEM’s graduates receive a promotion or raise within six months of completing the program. Turner noted that they had looked at programs all over the world and the GEM program is truly one of a kind. By incorporating the best practices in education with the enterprising and entrepreneurial spirit of the folks in the energy sector, UCD’s GEM program is a full-fledged success with a dazzlingly bright future.

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BUSINESS

Rebuilding Our Infrastructure

Rebuilding Our

Infrastructure Collaborating Through Public-Private Partnerships By John H. Ma

M

uch has been written recently about the poor state of the United States’ infrastructure.

We endure crumbling roads clogged with traffic in our major cities, failing bridges, and airports operating near capacity and in urgent need of upgrades. Many of our water and sewer systems are over a century old and desperately require major maintenance.

Meanwhile, countries in Europe, Asia and elsewhere seem to have raced ahead of the United States in infrastructure development, boasting speedy and environmentally friendly high-speed rail systems, sleek modern airports, and huge modern container ports buzzing with economic activity. America’s poor infrastructure condition has become a point of national anxiety, reflecting broader national angst over our global competitiveness and economic strength.

Expert studies confirm the level of disrepair we experience in our daily commutes: the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) latest annual report card on American infrastructure gives us a grade of “D”.

According to ASCE, the country needs to spend $2.2 trillion over the next five years just to get things to an acceptable condition.

Meanwhile, infrastructure spending in the United States has steadily declined since the 1950s, as a percentage of our GDP, to roughly 2.6 percent, versus upwards of 9 percent in rapidly modernizing countries like China.

While this problem looms ever larger in our national consciousness, federal and state governments continue to struggle with how to fund and finance our infrastructure

deficit. Budget crises, limited appetite for tax increases, political gridlock, and challenging financial markets have all conspired to limit the alternatives government leaders have to address the problem.

However, one innovative new tool that state and local governments have begun to turn to for building and rehabilitating infrastructure are public-private partnerships, otherwise known as PPPs or P3s. In the public-private partnership model, private-sector developers partner with public agencies to design, build,

» The challenge for Maryland was that to accommodate the larger container vessels, the Seagirt facility needed a major $350 million upgrade including a new deep-water berth and cargo moving cranes. « ( 38 )

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operate and maintain transportation, energy, water and other critical infrastructure assets.

Typically, the developers raise private financing to get the projects built, thus freeing the government from some of the direct financial burden. To ensure that everything is built and operated according to strict standards, government provides guidelines and ongoing oversight.

In bringing together governments, developers and operators, along with private capital, these projects represent innovative collaborations among groups that do not typically work together. While these partnerships have their share of critics and skeptics, many advocate that PPPs offer a useful alternative to address at least part of the infrastructure gap in America at a time when traditional approaches have been limited.

Traditionally in America, government infrastructure – a road, airport, or water system, for example – is planned, designed, operated and financed entirely by the

government itself. Private contractors might be hired to do some key tasks such as the project construction. But the private sector’s role is fairly limited as government seeks to maintain control of these large public works projects. Operations, maintenance and repairs are left to government and municipal agencies as well. To finance major projects, governments look to a variety of sources, but very often issue tax-exempt municipal debt backed by tax revenues or other fees.

Under a PPP model, while government maintains overall project control and oversight, the private sector assumes much greater responsibility for the project. Agreements take the form of a long-term lease or contract period ranging anywhere from 20 to 50 or more years.

The private entity collects revenues from the asset – either from direct user fees such as tolls, utility charges, or facility fees, or direct payments from the government over the lease period – in return for its upfront capital investment and responsibility for ongoing operating expenses.

What are the benefits of this approach?

First, the developer takes the financial, construction, and operating risk for the asset.

In other words, the pain of cost over-runs or project delays falls to the private sector. While this risk transfer may sound like an abstract legalistic benefit, one need only look at projects like Boston’s Big Dig or other major public projects to see how large an issue delays and cost over-runs can be.

» For major institutional investors such as pension funds, infrastructure also offers the appeal of providing a longterm investment opportunity, matching their longer-term investment horizons. «

Through its significant capital investment, the private entities are incentivized to manage and operate each asset very carefully, as if they were the owner. Stories abound of private developers in PPP projects who actually spend more in upfront construction costs on a road or building or utility system in order to lower long-term life-cycle maintenance costs over time. It’s not unlike how you or I might approach replacing the roof on our house, repaving our driveway, or even repairing our car. Spend a little more and have it cost less to maintain over time? Might be worth it. Spend some more time and money and have the oil changed regularly so you can get more mileage out of that engine? Of course!

You may ask what prevents our government from making these wise investment decisions itself, and operating the assets for the longterm. The answer is that, while there is nothing inherent that prevents it from doing so, the many competing and changing priorities of government

and its leadership can make it difficult to manage complex infrastructure assets for the long-term. While government plays a critical role in setting priorities and long-term planning, when it comes to actually fixing ageing pipes and upgrading airport terminals it often falls victim to the latest budget gap or other legislative priority, and the needed steps are deferred.

Critics argue that PPPs are just another expensive financing mechanism and that these deals are

tantamount to selling assets or mortgaging the future. Nevertheless, the track record of PPPs internationally, as well as the handful of examples in the United States points to savings to the government through these partnerships with the private sector. Importantly, these PPPs offer the promise of drawing new private capital sources into a sector badly in need of investment.

ort of Baltimore’s P Seagirt Container Terminal One recent, successful example of the PPP approach was the Seagirt Container Port Terminal Project in Baltimore, Maryland, an agreement struck in early 2010. Seagirt is the main container port terminal serving Baltimore and a major trade station in the mid-Atlantic.

With the widening of the Panama Canal expected to be completed in 2014, Maryland, along with other eastern states, anticipates an

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BUSINESS

Rebuilding Our Infrastructure

increase in larger container ships from Asia sailing directly to the East Coast of the United States rather than dropping off cargo on the West Coast and having the boxes make the inland journey by rail and truck.

For several years, state and local port officials saw the Panama Canal’s widening as an important opportunity to capture a greater share of East Coast container trade given Baltimore’s natural deep-water harbor. With an eye of Baltimore’s economic competitiveness as a trade hub, officials focused on having the facility open for business by 2014.

The challenge for Maryland was that to accommodate the larger container vessels, the Seagirt facility needed a major $350 million upgrade including a new deep-water berth and cargo moving cranes. But Maryland’s budgetary constraints would have meant either a delay in funding the project or raising debt and straining its valuable AAA credit rating.

Enter the public-private partnership.

After running a competitive procurement process, the state selected Ports America Baltimore, a privately held port-operator backed by New York-based infrastructure investment firm Highstar Capital, to finance, design, expand, and operate the improved Seagirt facility under a 50-year lease arrangement. Ports America put significant equity capital into the project and raised an additional $250 million of financing. The State of Maryland, in addition to ensuring that the Seagirt expansion and upgrade would take place by 2014, generated proceeds to finance other state-wide transportation projects. The project as a whole is expected to create more than five thousand permanent and construction-related jobs.

Maryland Governor Martin O’Malley, writing in Politico jointly with Christopher Lee, the head of Highstar Capital, touted the project’s innovative and collaborative PPP approach: “Even as the state government must do more with less, Maryland must continue to make critical investments that build the foundation for long-term economic growth and prosperity. Accordingly, the PPP model became a crucial tool for investing in the state’s competitiveness and for creating many jobs that can help Maryland recover and grow.”

What the Private Sector Sees From the private sector’s perspective, what is the attraction of working in partnership with governments? In recent years, infrastructure has become an increasingly attractive area for private investment. It is viewed as a stable, ( 40 )

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» Through PPPs, RTD’s leadership saw an opportunity to save both time and money and ensure that the agency ultimately delivered the project to the public on time and on budget. « durable area for investment and less prone to the cyclical ups and downs of traditional asset classes such as stocks or real estate.

Importantly, for major institutional investors such as pension funds, infrastructure also offers the appeal of providing a long-term investment opportunity, matching their longerterm investment horizons. Globally, pension funds have been major players in infrastructure investment. Major financial players on Wall Street have also moved into the area, with several funds established over the last five years focused on investment in roads, ports, utilities and pipelines.

Of course, given the dire infrastructure needs in America, investors also see a significant growth opportunity. While PPPs are relatively new to the country, many believe that the large infrastructure gap in the United States will lead to significantly more projects in the years to come. While the vast majority of public works remain financed through taxexempt municipal debt and other traditional financing mechanisms, many observers believe that these traditional approaches cannot fully address the scope of the needs.

Investors, along with state and local governments, need only look to places such as Canada, the U.K., and Australia for examples of the broad role that PPPs can play in infrastructure development. In each of those countries, PPPs have been employed to develop and build not only roads and bridges, but also a broad array of government facilities such as hospitals, schools, and courthouses, as well as services such as waste collection and other utilities. In each country, the PPP approach has been woven into the fabric of how government

thinks about asset delivery. Legislative frameworks are in place and contracts are well developed, leading to a steady stream of projects for government and the private sector to collaborate on together.

Denver’s RTD FasTrack’s Transit PPP In the United States however, projects remain pathfinders, requiring significant leadership and an appetite for innovation. In addition to the Port of Baltimore, another example of a recent PPP success story can be found in Denver. The Regional Transportation District (RTD) began looking at PPPs several years ago as a way to deliver its ambitious multi-billion dollar FasTracks transit system build-out and expansion, involving over 100 miles of new transit and light rail systems in addition to expanded bus lanes and other services. FasTracks was viewed as critical to the region’s long-term economic growth prospects.

RTD saw how quickly project costs could escalate and timelines could shift, quickly upending carefully laid budgets and financial plans. Though the FasTracks program was funded through a voter-approved local sales tax increase, RTD needed to maximize the value of its dollars in order to deliver the ambitious scope it envisioned. Through PPPs, RTD’s leadership saw an opportunity to save both time and money and ensure that the agency ultimately delivered the project to the public on time and on budget.

After a long and carefully planned competitive procurement, RTD selected the Denver Transit Partners consortium, led

by US-based construction and engineering firm Fluor and Australian investment group Macquarie Capital, to build and operate several key segments of its FasTracks program over a period of approximately 40 years. The Eagle project totaled over $2.1 billion and represents the first transit PPP in the country.

Through the PPP approach, RTD believes it has saved potentially hundreds of millions of dollars versus what it budgeted with a traditional government-built and operated approach; in addition, the private concessionaire committed to delivering the project nearly one year sooner than what RTD had planned on its own.

“It is a remarkable achievement for RTD to get a project of this magnitude through a public-private partnership that meets our goal of contracting under our budget and ahead of our schedule,” said RTD Chair Lee Kemp in announcing the transaction. “We said three years ago that public-private partnerships would be a vital part of keeping our FasTracks program moving forward.”

Significant Barriers and Challenges Remain Public-private infrastructure projects are not without their challenges. Perhaps the greatest barriers are distrust between the government and the private sector and the lack of an established history of these types of arrangements in the United States. PPPs, for now, remain collaborations between uneasy bedfellows.

Governments and the public at large are wary of private sector profit motives. They wonder aloud whether the profit motive can be consistent with keeping promises on how the assets are built and maintained. Though critical features such as toll rates and maintenance standards are strictly regulated under PPP agreements, these deals play into public fears that toll rates will rise unchecked.

The private sector, in turn, is wary of what they call political risk – that the hue and cry from the public over toll rates or broader budget battles can lead the government to renege on its promises to make payments or not unduly interfere with how the asset is managed.

Given the relative lack of track-record and history in the United States of PPP projects, these transactions often become political debates about transportation policy, spending priorities, tolling, attitudes towards organized labor, and foreign investment, among other issues.

The roster of PPP projects that have fallen victim to the politics of such deals is lengthy: the proposed $12.8 billion long-term concession of the Pennsylvania Turnpike in 2008 was scuttled by the state legislature, the concession of the City of Pittsburgh’s municipal parking system in 2010 was turned down by the City Council, and a proposed toll road project in Texas in 2007 was awarded then reversed.

Unlike foreign countries where PPPs have enjoyed greater success and longer track records, few U.S. states have enabling legislation in place to allow PPPs on a programmatic basis. At least for now, PPPs in most states happen on an ad hoc or caseby-case basis, requiring legislative or other political approval.

Given all this, it is little wonder that elected officials have been cautious in proposing these approaches. Why expend political capital and dare to be different, all for an experimental approach to something as unsexy as infrastructure, unless you have no other options?

The Outlook Yet, given the rising awareness that we have an infrastructure crisis in America, momentum behind PPPs seems to be picking up. Our prolonged fiscal crisis has only accelerated the pressure to try something new that can accelerate the construction of projects and make them more cost-effective.

Compared to five years ago, the list of states and regions exploring PPPs is growing.

California, Virginia, Florida, Indiana, Texas, and Puerto Rico have all taken steps to make PPPs an option for their major infrastructure projects. In New York, the Port Authority has begun a process to strike a $1 billion publicprivate partnership to rebuild and operate the aging Goethals Bridge, a critical transportation

» Public-private infrastructure projects are not without their challenges. Perhaps the greatest barriers are distrust between the government and the private sector. PPPs, for now, remain collaborations between uneasy bedfellows. «

connection in the region, affecting not just commuters but also the heavy container cargo trade that emanates from the New York/ New Jersey region harbors. New York City is reportedly looking at PPPs for a range of city infrastructure including energy and water and wastewater systems. Indiana and Kentucky are jointly exploring a PPP approach to build an ambitious bridge project in Louisville.

Basic infrastructure can represent many things to many groups: jobs, economic vitality, global trade, profits, stability, and effective government. In some respects, it is a measure of the country itself. As such, it has the power to bring together disparate groups from various spheres and interests.

Just recently, spurred to collaborate by the incentive of job creation, the AFL-CIO announced a $10 billion initiative to invest in infrastructure projects in partnership with pension fund managers, government and other business groups. “America’s building trades unions are ready, willing and able to work with any and all partners to map out a multi-year plan of infrastructure investment,” said Mark Ayers, president of the Building and Construction Trades Department, AFL-CIO. It is not often that you see organized labor, Wall Street groups and government standing alongside one another talking about financial investments.

Given the potential of public-private partnerships to align various needs and interests, and to provide effective solutions to the infrastructure crisis, what is needed to drive things forward? Political leadership and support are essential as long as PPPs remain new and are viewed as untested. Many groups involved in infrastructure planning and development remain wary of PPPs given their entrenched interest in how the status quo works.

And, let’s face it, while infrastructure has become a bit of a buzzword and a hot topic in recent years, it remains difficult for politicians facing a two or four year electoral cycle to get “electrified” about large public works projects that can take years to get built.

Yet, success begets success; and so, the stories of Baltimore’s Seagirt port terminal and Denver’s RTD transit program will hopefully pave the way for more states and cities to evaluate PPPs as an alternative in their arsenal of ways to tackle the broader issue: building and fixing the infrastructure of America.

John H. Ma was recently a managing director in the Investment Banking Division of Goldman, Sachs & Co. where he headed the Firm’s U.S. infrastructure banking practice.

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BUSINESS

CH2M HILL

CH2M HILL Cutting-edge Engineering in Every Corner of the Globe By Kim DeCoste

I

t might be hard to imagine what Pima County, Arizona and the West Basin of the Los Angeles Valley have in common, but like so many highly populated areas in the west and indeed around the country and the world, they are faced with water use issues and the demands an expanding population places on the natural resources. For one area, it’s not hard to understand really. The middle of the desert where vibrant cities like Tucson flourish is a logical place for water to be precious. In the western and south bay areas of Los Angeles, however, many of the cities served by west basin water have the word beach in their names—Hermosa, Redondo, Manhattan and others. They are water-front cities that need to find effective ways to reclaim and conserve the water as much as those in the desert.

The common thread for these two areas is now the connection to CH2M HILL , a global leader in consulting, design, design-build, operations and program management for government, civil, industrial and energy clients which is tucked quietly away in Englewood, south of Denver, Colorado.

CH2M HILL is one of the most highly regarded firms of its type in the world and it is involved in many of the most cutting-edge projects in civil engineering from the Arctic to just about every corner of the globe. It currently employs 23,000 employees and has annual revenue of U.S. $6.3 billion, and is employee-owned. The firm’s record of social responsibility is impressive and it has been listed among FORTUNE 100 Best Companies to Work For five times and named one of the World’s Most Ethical Companies by Ethisphere for three consecutive years. CH2M HILL is also ranked as an industry leader in program and construction management and as a design firm by Engineering News-Record and

named as a leader in sustainable engineering

by Verdanitix. This company has humble origins and few people know how integral water has been to its evolution since 1946 in Corvallis, Oregon.

