April 2017 President's Report

President’s Report

by Brian Morgan, Esq., Legal Counsel, CDM Smith Inc.

Congratulations! Once again, BSCES is setting the standard for the other ASCE sections. I am pleased to announce that BSCES was recently awarded the Annual Section and Branch Diversity Award for the second year! The Annual Section and Branch Diversity Award was established in July 2003 by ASCE's Committee on Diversity and Women in Civil Engineering, the predecessor of the current Committee on Diversity and Inclusion. Awards are presented each year to sections, branches, and institutes demonstrating stellar and noteworthy efforts in promoting diversity and inclusion within the civil engineering profession. BSCES is being recognized for making significant and impactful contributions to the enhancement and awareness of diversity and inclusion within their local community. The formation of a Diversity and Inclusion Task Force, a diverse board membership, and its contributions to promoting STEM to underrepresented student populations, establishes BSCES as an exemplary model for demonstrating the essential value of diversity and inclusion.

ASCE’s President-Elect, Kristina Swallow, will be visiting with each New England Section in May. We are fortunate that Ms. Swallow will be attending a Leadership Luncheon on May 12 during which she is expected to discuss ASCE’s three initiatives and what she hopes to accomplish during her tenure as ASCE president. Held at CDM Smith’s offices in Boston, this lunch is primarily for the BSCES Board of Government members and our Society Sponsor representatives. However, if you would like to participate, please contact Rich Keenan at 617/305-4110 or rkeenan@engineers.org. Seating is limited due to the venue and will be on a first-come, first-served basis. 

In addition to the Leadership Luncheon, Ms. Swallow will be the keynote speaker at the Outreach Spring Awards Dinner, which will be hosted at Louis Berger’s office in Needham and occurs the evening of May 12. Ms. Swallow will discuss ASCE’s inspiring, giant-screen movie Dream Big: Engineering Our World (http://www.asce.org/dream-big/). This night provides BSCES the opportunity to recognize BSCES student contest winners, ASCE and BSCES Life Members and others.

BSCES technical groups and institute chapters have lined up a lot of activities for this spring and I would encourage you to attend the upcoming events before we take a break for the summer. These include three events supported by BSCES Special Funds.

On Wednesday, May 17, at the Boston headquarters of CDM Smith, the Environmental & Water Resources Institute Boston Chapter will be presenting the 2017 Karl R. Kennison Lecture. This dinner meeting features Beth Lambert, aquatic habitat restoration program manager, MA Division of Ecological Restoration, and Nick Nelson, regional director & fluvial geomorphologist, Inter-Fluve, presenting the topic Creating Resilient, Healthy Rivers: Dam Removal Projects in Massachusetts.

The Transportation & Development Institute Boston Chapter will be hosting the 2017 Bertram Berger Seminar at the Omni Parker House in Boston on Wednesday, May 24. Organized under the theme, Multimodal Transportation for Today’s Modern Society, this seminar includes a keynote address by Anna M. Barry who is deputy commissioner of the Connecticut Department of Transportation and features two panel discussions. The First, Advocacy for Multimodal Transportation Infrastructure, is moderated by Luisa Paiewonsky, director, infrastructure systems and technology, U.S. DOT/Volpe Center. The second, Design Challenges to Accommodate Multimodal Transportation, is moderated by Lisa Brothers, chairman and chief executive officer, Nitsch Engineering.

The Engineering Management Group will be holding the 2017 Joseph C. Lawler Lecture on Thursday, June 15 at the Top of the Hub restaurant in Boston. The guest speakers will be Rick Dimino who is president and CEO of A Better City and Barry Bluestone, senior research associate at the Dukakis Center for Urban and Regional Policy, Northeastern University. Both speakers will be discussing Greater Boston’s Infrastructure Needs.

Please see the inserts at the end of this newsletter for further information on each of these upcoming BSCES Special Fund events and be sure to register to attend by their respective registration deadlines.

I would like to thank our Society and Program Sponsors, whose financial support helps enable BSCES and its committees, institute chapter and technical groups to host the numerous networking and professional development events that are planned for this year. I am especially appreciative of AECOM, which is a 2016-2017 BSCES Society Sponsor and sponsor of the April 2017 BSCESNews.

The theme of this month’s newsletter is State of Infrastructure and I urge you learn more about this issue’s featured group, the BSCES Public Awareness & Outreach Committee, which is chaired by AnaCristina Fragoso of WSP | Parsons Brinckerhoff. This issue of BSCESNews contains a page 1 article written by AnaCristina.