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Association & Industry News
NRMCA is looking for good men and women to serve on the Board of Directors. While serving on the Board requires both commitment and energy, it is a rewarding opportunity to give back to the industry. NRMCA represents a broad range of ready mixed concrete companies across the United States and our success is a direct result of the skills and expertise of our professional staff working in conjunction with our Board of Directors. Director nominees must be committed to promoting NRMCA programs and working in the best interest of its membership and the industry at large. The Board provides strategic direction, fiduciary oversight and governance of the organization’s operations. Nominees are vetted by the Nominating Committee, which consists of the current chairman of the Board, the immediate past chairman of the Board, and past chairmen of the Board for the previous seven years who are still in an active capacity in the industry. The selected slate of nominees is then presented to and elected by the general membership and will serve a three-year term that begins immediately following the annual convention in 2021. The deadline for submissions is Friday, July 24. Please click on links below for more information or contact NRMCA's Heather Houck at hhouck@nrmca.org. Ready mixed concrete production through November 2019 has been posted on the NRMCA website about two months ago. These estimates are based on cement shipments reported by the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS). USGS has not published its cement shipments for December 2019 and has indicated that its staff is in a remote work mode. USGS is processing the data and expects to publish reports for December 2019 by the end of April and January 2020 soon after. When these reports are available, NRMCA will update its ready mixed concrete production estimates for the U.S. and by state for 2019. NRMCA apologizes for the delay in this report. The National Center for Transportation Infrastructure Durability & Life-Extension is hosting a webinar titled Functional Aspects of Concrete Pavement Durability by Dr. Dan Zollinger of Texas A&M University on Thursday, April 16, beginning at 11 a.m. Pacific time. Click here for more information about Dr. Zollinger. *Please note that because of increased spamming, you will need a Zoom account to access this webinar. Zoom accounts are free and can be set up here. Also note the meeting ID and password below. For more information, contact Cheryl.reed@wsu.edu. 
Buildings
City officials of Worcester, MA, recently voted unanimously in support of a resolution to endorse statewide legislation that would amend Massachusetts’ building codes for fire safety reasons and provide an added level of protection for firefighters and residents alike. Worcester joins a number of labor and construction industry leaders in support of the legislation. The Build With Strength coalition in Massachusetts includes the following organizations to date: Massachusetts Concrete & Aggregate Producers Association, Mason Contractors Association of Massachusetts, Bricklayers & Allied Craftsmen Union Local 3, Ironworkers Local 7-Boston, International Union of Operating Engineers Local 4, Teamsters Local 25, Steel Framing Industry Association, Northeast Precast Concrete Association, Portland Cement Association, New England Concrete Manufacturers Association, National Stone, Sand, and Gravel Association and American Concrete Pumping Association. The adopted resolution supports House Bill No. 3844 and Senate Bill 1799 which would amend The Commonwealth of Massachusetts' building code. Measures would include the installation of automatic sprinkler systems in accordance with NFPA 13, measuring the number of stories from the grade plane using combustible materials for construction, installing a fire barrier with fire resistance rating of at least two hours that extends from the foundation to the roof, and providing for a fire watch at construction sites after hours. The bill was most recently reported favorably to the House Committee on Ways and Means from the Committee on Public Safety and Homeland Security. Build With Strength works with communities, lawmakers and industry employees to advocate for safer, sustainable building materials. Strengthening local and national building codes is among the organization’s top priorities. For more information, contact NRMCA Senior Vice President of State and Local Government Affairs John Loyer at jloyer@nrmca.org. The Portland Cement Association (PCA) in collaboration with NSF International (NSF) recently renewed the product category rule (PCR) for cement, reports NRMCA Senior Director, Sustainability Initiatives, James Bogdan. A PCR is a set of industry rules to develop disclosure reports, specifically environmental product declarations (EPD). This is the second version of the PCR for portland, blended, masonry, mortar and plastic (stucco) cements. It builds on the inaugural version (2014), has a life span of five years and is aligned with evolving standards such as ISO 21930:2017 and rating systems such as LEED. Its release is a benefit to the concrete products industry since there is a growth of transparency and disclosure being found in the construction market primarily due to green building standards and, in some cases, state and local laws. The PCR can be found on the NSF website. To learn about EPD market activity, register for the NRMCA GoTo Webinar, Market Activity and Communicating EPDs which will present examples how market influencers are requesting Environmental Product Declarations (EPDs) and how concrete producers are engaging NRMCA to respond. The content of the webinar will look at a summary of LEED projects, accompanying documentation and website resources that are continuing to elevate disclosure reporting to the design community. As part of the Build With Strength campaign, NRMCA promotes Strength Through Transparency for member and industry competitiveness in the green building marketplace and the trends toward product and company transparency. For more information about the disclosure in the green building construction industry, contact James Bogdan at jbogdan@nrmca.org or 412-420-4138. This Build With Strength (BWS) advocacy report summarizes activity related to the COVID-19 pandemic, including efforts to declare construction an essential service. The report also updates a number of BWS actions across a variety of subjects. Click here to access the advocacy report. For more information, contact John Loyer at jloyer@nrmca.org.
