This week, more than 150 ASCE members from all over the country gathered in Washington, DC for the 8th Annual Leadership Training in Government Relations, commonly known as the “Fly-In.”

While they are in town, the civil engineers will be meeting with their Members of Congress and lobbying them on issues of importance to the profession. Chief amongst them is the call to Raise the Grades on America’s Infrastructure Report Card with the Action Plan for the 110th Congress  (newly updated for 2008).

As they are out advocating on behalf of the nation’s infrastructure, we want to bring you a slice of life on the Hill, courtesy of our own live blogger, Danielle Elkins, an ASCE member from Los Angeles.

Her first dispatch:

Day 1, 11:30 PM: Leadership Training in Government Relations (aka DC Fly-In)

I'm writing you from a hotel room in Washington D.C. after opening night of the DC Fly-In. The beginners had their crash course in government relations earlier, and those whose flight was not canceled (snow storm in Dallas??), or flew in yesterday, met up with them after for a few drinks and typical ASCE schmoozing ("You work on bridges? Oh, me too!".

I'm from CA, so I immediately found some fellow Region 9 members who were making fun of a Region 8 member (typical behavior). I also had a few people come over that remembered me from last year, which was nice. I ended up afterwards at a Pub with a group of YMFers from FL and PA. We followed along the lines of typical engineering conversation, but then got into talking about the Congressional Fellowship Program. I had a little insight since this year's fellow, Rachel, was my roommate at the DC Fly-in last year... To be continued...

 Day 2:

Today was the day where we got thrown into the lion's den, but of course not without some training courses first. We started at the Madison Hotel bright and early (7:15 am = 4:15 am PST = 8 am arrival at hotel). Following a brief breakfast and intro, Amy Showalter, author of "105 Ways to Build Relationships With Your Elected officials," gave us tips on how to talk to our legislators. She gave great examples of how intelligent and articulate people have failed miserably at being effective with their legislators. Of course, the stereotypical engineer sometimes has a slightly harder time communicating or putting things in non-engineering terms, so this was perfect for the group. The difference between a social engineer and a non-social engineer is that th latter looks at their own feet while the other looks at yours, right? We're working on it... one fly-in at a time...

 

After that we got drilled on the issues for the day by Brian Pallasch (some refer to him as the guru for ASCE Government Affairs, he's basically the managing director). The topics we covered today were: the Infrastructure Improvement Act (already through the Senate, working on the House now), which establishes a national commission to complete a study on all matters of infrastructure to be presented to congress; The National Highway Bridge Reconstruction and Inspection Act (being circulated through the House, introduced by Chairman Oberstar - MN of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee (Thank you!!)), which authorizes $1B to help bridge inspection, repair, and replacement...

 

Day 2 Still Continued after horrible hotel wireless dropped out... The Dam Rehabilitation Act (passed house and introduced in Senate by Sen. Akaka-HI, which addresses an estimated $10.1B needed to repair the "high hazard" dams over the next 12 years with a mere $200M (aka reconsider buying property downstream...); The Water Quality Financing Act 2007 (Passed house the day we visited for last year's fly-in and was introduced by Oberstar (thanks again!), there is no Senate bill yet and yes, it's 2008), which would appropriate $14B over 4 years for construction and repair of our aging wastewater treatment plants (I won't get into wastewater...); Highway Trust Fund Act (no bill, but by far the most important, no I'm not a biased transportation engineer, pssh), would provide additional needed funds in some creative way to make up for the 36% of the SAFETEA-LU (a transportation thing) funds congress guaranteed that the Bush Administration forgot to include in their budget...anyone got $15B?

Day 2 Continued last one I promise: Last topic was Federal Appropriation Priorities (you can say you want to fund something, but it's not actually funded until you "appropriate" the money), which are fully funding the SAFETEA-LU guarantees ($42.2B), fully funding the Dam Safety Program ($11.7B), and funding the Clean Water State Revolving Loan Fund (try remembering that one when you're talking to your senator's staffer, $1.5B). So after learning about these issues and hearing a little more motivational tips from Amy, we headed to lunch and then to start out visits. At lunch, each state met as a table to discuss their plans for the day and talk about any Senator meetings. I had my first meeting at 2 pm (lunch ended at 12:30), so I headed over to Rep. C. Peterson's-MN office to meet my friend from HS who works as a legislative assistant to get myself prepared for the meeting. It's a little easier giving the infrastructure shpeel to someone you've known since 3rd grade...

 

Continued ok I lied for real this time: After my practice run, I headed to my appt. at my Representative's office, the powerful Representative H. Waxman-CA, with one of his aides. I had met with another staffer last year; not sure if that's good or bad for me. Good in that I got a clean start if my inexperience shined through last year! She was really nice, and I like to think I did an alright job of describing the issues as well as how they applied locally to the district. Waxman usually votes with ASCE on infrastructure, Yes on Water Quality and Dam Rehab last year, thank you sir, so it was a relatively stress-free meeting. After that I ran over to one of the Senate office buildings to meet the rest of the CA attendees (Region 9ers) to meet with a representative from Dianne Feinstein's office. I was looking forward to this one because the ASCE Congressional Fellow, my old roomie, would also be in the meeting...

 

Day 2 Dah facebook needs to work on allowing more characters on a wall: So unfortunately, if I had checked my voicemail prior to the Feinstein meeting I would have found that Rachel (the Congressional Fellow) was too sick to meet with us. We still met with the aide who focused on transportation and had a pretty good dialogue about the need to find additional sources of funding to pay for the growing cost of roadway and transit needs. Anyone got some unique ideas?? After the meeting, I grabbed my fellow MLAB YMFer Serge, and we headed to meet a few of my friends that work as aides in other various offices. We stopped by Oberstar's office to tell my friend that works there "thank you again," and saw a college friend at another CA Representative's office before heading to the ASCE Reception (shmooze with the reps and feed the aides time). According to my aide friend, our food selection was on the better side. Definitely better than the pound of meat sandwich they served us at WRYMC.

 Day 2 ok this has to be the end of Day 2 because it's Day 3 now: so WRYMC (great conference, bad lunch meat). So after the reception everyone either headed back to their hotels or out to eat. I met up with some aide friends and grabbed dinner at one of the "local hang out spots" and then headed back to my hotel... getting ready for Day 3 now... man it's early.

You can also catch more of Danielle’s comments on our ASCE Government Relations Facebook Group

While you’re on Facebook, take some time away from spying on your friends and join our new group: Save America’s Infrastructure