In Oregon in 1946, an idea came to fruition when three civil engineering students and their devoted professor saw the needs of the post WWII economy, which demanded smart, flexible engineering solutions. The four men, Holly Cornell, Burke Hayes, Jim Howland and Fred Merryfield (thus the CH2M) were convinced that they could apply their skills effectively, and with the right mix of support, determination and skill, they launched a successful firm with the simple philosophy that if they hired good people, remained flexible and shared the wealth, they would succeed.

They certainly did.

By 1969, they had completed 5,000 successful projects and employed over 300 people. Their gross revenue in the U.S. was $6.2 million. It was a 1971 first-of-its kind water project for Lake Tahoe that garnered national press coverage from The Wall Street Journal and Reader’s Digest that finally put them on the public map. It was also in 1971 that the firm merged with Claire A. Hill & Associates of Redding, California after the completion of the Tahoe project that gave them the name they now bear.

The company continued its successful trajectory on key international projects over the coming 30+ years as it expanded internationally. CH2M HILL’s successful track record on projects in the Middle East, the Panama Canal and others highlighted its ability to drive successful projects to completion, often shaving millions in costs and years of time off of highly visible complex projects such as the cleanup of the Rocky Flats Closure Project. That project alone was completed 60 years and $30 billion ahead of schedule.

Staggering success by any measure!

The ascension of Lee McIntire from president of operations to the helm as CEO in 2009 marked an important point.

Challenging economic issues faced many, but for CH2M HILL, there was also opportunity to address global challenges surrounding the environment, energy and water resources.

They’ve worked on the world’s first sustainable city, Masdar, near Dubai, and continue working on the Panama Canal Project. Closer to home, in the United States, they will now be driving the success of the West Basin Water Project as well as the Pima County Water Reclamation Facility.

» The four men were convinced that they could apply their skills effectively, and with the right mix of support, determination and skill, they launched a successful firm with the simple philosophy that if they hired good people, remained flexible and shared the wealth, they would succeed.They certainly did. «

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BUSINESS

CH2M HILL

Pima County Pima County is the home to Tucson, Arizona and sits in the northern part of the Sonoran Desert. It was the second largest of the original four Arizona counties, and like many places, came into being as a Presidio (or outpost) to Mexican explorers traveling north along the Santa Cruz River to San Francisco.

Tuquison, as it was initially called, was the northern-most Mexican outpost through the middle of the 19th century. From its original 356 settlers, it is now the city of Tucson, Arizona’s second-largest city and home to the University of Arizona. The 2005 census data puts the population just under 850,000.

Pima County just broke ground on this project at the end of June, 2011. It will be a new wastewater facility to replace the Roger Road Wastewater Treatment Facility, which was built in the 1950s. The new facility will have the capacity to treat 32 million gallons of wastewater per day and is part of a county reclamation campus. It will reduce nitrogen and ammonia in effluent, which is currently discharged into the Santa Cruz River.

At the groundbreaking ceremony, Senior Vice President Dan Reynolds said, “…thanks to the county for the opportunity to participate in this landmark project. The water campus is part of the largest project that Pima County has ever awarded in its history. Their foresight will protect the environment and water supplies in Pima County for decades to come.”

The county has a broader Regional Optimization Master Plan that will deal with sewage treatment operations and is scheduled to be completed in 2014. The current scope of engagement puts CH2M HILL at the head

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» CH2M HILL’s successful track record on projects in the Middle East, the Panama Canal and others highlighted its ability to drive successful projects to completion, often shaving millions in costs and years of time off of highly visible complex projects. « of the operation- designing, building, and then operating the facility for 15 years with a budget for the Water Campus slated to be $215 million.

West Basin Municipal Water District Los Angeles as we now know it today is a far cry from the pueblo that began with a tough-to-recruit motley group of 12 settlers and 45 soldiers in 1871 called pobladores, who gathered at the Mission in San Gabriel, just outside of what is today, Pasadena, California.

At that time, Los Angeles was part of a lush flood plain where trees and rivers were

abundant, and the naturally fertile land easily sustained and supported the communities being built upon it. But growth happened very quickly. From fewer than 5,000 people in 1870 to more than 100,000 by 1900, the city was clearly becoming a mecca. The completion of rail lines, discovery of oil, climate and other factors continue to drive population growth.

By the turn of the 20th century, with the addition of the film and garment industries, Los Angeles was firmly set in a path of growth that would place increased demand on finite resources. The trend never abated. And though the Los Angeles River supported the growth of the first 120 years of the city’s development, it was clear that water from afar would at some point be needed. Southern California, though lush, is a semi-arid climate. Southern Californians ignored that for generations.

Recent census data puts the population of Los Angeles county at 3.8 million and Greater Los Angeles (L.A. and Orange County) at just over 12.8 million. Most of the 12.8 million people travel, live and work freely in the L.A. area and do impact water consumption in the area. The West Basin covers 18 cities and unincorporated areas in southwest Los Angeles Counties, and the West Basin Municipal Water District (WBMWD) began its water recycling program with CH2M HILL in 1990 in an effort to conserve available drinking water and to attempt to minimize its dependence on outside water sources.

Whether building zero-carbon footprint cities, wastewater treatment facilities, or water recycling efforts, CH2M HILL is certainly a leading firm with the know-how and expertise to help clients achieve success.

Denver World Affairs Council

Save the Date - Fall 2011

September 21, 2011 Anthony Shaffer “21st Century Terrorist Threats – And the Path We Need to Follow”

November 16, 2011 Stewart Patrick “Weak Links: Fragile States, Global Threats, and International Security”

September 30, 2011 Diplomats Ball: A Celebration of Ping Pong Diplomacy

December 8, 2011 Phil Wilcox “Israel and Palestine”

October 12, 2011 Moeed Yusuf “U.S., Pakistan, And the End-Game in Afghanistan: Making a Broken Partnership Work” October 19, 2011 Charles Freeman “China on the Rise: Replacing the U.S. as the World’s ‘Indispensable Nation’?”

To register for these events or to find information on venues, times and speaker biographies, visit www.rockymountainiie.org or call 303-837-0788 x 10.

October 27, 2011 Christine Fair “Political and Military Affairs in South Asia” November 1, 2011 Robin Wright “Rock the Casbah: Rage and Rebellion across the Islamic World”

2011 Denver World Affairs Council Sponsor The Denver World Affairs Council is a community service of the Institute of International Education, a world leader in the exchange of people and ideas for mutual understanding.

Join our world-wise community and globalize yourself!

BUSINESS

Alstom: Cutting-Edge Clean Energy Manufacturing

Alstom Chattanooga factory

Alstom Chat•ta •noo• ga By Maria E. Luna

C

hattanooga Alstom is a gleaming example of how smart investments in the right infrastructure are a foundation in manufacturing which will change the ability in the United States to compete in global markets. The facility provides energy components to power plants, which in turn, fuels infrastructure. This niche as important, as it is also said by President and CEO of Alstom in the U.S. and Canada, Pierre Gauthier, to be “a perfect example of how the right infrastructure investments attract businesses that cascade benefits throughout the local and national economies.” Infrastructure investments need modernization through collaborations between people, technology, and control/support systems.

Alstom developed the Chattanooga facility to be the center for excellence for power generation technologies in North America.

The world’s largest turbines are engineered and manufactured in Chattanooga, Tennessee by Alstom. Alstom invested $300 million in the facility. Being the biggest is in this facility’s ( 46 )

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culture since it is also the largest rotor over speed balancing facility in the world. Turbines are used in power generation for fossil steam, nuclear and gas power plants. Not only is there manufacturing and rotor balancing, but the facility is state-of-the-art and is committed to using clean energy, and as such, has LEED Gold certification . The facility also retrofits projects so the range of services for customers is extensive. Alstom is not only in Chattanooga, but it is in 26 different locations employing 8,500 people in North America. Specifically, this facility alone created 350 new jobs.

The balancing facility assures that rotors experience no vibration during normal operation. Alstom Chattanooga is capable of balancing rotors that weigh up to 350 metric tons, are 22 meters long, have a diameter up to eight meters and have a maximum speed of 4,500 rpm. For visualization, the average car could fit into a balancing chamber. The size is of importance to the nuclear energy industry as it can retrofit existing parts to make them more efficient and build equipment for the next generation of power plants. Services for major power plant components are rotor and casing for steam turbine assembly, rotor and final assembly for gas turbines, production of turbo-generators, and production of moisture separator re-heaters and other heat exchangers.

Chattanooga is in the heart of the industry.

The location is of significance due to the comprehensive roads, rails giving access to heavy freight, and waterways available to the city of Chattanooga. Therefore the strategic

Birds' eye view of Alstom's new state-of-the-art clean power Chattanooga factory

Full Steam Ahead

O

n August 8, 2011, two new turbines left the Alstom Chattanooga facility in the factory’s first water delivery going upstream to Exelon Corporations’ Dresden nuclear power plant in Morris, Illinois. Each steam turbine is 35 feet long, weighs 130 tons and stands 15 ft. tall. The fully bladed rotor is traveling on a barge in a finished state. In the past, turbines needed to be assembled on site due to the cost of road and/or rail delivery. The 10-day water transit will cross over 1,000 miles, travel on four U.S. rivers – the Tennessee, Ohio, Mississippi and Illinois. This method of transit has now proven to be cost effective. location means rapid fulfillment and simplified transportation logistics for customers. Alstom Chattanooga’s barge dock on the banks of the Tennessee River is equipped with a 1,000 ton lifting crane, which is a well thought out endeavor since 80 percent of North America’s power plants, existing and planned, are accessible from the Tennessee River.

LEED is a rating system that guides construction in producing high performance buildings that are not only better for the environment but for the people who work there, and in comparison to other buildings are more profitable. LEED Gold certification requires high standards in six categories: sustainable sites, water efficiency, energy and atmosphere, materials and resources, indoor environmental quality, innovation in design, and lastly, regional priority. The scale is based on 100 points. LEED Gold ranges 60-79 points. This is a benchmark of excellence for a manufacturing facility. The Chattanooga facility specifically has done the following to reach Gold certification: Recycling • More than 3,400 tons of steel (226 truckloads) were recycled during construction of the plant.

• Concrete debris from the construction was used for road construction • One pre-engineered building was given to a local high school for use as a sports training facility, and another is being use by an alternative energy company.

• A ir conditioning units have been donated to the city of Chattanooga.

• Glass doors and storm doors, windows and

» 80 percent of North America’s power plants, existing and planned, are accessible from the Tennessee River. « light fixtures have been given to Habitat for Humanity for use in local housing projects.

Sustainable design • Efficiency upgrades lowered energy consumption by 35 percent.

• Skylights provide lighting to 75 percent of the occupied space.

• Heat generated from manufacturing will supplement the Heating, Ventilation and Air Conditioning (HVAC) system.

• Captured rainwater will irrigate the terrain.

• Fifty percent of the property, excluding the building, was landscaped to minimize storm water run-off.

• The site promotes low-emission transportation with bicycle racks, preferential parking for low emission vehicles and public transportation access.

Through collaboration between Deborah Wince-Smith, president and CEO of the Council on Competitiveness, and Alstom, discussions have started to identify specific recommendations for infrastructure investment policies. These recommendations will be available through the National Manufacturing Strategy and presented during the National Manufacturing Summit in Washington, D.C. on December 7-8, 2011.

Alstom employees work on nuclear steam turbine rotor at new state-of-the-art clean power Chattanooga factory

Turbine being hoisted onto barge at Alstom riverdock.

(C) Alstom, 2011 / D. Barnett

Turbines on barge for transport. (C) Alstom, 2011 / D. Barnette

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BUSINESS

Komatsu Equipment Company

Building for

the Future Komatsu Equipment Company By Emily Haggstrom

E

quipment manufacturers and dealers hinge their businesses on growth and development across America. As work and jobs decline, so does the need for these suppliers; but as one Utah-based Komatsu-owned distributorship knows, if you build it, they will come. This distributorship proves that their key pieces in the heavy equipment industry are vital to continued development throughout Nevada, Utah and Wyoming, the tri-state territory they serve.

The precipice of business for Komatsu Equipment Company has always been rooted in customer service, by supporting and supplying mining and construction equipment in their region. The Company offers its customers a range of equipment from 1 ton compact hydraulic excavators to 360 ton haul trucks.

Komatsu America, the second-largest fully-integrated manufacturer and supplier of construction equipment in North

America realized the growth within Komatsu Equipment Company’s tri-state territory and expanded the current Salt Lake City facility to meet the growing demands of their customers. “We think this facility is truly state-of-the-art and will definitely help us better serve our customers, not just in Salt Lake City and the state of Utah, but throughout our three-state territory,” said Komatsu Equipment Company President John Pfisterer at the dedication of the company’s new facility last fall.

In just under one year, Komatsu Equipment Company expanded from their original 75,000-sq./ft. operations into a

brand new state-of-the-art 102,000 sq./ ft. green-enhanced facility. Because of its size, the new facility serves as the Western region-training center for Komatsu America providing up-to-date education on engine technology, EPA regulations, new models and machine monitoring technology to customers and employees.

The new facility also features a 12-bay service shop equipped with a dedicated paint bay; a rebuild center with 30 ton cranes for specialized mining equipment; a 360 ton track press for even the largest dozers and excavators; and a parts and warehouse department that can store more than 100,000 parts and components.

The increased storage, quicker repair turnover and emergency call-out service allow Komatsu Equipment Company to better serve customers like Flatiron Construction, Wadsworth Brothers Construction, Western States Contracting and Kennecott Utah Copper to achieve improved productivity in the work they do.

» Komatsu Equipment Company offers its customers a range of equipment from 1 ton compact hydraulic excavators to 360 ton haul trucks. «

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CHANGING THE WORLD!

ICOSA website - Text is outside of live area, too close to trim. Need to fit to specs.

WE ARE THRILLED FOR OUR BRAND NEW WEBSITE LAUNCH WWW.ICOSAMAG.COM! WE HOPE YOU WILL ALL ENJOY VISITING AND JOINING IN BY ADDING COMMENTS VIA THE BLOG AND FACEBOOK. PLEASE ALSO FOLLOW US ON TWITTER FOR UPDATES AND COME BACK REGULARLY FOR NEW FEATURES, VIDEOS, WRITE UPS, REVIEWS ETC

WWW.ICOSAMAG.COM

BUSINESS

Campos EPC

Pipeline Infrastructure Campos EPC - Engineering America’s Fuel Transportation By Matt Edgar

I

t’s seemingly inconsequential, but everyday some Americans take for granted that they can turn on their thermostat, warm water, chill food, and fill up on gas. The natural resources that society finds as necessities to daily life are readily available. Often, the end user of oil and natural gas puts little thought into the complex processes involved in converting natural resources into a useable product. All the while, energy producers and transportation companies are at work, exploring and recovering the fuel sources to help society, while simultaneously helping to power the nation’s economic engine.

After oil and gas are discovered and extracted, they must be transported to a refinery. Generally, the most efficient ( 50 )

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and economical means of transporting large amounts of oil and gas is through buried carbon steel pipelines. The pipeline infrastructure across the nation is an overwhelming network composed of massive multi-diameter pipelines that bring oil and gas from the well sites to the refining facilities, across rural areas and state lines, which will ultimately serve the end consumer.

One group serving the needs of the midstream sector is Campos EPC, LLC. The Denver-based firm, according to its web site, “has the capabilities to perform turnkey pipeline projects with specialized expertise in the areas of hazardous liquid and natural gas pipelines.” Its core business, however, is “helping natural and liquid gas transmission pipeline companies to develop

and implement their Pipeline Integrity Management Program,” says Jim Pyeatte, one of the firm’s principals.

Six years ago, the company was founded

by Marco Campos, a University of Colorado, Boulder engineering graduate, whose corporate website biography highlights his in-depth knowledge of pipeline operations, maintenance and construction, with an emphasis on Pipeline Integrity Management. In the firm’s early stages, Campos brought in other industry veterans, such as Jim Pyeatte, to “help the company grow strategically, utilizing my knowledge and network that I acquired over my career at Texaco Pipeline Inc.,” Pyeatte relayed.