Government Affairs
On Monday, House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-MD) announced that the House would not return to session in Washington until May 4 at the earliest. Leader Hoyer did, however, advise that members may be called back in the event of an “emergency.” On Tuesday, the Senate similarly announced that no session was expected in Washington until May 4. House leadership has communicated to the Democratic members that they will continue negotiating Phase 4 and additional funding for the small business loan programs authorized and funded in the CARES Act. Leader McConnell has requested multiple times that the Senate to unanimously pass an additional $250 billion in funding for the Paycheck Protection Program; each time Democrats have objected. For more information, contact Andrew Tyrrell at atyrrell@nrmca.org. Despite being subject to stay-at-home orders and quarantine, NRMCA and our allied associations have continued our Capitol Hill outreach and advocacy.
NRMCA and our allied associations remain in close contact and coordination through this challenging time and continue to look for opportunities to advance a pro-ready mixed concrete, pro-business, pro-construction agenda. For more information, contact Andrew Tyrrell at atyrrell@nrmca.org.
Pavement
The second installment of NRMCA’s Concrete Pavement Education Series was another huge success with more than 400 attending the Designing Concrete Industrial Pavements webinar, reports Senior Vice President, Local Paving, Jon Hansen. These weekly webinars focus on topics related to design, construction, maintenance and rehabilitation of concrete pavements. The next program in the series, scheduled for Thursday, April 16, at 2 p.m. Eastern time, is one that has fostered many questions in previous webinars and promises to answer all those questions: Soils 101: What to Know for a Successful Paving Project. This webinar, conducted by Pave Ahead team leader Brian Killingsworth with assistance by Luke McHugh, is one of the most requested topics in pavement design and promises to be one of the largest attended webinars to date. (Click here to register.) Click here for a complete listing of all Pave Ahead webinars through the end of May 2020 or contact any member of the NRMCA Pave Ahead team. 
Business Advancement
NRMCA Chairman John Carew will host the first Developing Industry Leaders (DIL) alumni conference, called the Chairman’s Leadership Summit, from September 2-4 in Milwaukee. Save the date: all DIL participants are invited to the premier of what will become an annual networking and leadership growth event where DIL can stay nationally connected to colleagues while also staying informed about the industry in an enjoyable leadership setting. If you are an NRMCA DIL alumnus or alumna and have NOT received communication about exclusive DIL alumni receptions held at the Annual Convention and ConcreteWorks in 2019 and 2020, NRMCA would like to keep you in the loop. Please email Eileen Dickson at edickson@nrmca.org so NRMCA can add you to the contact list. September 25 – 29, Denver October 8, Nashville, TN October 20 – 22, Mendota Heights, MN November 17 – 19, Glendora, CA December 15, Charlotte, NC December 15 – 18, Phoenix Engineering
The Technology in Practice on Chloride Limits (TIP 13) was revised to reflect changes in the ACI 318 Building Code. The important changes include the option to calculate chlorides instead of testing and to express chlorides based on total cementitious materials. There are 20 TIP topics that are useful education tools for ready mixed concrete technical service personnel. The NRMCA Research Engineering and Standards (RES) Committee is working on several additional topics. TIPs can be viewed and purchased, either by individual topics or as a set, here. For more information, contact Jacques Jenkins at jjenkins@nrmca.org. 
Calendar
*Please note that e-mail and direct links to each event listed below can be accessed from NRMCA's Web site. April 16, Concrete Pavement Webinar Series April 17, Sweetwater, TN April 21, Free Promotion Webinars | 2 – 3 p.m. Eastern time April 22, Build With Strength Webinar April 23, Concrete Pavement Webinar Series April 28, Free Promotion Webinars April 28 – May 1, New Orleans *Postponed April 29, Build With Strength Webinar April 30, Concrete Pavement Webinar Series May 5, Free Promotion Webinars May 6, Build With Strength Webinar May 7, Concrete Pavement Webinar Series May 12, Concrete Paving Promotion Webinar Series May 13, Build With Strength Webinar May 13 – 15, Glendora, CA *Postponed May 14, Concrete Pavement Webinar Series May 19, Concrete Paving Promotion Webinar Series May 20, Build With Strength Webinar May 21, Concrete Pavement Webinar Series May 26, Concrete Paving Promotion Webinar Series June 2, Free Promotion Webinars June 16 – 18, Nashville, TN – Sponsored by Tennessee Concrete Association July 14 – 16, Nashville, TN – Sponsored by TCA |
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