Voices from NASCSP Training Conference, Seattle

Voices from the National Association for State Community Services Programs (NASCSP) Training Conference, Wednesday, September 21:

(Some are direct quotes, some are loose paraphrasing, and some are what I think I heard them say. Meanings are 100% accurate!)

WAP has weatherized 520,000 homes through August and spent $3.5 billion of the $5 billion we were given through ARRA. WAP is the 8th largest job creator of all the ARRA projects; we've created 15,000 jobs.

—LeAnn M. Oliver, Program Manager, Office of Weatherization and Intergovernmental Program, Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, DOE

Give people healthcare and education and you seriously diminish their vulnerability.

I don't know where we would be without ARRA.

(Quoting Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.) Change comes through continuous struggle.

Jeannie Chaffin, Senior Program and Policy Specialist at NASCSP, is the new Assistant Secretary, Administration for Children and Families, DHHS

—George Shelton, Acting Assistant Secretary, Administration for Children and Families, DHHS

Always start with training the administrators first when starting a new weatherization program, then do the technical training. 

—Eunice Herren, Tribal Liaison for Weatherization, Community Services and Housing Division, Washington State Department of Commerce

I promise there will be food left for you after the tour. [And there was!]

—Ray Li, Director of Strategic Initiatives, Neighborhood House

When I was a young artist displaying my art in some downtown gallery, hoping that some rich collector would like my signature style, and buy it, and I would become rich and famous, I always felt uncomfortable at the thought that the building the gallery was in, the street, and the neighborhood the building was in would not be changed one bit because of my work.

Stop the kill joys. That would be the curmudgeons, NIMBYs, Know-it-alls, ... [you get the point]

—Milenko Matanovic, Executive Director, Pomegranate Center, and self-described recovering artist.

We've been able to work the way OSHA wants us to work for the most part, and everyone from our crews who takes the OSHA safe workplace and practices training really believes in it. We do have a bit of a problem when doing lead safe work—OSHA says no plastic sheeting on the ground when it is raining or snowing because it gets slippery, and we need the plastic to be lead safe. But we'll work it out.

—Mark Bergmeier, Bureau of Weatherization, Iowa Department of Human Rights.

Take the light rail system from the airport to downtown Seattle. You see some great neighborhoods and really interesting houses, and it only costs two fifty.

[She also said some seriously scary things about asbestos and vermiculite.]

—Cheryl Hansen, Monitoring and Inspection Technical Specialist, Washington State Department of Commerce

Using an XRF system is a great way to test for lead in a house. It looks like a phaser from Star Trek. Are there any Star Trek fans in here? It takes about 30 seconds to shoot one spot in a house, and it's really easy to uplaod the test data, print it and file it. But don't ask DOE to pay for putting more radioactive material in the XRF when it runs out after two or three years. Is anyone from DOE here? DOE doesn't do that.

—Paul Krievins, Deputy Director of Energy Programs, Indiana Housing and Community Development Authority [at least as of today}