Pipeline infrastructure requires intensive, on-going assessment and management regulated by the Department of Transportation that has developed codes to ensure that pipelines are constructed, maintained and operated in a safe manner; with minimal impact to the environment.

» Integrity management is a “formalized and documented process that assesses specific threats." «

Over the past 15 years, hazardous liquid and gas transmission pipeline companies have been forced to develop formalized Pipeline Integrity Management Programs in accordance with federal and state regulations.

Pyeatte explains that integrity management is a “formalized and documented process that assesses specific threats, inspects the pipeline using destructive and non-destructive techniques while developing and executing repair strategies to safely operate the pipeline until the next scheduled inspection, which typically occurs every five to seven years in high consequence areas depending on the product type.

Currently, the hazardous liquid industry has completed baseline assessments of all their pipelines in high consequence areas, whereas the natural gas pipeline industry has until December, 2012. Campos EPC supports clients nationwide, but locally the company has been focusing on clients such as Xcel Energy and MarkWest Hydrocarbon to support compliance with the December, 2012 deadline.

The first step of assessment is a thorough review of the documents for a particular pipeline, looking particularly at year built, pipe characteristics, appurtenances, valve types, historical modifications made to the pipeline, previous inspection results, leak history, etc.

Inspection tools like an Internal Line Inspection Tool (ILI), is used to run through the pipe using magnetic flux leakage principles to locate anomalies such as internal and external corrosion, mill anomalies and dents. The ILI tool collects data sent to a data analyst who interprets it much like a cardiologist reads a cardiogram.

In conjunction with a GPS, anomalies are

» "Increased regulation and scrutiny of the industry have been a positive for not only the consumer and the environment, but also for the company." «

identified, and problems within the pipeline can be easily located, in some cases within a few feet, and repairs can then be made.

Pressure testing is another assessment method used. In this long-used technique, water is pumped into the line and is pressurized between 125-150 percent of the maximum allowed operating pressure. The line must hold pressure to assure that there aren’t any critical anomalies in the line while also testing the strength of the pipeline. A rupture or leak during these tests indicates areas of weakness.

However, a limitation of this method is that it doesn’t identity areas of active erosion unless a rupture or leak occurs and the corrosion can be identified visually.

“Increased regulation and scrutiny of the industry have been a positive for not only the consumer and the environment, but also for the company,” states Campos. The firm has since doubled its revenue in the last three years, adding staff in areas like engineering, project management, procurement, and inspection.

With increased staffing and the continued need for pipelines to transport our nation’s energy, Campos EPC subs-out $7 million per year in field services work. By continuously updating its process and safety manuals, as well as its business model to better serve its clients, endusers of oil and gas can be assured that it is life as usual by not having to think about the colossal infrastructure running beneath their feet.

To learn more about Campos EPC, visit http:// www.camposepc.com or call 303.623.3345.

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BUSINESS

Refinery to Terminal Conversion

consider repurposing refinery sites that are often considered an eyesore.

Although these refining sites may have considerable environmental issues; they benefit from an installed base of infrastructure with multi-modal access, and have permits that can be transferred or re-instated. By using private funds and bringing in well capitalized energy companies as owners, ex-refining sites can be converted into useful sites that generate tax revenues for local governments and provide communities with well-paid, highly skilled jobs from a business model that can generate consistent cash flow.

HISTORY

Converting Refineries to

Terminals Creative Infrastructure Transactions Turn Inoperable Refineries into Growth Centers For Communities By Steve Crower, Greg Haas, and Emily Haggstrom

A refinery-to-terminal (RTT) conversion trend is unfolding in the North American and European refining markets. Dahlman Rose & Co. sees opportunity in restoring long-shuttered ex-refinery sites into productive storage and distribution terminals to serve growing global energy needs.

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O

VERVIEW

Several announced or completed RTT projects are repurposing operating and shuttered refineries in an industry that has been plagued by decades of excess refining capacity. An over supply of transportation fuels in developed economies is lowering refining margins and forcing owners and governmental agencies to

Currently in the United States there are 326 refinery sites of which 60 percent, or 196, are ex-refineries, they are obsolete, shut down and inoperable. Most of these ex-refineries were shut down as a result of the unintended consequences of generous U.S. government subsidies from the 1950s to the 1970s that led to the construction of hundreds of small, unsustainable refineries.

In general, energy feedstocks and refined fuel products are transported to and from an operating refinery using rail, highway, water and/or pipelines. Refineries that had access to all of these forms of transportation were able to compete and are most likely operating today.

However, refiners without access to a pipeline or water transportation logistics were forced to refine only feedstock resources that could be transported short distances by costly rail or over-the-road tanking options which left them at a competitive disadvantage.

After crude prices collapsed in 1982, refining margins decreased as well. Low prices for distillates and other refined products drove refiners to consolidate into ever-larger, morecomplex, better-capitalized companies with greater economies of scale. Refiners located on deep-water ports were able to import various grades of less expensive crude as they leveraged their tremendous processing volume advantage to produce a wide range of low-cost distillate products.

In 1984, the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA) passed more stringent laws governing waste disposal and emissions.

Many of the smaller refineries that were already struggling were unable to afford the equipment required to meet the new federal guidelines.

When guidelines were not met, penalties and fines were imposed putting small refiners at an even greater disadvantage.

For the next several decades, volatile and depressed commodity prices limited investments in the U.S. energy infrastructure.

Demand for energy was increasingly met using

imports from countries with excess natural resources. Now, environmental regulations have restricted the number of available terminal locations to store and distribute hydrocarbons while the U.S. struggles to meet its own resource needs and export its excess resources to the rest of the world. The confluence of these factors and the presence of 196 available ex-refinery sites ready for potential RTT projects provide an opportunity to both energy companies and local governments looking to clean up the properties and produce jobs for the community.

RTT TRANSACTION PROCESS Enter Dahlman Rose & Co., an investment bank positioned to advise governments and energy companies on transactions for these environmentally contaminated ex-refining sites in an effort to convert them into productive storage and distribution facilities. After performing several refining asset transactions, bankers discovered a trend among buyers of small refineries: even with the most wellintentioned business plan, buyers were unable to restart the small shuttered refinery.

Typically, Dahlman Rose evaluates exrefining sites and works with the buyer and seller to ensure the valuation makes sense for each party involved. Most sites have a tank farm used to store inventory while the refinery was operational. Therefore, these tanks require little additional capital and can produce consistent cash flow by storing distillates, asphalt or other products used in the energy value chain. Permits once used by the refinery can be applied to the trans-loading coal located in remote locations in the U.S. and can now be distributed to world markets.

CASE STUDY – Western Colorado One recent RTT conversion example lies in western Colorado where there is an abundance of natural gas, uranium, coal and oil shale reserves.

However, western Colorado is served by only one rail line, has few pipelines and is 200 miles away from the nearest refinery. Therefore, the region needs to import distillates and products to develop its natural resources and needs a location to store and export its energy resources to world markets.

Through a series of transactions, an exrefining site located in Fruita, Colorado is currently coordinating several large industrial annexations on its path to becoming an RTT conversion project. The 536-acre ex-refining site used to be the home of an old Gilsonite refinery and was eventually sold in 1973 to Gary-Williams Energy Corporation and other oil refiners processing crude oil until all operations ceased in 1993.Typical of most ex-refineries, the site benefits from rail access along the entire northern side of the property and overland roadway access to interstate 70 and the Colorado River on the southern side.

The first transaction, a $10.1 million deal with a private equity-backed environmental remediation firm, is removing the asbestos

and dismantling the refining equipment for scrap steel. The soil is being remediated and the groundwater is being cleaned using private funds augmented with cash flow from longterm contracts to store asphalt in 50-year-old storage tanks that are still on the site from the previous refining operations.

The second transaction resulted in a $6 million deal with a publicly traded oilfield service company that purchased 40 acres of environmentally clean land to import, store, and distribute hydraulic fracturing sand to develop the significant gas fields in Wyoming and western Colorado.

The third transaction was a $4.5 million deal with a publicly-traded coal company that purchased 213 acres of land and will invest additional $15 million to build a two-mile rail spur to export the vast Colorado coal reserves.

This transaction became necessary after Colorado passed legislation that forced the conversion of coal power plants to natural gas, forcing coal companies to find a way to move the product to more receptive markets.

Finally, a large road construction company owns 100 acres of land that will serve as a gravel mine with an expected resource life of 15 years. As traffic in the area increases, road construction will require the import of asphalt and gravel located on the site.

» Ex-refining sites can be converted into useful sites that generate tax revenues for local governments and provide communities with well-paid, highly skilled jobs from a business model that can generate consistent cash flow. «

HE TERMINALLING T INDUSTRY The U.S. business has few competitors, high barriers to entry and strong profit margins (profit margins can be five times more than refining). companies are compensated to store physical commodities such as coal, oil, natural gas, asphalt and distillate fuels to assist refiners in their operations. Recently, financial institutions have invested in the terminalling business, allowing their traders to use the physical product as collateral for trading.

Even if the majority of ex-refining sites were used for storage, the supply/demand dynamics have pushed storage rates to their current increased value. In fact, terminals on the West Coast command high storage rates because the permits to build new terminalling sites have been significantly restricted.

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BUSINESS

Refinery to Terminal Conversion

CONOMIC VIABILITY OF E THE CONVERTED SITE In 2001, when the City of Fruita realized the implications of the run-down site and the potential the rail-line served, it forged partnerships to ensure the parcel was remediated using private equity with no expense to taxpayers and releasing the city from the environmental liability and tax repercussions that the site posed. The city also saw the monetary and fiscal benefits that could spur growth within the small town from businesses that could be served by improving the entire site.

As a result, the city laid out a development plan entitled Greenway Business Park, a document that outlined the city’s intentions to, “capitalize on the assets of the three major areas in the Fruita/Mesa County Greenway Business Park,” a large parcel of land that would cover an area marked by remnants of the ex-refinery site.

Through its forged partnerships, the city was able to obtain a grant from the U.S. Economic Development Administration to fund the clean-up, redevelopment and restoration of the larger 1,336-acre industrial park and the 39 acres of the ex-refinery terminal conversion. The project is in line with the city’s 2011 Economic Development plan, which strives to protect and enhance existing assets while creating the infrastructure for new growth. ( 54 )

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After the site met Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA) compliance orders with the Environmental Protection Agency, the city of Fruita was able to secure a strong viable company to acquire a portion of the ex-refinery site. Once the land remediation is completed, and pending annexation, the city of Fruita is poised to generate significant economic impacts from taxes, infrastructure and business development.

Additionally, the site permits allow supplementary storage terminals and distribution infrastructure to be built that will provide the local community with jobs. Once the RTT process is complete, the site will allow refined products to be imported via truck and rail, and its energy resources to be exported to world markets.

Once the infrastructure is in place, the city will boast increased tax revenue from businesses establishing or relocating to the area; increased energy and property tax revenues for the city, the county and the school district; and is set to include a new wastewater and sewage treatment plant that has long been needed in the area.

Without the impending conversion of the ex-refinery into a terminalling facility, the city of Fruita would have never been able to realize the benefits to help improve the quality of life for local residents. It was important to the city to grow and build energy

related businesses. And with the terminal conversion, it brought hope for attracting new businesses and individuals into the area.

Through the coordination of several large industrial annexations due to be completed by the end of the year, the city of Fruita may once again see a spur in investment, property ownership and increased business relationships through financial incentives and tax credits from the larger industrial site—Greenway Business Park.

Portions of this article originally appeared in Fuel Magazine, a publication of Hart Energy LLP. Steve Crower is vice president of energy investment banking at Dahlman Rose & Co. in New York, NY. Mr. Crower graduated with a B.S. Civil Engineering from the University of Michigan and an M.B.A. in Finance from Rice University. He can be reached at scrower@drco.com.

Greg Haas covers the energy industry for Houston-based Hart Energy LLP from the dual perspective of a former Wall Street energy equity analyst and a former engineer with Exxon. Mr. Haas graduated with an M.S. and B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Illinois in Urbana Champaign and an M.B.A. in Finance from Rice University. He can be reached at ghaas@hartenergy.com.

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OCTOBER 13-14

2011

BUSINESS

WesTech Engineering

Rex Plaizier, CEO and Steve Brewster, President of WesTech Engineering

Water Infrastucture A Paradigm Shift By Marshall Palm

N

atural light floods the central atrium and modern architecture of a newly constructed office building in Salt Lake City. Rex Plaizier, company president, stands on the broad teakwood staircase thinking back about his quarter ( 56 )

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century career with WesTech Engineering.

Having worked in most every capacity during his tenure, he has witnessed the growth of a great company. From an initial group of several visionary men who mortgaged their futures to forge the beginnings of a small wastewater treatment engineering firm, the company

has grown to now count global sales and a worldwide reach. The rows of drafting tables in the basement of a modest home have been replaced by a new glass-faced office building housing dozens of computer-aided drafting stations. The slide rules that were indispensible to perform calculations are an anachronism now, replaced by machines that complete hundreds of calculations per second.

But the tenets that made the company great in the beginning still hold true today. Hard work, accountability, and pride of ownership still guide the company. As a recognized leader in a dynamic industry, Rex Plaizier relates an experience which was for him a paradigm shift in his understanding of the world and the legacy of his company.

In a scene that plays out daily in many parts of the world, he saw a glimpse of a larger picture. “A few years ago I took my family to Mexico. It was a marvelous cultural experience for them, and we were all enjoying our time there.” He recalls. “There were many different sights and sounds and environments there. One of the things that we started to notice were women and girls carrying large bottles of water on their heads. Curiosity got the best of me, and I stopped and chatted with one woman and her daughter, and I found out that this was their drinking water that they would take home two or three times a week. It was about a mile and a half journey each way.”

“My paradigm shifted considerably when about a block and a half later my little daughter, who was about the same age of that girl carrying the jug, looked up at me and said, ‘Dad, thank you for doing what you do so that me and mom don’t have to carry water on our heads two or three times a week.’ Then I realized what we do at WesTech is more than just a job, more than just manufacturing equipment; it is truly benefitting the lives of people.”

It is estimated that one billion people on planet Earth have no access to clean water, and instead are subject to the ravages of disease and misfortune from the lack of any infrastructure that would bring them relief.

While Earth is the water planet, only a small two percent of it is able to be consumed as drinking water. And the human population is growing each year, increasing pressure on these finite resources.

While people in many countries take clean water availability for granted, it is bracing to consider that the mortality rate associated with waterborne disease in New York City and other major western population centers was staggering if we looked back just over one-hundred years. Advances in water

and wastewater treatment have been arguably the greatest benefit to the human condition during the 20th century—equally as important as the great advances in medical technology because it affects the lives of us all.

Against this backdrop, WesTech Engineering finds reason to take great pride in each project that they design and manufacture as both an opportunity for environmental stewardship and for helping to build the infrastructure for a healthy society.

Each project is a small step that may help one day to end the ongoing scourge of water scarcity.

With thousands of installations commissioned over the course of WesTech’s 38-year history, many are large municipal and industrial plants handling huge flow rates in the billion of gallons per day. Some more modest projects are counted as equally important.

Partnering with Laval Tijuana, a construction contractor in Mexico, WesTech works closely with Rigo Laborin to provide long-term wastewater treatment solutions in northwest Mexico. Laborin was born in the area and knows firsthand the importance of clean water.

Laborin endeavored to build with WesTech a wastewater treatment plant near Rosarito, Mexico. Laborin’s first challenge was to convince local officials and residents that a treatment plant would benefit them.

Explains Laborin, “I was born in Tijuana, so I know about water shortages in this particular area of the country. It’s a major problem.

The water quality was not even close to think about reusing it. So we searched for technologies to make that dream possible. It’s been an uphill battle. Nobody believed in water reuse. Trying to convince government officials to use the best technologies out there and not cut corners was difficult. …There were a thousand people not wanting the wastewater treatment plant there. Fortunately, we had worked with WesTech before on a wastewater treatment plant that was called Santa Fe Number One. It had a good start and a great result.”

