August 2016 President’s Message

Welcome back everyone. The summer is nearly over and it’s time to get back to work. Our Executive Committee recently completed the annual local section planning agenda for the upcoming year. We believe the future of NJAIHA is going to be even better behind our strong leadership team. Our newly elected Director of Membership Services is Candice Kowalewski and our President-elect is someone many of you know – Craig Doolittle, a NJAIHA Past President. Thanks to Barbara Woodhull who returns for her third term as Treasurer. Welcome aboard.

The local section is going be very active again this year and I look forward for the membership to help us achieve our goals. The Executive Committee has formed a planning group since NJAIHA will be hosting the Northeast Industrial Hygiene Conference and Exhibition (NEIHce) on Friday, December 2, 2016. We could use your assistance to help with logistics and other coordinated activities. Anyone who wants to volunteer, please contact Barbara Woodhull.

We are planning a stellar lineup of engaging speakers for our Professional Development Courses (PDCs) for December 1, 2016. More information will be forthcoming as we get closer to the event. We are always interested in hearing from anyone either from our membership or outside the organization who wishes to speak at our monthly dinner meetings, PDCs, or our annual regional conference. Please contact Craig Doolittle if you wish to volunteer.

Another goal is to collaborate with stakeholders to develop awareness, construct legislation, and provide the tools for the NJ Youth@Work training program. When you consider that nearly 18.1 million workers less than 24 years of age, and these workers represented 13% of the workforce (2013); young workers have high occupational injury rates in workplaces where they typically work (e.g. restaurants with slippery floors and use of knives and cooking equipment). Inexperience and the lack of any formal safety and health training also increase injury/illness risk to young workers.

The Executive Committee already has been hard at work over the summer trying to connect with various vested organizations about (1) developing policy to require all school districts to present a 45-minute curriculum for students who will be seeking employment, possible for the first time and the responsibilities of their employers to provide a safe and healthful workplace and (2) uploading the free materials needed for faculty to conduct the group training by the end of the school year.

The designed curriculum is a fun, free and engaging that helps administrators, teachers and school/community-based job placement staff educate young people about the basics of job safety and health. The curriculum also presents essential information and career-readiness skills that focuses on eight (8) strategic core competencies. These transferable skills will help students stay safe and healthy now and throughout their lives. The curriculum is flexible and it can easily be tailored to meet the needs of all NJ students while addressing specific child labor rules and regulations. In order for us to be success we seek the assistance of our membership and several Outreach Coordinators. The tools for administrators and faculty to train students was posted on the NJAIHA website under IH Resources. If you are interested in supporting this initiative, please contact Mark Ostapczuk.

Our standard order of business continues to be our main theme for 2016. We want you at the dinner meetings! We are working hard to find quality speakers to engage our membership. If you haven’t heard, NJAIHA is offering a “Loyalty Rewards Program”. Members who attend any five (5) dinner meetings will get the sixth dinner free!! In addition, if you sign-up five (5) new or former members, we will gladly offer you a free dinner as well. Feel free to contact me on any other incentive programs drive engagement in the organization and increasing the membership.

We are still looking for volunteers to be our Outreach Coordinators. This important opportunity assists NJAIHA to increase awareness of our profession as a career choice and the benefits of being a member of our local chapter. Ideally, we would be to start a NJAIHA student chapter to create synergy between NJAIHA, local universities and colleges. We envision that some of our scholarship winners and undergraduate and graduate students could work as Outreach Coordinators to tell middle school and high school students about the benefits of our profession. NJAIHA has constructed a fun and brief to meet this goal. If you are interested in this project, please contact Candice Kowalewski.

As always, more information is being continuously uploaded to the NJAIHA website and the Linkedin and Facebook webpages. There are many peer-reviewed articles and other resources, which may be of interest to our members and the work that they do. We look forward to receiving comments and recommendations regarding content and format to deliver timely information about our profession. It is our hope that other people outside our profession will find this information informative as well. We hope to cross pollinate different related disciplines. The relationship can provide useful insight and dialog on how industrial hygiene and occupational health can become a sustainable entity that provides cost savings, return on investment, and improves productivity, profitability, and prosperity for business. We also envision more collaboration with economists, sociologists, and investors about risk.

The new OSHA health standard on crystalline silica is being discussed among business in general industry, construction, and maritime trades. Our webmaster, Jack Zybura has uploaded a Body of Knowledge (BoK) on crystalline silica information to the website including federal OSHA, NIOSH, and NJ Department of Health and Human Services published resources. We hope our members and other stakeholders will find this information useful to construct a robust corporate policy, written program and standard operating procedures as OSHA compliance deadlines loom in the not so distant future.

Our plan is to continue selling the piqué polo shirts with the NJAIHA logo to raise additional revenue to support the student scholarships next year. After some deliberation, we plan on holding our pricing so that more of our members can afford these items. Several of our members proudly wore these shirts in support of NJAIHA at our Past President’s night and AIHce in Baltimore. MD. Please consider making a purchase as a gift, present, or any other commemorative celebration.

Finally, NJAIHA is hopeful to attract more occupational health and safety consultants, equipment manufacturers and distributors, analytical laboratories, and corporations to help sponsor our monthly dinner meetings, advertise in our newsletters, and become premium exhibiters at the 2016 NEIHce. If you are interested in advertising, contact Mark Ostapczuk. In closing, I look forward to seeing all of you at our September 15th dinner meeting at Snuffy’s!

Best Regards,
Bernard L. Fontaine, Jr., CIH, CSP, FAIHA
President NJAIHA