February’s EC06—the annual IECA conference and expo held this year in Long Beach, CA—was IECA’s best-attended event to date. Two things came out of the conference that you’ll be hearing more about in these pages and at upcoming industry events. Both have great significance for the future of the ESC industry, and both are going to make jobs and processes smoother, in very different ways.

One of these is the fledgling Certified Inspector of Sediment and Erosion Control (CISEC) program. Jerry Fifield of HydroDynamics Inc. has been working for several years on the idea of a nationwide program to provide certification and recognition to inspectors, as well as to provide training programs. Inspectors are in short supply in many areas, and it’s difficult to achieve consistent standards.

Jerry presented the CISEC idea at StormCon ’05 in Orlando, FL, last July, and he will be giving an update at StormCon ’06 (www.StormCon.com) in Denver on July 25. Here in Long Beach he led a discussion and invited attendees’ participation, assisted by several people who’ve been working with him for the last several months: Joe Crea, Mike Chase, and Christy Lowe. They divided the session into groups to generate ideas on particular areas of interest, such as land development, vertical construction, “big box” construction, and highway or linear development.

During last year’s Orlando presentation, Jerry set out several goals, and he recapped at the Long Beach session the things achieved since then, including an agreement with CPESC Inc.—the organization that administers the Certified Professional in Erosion and Sediment Control (CPESC) and Certified Professional in Storm Water Quality (CPSWQ) programs—to administer the CISEC program.

Identifying the standards and formulating the exam questions—even deciding whether the exam should be written or a combination of a written test and an in-the-field component—are still works in progress, but he emphasized that the program will meet EPA’s, rather than local or regional, criteria. Those with the CISEC certification will then need only minimal training to meet local regulatory requirements for inspecting ESC practices on construction sites.

The program has come a long way in the last few months and will be a major step forward in improving the quality of inspections—and ultimately the quality of water—across the country.

Another development from EC06 is the continuing work of IECA’s Economic Research Committee to quantify the value of erosion and sediment control—in other words, is what we’re doing worth it, and how can we demonstrate that to people outside the industry? This is a tough issue to tackle, and the committee has been examining it from a number of different angles. Dan Waldman’s editorial on page 6 of this issue presents the concept of developing a methodology for determining a cost/benefit ratio for ESC practices, something that has potentially huge implications for those within the industry as well as for those who set policy and allocate funds. (And he really does want your feedback on this formula!)

Both of these concepts—the CISEC program and the cost/benefit ratio—will make it easier to communicate ESC concepts and goals. One is a global, big-picture point of reference: What are the standards? What are the things to be considered when looking at the cost? The other, equally important, is a way to tailor that larger concept to local conditions, which, when it comes down to it, is the essence of everything we do with ESC.

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EC - May/June 2006