Conchita Cantù, a local resident, along with many community members of Rosarito, Mexico were very upset when they were told that a wastewater treatment plant would be built close to their homes. “I said, when this started, that I didn’t want the plant there,” said Cantù. “Everyone in the community didn’t want the plant there. I thought it was going to be something really smelly and really bad.”

But with an attention to excellence in public works projects and a desire to improve the reputation of wastewater treatment plants and their operations, Laborin was able to help educate the Rosarito community about the importance of clean water in the local and world environments.

“When Rigo explained everything about the water and the treatment of the water, I began to think that it was something really good,” said Cantù. “And then, when the plant started working, everybody realized it was a good thing. I think that’s good because we have water, and we have sewer lines and everything, and our lives are better now.

Everybody enjoys the park, and everybody is happy about the plant.”

Since the plant began operations, the quality of life in the Rosarito community has

» The tenets that made the company great in the beginning still hold true today. Hard work, accountability, and pride of ownership still guide the company. « Employees at headquarters in SLC

Help for Haiti When a massive earthquake struck Haiti in January 2010, the scope of the tragedy was overwhelming. WesTech began like many companies in their industry, working with charities and companies across the United States to provide an efficient and readily available means to provide safe drinking water to the rural areas of Haiti.

WesTech has partnered with Cascade Engineering to transport to and set up water filtration sand filters for families. The inexpensive, cylindrical sand filters use easilyreplaceable sand and gravel in a simple gravity filtration process which provides the daily drinking water requirements for a small family.

With the help of many volunteers, WesTech continues to be instrumental in providing filters to rural communities of Haiti.

Operation of the sand filters is simple, inexpensive and effective. Water from their local source is introduced into the top of the cylinder, flows through a diffuser plate, then a biological layer of organisms which develop on the surface naturally. These ingest the bacterial contaminants present in the water.

The water then flows down through separate levels of tight sand, separation gravel, and lastly, underdrain gravel. The resulting filtered water is pushed up and dispensed through a top-mounted outlet tube for use in the home and community.

With the onset of the cholera outbreak in Haiti that has claimed thousands of lives, WesTech continues in partnership with charities and companies to help bring more

filters to Haiti. Over the past 14 months, WesTech has successfully provided a reliable means of water supply to hundreds of families.

assion for ProblemP Solving CEO Steve Brewster has also been with WesTech since its inception and explains the passion that he feels for their work, “We want to bless the people across the United States and across the world. Water is such an important need. You can’t live without water. We want to bless the lives of our employees, and one of the best ways we can do that is through the core values we espouse.”

The core values to which he refers support the fact that the company is incorporated as an Employee Shared Ownership Plan, or ESOP. This mentality of ownership and accountability is the basis for every decision made by the board of directors on down to the man pushing a broom and has lent to their continued success over nearly 40 years.

The back of each employee-owner’s name badge is printed with the company core purpose. It reads “To pursue our passion for problem-solving by advancing and applying water technologies to benefit humanity.” This purpose defines the direction of each new project identified by the company.

Rosarito Rising A recent project in Mexico highlights the real improvements to quality of life realized by infrastructure improvements to water and wastewater systems.

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WesTech Engineering

improved dramatically. Its residents now revere the work that Rigo has done and the vital role that the new water treatment plant plays in providing a better life for the Rosarito community.

- Rigo Laborin “By getting running water and sewage lines into those houses, their way of life changed dramatically,” says Laborin. “Next thing we knew, they had a gorgeous park, a community center, paved roads, running water and a sewage system, just because a wastewater treatment plant was built nearby their community. This work is making a big difference in our communities. Wastewater treatment has changed people’s lives. It feels good to do something relevant; you know that you’re actually making a difference. You see cleaner beaches, non-contaminated wells. I know we’re doing the right thing.”

Hyperion Treatment Plant, Los Angeles, CA. Conchita Cantù now gardens at the community park with children of her community, drives on paved streets After the Hurricane and enjoys many other benefits made possible by the reclaimed water now available from Current projects offer similar advances the wastewater treatment plant and the new to communities and to the environment. In supporting infrastructure.

Florida, the Emerald Coast Utilities Authority oversees the water treatment needs for some of the most pristine and scenic parts of Florida, Beach Closed aptly named The Emerald Coast.

Larger and higher profile projects are Hurricane Ivan was a category five storm also on WesTech’s resume. One example is at its peak that came ashore in Florida with the Hyperion Wastewater Treatment Plant sustained 130 mph winds causing major Expansion Project in Los Angeles. The devastation. The existing water treatment project provided Hyperion 20 mammoth 150 infrastructure was not spared. Power was ft-diameter clarifiers, large sedimentation knocked out, and resulting pump failures at devices for water clarification which the plant flooded parts of downtown Pensacola incorporate proprietary and highly efficient with storm water and raw wastewater for separations technology. Prior to the plant several days. The deficiencies of the old plant capacity expansion, releases of sewage into were made apparent by the storm, and plans the ocean were recurring events with closure were made to upgrade the facility for future of the beaches as only one environmental storm events and increased capacity needed consequence. The clarifiers were a large for population growth. WesTech has provided commitment for WesTech, who won the bid advanced equipment for solids separation, and supplied the equipment ahead of the sludge removal and biological treatment that contractors’ deadlines. increases plant capacity to 20 MGD. The new The new clarifiers increased the treatment plant is the largest public works project in capacity at the Hyperion WWTP to 450 the history of Escambia County and services million gallons per day (MGD) average with the entire population of Pensacola. It was peak flow capabilities of 1000 MGD. The commissioned in spring, 2011. importance and scope of the project led the American Public Works Association to name Self Sustainability Hyperion as one of the top 10 public works projects of the 20th century. The plant services Santa Monica, California is a place of the entire population of the City of Los unparalleled beauty which embodies the carefree Angeles. Unintended releases of wastewater coastal lifestyle. When Methyl Tert-Butyl Ether to the open ocean are no longer a menace to (MTBE) was detected in the groundwater wildlife or to surfers and swimmers. supply of Charnock Wells in Santa Monica,

» "By getting running water and sewage lines into those houses, their way of life changed dramatically." «

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immediate action was needed. MTBE is a chemical compound which is a flammable and colorless additive to gasoline. It easily mixes with water with a resulting unpleasant taste and documented health issues including a known carcinogen.

WesTech worked with the city and with local environmental officials and Black and Veatch, a global engineering firm, to implement a solution. Granular Activated Carbon Contactors and Horizontal Pressure Filters were designed specifically for the project and deployed to meet strict project deadlines.

The new plant is now in operation and services 90,000 permanent residents and nearly 300,000 daytime visitors. It has restored Santa Monica’s contaminated groundwater supply and renewed their self sustainability by reducing the city’s dependence upon imported water from Northern California and the Colorado River.

Personal Challenge – Global Growth Chicago and Atlanta are now home to WesTech offices alongside the headquarters in Salt Lake City. Offices also operate in China, Brazil, and South Africa, and the company recently opened new offices in India. WesTech India commenced business in spring, 2011 with offices located in New Delhi and Chennai, giving them reach into both northern and southern India. An additional office will soon be opened in Mumbai, giving WesTech additional reach into central India.

With capabilities in minerals production, industrial process, energy production, water and wastewater process, WesTech is well diversified. This diversification enables the experience from a broad spectrum of knowledge bases to be brought to bear in any liquid solids separation challenge.

CEO Steve Brewster smiles as he explains, “This company has grown from three to well over three hundred people during my time here.

One of our core values is to achieve productivity through hard work. We know that being successful doesn’t just happen. As a company, we studied the notable business book, The Great Game of Business, by Jack Stack, and we believe its premise is true: “It’s pretty easy to stop one person, but it’s hard to stop a hundred.”

WesTech is its people!

To learn more about WesTech Engineering, visit http://www.westech-inc.com or call 801-265-1000.

BUSINESS

FasTracks

Metropolitan Denver Breaking Barriers With Multi-modal Transportation Infrastructure

By Niccolo Casewit, Eli Regalado, and Emily Haggstrom

I

nfrastructure is more than airport runways, bridges, roads, and trains. It is ultimately about connecting people, information, goods and services. Our lifestyles have become more regional requiring greater mobility to get where we need to be.

Colorado is transforming what it means to live, work, and play in a great environment.

And that environment is about to get substantially better as Denver’s transportation dreams are finally becoming a reality. Through collaboration, inspired innovation and a wellcoordinated directive, public transportation is ( 60 )

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showing up as an increased investment for the diverse communities across Colorado’s front range. After more than a decade of planning, Denver’s metropolitan communities will finally see construction and expansion to their transportation infrastructure through its front range FasTracks development.

FasTracks: Connecting communities The $6.7-billion FasTracks multicorridor rail system, although conceived in the late 1970’s, was finally made possible

three decades later after a group of elected officials reached out to communities in the suburbs through a regional campaign. Led by charismatic innovators like restaurant owner and former mayor turned Colorado governor, John Hickenlooper, the initiative was spearheaded with a win-win approach to regional transportation.

The program aims to expand Denver’s current infrastructure by building roughly, “122 miles of new commuter rail and light rail, 18 miles of bus rapid transit, 21,000 new parking spaces at light rail and bus

stations, and enhanced bus service for easy, convenient bus/rail connections across an eight-county district,” says the Regional Transportation District’s (RTD) FasTracks website. The successful implementation of the program hinged on how unique communities found ways to link to each other, providing visitors and residents public transportation to Denver’s central business district and cultural amenities.

With the expected completion of FasTracks in 2025, the development is poised to serve roughly 3.39 million people, helping to alleviate traffic congestion, connect communities, and enhance economic development in the neighborhoods it passes through.

owntown Denver D and its Growing Urban Sprawl: The need for transportation infrastructure As Denver’s tourism and convention business continues to thrive and citizens across the downtown and metropolitan communities begin to experience what each neighborhood has to offer, it has become more important than ever to connect residents to the growing attractions in and around Denver. And access is everything as the city’s downtown hosts three major sports venues, a world-class performing arts center, a leading second-tier convention center, a funky mix of restaurants, retail, and entertainment along streets across Denver’s prime pedestrian sprawls.

With 300 days of sunshine, connecting modes of transportation between exciting, walkable, mixed-use districts is Denver’s way of creating innovation through transit-oriented design and city building. The FasTracks development has helped to attract companies like DaVita, the Environmental Protection Agency and the Gates Corporation, which were looking for a prime location and ease of mobility for their employees.

RTD, the City of Denver and the Denver Union Station Project Authority (DUSPA) faced a $300-million budget gap for improvements and was forced to seek additional capital through cooperation with around 50 entities, which involved federal, state and local agencies to work with private partners to assure funding. In the end, Federal Railroad loans, an increase in property and local sales tax, as well as tax increment financing will be the key to the project’s successful completion.

DUSPA, with their contractor Kiewit Western Company, report that the first phase of the underground bus transit project and the relocation of the existing light rail platform are nearly complete.

The commuter rail station itself, is set to be completed by fall 2016 with the unveiling of the east line to Denver International Airport. If the deadline for construction is met, Denver’s Union Station will serve as the designated terminal in FasTrack’s hub and spoke system.

The Eagle 3P Project: Public Private Partnership Success The Eagle 3P project is a public-private partnership between RTD and Denver Transit

Partners (DTP). By creating this partnership, RTD has been able to tap into the private sector’s up-front capital to build FasTracks, the largest commuter rail system expansion in the United States.

Through its partnership with the private sector, RTD is able to obtain global expertise and financing that will bolster a sustainable financial armature for the rail system in decades to come. For example, the team was able to forgo a 34-year term, instead securing a shorter 20-year term typically used by public bonding agencies. Through its securitized bond, global bonding agencies responded with lower financing costs, which in turn increased profits and also helped to off-set higher onetime costs associated with all-electric rail lines.

The Eagle 3P partnership arrangement passes the benefits of long-term capitalization, value engineering, and operational cost savings back to the transit district. By augmenting RTD’s FasTracks funds with private equity and private activity bonds, along with Federal loans and grants, the prudent long-range financing terms are paying off. Integrated design-build and clever operations planning have helped RTD achieve a $750-million savings over the total cost of the multi-corridor commuter rail projects.

» The development is poised to serve roughly 3.39 million people, helping to alleviate traffic congestion, connect communities, and enhance economic development in the neighborhoods it passes through. «

nion Station: The U $500-million Hub for FasTracks Denver’s beaux-art Union Station was built in 1881 to connect Denver with Cheyenne, Wyoming. Currently, the building is being repurposed as the new multi-modal transportation hub that will host a three-block underground regional bus transit station, new commuter rail platforms, and a public plaza serving a mixed use retail and office development in the newly constructed terminal.

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FasTracks

By using a globally inspired financial payment model called the availability method, RTD is able to pay the capital costs over time with fare box collections, grants, and transit sales-tax subsidies. This enables RTD to concentrate district efforts on organizationalwide integration and finding ways to improve system services.

Work Force and Economic Development According to Kevin Flynn, RTD’s Public Information Officer for the Eagle 3P Projects, over the five-year multi-corridor rail build-out, RTD estimates that the project will stimulate 10,000 new jobs in construction including their suppliers and other related services.

Through its commitment towards longterm work force development and training, RTD was the recipient of a $486,465 grant from the Federal Transit Administration (FTA). RTD in collaboration with the Community College of Denver, the Urban League of Metropolitan Denver and Denver Transit Partners (DTP) secured the grant for the Workforce Initiative Now (WIN) program that will assist in providing work-force training for the construction of the new heavy-rail commuter rail lines.

“In the long term, finished transit projects will increase employment by increasing the reach for the employees to possible jobs, and the employers, thus increasing the desirability of transit-rich Metropolitan Denver to companies wishing to relocate here. Bottom line: The reliability of commuter trains and fixed guide-ways, and Bus Rapid Transit (BRT), will make

Denver one of the most attractive places to do business.”

With a young and well-educated population of over 2.8 million people, the Denver metro area has become a regional-hub for research and technology.

Colorado’s regional high-tech beltway runs 30 miles between Denver and the City of Boulder, housing a number of national research institutions like the University of Colorado, National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR), National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOA A), and the National Research and Energy Laboratory (NREL) which will

benefit from the ease of transportation the rail lines will bring.

More importantly, the American Public Transit Association (APTA) reports quarterly on transit issues and compiles data on the savings that an average commuter can expect. Denver’s costs vary, but it ranks 13th in transit savings of $857 or $10,287 annually by citizens who do not own or operate a car. As a benefit of living and working in transit-rich neighborhoods, transitoriented communities actually induce additional economic development - supporting local shops, restaurants and services around each transit node.

Real estate values in transit-rich neighborhoods are also seeing gains for this very reason.

Note: Since this story was written, RTD received a full Financial Funding Grant Agreement with the Federal Transportation Administration (FTA) for a total of $1.03 billion to cover two separate rail line projects.

While the construction of the East Rail Line is now fully funded, it was not dependent on finalizing the grant. This represents a huge boost for the 122-mile build-out of the entire FasTracks rail system.

Niccolo Casewit AIA, is an architect and urban planner. As a Transit Oriented Development (TOD) activist, a member of the Denver Regional Council of Governments (DRCOG) Livable Communities sub-committee; and the AIA Denver Urban Design Committee he is well known as a community advocate for multi-modal infrastructure in the Denver region. Casewit is currently working on several architectural planning projects in several of the transit-rich neighborhoods of Denver.

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DA H L M A N

R O S E & C O.

BUSINESS

Takraf USA

TAKRAF Heavy Equipment for Extreme Infrastructure

I

By Matt Edgar

n the earliest part of the Iron Age in Europe, iron was smelted from ore found in bogs and swamps in Germany, Scandanavia, and the Netherlands. Bog iron is somewhat resistant to rusting due to residual silicates, and has been used in art, architecture, tools, and weapons for over two millennia. In 1725, the Baroness of Löwendahl and Augustus II the Strong started a foundry, which smelted bog ore to be used in the production of iron art castings in Lauchhammer, Germany. The foundry eventually transformed into a construction factory, and TAKRAF, one of the world's leading manufacturers of heavy surface mining and transportation equipment, was born.

Eighty years after its founding, the company was commissioned to work on the first steam engine in Cure-Saxony, and from there, became focused on mechanical engineering and production, building water wheels and machines. As the end of the 19th century neared, TAKRAF moved to Leipzig, one of Germany’s larger industrial cities at the time. During this period, the company became more invested in mining, bulk material handling, crushing and conveying. Within 50 years, the TAKRAF name was officially established and became the leading manufacturer of mining systems and equipment.

