November Member News

MONTHLY MEMBER NEWS

NOVEMBER 2021

Your Member Liaison | P: 712-898-0083 | E: lfield@younglovellc.com

At the October Board meeting, we again focused on the progress being made in achieving the goals of our strategic plan. As the plan builds each year on the success of our annual goals, we were able to celebrate in October the achievement of exceeding nearly every goal established for 2021 by the Board of Directors. Here are some highlights:

MEMBERSHIP

Members helped us exceed our retention goals as we currently are at 92% retention. We are grateful for each and every one of you.
Thru a collaborative effort of Board members and staff year to date we are at 65 new members and the Board goal of ending 2021 with over 500 members has already been surpassed with 522 members.

GOVERNMENT AFFAIRS

The goals for our state PAC were to raise $85,000 and get more members involved as donors. While we are currently just short of our fundraising goal, we have exceeded individual donors. You may donate here.

SAFETY

The Safety Council set a goal to collaboratively work with IOSHA to get our Alliance Agreement renewed for 2021 and that was accomplished this year. The Safety Council is now working with IOSHA to finalize the agreements 2022 Work Plan.
Safety Training Evaluation Program (STEP): Our 2021 goal was to have 36 members engaged in STEP, and as of October we were just shy of that goal at 31 members participating. Learn more about STEP.

APPRENTICESHIP & EDUCATION UPDATE

Ginny Shindelar, VP of Education and Training Services

P: 515-985-1175 | E: ginny.shindelar@abciowa.org

Like just about anything last year, COVID-19 upended our annual Craft Championships competition in 2020, but this year we are back and better than ever! The Craft Championships competition, held at the Varied Industries Building on the Iowa State Fairgrounds on Dec. 3, is an exciting event for ABC of Iowa’s Apprenticeship and Training Trust.

First, it is a highly competitive event for our current apprentices. Students qualified for the state competition this fall through exemplary scores on a written test. Craft Championship competitors placed in the Top 10 of their respective fields’ testing. This is a perfect opportunity for apprentices to showcase what they’ve learned on the job and in our training program. Observers get to watch apprentices compete in HVAC, Electrical (Commercial and Residential), and Plumbing trades. Besides prizes and awards, the winners in each trade will go on to compete, representing Iowa, in the National Craft Championships competition held in San Antonio this spring.

SEEKING: INTERACTIVE BOOTHS

Each year, over 300 high school students from around the state register to attend our Career Day. This is an excellent opportunity to interact - completely FREE.

HOST A BOOTH!

GOVERNMENT AFFAIRS

Sandi Conlin, Government Affairs Director

P: 515-321-8358 | E: sandra@iowapolicy.com

ABC OF IOWA PAC

We're wrapping up our fundraising efforts for ABC of Iowa PAC.

Please consider a donation today!

Donate Now!

Training Center Tours

We love showing off our training centers across the state and talking about our program to elected officials. This October, we invited legislators to come for a tour of our training centers while classes were in session. Thank you to all legislators who came to a tour this month!

Ginny Shindelar, VP of Education & Training takes legislators on a tour of our Davenport Training Center.

MEMBERSHIP UPDATE

Jared Harridge, Membership Director

P: 515-681-5620 | E: jared.harridge@abciowa.org

After Business Cocktails

We'll wrap up the year with two remaining evenings with our members in Dubuque on Nov. 18 and S. Sioux City on Dec. 7. We know everyone is extremely busy, but we encourage you to drop by between 4:30-6:30 p.m. for one of these upcoming events - they are worthwhile and an excellent way for our members to connect and do business with other ABC members in their area.

Iowa has one of the strictest and most complicated drug and alcohol testing laws for private employers in the United States. Adverse employment actions will not survive legal challenge, and protests of unemployment claims will be lost if a drug/alcohol test was not lawfully conducted.

This is a training you can’t afford to miss if you are an ABC member who is conducting—or wants to start conducting—drug or alcohol testing on your employees.