Message from Clay Rahn, President of RMWEA

Our Amazing Students and RMWEA’s New Vision, Mission, Values and Strategic Plan…The Final Countdown!

Isn’t summertime a wonderful time here in Wyoming, New Mexico and Colorado? The changing seasons provide a much-needed hiatus from bone-chilling weather and offer a chance to soak in the sun. Don’t misunderstand, I love spring, fall and winter as well, but our relatively mild summers here in the Rocky Mountain region are truly special to me. See, most of my life I have dreaded the summer. Riverside, California (where I grew up) and Fort Worth, Texas (where I lived for ten years just prior to Colorado) both hit triple digit heat for an average of 30 days each summer. By contrast, Denver only experiences a gloriously low 2.5 days above the dreaded century mark each summer!

You may be thinking, “Clay, what does 100-degree days and your move to Denver have to do with our new vision, mission, values and strategic plan?” Well, not a great deal, except for one important thing: change, as challenging as it is (like uprooting your life, in part for coolers summers) can be good. Our new VMV and SP will somewhat change RMWEA, and it will be challenging, but good!

While the new VMV and SP are still in development by a core team of about ten RMWEA officers and board members, I would still like to offer a brief sneak peek into what can be expected. We included words to the VMV like “building”, “serving”, “purpose”, “belonging” and “empowering” while preserving the phrase “Elevating Water Professionals.” And our strategic plan captures four specific goals focused on workforce development, collaboration, industry visibility and technology. More to come, stay tuned!
While there is still some work to be done during a few remaining meetings and with solicitations for content review, we are still expecting to meet our goal of rolling out everything during the RMWEA Business Lunch at the Rocky Mountain Water Conference (RMWC) on Tuesday, August 26th. I cannot think of a better reason to register for the RMWC and RMWEA Business Lunch than to witness this reveal in person…can you? OK, my excitement may be causing a tiny bit bias, and sorry, it will also produce a shameless plug: The RMWC runs from August 24-27 in beautiful Keystone, Colorado if you haven’t already signed up 😊

In addition, it cannot be overstated that I am so grateful to all of the very gifted professionals who have guided and contributed to this important initiative so far. It would be a mess without you. I simply cannot say “thank you” enough!

Switching gears from the VMV and SP, I want to highlight our talented student teams from the University of Colorado, University of New Mexico, and Colorado School of Mines who competed in the RMWEA Student Design Competition (SDC) on April 25th. This year’s SDC problem statement focused on how to meet future effluent temperature regulations at the J.D. Phillips Water Reclamation Facility in Colorado Springs. I had the pleasure of watching the presentations and witnessing those bright students who are the future of water quality in America. Congratulations to the students from Mines who placed first and will represent RMWEA at the National SDC during WEFTEC in Chicago. Their solution was a heat exchanger/heat pump system that would reduce effluent temperatures to meet future regulations while recovering heat to be used elsewhere onsite. Mines: We will be cheering you on in Chicago!

With that, feel free to reach out to me at any time with questions or comments. I would love to hear from you! And thank you again for this amazing opportunity to serve you as President.