Prior to the end of the cold war, the firm was one of East Germany’s largest industrial companies. The company specialized in open pit mining infrastructure, cranes, and bulk material handling. After the re-unification of Germany, the MAN Group, a $20 billion leading European industrial player in transport-related engineering, bought TAKRAF and helped give the company a worldwide platform. TAKRAF USA was founded in 1994 in the Denver Tech Center and was TAKRAF’s first international subsidiary. The company went through another change when the Techint Group, another massive $28 billion worldwide group based in Milan and Buenos Aires, purchased the firm in

2007 and merged them with Techint’s material handling division Italimpianti, forming Tenova TAKRAF. TAKRAF USA services open pit mining infrastructure in both North and South America. Its equipment is used in some of the most extreme climates of the world, servicing the northern tundra of Canada, the high mountains of Chile and Peru, and the deserts of Mexico.

The equipment itself is some of the biggest pieces of machinery in the world. For example, the F60 conveyer bridge is 502 meters long and holds the Guinness World Record as the largest moveable object in the world. The equipment is commensurate with the large volume and needs of the mines that they service. TAKRAF crushing and conveying systems are currently being used in Chile’s Escondida Mine, which is the largest mine in the world.

Because TAKRAF’s equipment provides vital infrastructure for mega mines, there are big dollars at stake. Thomas Gramling, executive vice president and director of TAKRAF USA, explains, “In our business, we deal with base metals such as lead, iron ore, molybdenum, copper and precious metals like gold. All of our equipment is used on critical

paths of production, from crushing the source ore to conveying the materials. It must be durable to operate in extreme locations, but also efficient and easy to maintain because it operates at the top of the industry in terms of tonnage. Gramling explains, “The temperature in Canada can get down to -40 degrees Fahrenheit, so ease of maintenance is important.” He goes on to underscore the importance of TAKRAF’s equipment running smoothly by pointing out that every hour that a world-class mine is shut down they can “lose millions of dollars in gross margins.”

TAKRAF views its client relationships as long-term partnerships built to service a premier customer base. A mine can last 2040 years depending on the ore body, so the company will be involved in the mine in some capacity whether it’s equipment, engineering, retrofitting and more for decades. Clients served out of the Tech Center office include BHP Billiton, Rio Tinto, FreePort McMoRan, Groupo Mexico, and Goldcorp. These are, “leading edge clients with high standards, and they have great expectations for their partners,” according to Gramling.

Over the next few years, TAKRAF plans to capitalize on the booming mining market as rates of precious metals continue to climb to record-setting numbers. In an effort to increase mine supply and efficiencies to meet the increased demand, TAKRAF clients are interested in increasing capital expenditures on capital projects, boding well for TAKRAF, which will be involved in many of these capital projects.

TAKRAF USA is on track to have a record revenue year in 2011 and doesn’t foresee growth slowing in the immediate future. Gramling sees big potential in the U.S. coal market, especially in coal exports, and expects to see an increased need to export coal to the BRIC countries like India, China, Russia, and Brazil as they stoke their economies. Since some of these U.S. coal facilities are at maximum capacity, outdated, or both, TAKRAF can assist in the capital projects required to increase capacity, retro-fit or build new coal terminals, loadout and port facilities, so U.S. coal mines can meet the projected demand for exports.

» The F60 conveyer bridge is 502 meters long and holds the Guinness World Record as the largest moveable object in the world. «

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Matt Edgar is a contributing writer for ICOSA. He is the owner of Community First Commercial Real Estate, a Denver-based Tenant Representation firm. Matt can be reached at 720.435.2191 or matt.edgar@ communityfirstcommercial.com.

Mae Moh

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BUSINESS

TSC Global

TSC Global Roofs for the World By Aaron Arnold and Rebecca Saltman

T

he Challenge

January 12, 2010, 4:53 p.m. just west of Port-au-Prince, a 7.0 magnitude earthquake ravaged Hispaniola’s poorer half. Nineteen months later, some 634,000 survivors—40 percent of those Haitians displaced by the original quake—are still virtually homeless. Residing in tents distributed by the United Nations High Commission on Refugees (UNHCR) is proving punitive, as the tents swiftly become useless tatters.

Constructing durable and cost-efficient residential housing, simple commercial buildings, schools, and medical clinics which ( 66 )

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could be swiftly erected, remains a daunting challenge. Add to that massive undertaking the desperate need for infrastructure development in the beleaguered nation, and the challenges start to look Biblical. Addressing Haiti’s structural and infrastructural needs will require a matrix of public-private partnerships. That naturally suggests both collaboration and an organization not afraid to shift and transcend conceived boundaries between public and private enterprise. Collaborative efforts will have to be infused with innovation in order to accomplish large-scale development that directly meets the needs of the impoverished and displaced.

The Social Enterprise TSC Global is an organization that blends these facets together in an effort to solve the challenge of building for communities plagued by poverty and degradation. The for-profit social enterprise blends business acumen with the heart of a not-for-profit. By promoting its products in a B2B stream, the goal of genuine infrastructural development in the developing world becomes something more than onerous. According to Director Steve Riley, the decision to commit to enterprise was driven by the need for twofold sustainability. “[We] want to be on the side of the equation that is focused on capacity building and restoring the dignity that comes with self-reliance,” he says. He notes that systematic humanitarian aid can create an unsustainable dependence in the recipient community. Therefore, the organization itself is not interested in a symbiotic existence with donors, preferring self-sufficiency through revenue generation. “Fundamentally,” says Riley, “our motivations are philanthropic, but we have not forsaken entrepreneurship or free enterprise to fulfill our corporate mission.”

The Innovation The organization’s innovation is actually relatively simple. Its products are based on cement-latex thin shell composite (TSC) hyperbolic paraboloid (HyPar) roofing technology. This TSC HyPar construction method is the brainchild of George Nez, who recognized the potential for the versatile HyPar shape—a double curved planar surface. Nez discovered that the shape could be combined into many configurations, such as a pyramid hat or lampshade, or an attractive crossgable bungalow that can be constructed with minimal and often local building materials.

To achieve the shape in quadrant by quadrant panel form, a rigid frame is first constructed, generally using lumber or even bamboo. The frame is then carefully tightened across a sequencing of HyPar lines and spanned with a mesh of either fiberglas mesh strips or locally sourced porous fabric and chicken wire. The HyPar membrane forms the underlay for several applications of thin shell composite “parge”, an admixture of portland cement and latex additive. The mixture is “painted” on using brooms, interpenetrating the HyPar-shaped membrane. Usually, a total of six layers are applied over a week’s time, amounting to a flexible but strong surface that in the end is no thicker than a centimeter.

Overall, a TSC roof is lightweight, swiftly erected, very cost-efficient, adaptable, and durable, contributing to TSC Global’s tagline “Roofs for the World.” The strength-flexibility continuum translates to earthquake and wind resistance, and theoretically promises 100 years of longevity. The composite material diminishes interior noise from rain, while the HyPar shape is ideal for rainwater harvesting.

Top-vents create a much cooler living space compared to the brutal heat suffered under corrugated metal roofs. The entire roof can be lifted onto an existing wall structure, or the structures can be built “roofs first” atop posts, allowing for a shelter that a family or school can move under and later add wall systems as desired or able. Moreover, the reduction of material usage plus the proof of suitability and widespread acceptance of bamboo instead of lumber provides a greener solution for affordable structures.

The Originators TSC Global founders Brad Wells, Steve Riley, George Nez along with key advisors Randy Parsley and Steve Brooks, have decades of pertinent experience among them. From Executive Director Brad Wells’

» Systematic humanitarian aid can create an unsustainable dependence in the recipient community.

Therefore, the organization itself is not interested in a symbiotic existence with donors, preferring selfsufficiency through revenue generation. «

business ownership experience, connections and entrepreneurial spirit, to Steve Riley’s passion for growth in underdeveloped countries, to George Nez’s inspiration and seminal ideas regarding how to create these roofs starting with his 1974 “roofs first” epiphany while relocating 23,000 villagers in Ghana, to Randy Parsley’s 30 years of residential and commercial construction experience, to Steve Brooks recent experience village and urban planning in Kigali, Rwanda—these men have a rare personal grasp of and innovative approach to affordable and post-disaster problems and the solutions.

The Model “I believe TSC has a great potential to address the shelter needs of people at the bottom of the pyramid,” says Steve Brooks, Principal at Denver’s Oz Architecture, referring to the technology’s possible impact in the developing world. Brooks serves as a board member at TSC Global and sees a demonstrable value in the way that the technology can be implemented with local materials and local labor, and in fact the structures are architecturally satisfying. “[The TSC] surface becomes an integral structural shell that resists vertical and horizontal loads without beams and joists,” he says. Furthermore, natural ventilation is built into the construction process. Brooks acknowledges that the organization will meet with obstacles, from the political to the mercenary. For example, there is real potential for opportunists to mimic the techniques outside of TSC Global’s purview: “The challenge is quality control in execution within the local context.”

Ensuring such controls is a matter of collaboration, especially since TSC Global aims to build on a large scale. Progress begins by establishing partnerships with local community and business leaders, then looking to build contracts with international aid organizations and governmental institutions. The organization trains local tradesmen, conveying the technology to home-grown entrepreneurs. The end goal, providing an appropriate and immediate structural solution while also ensuring income generation for needy populations, comes about almost organically.

TSC Global’s aspiration is to proliferate its high-tech product with lowtech methods, giving families and local businesses affordable real estate assets. The organization estimates a unit cost of $4,000

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BUSINESS

TSC Global

» The organization estimates a unit cost of $4,000 including materials and labor. Assuming an 8 percent interest rate, a family making the developing world median income of $2.50 per day can pay off its own mortgage over 30 years. « including materials and labor. Assuming an 8 percent interest rate, a family making the developing world median income of $2.50 per day can pay off its own mortgage over 30 years. Associated costs are little more than those of temporary relief shelters, while the life of the TSC structure is exponentially superior.

The Work In Haiti TSC Global has completed small-scale projects in Africa and is currently working to establish itself in Haiti in the more expansive role described above. Wells and Riley are striving to simultaneously attract private investors and grant funding from international organizations, including the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). In these early stages, however, local, in-country collaboration is paramount. TSC Global has worked closely with Haitian construction company Truxton, SA which has provided logistics and shipping support. Truxton’s president, Didier Gardere, has proven to be invaluable, making numerous marketing calls and opening doors with the Haitian government and NGOs. Collaborators like Gardere are refreshing, according to Riley, especially in a humanitarian environment in which large aid organizations tend to be bureaucratic, cynical, and innovation averse, all of which contribute to exacerbating poor structural conditions. Riley expands: “I know NGOs don't want to build shacks that will fall ( 68 )

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apart and devolve into slums, but that is what will happen at the prices for houses that NGOs want their contractors to build with. Haitians don't want this kind of housing either. It is offensive to them in my opinion. What they want is help buying a home that will be livable and long lasting so they have the benefits of home ownership and wealth building through real estate.”

Further challenges abound in Haiti. Riley explains that logistics and supply chain establishment are difficult in any developing world situation. TSC Global has overcome these issues in small projects by sourcing materials in local markets. However, scaling up in Haiti will require a different approach. “We simply do not have the time, nor can our clients afford for us to spend weeks tracking down materials suppliers in-country,” says Riley. The organization’s proposed solution, which it is shopping to investors and grant-makers, is to construct a materials yard to serve as a home-base for controlled inventory of goods both imported and locally sourced (including for wall systems), as well as distribution to building sites. In other words, TSC Global becomes its own supplier, and eventually can support entrepreneurs who take on the technology.

The Public Factor Part and parcel of the effort to make TSC Global grow is nurturing the ultimate public-

private partnership: outreach intended to lodge the organization’s technology and operating model in the minds of potential investors and influential personalities, while also generating interest in the media and general public. Most recently, the organization displayed its products at the Clinton Foundation/Government of Haiti Building Back Better Communities Expo in Port-au-Prince, an event attended by both former U.S. President Bill Clinton and new Haiti President Michel Martelly. Stateside, residents and visitors of Denver can check out TSC Global at their facilities at 1205 Osage in Denver, and at the Design for the Other 90% exhibition at RedLine Gallery (2350 Arapahoe Street). The Design 90% display includes three small roofs artfully and prominently presented. The exhibits are the beginnings of a campaign to bring affordable product, to the bottom billions, and also to make reverberations locally and globally, rippling outward to deliver on the aspiration to “build back better” what has crumbled and to innovate not only the way that people think about infrastructure development, but also spark a revolution in humanitarianism— one driven by an entrepreneurial spirit and financial empowerment rather than unsustainable handouts.

For more information about TSC Global please see visit their website at http://tscglobal.org or on twitter @tscroofs.

BUSINESS

Basin Electric

Infrastructure for Dominant

Low-Cost Electricity Dry Forks Station – Will it be the Last Coal-Based Power Plant? By Emily Haggstrom

C

oal is as much a part of our past as it is our future. The Greeks used it to fabricate metal, Aztecs used it as fuel and the Britain’s used it during the occupation of the Roman’s and throughout the earliest stages of the monarchy. Coal is the very foundation of our early economic progress in the United States, providing basic domestic needs, transportation options, and production of raw materials as well as power.

As an abundant natural resource, coal has continued to serve as the primary source of energy to produce electricity.

And although our country continues its environmental movement, making strides towards more clean technologies to provide electric power, our nation as a whole still relies heavily on the power generated from coal and its low-cost production.

And while the need for electricity continues to rise along with the costs, it is more important than ever for requisite low-cost, reliable, time tested methods of production that are still in high demand. And while many Americans would prefer green sources of energy, the cost to benefit ratio doesn’t fit the pockets for most of those same individuals.

Federal regulations have been strengthened around coal-based operations and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has proposed new standards to protect the quality of air and water while preserving the land as much as possible in its original state before any reclamation occurs. These statutes and standards have made it increasingly hard for companies like Basin Electric and other coalbased energy producers to acquire permitting to create infrastructure for low-cost electricity options desired by many rural Americans.

Although grant money, private equity and government subsidies are being directed towards clean energy, research continues to be made regarding continuous improvements in ultra-low emissions from coal-based electricity.

By working towards advanced emissions controls, a suite of new technology has become ( 70 )

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available and will continue to be refined to help deliver clean-coal fueled electricity.

“Coal is the most available, reliable and affordable energy resource that this country has,” said U.S. Senator John Barrasso.

Establishing Power In a 2002 Power Requirement Study, Basin Electric and its member facilities evaluated the need for generation based on load requirements with a 10-year perspective. The group forecasted the need for a new facility between 2008 and 2011 to meet the growing need of the local communities served by these member cooperatives.

» By working towards advanced emissions controls, a suite of new technology has become available and will continue to be refined to help deliver clean-coal fueled electricity. «

Dry Forks Station

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BUSINESS

Basin Electric

After three years of a rigorous permitting process necessary to meet the requirements for impact alleviation and a review and analysis of over 12,000 pages by the Wyoming Department of Environmental Quality (WYDEQ ); which ultimately led to a subsequent federal lawsuit, Basin Electric was issued a “complex, highly technical permit”. “Issuing a permit for a plant like this is a monumental undertaking.

Staff from WYDEQ reviewed hundreds of documents, attended hearings, and spent countless hours analyzing technical data regarding the environmental controls for this power plant. Wyoming has some of the strictest environmental rules in the country,” said Ron Harper, Basin Electric CEO and General Manager.

Once the permit was issued, project development ensued. In just four years, with a workforce of 1,300 at its peak and over six million hours worked without lost time injury, the mine-mouth operation finally opened. By strategically locating the facility next to the Powder Basin subbituminous coal mine, Basin Electric helped eliminate rail expenses over a long-term haul for lower quality coal to help keep costs down and quality up.

“You can build clean coal-based power plants, we’ve done it with Dry Forks,” said Daryl Hill, Media Relations Supervisor for Basin Electric, “The DEQ wrote us a very good permit and Dry Forks is the first of its kind to have the environmental standards that it does.

It’s a great plant on the front end in terms of production and on the back end in terms of the environmental controls and we’re very proud of that and we think it will set a precedent for other plants moving forward.”

