Dear Members,

What an amazing Gingerbread Challenge we just had! Thank you to all the teams who participated, our sponsors and to those that showed up to support the amazing builds. We had an incredible event this year and I was incredibly excited by the energy in the room.

We had a lot going on in November with webinars, partner meetings with AIA not to mention the NCSEA Summit in our backyard at Disneyland! Between SEAOC Board meetings, a joint SEAOC/NCSEA Board meeting and all our committee meetings, your Association was hard at work in November.

And the events all showed not only the dedication of our membership in promoting our profession, but also to all the opportunities still available out there. One ask that came out of our State meeting was for continued support of some of our State commitees. If you have interest in any of the following committees, our local SEAOSC MO could use representation on either the Wind, Policy/Legislature, Professional Practice or Continuing Education State Commitees. Please help SEAOSC stay involved and have a voice at the State level on these important committees. If you have interest, please reach out to me directly or to our association executive director at seaosc@seaosc.org.

We also approved two new policies through our Board of Directors in the past two months. One of these was to formalize our Safer Cities Advisory Board process. SEAOSC continues to get requests from cities and AHJ's to support and/or comment on upcoming legislation and we have a great process for providing feedback. We also adopted a new policy on Committee Grants/Stipends for promoting attendance at the annual SEAOC Convention. Your committee chairs received the latest policy on this opportunity and if interested, please reach out to them for information. Both of these continue to support our members who are interested and want to get involved!

One additional opportunity that will be coming in the next several months is the development of our Convention committee that will begin working on the next convention that our MO is responsible for in 2026. Will we go back to the desert? Will we go out of state?  Who knows, but if you want to be a part of the planning and help organize one of the most important and prestigious Structural Engineering events in the world, please reach out to me or via email at seaosc@seaosc.org.

My word for the month is Accountability. We all need to be accountable for what we do. Imagine if we all hit our deadlines and committed to getting done what was asked….. On time. Imagine the production that would result. Being accountable goes a long way in helping your team achieve the goals is sets forth. Without accountability, we'd be drifting without accomplishing much of anything. As leaders, we need to ensure we hold others accountable. We cannot be a team without it. But with it, amazing achievements can be realized. Make sure to hold yourself accountable and get done what you say you would. You can do it. 

We have a wonderful webinar later in December titled, "Seismic Retrofit and Repair in Alaska". This was a presentation that was also supposed to be given at the convention in Hawaii earlier this year and we are excited to bring it directly to our membership. We are also focused on our symposium in mid-January, Northridge30. This is a day not to be missed as we look back at what happened 30 years ago this January 17th. And we will also look at where we are headed today. Our symposium will be held on the campus of Caltech in Pasadena. There is lots of buzz about the event not only from our members but also media and government officials. This is a can't miss event. Be on the lookout for new announcements and registration opening soon.

Have a wonderful end of the year and Happy Holidays to all! I look forward to celebrating with everyone in the New Year. 2024 will be spectacular!

Best,

Craig Chamberlain, S.E.
SEAOSC President 2023-24