SWANA’s International Board – What New with the Mothership?
by Laurie Batchelder Adams

Winter 2006

Despite the fact that we don’t always hear a lot about what’s going on at the national SWANA level between WasteCons (just what do 20 staff DO in the Silver Spring, MD offices all day???), both staff and the Int’l Board of Directors maintain a surprisingly active schedule of activities that keep SWANA alive and kicking:

SWANA conducts a third-party audit of our finances each year – a painful process for someone like me to waddle through!, but necessary to verify to our members and the rest of the world that our organization is fraud-free and up-to-date on all accounting and investing standards (this audit was recently completed for FY05, which ran from 9/04 through 8/05);
On the heels of the organization’s decision not to consolidate with EIA’s Waste Expo (based on input from Colorado and other chapters) – staff and the IB are closely evaluating how to provide future training and conference services that gets more information to members’ in a more timely and efficiently manner (i.e., more electronic versus face-to-face events) and makes sense fiscally;
SWANA staff and IB Finance Committee is in the midst of developing the $4M+ budget for FY07 – which will address the changes mentioned above as well as make payments to SWANA’s reserve account as promised with the dues increase approved last year (the reserves allow SWANA to develop a cushion against events beyond our control like another 9-11 or trio of hurricanes that impact the success of future WasteCons);
Preparation for WasteCon 2006 is fully underway for Charlotte, NC with NASCAR highlights – this is the biggest project SWANA undertakes each year for over 3,000 participants, and takes considerable effort from staff, IB members, chapters and technical division leaders;
And a myriad of e-course, e-session, training courses and conferences will be held between now and the end of the year.
See www.swana.org for me details or contact Laurie, 303-733-7943.
- “Taking Recycling to a Whole New Level” - held in Albuquerque, NM February 13th and 14th
- Landfill Gas Symposium – held in St. Petersburg, FL March 27th-30th
- SWANA’s 2006 Training Center - held in Las Vegas, NV April 3rd – 6th
- Landfill Symposium & Solid Waste Managers ‘Trends & Challenges’- held in Nashville, TN June 5th-9th
- WasteCon 2006 – held in Charlotte, NC September 19th-21st