The Strength of Dry Forks Station In what could be considered a perfect Wyoming morning, without a cloud in the sky, the sun shone bright and a light breeze danced past more than 1,100 people as dignitaries cut the ribbon and dedicated what some believe to be the last coal-based power

» "Coal is the most available, reliable and affordable energy resource that this country has." « - U.S. Senator John Barrasso

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Ribbon cutting ceremony

» "This plant provides jobs for hard-working Americans. Producing electricity takes hard work and coal helps make this country great." « - Tom Murphy, Mayor of Gillette

plant in the United States. It was a defining moment for the people of Gillette, the state of Wyoming and the nation as a whole to stand witness to the possible historic event.

Speaking tongue-in-cheek, Gillette Mayor Tom Murphy said, “Not only do we (Wyoming) have electricity, but without Wyoming, you wouldn’t have any. This plant provides jobs for hard-working Americans.

Producing electricity takes hard work and coal helps make this country great.”

Utilizing advanced coal technology to meet the stringent requirements of the W YDEQ and the EPA, the new Dry Forks station features an “air-cooled condenser, the largest in North America, which works as a large radiator cooling water without losing the water to evaporation.” The bag-house along with a high efficiency circulating f luid bed scrubber to help reduce pollutants such as mercury, along with an accompanying removal system is the first of its kind in the industry; add in 20 LO NOx burners equipped with environmental controls and the station is poised to meet its permit limits.

The $1.35 billion Dry Forks Station, six miles north of Gillette was built to provide enough wholesale power to member

cooperatives in 135 counties over a nine state territory that will supply electricity to over 308,000 homes. More than $336 million was invested in environmental controls with an accompanying budget of $5 million annually to operate those controls. Basin Electric is proud to employ 85 fulltime employees who are supported by local vendors and contractors.

“Coal from Wyoming has fueled American dreams. As we think about this, it’s grand to see a power plant up and running in the midst of other coal plants across the country being shut down,” said Governor Matt Mead speaking about how low-cost electricity helps maintain a quality of life. “We hope this is a sign of many more to come.”

And while the immediate future suggests otherwise, Basin Electric and its Dry Forks station will continue to mine the local subbituminous coal that the region is known for, providing low-cost electricity to nine rural electric systems that provide electricity to around 2.8 million consumers.

“The energy from this power plant is not only electricity but human energy to keep it going,” said Powder River Energy Corporation CEO Mike Easley.

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COMMUNITY

ARC Solutions

Wildlife Bridges First-Ever International Competition Develops Innovative & Cost-Effective Design Solutions for Safe Passage of Wildlife Over Superhighways By Jennifer Cook

S

ince World War II, roads and highways have spread across our landscape to connect urban and rural communities, drive the economy and fuel an ever-growing population’s transportation needs. Yet when it comes to locating and designing these byways, little attention has been paid to the effects on wildlife movement and the integrity of eco-systems.

Now two major trends are increasingly being recognized as experts analyze the effectiveness of North America’s roadway systems. The first is that collisions between wildlife and vehicles have doubled in the past 15 years and are a growing threat to both human safety and wildlife, costing Americans $8 billion annually. The second is that climate change is creating a need for wildlife to move across landscapes, unimpeded, as they seek more normal temperatures, water and other resources being compromised in current habitats.

As a result, both transportation and natural resource agencies are looking at ways to make North American highways safer for drivers and wildlife alike. In response to this emerging priority, the ARC International Wildlife Crossing Design Competition—a CanadaU.S. collaboration including more than 25 government, academic and environmental organizations—was formed in early 2010.

“Our goal for this initiative was to engage interdisciplinary design teams and challenge them to come up with cost-effective solutions that would enable humans and wildlife to better co-exist through innovative engineering and architecture,” explained Nina-Marie Lister, ARC’s professional competition advisor and associate professor of urban & regional

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planning at Ryerson University in Toronto, Ontario. “Through the ARC competition, we hope to usher in the next generation of wildlife crossings, taking what we’ve learned through existing infrastructure and use new methods, materials and thinking to reduce structural costs, and increase adaptability and ecological function.”

ARC’s creators and sponsors chose West Vail Pass on Colorado’s Interstate 70 as the design case study for the competition from numerous nominated sites throughout North America. Since the heavily traveled stretch of highway bisects a critical wildlife habitat linkage for a wide range of species—including black bears, cougars, bobcats, lynx, coyote, elk, deer and marten—the site presented competition participants with real and serious problems of animal movement.

Out of 36 submissions, ARC partners short-listed five teams comprised of landscape architects, architects, engineers and ecologists to develop concept designs for a crossing structure that provides safe passage for wildlife across the busy I-70 corridor. On December 1, 2010, the five top teams unveiled their architectural models during the Western Governors Wildlife Committee Meeting in Denver.

» "The international

competition both establishes and inspires a new category of public infrastructure that is both responsive and responsible to environmental concerns." « - Jared Polis

The five ARC finalists include: Balmori Associates from New York City; The Olin Studio from Philadelphia; Janet Rosenberg & Associates from Toronto; Michael Van Valkenburgh & Associates with HNTB Engineering from New York City; and Zwarts & Jantsma Architects from Amsterdam.

The museum-quality architectural models then went on display at the U.S. Capitol in Washington D.C., where the winning team was

announced on January 23, 2011, during the National Academies' Transportation Research Board's Annual Conference.

HNTB+MVVA, a New York City design firm, was unanimously chosen by a jury of five leading experts for their use of ordinary materials, such as concrete and other structural materials easy to procure close to any given area. The exhibit finally returned home to Colorado last April for the 2011 Vail Film Festival, where community leaders had the opportunity to learn about the need for Wildlife Crossings in their own backyard.

“The international competition both establishes and inspires a new category of public infrastructure that is both responsive and responsible to environmental concerns,” said Jared Polis (D-CO), Colorado congressman.

“The ARC competition addresses a global problem with a Colorado-based solution that will demonstrate the importance of international cooperation.”

Growing scientific research—including the seminal work in road ecology initiated by Parks Canada—shows the importance of wildlife crossings and their effectiveness at reducing wildlife-vehicle collisions. In 1981, Banff National Park began to upgrade an 83-km (51.6-mile) section of the Trans-Canada Highway in response to growing traffic volumes, collisions and wildlife roadkill. Now there are over 24 wildlife underpasses and four wildlife overpasses from Banff National Park’s east entrance to the border of British Columbia.

The crossings, along with fencing, have reduced wildlife-vehicle collisions by more than 80 percent. As a result, 11 species of large mammals—including wolf, grizzly bear, elk, lynx, mountain lion and moose—have made nearly 250,000 safe crossings (and counting) across these paths. More such projects are underway, including an international public-private partnership established by Parks Canada to monitor wildlife mitigation measures and improve efficacy of these types of projects around the world.

“The work that Parks Canada started nearly 30 years ago has put Banff on the map as a leader in wildlife crossings and will continue to provide opportunities for technology transfer for ARC and other similar initiatives,” said Carol Markham, consul for political/economic relations at the Consulate General of Canada in Denver. She further states, “The ARC competition clearly demonstrates the strong relationship between Canada and the United States and is a wonderful opportunity to underscore the CanadaU.S. partnership as joint stewards of our shared environment.”

Now that the ARC competition is complete, Nina-Marie Lister is still hard at work preparing for the next incarnation of the project, ARC Solutions. While the competition focused on the West Vail Pass area, the applications developed can also be applied to other locations in need of wildlife crossings, explained Lister, adding that ARC’s new phase will strive to implement the design concepts already created through the competition. The website www.ARCSolutions.org is scheduled to launch late September 2011.

“By installing wildlife crossing structures, whether you’re building new bridges or retrofitting old ones, we are able to preserve the integrity of the whole landscape,” said Harvey Locke, co-founder of the Yellowstone to Yukon (Y2Y) initiative based in Calgary, Alberta, and vice president for Conservation Strategy at the WILD Foundation in Boulder, Colorado. “ARC is about how to do something we know how to do and do it in a more beautiful and cost-effective way.”

For more information regarding the ARC International Wildlife Crossing Design Competition, visit www.arc-competition.com, and for ARC Solutions, visit www. arc-solutions.org. To learn more about the Consulate General of Canada in Denver or the Canada-U.S. partnership in environmental stewardship, please contact Jennifer Cook, Communications & Cultural Affairs Officer for the Consulate General of Canada at (303) 626-0672 or jennifer.cook@international.gc.ca.

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COMMUNITY

Colorado Women's Chamber of Commerce

Colorado Women Building

Infrastructure Both In Business and In Life By Elizabeth Leake

T

DatamanUSA believes in providing effective and efficient technology solutions through best talents, along with a sense of commitment, value and integrity for 100 percent customer satisfaction. They assist their women workforce with high energy and focus making them purposeful people and committed activists—who make it happen.

DatamanUSA has training, retraining and mentoring programs.

The Lifetime Achievement Award recognizes the efforts of a woman who has demonstrated significant leadership and has made an impact on women in her community.

DatamanUSA has a mature subcontracting program that helps identify, qualify and leverage services. There are over 50 womenowned IT consulting and staff augmentation companies that are in the DatamanUSA’s subcontractors program.

he Colorado Women's Chamber Annual Awards Luncheon celebrates the accomplishments of outstanding women and businesses in Colorado. The awards presented are Lifetime Achievement, Young Professional, and Sustainable, Small, Medium and Large Businesses of the year.

The Young Professional Award recognizes the efforts of an outstanding Colorado young professional woman who demonstrates significant accomplishments in her career and has contributed to the business community.

The Company of the Year Awards honor small, medium, and large companies that create a workplace culture that supports the highest levels of personal and professional accomplishment for their women employees by encouraging them to excel in the company, devote time and energy to their community in a meaningful way, and forge paths of leadership for other women to follow.

The Sustainable Company Award honors a company that creates a workplace culture that supports the environment, the economy, and society.

Large, Medium and Small Companies of the Year Award Finalists DatamanUSA, LLC DatamanUSA is a small, local, privately-held, for-profit business with a history of Best Business practices. It is100 percent woman-owned by Nidhi Saxena, who is the founder and CEO, and who mentors female employees to help them achieve the same level of excellence as she has.

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Entitlement and Engineering Solutions, Inc. Entitlement and Engineering Solutions, Inc. (EES) fosters a work culture that encourages all employees, not just women, to provide their best work. EES is a small woman-owned civil engineering company that employs a majority of women for their staff. EES has cultivated a workplace environment that supports women in their career pursuits while acknowledging the demands on their personal lives. The female majority at EES encourages a comfortable, supportive, non-competitive atmosphere to allow each employee to strive for excellence.

Women’s unique traits are valued as one of EES’ strengths, and EES employees are encouraged to cultivate those unique traits along with their professional skills to climb to leadership positions within the company, on projects, and within the community. By allowing flexible schedules, alternative work weeks and telecommuting, EES keeps talented and successful women engaged and employed within their field. By embracing these alternative work options, EES highlights women’s contributions to the industry and secures a consistent place for women in the profession.

Hensel Phelps Construction Co. Hensel Phelps Construction Co. (Hensel Phelps) established the Women’s Network (WNet) to create an environment that encourages women to pursue excellence within the company. It was established as a forum for mentorship

and leadership development for women in construction within the organization. The WNet has working groups established in each of Hensel Phelps’ seven district offices, having been established in Colorado at the corporate headquarters in Greeley, Colorado.

Hensel Phelps contracts for all types of goods and services from women-owned companies involved in all aspects of the construction and related industries. From design and engineering, to supply and installation of construction products and services, to inspection and commissioning of projects, Hensel Phelps has been recognized in the Colorado community as a leader in the advocacy and advancement of women-owned businesses.

Holland & Hart At Holland & Hart, women are encouraged to take an active leadership role within the firm. In the last 20 years, three women have acted as the managing partner or chair of Holland & Hart’s management committee. In addition, the firm’s activities committee, audit letter committee, federal political action committee, lease committee and wellness advisory committee are all currently chaired by women. Women attorneys are also included as voting members of other influential firm committees.

Holland & Hart was one of only 32 firms in the country recognized by the Women in Law Empowerment Forum (WILEF) through its new Gold Standard Certification Awards Initiative. It is the only initiative directed toward certifying, publicly recognizing, and broadly publicizing eligible law firms that have integrated women into the highest leadership positions in the firm.

Raytheon Diversity at Raytheon is about inclusiveness— providing an atmosphere where everyone feels valued and empowered to perform at a peak level regardless of the many ways people are different, including but not limited to age, race, gender, sexual orientation, family history or physical ability.

One of the ways Raytheon promotes inclusiveness is Raytheon Women’s Network (RWN). RWN provides employees with various opportunities to facilitate their career development, enhance their leadership skills, and increase their exposure to leaders. Additionally, RWN's community outreach and science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) programs establish Raytheon's brand within their community. RWN is an employee resource dedicated to serving as a strategic business partner in building and maintaining a diverse and inclusive workforce. RWN is committed to increasing the visibility and contributions of Raytheon women, thereby enhancing the company's ability to become an employer of choice for women.

council made up of lawyers and other firm professionals who work to ensure that inclusiveness is a core value throughout the firm and remains a core principal in recruiting, retention and promotion practices. Through these initiatives, Sherman & Howard seeks to develop and maintain a partnership and workplace that is inclusive for all lawyers and staff including people regardless of their race, gender, age, religion, sexual orientation, disability, or national or ethnic origin.

Sherman & Howard demonstrates its commitment to diversity and inclusiveness by placing women in leadership roles throughout the firm.

Over 90 percent of the positions listed under professional leadership opportunities have been filled by women within the firm who have demonstrated outstanding efforts and were awarded the position based on performance and demonstrated capability in their respective fields.

Work Options for Women The mission of Work Options for Women (WOW) is to help impoverished women gain the skills and confidence they need to work their way out of poverty and become gainfully and permanently employed in the food service industry.

WOW trains and hires women in poverty situations into the food service industry and assists them with life-changing opportunities by helping them address transportation, housing and childcare needs in order to teach them job responsibility and commitment to the training program. Their success rate with moving participants out of poverty and into self-sustaining employment situations is over 80 percent.

With a staunch focus on moving women in need into a selfsustainable employment situation by teaching them much-needed skills in an industry, WOW will succeed in putting women to work in the community with an opportunity for advancement.

Sustainable Company of the Year Award Finalists Goodwill Industries of Denver

Sherman & Howard

The mission of Goodwill Industries of Denver (Goodwill) is to create opportunities for individuals to change their lives and the lives of others while building a strong and sustainable community. Goodwill is a solution to reducing waste, a thriving nonprofit serving the needs of many in our community and ultimately, a socially responsible discount retailer.

Sherman & Howard recognizes that diversity is critical to the success of the firm and their clients. In 2008, they developed an inclusiveness

Each year, Goodwill diverts more than 55 million pounds of waste from landfills including used computer equipment through a

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Colorado Women's Chamber of Commerce

partnership with Dell computers. More than one million donors and two million shoppers helped turn one person’s trash into someone else’s treasure by donating, reusing and repurposing goods.

Goodwill ensures that more than 30,000 individuals in the community have the opportunity to change their lives and the lives of others while building a strong, sustainable community. Revenue from stores provides career development and skills training for atrisk youth, struggling families, and individuals with disabilities.

ReDirect Guide At ReDirect Guide, everything they do is in an effort to make living green simple and accessible. ReDirect Guide's resources, events, initiatives and projects are intended to provide pragmatic and easy-to-use tools to help everyone make green choices in their everyday purchases. They believe that by finding, qualifying, and presenting green businesses in easy-to-use formats, they are helping individuals contribute to a better world with every dollar they spend. Their products and services are designed to promote businesses that incorporate environmental and social responsibility, to strengthen community, to provide educational resources, and perhaps most importantly, to make it easy for consumers to find healthy and sustainable products and services in their area.

Young Professional Award Finalists Madison A. Carter Madison Carter runs a holistic wealth advisory business, working with individuals, families, businesses, and foundations/ endowments to help them identify their objectives and reach their goals.

As their name implies, they redirect consumer support to sustainable companies by providing an easy to use guide to green businesses and local resources.

Carter hosts monthly educational, business networking, cultural, charitable, and women’s events.

