Attendees:

Sam Pierre, Washington State Fire Marshal
Roland Huggins, AFSA
Joe Faulkner, Sprinx
Randy Knighton, Knight Fire
Roger White, Knight Fire
Kent Fricks, Hughes Supply
David Smith, Vancouver, WA FD
Kyle Evans , Simplex/Grinnell
Mark Hoyt , Globe Sprinkler
Kevin Kane, Viking Supply Net
Bill McKay, Advanced Fire
Ron Greenman, Bates Technical College

So finally the Spring newsletter. This was one of the more pleasant meetings in that business was minimal and socialization was at full throttle. The main topic of discussion was the return of WORK. Everyone was busy to too busy. Not wanting to give his competition a leg up Kevin clandestinely showed the contractors present a few new Viking products. Given the secrecy he displayed I think I won’t mention what Kevin showed me other than to say one of the items was a part that poor designers love to draw but that heretofore didn’t exist. Ponder on that for awhile.

Mostly we just chatted and got to know Sam Pierre, the new State Fire Marshal for Washington. Sam comes to Washington from Louisiana where he directed the Lafayette Bureau of Fire Prevention. I’ve been at a couple of previous meetings where Sam was present and I think he might agree that he seemed most relaxed at our local AFSA chapter meeting. I don’t know if it’s just getting used to his new job, or our friendly contractors, suppliers and associates, or both but I was happy to see him having a good time. Sam is a strong advocate of fire sprinklers and supports our efforts to help protect and save lives and property.

As always there was discussion about the perennial problems with insurance, salting, rising prices and cutthroat competition. There was discussion about the upcoming certifications for inspection technicians. We also talked about the possibility of centralized reporting on a statewide basis for inspection, testing and maintenance per NFPA 25. Since the meeting I’ve had lots of calls from contractors looking for designers so I’ll add that for upcoming discussion.

We also talked about our scholarship winners and AFSA’s apparent move away from an essay based scholarship award to more of an “enter your name to win the drawing” type of contest. Bill had less than positive things to say about this move. I”ll report more on this as information comes to me. As for now someone suggested that I post our Pacific Northwest winning essay by Harasyn Sandell of Sequim on our website so you may read it there.

Until next time….