GCR Wraps Up a Busy, Productive Fall Meeting

GCR Fall Meeting Features

Elections, Tour and More!

The ISRI Gulf Coast Region’s fall meeting—held Nov. 1-2 at the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino Tulsa—offered the roughly 40 attendees a facility tour, a PAC luncheon, and a board meeting that covered timely regional and industrywide issues and featured the election of GCR board members.

The meeting kicked off Nov. 1 with an opening night dinner during which attendees shared their thoughts on the challenges and opportunities in the recycled materials industry.

The next morning, Nov. 2, the GCR board meeting began with a safety message then provided reports from the four GCR officers and legislative updates on the GCR member states and Mexico as well as reports from GCR’s working committees.

Topics discussed at the GCR board meeting included

■ ISRI’s common language project, which seeks to establish a new lexicon for the recycled materials industry (click HERE and log in using your ISRI member credentials to access these member-only resources);

■ ISRI’s Workforce Management Toolkit, which includes marketing materials that members can use to recruit new employees (click HERE and log in using your ISRI member credentials to access these member-only resources); and

■ discussion of a request from Professor Qiong Wang of the University of Oklahoma to study recycling facilities in the Gulf Coast region. GCR appointed a task force of the following members to work with the professor’s team on this request: Nina Grimes of Grimes Iron & Metal; Brandon Huerta of CMC Recycling; Marcie Rodriguez of Comal Iron & Metals Inc.; Jessica Montes of Sims Metal; Stephanie Lankford of R6 Recycling; and Scot Stein of Builtrite Manufacturing.

The GCR meeting also included the election of the following board members for two-year terms:

■ Mike Kalpin of OmniSource;

■ Roberto Bremer of BRX;

■ Gigi Gebhardt of Rise Equipment/Himes Service Co.; and

■ Eric Cherry of The Yaffe Companies Inc.

In addition, the following GCR members will serve on the board as presidential appointments for one-year terms: J.D. Binkley of Artesia Metals Inc.; Douglas Derichebourg of Derichebourg Recycling USA; and Marcie Rodriguez of Comal Iron & Metals Inc.

Following the GCR board meeting, interested members toured CMC Recycling’s processing facility in Tulsa (shown at left). The fall meeting then wrapped up with a fundraising luncheon to benefit WolfPAC, which supports candidates for the Oklahoma statehouse. Kyle Hilbert, Speaker Pro Tempore of the Oklahoma House of Representatives, provided opening comments at the luncheon. Then Hilbert and three other Oklahoma legislators at the luncheon—Anthony Moore, Mark Lawson, and Trey Caldwell—engaged in a Q&A session with attendees, with the discussion focusing on metal theft and regulation enforcement.

“The GCR board meeting and related events are an ideal forum to learn more about the resources available to you as an ISRI GCR member,” says GCR President Becky Proler of SCR Recycling (shown center right with Professor Qiong Wong, left, and GCR Secretary/Treasurer Brandi Harleaux). “I encourage all of you to discover this value for yourselves by attending GCR’s 2024 meetings, including its summer convention in Austin, Texas, from June 25-28 and its fall meeting next year.”

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For more information on the ISRI Gulf Coast Region,

click HERE or contact one of the following officers:

President: Becky Proler, SCR Recycling

First VP/Convention Chair: Alton Schaubhut, CMC Recycling Liberty

Second VP: Chip DeJean, Louisiana Scrap Metal Recycling

Secretary/Treasurer: Brandi Harleaux, South Post Oak Recycling Center