She is also an active member of the Women’s Vision Foundation, the Colorado Philanthropic Advisor’s Network, the Association for Corporate Growth, and the Boston College Alumni Association. She participates in economics and entrepreneurial associations and supports Girls Inc., Goodwill Youth Programs, Boys and Girls Club, Project C.U.R.E., Zuma’s Rescue Ranch, and Children’s Hospital. She recently launched her own nonprofit organization, the National Alliance for Education Empowerment (NAFEE), to further her mission to transform education and create a world where every child has access to the same empowering and engaging education programs.

Xcel Energy

Sarah Miller

Xcel Energy consistently meets its business goals and honors its commitments to customers, employees and the environment; the company proves that it is built to last. That was certainly true in 2010, an outstanding year in every category. They met their financial goals, maintained outstanding customer service, demonstrated environmental leadership, and achieved operational excellence.

Sarah Miller is a Financial Representative with The Cunningham Group of the Northwestern Mutual Financial Network in Denver. She joined the company in 2008 upon graduation from Colorado State University. Miller prides herself in developing meaningful, long-term relationships with her clients and community.

Xcel Energy’s list of environmental accomplishments is long—from their portfolio of renewable energy sources to their emissionsreduction efforts to their investments in promising new technology.

All of those initiatives got them closer to a clean energy future.

As Xcel moves in that direction, they balance their environmental responsibilities with their obligation to customers to deliver reliable energy at a competitive price. They want consumers to be aware of the fact that their balanced resource strategy, which includes a mix of energy sources, will continue to keep costs reasonable.

Miller got involved in the Women's Foundation of Colorado in 2010 because their mission aligned perfectly with hers: to make women and girls financially self-sufficient.

She also sits on their empowerment council, which is a fundraising and grant-making arm of WFCO. She also is involved in Habitat for Humanity's Women Build and The Women’s Bean Project.

Miller believes that you are only as great as what you give and she continues to be nourished by her community involvement. She believes in the potential of young women and dedicates herself to organizations that can provide them with tools and resources for their future.

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Meshach Rhoades

Frances Owens

Meshach Rhoades is corporate counsel for CenturyLink, where her practice focuses on right-ofway for the company’s local and national networks, finance facility costs, and wholesale contracts.

Rhoades is a past president of the Colorado Hispanic Bar Association and currently the regional president for the Hispanic National Bar Association and chair of the diversity in the legal profession of the Colorado and Denver Bar Associations, where she runs a mentoring program. She serves on the board of directors for Easter Seals Colorado and the Colorado Center on Law and Policy. Rhoades was named the Outstanding New Hispanic Lawyer by the Colorado Hispanic Bar Association in 2006.

Rhoades was also recently selected by the leadership council on legal diversity to participate in its inaugural fellowship program.

Frances Owens currently serves as executive vice president for Galloway Group, which focuses on forging mutually beneficial partnerships between for-profit and not-for-profit organizations.

Rhoades is a volunteer attorney at the Colorado Coalition for the Homeless and on the Hispanic Advisory Council for Florence Crittenton High School.

Lifetime Achievement Award Finalists Norma Frank Norma Frank, president and owner of Colorado Lighting, Inc., oversees the office while concentrating her major efforts on sales, public relations and marketing. Frank has been a part of the lighting industry for the past 34 years. She received her Certified Lighting Management Consultant (CLMC) designation 17 years ago, received her Lighting Certified (LC) certification in 1999, and served as President of NALMCO in 1989-90. In that capacity, she worked closely with the Environmental Protection Agency and the U.S. Department of Energy on their upcoming programs for energy-efficient lighting.

She is currently the chairperson of the Illumination Engineering Society's maintenance committee. Frank also sat on Governor Romer's Women's Economic Development Council. Norma is president of the Mapleton Public Schools Board of Education and is on the Archdiocesan Pastoral Council.

Owens served as First Lady of Colorado from January 1999 through 2006 and is well-respected for the leadership and support she offered to countless charitable causes. She currently serves on the board of the St. Joseph’s Hospital Foundation and the Colorado Nonprofit Association.

She is co-chairing the Art for ARC event this fall. Owens served as honorary chairs for AWARE’s annual luncheon last year, the Alzheimer’s Women’s Auxiliary for Research and Education, Owens is an active supporter of the Tennyson Center, Mt. Saint Vincent’s Anchor Center for the Blind, Developmental Pathways, Recording for the Blind and Dyslexic, Samaritan’s PurseOperation Christmas Child, The Children’s Hospital, the Colorado Historical Society, The Colorado Autism Society, Women’s Heart Health, and Habitat for Humanity as well as Key to the Cure, The Mask Project and many more.

Nancy Phillips Nancy Philips is co-founder and COO of ViaWest. She has over 15 years of management experience in technology and oversees ViaWest's operations, engineering and technical support divisions.

In addition to being recognized

by ViaWest for her outstanding contributions, Philips has earned a reputation for excellence throughout the industry. In 2010, she received CSIA’s prestigious Bob Newman Lifetime Achievement Award. She has been named the Denver Business Journal’s Outstanding Woman in Business in the high-tech category, and has been recognized by the Denver Chapter of the National Association of Women Business Owners (NAWBO) and the Denver Business Journal, winning the Outstanding Women in Business Jean Yancey Award. Phillips serves as the board Chair for CSIA (Colorado's Technology Organization), and also serves on the board of the National Center for Women & Information Technology (NCWIT).

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Colorado Capital Congress

Taking Care of Business Colorado Capital Congress By Rebecca Saltman

N

ovember 2011: With countless attack ads ringing in his ears, the announcement of John Hickenlooper’s victory in Colorado’s gubernatorial campaign, and the state facing a record deficit, entrepreneur Karl Dakin and a number of other business leaders decided that the time was ripe for further change. Calling themselves CIO Colorado (Chief Innovation Officer), they started brainstorming solutions to the ongoing recession, solutions in which Colorado needed to play a major role or else face an endless procession of fiscal quarters bleeding red.

Although rookies in the overall political process, they nevertheless were able to craft a bill (HB 1266), obtain the sponsorship of Pete Lee, a Democrat from HD 18 (Manitou Springs), and start recruiting support for legislation to create a public-private partnership. Its purpose— to raise and invest money in Colorado’s businesses. They were warned early in the process that any legislation would die quickly if it cost the state of Colorado any money, and so the bill was amended to include a Colorado stock exchange and licensing of finders to match-make stock sales where fees would cover operating costs and generate revenue to pay for a bond offering.

As one Capitol Hill insider puts it, “Getting time with state legislators while in session is like panhandling for money at an intersection.

You have to catch them when they come to a stop and pitch your proposal before the light changes.” The number of innovative components in HB 1266 required more time than usual to explain, putting CIO Colorado at an immediate disadvantage.

The bill was voted down 7-6 (in a surprising show of political solidarity, right along party lines – 7 Republicans and 6 Democrats).

However, in graciously acknowledging the efforts of CIO Colorado and commending everyone for thinking outside of the box, an invitation was extended by a number of the legislators, civic leaders and state officials to come back after the Legislature adjourned and discuss ideas for improving Colorado’s capital markets. ( 80 )

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This invitation led to the establishment of the Colorado Capital Congress. The effort is run by Karl Dakin, who also serves as the Executive Director of the Sullivan Chair for Free Enterprise at Regis University. The Congress represents a citizen-led public forum focused on improving Colorado’s capital markets and has teamed with the Institute for the Common Good, also at Regis University, to do just that. “If you don’t like an idea, you can’t simply criticize it.

You have to try to make the idea as good as it can be,” Dakin says.

“From the perspective of someone who opposes the idea, your commitment is to make it more acceptable. Then, if you are a member of the Congress and you still don’t like the idea, your first chance to say anything negative is to vote no on October 20.”

The concept for the Congress is to promulgate ideas for increasing monies to Colorado’s businesses and projects, while easing access to existing capital. The Congress acts as a new democratic interface between the public and Colorado legislators, without the narrow-minded agendas accorded to other groups such as lobbyists and their ilk.

It presents an opportunity for ideas like those raised by CIO Colorado to be vetted through development and dialogue by capital experts and the general public, married to feedback from Colorado officials and legislators.

» Getting time with state

legislators while in session is like panhandling for money at an intersection.

You have to catch them when they come to a stop and pitch your proposal before the light changes. «

The Colorado Capital Congress is open to the public, and an invitation is extended to every citizen of Colorado to join as a representative.

The Congress provides a non-partisan, innovative environment where ideas will be evaluated, discussed and developed. “The Congress is intended to provide a forum where ideas can be engaged through positive dialogue,” said Paul Alexander, director of the Institute on the Common Good (ICG).

The ICG serves the community at-large by promoting the common good and providing a safe and effective space for community dialogue, communal discernment, and public deliberation. The Institute also seeks to facilitate dialogue aimed at developing strategies to resolve important community issues.

From a business perspective, the Congress is intended to give a new voice to the Colorado legislature. However, the need for better communication is not only on the business

side of the equation. During any given legislative session, there are often too many bills vying for discussion, the merits of which rarely come under rigorous scrutiny. The Congress creates an opportunity for legislators to not only understand proposals for change, but to participate in the process that may grant those bills life.

As Karl Dakin criss-crosses the state recruiting businesses and legislators to join the Congress, he faces skepticism and apathy.

“It’s hard work,” he admitted. “Most small businesses feel that they are invisible and that any effort is a waste of scarce time needed to survive.” He laughed about a pitch to one sitting legislator who stated he didn’t have the time because he was campaigning for office. “How can any candidate expect you to vote for them if they put more time into campaigning than solving our problems?” said Dakin.

» The concept for the Congress is to

promulgate ideas for increasing monies to Colorado’s businesses and projects, while easing access to existing capital. «

The Colorado Capital Congress will circumvent lawmakers’ lack of resources by moving ideas for improving Colorado’s capital markets via a very different vehicle. The Congress will fashion ideas into action initiatives through a carefully-refined six-stage process. The process takes existing bureaucratic functions and redefines them, creating a chronological horn-of-plenty. Each of the six stages alone is a familiar tool in legislative parlance, but here are joined and timed to flow organically. In the first stage, ideas are born – exploring new solutions and improvements to existing systems. Second, initiatives are developed as ready-to-implement, detailed statements of change.

Third, the all-important discussion stage represents a determined effort for public input to avoid the behind closed doors label.

Logically then, the fourth stage is the vote – indication of support or opposition to a developed initiative. The final two stages – information dissemination (publication of books and educational programs) and action (new laws, regulations, public/private partnerships or private collaborations) are already better known as the public faces our governing bodies.

Up to 20 ideas will be selected as initiatives and assigned to task forces that will be responsible for developing the ideas to a point of readiness for implementation. Then, representatives in the Congress may discuss the issues online. On October 20, all representatives will be invited to the Regis University campus to vote on all initiatives.

The Sullivan Chair will then arrange for development and publication of knowledge gained from the Congress. Finally, champions will be recruited to implement each initiative receiving a majority vote.

Action may ultimately take many forms, any one of which could impact the daily lives of tens of thousands of Coloradoans.

The organizational meeting for the Congress was held on June 29.

Pat Ladewig, vice president of academic affairs at Regis University, welcomed participants and invited everyone to join in the Jesuit tradition of improving one’s community through innovation.

Alexander shared some of his family’s history in Colorado banking and set forth the convening principals for dialogue in the conduct of the Congress. Dakin provided details on the operation of the Congress and opportunities for participation.

On July 25, the Congress held a brainstorming session to better identify and recreate serendipitous opportunities: changing how sources of money are matched with businesses seeking funding. Futurist Tom Frey of the DaVinci Institute made a keynote presentation on the future of Colorado’s capital markets. Pointing out how the Roman Empire failed in part due to its use of Roman numerals and its inability to complete higher math functions, Mr.

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Colorado Capital Congress

Frey challenged the audience to identify and be prepared to discard the Roman numeral equivalents within Colorado’s capital markets. The address presented trends on the use of money, alternative currencies, and new forms of payment.

Thus inspired, the attendees formulated the four most pressing issues within the state’s capital market which included: sources of capital – existing cash or other resources that may be converted to cash or used as collateral; matching capital sources with businesses – quicker, better, faster ways to create appropriate matches that recognize the readiness of a business to receive capital and the ability of the an investor to evaluate risks; greater incentives – ways to make investments in Colorado businesses more attractive than offshore investments, creating cash reserves or other investment alternatives; and reduction of risks – ways to reduce actual risks and the perception that investing in Colorado businesses is too risky A variety of collaborative techniques were employed to avoid overthinking, to encourage lateral thinking and to shift perspective.

» A variety of

collaborative techniques were employed to avoid overthinking, to encourage lateral thinking and to shift perspective. «

Several ideas were proposed which will be reviewed and filtered for duplicates and then placed on the idea page on the Colorado Capital Congress website. Members of the public may join the Congress and post their own ideas as well. Key individuals are being recruited to become part of the leadership of the Congress and manage the taskforces developing each initiative. 80 individuals will be matched with 20 Regis University students to research issues and facilitate public discussion. The objective is to develop each idea to a point where it is ready-to-implement.

The first initiative, Colorado Capital Agents, will explore authorizing qualified individuals to facilitate the sale of Colorado securities between Colorado buyers and sellers and to earn a commission for their work. Additional initiatives are being staged on a wide range of topics. Currently these talking points are loosely aggregated into local approaches (enabling community investment pools, singleand multiple-industry specialty funds, and recognition of hybrid L3C entities), and regional approaches (recruiting international capital into the state, online scoring systems benefiting both investors and investees, and government incentives for investing in Colorado businesses).

“To be successful, the Colorado Capital Congress must generate workable initiatives,” Dakin observes. Simple statements of objectives or public policy have the appearance of wish lists. The Congress’ initiatives must address the needs and concerns of investors. Like any customer, investors need to be incentivized to invest now and to invest in Colorado businesses instead of other alternatives. The higher quality of Colorado businesses must be proven and broadcast to the rest of the world. In effect, Colorado’s investment products have to be ( 82 )

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superior to those of the competition. Product improvement will likely take the form of improving investors’ rates of return and lowering risks associated with investing. Nominations are now being accepted for the leadership of the Congress and individuals are needed to lead task forces with the responsibility for development and dialogue of each initiative.

Business and civic organizations are asked to endorse the Congress and invite their members to become representatives in the Congress. Current representatives engage each other on opposite sides of many contentious issues, but always arrive at one shared observation. The Colorado Capital Congress is a wonderful opportunity to speak up and be heard—to work with others who share the vision that together we can make things better, and to actually dive into the nuts and bolts of our problems, and make changes where they will do some good.

To learn more about the Congress visit http://www.ColoradoCapitalCongress. com or on Twitter at @cocapcongress. To learn more about Colorado Capital Agents visit http://www.meetup.com/Colorado-Capital-Agents.

Rebecca Saltman is a social entrepreneur and the president and founder of an independent collaboration building firm designed to bridge business, government, nonprofits and academia. To learn more visit www.foot-in-door. com or twitter @opendoors4u.

For dreamers who do.

Live, learn, and work with a community overseas.

Be a Volunteer.

peacecorps.gov

COMMUNITY

A Future By Design: The Venus Project

A Dynamic World The world is changing quickly. Science and technology continually increase what is possible, and many observe that the rate of change is increasing. At the same time, social organization has not changed fast enough to adapt to humanity's modern problems. Today's political and economic systems are becoming obsolete and cause avoidable waste and suffering. The constant state of war is unnecessary and wastes unfathomable numbers of human lives and valuable resources. Also, the earth's natural capital goods and services are facing increasing pressure as a result of record population, consumption, and waste. This situation necessitates actually designing society and its infrastructure comprehensively, rather than allowing inferior constructions to continue unquestioned because of historical conditioning. Modern technology can offer solutions far beyond what most people imagine.

Creating a Future by Design Perspectives from Jacque Fresco and Roxanne Meadows By Keenan Brugh

The limitations and opportunities of the future are dependent on the perspectives that people hold. As Fresco explained, "If any baby were brought up in Nazi Germany and never saw anything else, they'd be a Nazi. I believe that environment shapes people's behavior. All the values, facial expressions, emphasis on words, learned actions, etc. are all ideas from our movies, books, and role models." Just as one's native language is a product of the area in which they were raised, today's society, its institutions, and its infrastructure also affect understanding of what the world is and what it can become. The great challenge is to understand this frame of reference, then go beyond it, and actually imagine better frames that are unhindered from the past.

The Venus Project

T

ake a moment and imagine the future. How could technological advances be applied? What will cities look like? How might society operate to best address the challenges that humanity faces today? Meet Jacque Fresco, a modern day futurist whom many compare to the likes of Leonardo Da Vinci. At the age of 95, he has been living an accomplished life as a self-taught inventor, industrial designer, and social engineer. Applying a creative, scientific, and multidisciplinary approach to humanity's problems, Fresco has been imagining the future through technical solutions. In a phone interview, I was able to talk with Fresco and his partner, Roxanne Meadows, to gain insight into the future's wondrous possibilities.

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If you could clearly remove all of your biases about the way things have been, what sort of world would you want to create? Fresco has been practicing this exercise for roughly 90 years. He has been doing so, not as an armchair philosopher; but rather by learning through experiments and testing new alternative hypotheses. Fresco believes that in order to create a peaceful and prosperous world, one must declare all the world’s resources as a common heritage of all of mankind. The current inequality between individuals and countries will continue to breed war after war. This is a long term transition into an entirely new social system of the future. Eventually, he says, the current monetary system will be replaced by a resource-based economy. In this world, human and natural resources can be better utilized to address the problems facing humanity, such as how to

obtain energy sustainably or how to build better cities, instead of building stronger weapons to fight for control over scarce resources. We no longer have to live in a world of scarcity. For decades, Fresco has argued that geothermal energy is a viable source of clean energy that will last thousands of years.

Today’s cities have grown into what they are through a history of shortsightedness and insufficient technology. These cities have unending problems such as crumbling infrastructure, urban sprawl, and inefficient transportation. Rather than allowing key infrastructure such as energy, water, and public transportation systems to be formed haphazardly, Fresco calls for their design to be a creative, scientific, and conscious process. This alternative is comprehensive in its planning. The city is regarded as a whole system, with interrelating internal parts and external environments. The circular city that Fresco pictures is one of thousands that Fresco has engineered. The layout uses public transportation that goes around the city and extends in radii from the city center outwards to the government buildings, business centers, and housing areas. On the outskirts, housing gives way to recreational areas and agricultural lands. Many buildings can be made efficiently through being prefabricated and transported on site.

» By increasing

awareness about the future’s great possibilities, limiting world views can be replaced with a spirit of innovation and collaboration in shaping a world in which everyone would want to live. «

In Venus, Florida, Fresco and Meadows have created functional prototypes of some of their designs. They have made clean, hightech, and aesthetically pleasing buildings that work in harmony with nature. Of their many designs, many incorporate a dome shape. The

purpose of this is to maximize internal space relative to the amount of materials used. The dome is also highly resistant to outside forces, such as hurricane winds or earthquakes. The Venus Project facilitates research and development efforts as well as acting as a showcase center for spreading the ideas and designs of tomorrow. Their database of likeminded scientists, engineers, and designers acts as a broad technical network to increase cross-discipline communication and help to advance their cause.

“Just as the middle class of today lives better than kings of the past, we believe the wealthiest people today would do better in the resource-based economy of the future,” said Fresco It will take the adoption of a new mindset in order to bring about the technological and social innovations that Fresco and Meadows envision. Already, Fresco has been the subject of an award-winning documentary, Future by Design by William Gazecki.

Presently, they seek to make a major motion picture in order to bring the opportunities of the Venus Project into the minds of mainstream audiences. By increasing awareness about the future’s great possibilities, limiting world views can be replaced with a spirit of innovation and collaboration in shaping a world in which everyone would want to live.

To learn more, visit TheVenusProject.com.

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collaboration close up

We Must Work Together to Keep Our

Communities Safe The Arrival of the 9/11 Memorial in Denver By Tammy Schmidt

I

t might have gone unnoticed, a huge piece of twisted steel riding across the country on a flatbed trailer.

What drew attention to the giant mound of metal was the American flag, draped and billowing in the backdraft of a semi tractor, cutting through the nation’s summer heat.

The driver of the truck, John O’Dell, could hear the chatter on the CB radio as he drove from state to state. “What’s the deal with that hunk of metal?” an unknown trucker would ask. The reply, “It’s a piece of the World Trade Center from September 11th.” Then the citizen’s band (CB) would light up.

“We would only stop for gas and rest stops, and people would come up to ask about it. They would ask if they could touch it. That was very moving, “O’Dell said.

Through some parts of the country, citizens lined the roadway to pay their respects as it came by. O’Dell remembers Saint Louis, Missouri in particular, where it took him hours to drive just a few miles through the city.

The rusted and shredded steel is among 16 artifacts from the site of the former World Trade Center in New York City. It was accepted by the state of Colorado to commemorate the tragedy that happened half a continent away, yet impacted all of us as a nation. The move and its subsequent exhibition was sponsored by The Counterterrorism Education Learning Lab (The CELL), The Denver Post, 9News KUSA-TV, The Anschutz Foundation, MDC Richmond Homes Foundation, Liberty Media, the Civic Center Conservancy, the Colorado Air National Guard, and CAP Worldwide.

Colorado Lieutenant Governor Joe Garcia referred to the artifacts as, “A graphic reminder of that day almost ten years ago— twisted, lifeless, inanimate pieces of steel that remind us of the thousands of lives that were

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lost that day and the millions of lives that were affected by the events of that day.”

The CELL curates exhibits as education on today’s threats of global terrorism, and the Trade Center artifacts will be a part of

» "A graphic reminder of that day almost ten years ago—twisted, lifeless, inanimate pieces of steel that remind us of the thousands of lives that were lost that day and the millions of lives that were affected by the events of that day. « - Joe Garcia

the redesigned exhibit. Some pieces will also be made into a memorial in Babi Yar Park in Denver and eventually in other communities throughout Colorado.

“These artifacts stand as a stark reminder to Colorado, to Denver, indeed to all of us as Americans of our obligation to remain vigilant and work together to keep our communities, our state and our country safe and secure,” said, Denver Mayor Michael Hancock on August 8th, the first day that the warped steel was on display in Denver.

A small crowd gathered in front of Denver’s City and County Building to see the pieces of the Twin Towers up close. Wendy Young brought her five young children to see the display. Her oldest is 10, and was born exactly a month after the 9/11 attacks; the youngest is a toddler. Young tried to prepare them for what they would see, not knowing how it might impact them. “It’s difficult for them to understand, but I think definitely necessary for them to see just even a little piece of history to try to help them understand what happened,” she said.

Gerri Szadaj and Linda Kent brought flowers to lay before the World Trade Center remains. “When it hit it kind of struck everybody—united everybody. And this way, it gives us a chance to pay our respects,” said Szadaj.

Even 10 years later, the sight of the steel stirs deep emotions—sadness, shock, and once again, pride. “It was truly a life changing event, I think, for so many people, individually and as a country,” Kent added.

The artifacts will be on display again on September 11th, as Denver memorializes the 10th anniversary of the attacks. It will be an event that Lieutenant Governor Joe Garcia describes as an opportunity to “…give the people of Colorado a forum to come together and salute America’s will to prevail.” The day will be punctuated with free performances by the Colorado Symphony, the Colorado Children’s Choral, and The Beach Boys.

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Ethiopia Reads Creating A Reading Culture

By Janet Lee

Colorado Gives Day

Y

in that same year, he was honored with an ohannes Gebregeorgis, Honorary Doctorate in Public Service at children’s librarian and Regis University, in Denver, Colorado. He library champion, received was then further honored by being featured honorary membership to in Changing the World: Stories Celebrating the American Library Association (ALA) 100 Years of Graduate Education at the in New Orleans during the opening session University of Texas at Austin, published by of the ALA annual conference. Honorary the University of Texas Press. membership is the highest honor bestowed In an effort to expand literacy efforts to

by ALA on an individual. the northern region of Tigray, Ethiopia he Honorary membership may be established the Tigray Library and Literacy conferred on a living citizen of any country Development Project, under which he set whose contribution to librarianship or a up the Segenat Children closely related field is so and Youth Library in outstanding that it is of Mekelle. This gained the lasting importance to the attention of American advancement of the whole Libraries editor, Leonard field of library service. It is Kniffel, who wrote about intended to reflect honor Gebregeorgis’ work in upon the ALA, as well as the article New Youth upon the individual. Past Library in Ethiopia Makes recipients of the award Impossible Dream Reality. have included: Bill and In addition to his Melinda Gates, Oprah beloved book, Silly Winfrey, President Jimmy Mammo, Gebregeorgis Carter, members of has written a new Congress, and other Throughout his career, children’s book, Tirhas noted librarians.

In 2008, Gebregeorgis has overseen Celebrates Ashenda: An Ethiopian Girl’s Gebregeorgis was the establishment of Festival. Over 3,000 named a Top 10 copies of this book CNN Hero for his over 40 school library were distributed work in bringing partnerships, three during the dedication libraries and literacy of the Segenat Library. to his native Ethiopia. free-standing children’s While in New Throughout his libraries and seven donkey Orleans to receive career, Gebregeorgis mobile libraries. the ALA award, has overseen the Gebregeorgis was establishment of over invited to speak at 40 school library the Dr. Martin Luther partnerships, three King branch of the New free-standing children’s Orleans Public Library in libraries and seven donkey the Lower Ninth Ward, a mobile libraries. joint-use library that was He received the ravaged by floodwaters Presidential Citation for after Hurricane Katrina International Innovation and has since become a in 2008 from the ALA vital force in the rebuilding president, his former of New Orleans. professor, Dr. Loriene Roy, and was invited by ALA president Camila To learn more about Alire to present the Ethiopia Reads visit http:// presidential keynote in www.ethiopiareads.org.

Boston in 2010. Later

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07.11 - 09.11

Colorado Businesses Help Build Their Communities on

By Caitlin Jenney

C

olorado Gives Day, an initiative to increase philanthropy in Colorado, is back after an outstanding show of support for the state’s nonprofits last year. An amazing 12,500 individuals donated online, giving $8.4 million, and 28 local businesses joined the effort by adding another $320,000 in just 24 hours.

Colorado Gives Day founder, Community First Foundation, and corporate partner, FirstBank, look forward to a repeat performance on Tuesday, December 6, 2011, the second annual Colorado Gives Day. “Giving back is part of our culture,” said FirstBank CEO John Ikard, whose company is contributing $500,000 for the campaign. “The way we see it, we’re only going to be as strong as our community.”

FirstBank’s goodwill has generated $40 million in charitable contributions and thousands of volunteer hours since 1963, bestowing upon them the honor of Partner in Philanthropy by the Denver Business Journal.

Events like Colorado Gives Day can inspire organizations to support their communities in creative ways. Last year, Colorado Lending Source gave each of its employees $100 to support their favorite local charity.

“Colorado Gives Day was my inspiration for giving my employees money to make a donation online in lieu of a traditional holiday gift,” said executive director Mike O’Donnell.

“Every day my employees are helping our small business clients make investments in Colorado’s economy, so I can’t think of a better holiday gift than one that gives my employees a chance to make their own investment by giving back to charity.”

For more information or to make a donation, visit www.GivingFirst.org/cogivesday.

Cordially Invites You

the Institute of International Education

to the

10th Annual Diplomats Ball

Honoree: William J Hybl

Corporate Honoree:

Friday, September 30, 2011 DU Magness Arena 5:45pm - VIP Reception, 6:00pm - Cocktail Reception, 7:30pm - Ping Pong Diplomacy Exhibition & Reenactment, 8:00pm - Dinner

Evening attire or national dress and sneakers are encouraged!

For more information about buying tickets, parking, and more, please visit www.diplomatsball.org.

Presenting Sponsor

Gold Circle Sponsors

Championship Sponsor

®

Ping Pong Diplomacy Month

Celebrate the 40th Anniversary of Ping Pong Diplomacy with IIE and our community partners at the these three events leading up to the Diplomats Ball. For more information, please visit www.DiplomatsBall.org.

International Fashion’s Night Out at Neiman Marcus

Thursday, September 8 • 6:00pm – 9:00pm Neiman Marcus, Cherry Creek Shopping Center

Ping Pong Diplomacy Proclamation Thursday, September 13 11:00am-2:00pm Civic Center Park

Table Tennis Tournament Saturday, September 24 9:00am-9:00pm Infinity Park at Glendale

collaboration close up

An Initiative Promoting Environmental, Economic, and Cultural Growt h Solar Light Bulbs to Tafert, Morocco By Maria E. Luna

I

n the Big Ideas, Smart People…

Changing the World issue of ICOSA we published a story featuring Nokero solar light bulbs. We are inspired by Nokero’s story and decided to send and deliver bulbs to Tafert, Morocco.

This effort is more than a coincidence, but as an opportunity to promote environmental, economic, and cultural growth. We have formed a partnership with

Tim Sanders

Nokero to provide an indigenous village in Tafert, Morocco with solar light bulbs, for both personal and community use.

Currently the Tafert village uses kerosene as their main source of lighting.

We know that fuel lanterns release 190 million tons of carbon each year which is the equivalent of 30 million cars, and that more than one million deaths are attributed to fires caused by fuel lighting each year.

07.11 - 09.11

Join us in the movement and donate today at www. icosamag.com or www.nokero.com/morocco

By Annette Perez

Tim Sanders, best-selling author of the book Saving the World at Work and featured in ICOSA’s Corporate Social Responsibility issue has released a new book. In Today We Are Rich: Harnessing the Power of Total Confidence, Sanders provides realistic guidelines to have a successful life and not just how to be successful. Many of his ideas are based on lessons learned from his grandmother — an example of wholesome ideals and pure living. He shares brief reflections of his grandmother, Billye's, way of life, during what seems like a simpler, more innocent time.

He shares what really matters in our lives — strong faith and reliable people. That notion is ( 90 )

“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that has,” is a guiding principle of ICOSA so when we heard these staggering statistics we had to act!

backed up with abundant tips on positive thinking and avoiding negative effects from media, people, gossip, and the internet, suggesting instead, to surround oneself with fruitful knowledge.

Sanders' concepts remind us that we feed our minds just as we feed our bodies, and of the importance of similarly making healthy choices.

Today We Are Rich: Harnessing the Power of Total Confidence was released in April. For more information on Sanders book or to download a free section of the book please visit www.twar.com.

Polio still cripples thousands of children around the world. With your help, we can wipe this disease off the face of the earth forever.

Visit rotary.org/endpolio to help.

END POLIO NOW

We Are

ThisClose

Rotary

to Ending Polio.

Jack Nicklaus

Would Like To Thank The Following Friends For Their Inspiration

Brian Bartony John Boner Martha Butwin Tessa Carter Niccolo Casewit Adam Cohen Jennifer Cook Tim Cook Steve Crower Ina Cunningham Karl Dakin

Karen DeBartolome Tamara Door Matt Edgar Donna Evans Stacy Farley Kevin Flynn Elizabeth Goryunova Christina Gradillas Kelsey Guyette Thomas Gramling Greg Haas Colby Haines Kyle Hendren Darryl Hill Tom Hughes George Husk Lori Irvine Caitlin Jenney Kathleen Kennedy Townsend Rebecca Kersting Elizabeth Leake Janet Lee

John Ma Marshall Palm Melanie Pearlman Jim Pyeatte Eric Reamer Kim Reed Stephen Riley Debbie Ritchie Rebecca Saltman Tim Sanders Michael Schoenfeld Elliott Smith Larry Smith Judy Taylor Angel Tuccy Brad Wells Steve Werner Adam Wooten Catherine Worster Kathryn Wylde Bob

Building Tomorrow... Today: Infrastructure July - September 2011

4120 Jackson Street Denver Colorado 80216 I www.icosamag.com

BETTER SOCIETY

Giving Our Customers More than Equipment Conchita Cantύ did not like wastewater plants. She felt they would detract from the quality of life and diminish the cleanliness of her community. Conchita now enjoys the many benefits of water re-use from the same plant she once vigorously opposed.

Learn more about Conchita’s story at:

westech-inc.com/better-society WesTech’s experience and service-driven relationships allow us to build partnerships that generate the best possible wastewater solutions. The water technologies we provide benefit not just our customers, but society as a whole.

Industrial Process Equipment

Municipal Wastewater Equipment

Municipal Water Equipment

Telephone 801.265.1000

www.westech-inc.com Salt Lake City, Utah USA