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As long as we are on the discussion of retirements – a couple of noteworthy bon voyage events are in the offing for your calendars – as follows:

1. Rick Schneider, Director (Woodbury CCB) – 42 Years of Service Friday, December 15th, 1:00 – 4:00 PM, Dorothy Pecaut Nature Center

2. Dan Carl, Director (Adams CCB) – 35 Years of Service Friday, October 20th, 1:00 – 3:30 PM, Adams County Courthouse, Corning

CONGRATULATIONS to both of these gentlemen on tremendous service to their local county conservation board and to Iowa’s County Conservation System! If you have a chance to drop in for these open houses – please do, and extend your appreciation to Dan and Rick for a great four decades of service! This is a good time to remind everyone that if you have a significant staff retirement, or a conservation board member rotating off after multiple terms – IACCB would be pleased to provide a nice certificate of appreciation for your celebrant – just give us plenty of notice!

@IACCB_HAZE1955

mycountyparks.com

SAVE THE DATE:  

The IACCB Calendar is 

also available online via the 

IACCB link on MCP.com 

* REAP Assemblies across 

Iowa in October!! 

* Oct. 10‐12 – CCPOA Fall 

Workshop – Johnston 

* Oct. 18 – District 3 Mtg. 

– Woodbury CCB 

* Oct. 19 – District 1 Mtg. 

– Hamilton CCB 

* Oct. 26 – IACCB Board 

of Directors Mtg. 

* Nov. 1 – New CCB Emp. 

School – Des Moines 

* Nov. 2 – E‐Commerce 

Summit – Des Moines 

* Nov. 7‐9 – IAN Fall 

Workshop 

* Nov. 16 – District 4 Mtg. 

– Taylor CCB 

* Dec. 13 – District 6 Mtg.  

– Allamakee CCB 

* Jan. 6 – REAP Congress 

– State Capitol 

* Jan. 23‐25 – Winterfest 

2018 @ Waterloo  

The IACCB Newsletter is 

produced on a periodic basis, 

and provided in digital format 

as a membership benefit to 

IACCB Members and 

IACCB@mycountyparks.org       (515) 963‐9582

Volume 59, Issue No. 5 September 29, 2017

2018 IACCB Annual 

Fall Conference 

September 19‐21    

Des Moines, IA  

It’s Been a Great 84 - year Ride!

…..and they still look so young! I speak frequently to all of our new CCB employees about surrounding themselves with good, positive role-models and industry peers early in their careers. The importance of this personal professional network will soon demonstrate its value, and will continue to provide rewards for decades to come. So, it was a privilege for me in the mid-‘70s to not only connect with many of the original CCB leaders from the 1960s – but to also join a few peers in what would turn out to be a 40+ year sprint into the 20-teens!

Dan Biechler (L), Director of the Linn CCB, and Rick Schneider, Director of the Woodbury CCB have each provided 42 years of dedicated service to 

Iowa’s County Conservation System 

IACCB was pleased to honor Dan Biechler (Linn) and Rick Schneider (Woodbury) for their 42-year careers at the 58th Annual Meeting last week in Sioux Center. Individually they have led by good example, shared their best practices, and never once hesitated to step into a leadership role for our industry. They have met a multitude of challenges head-on, been frustrated by government bureaucracy, and spent decades “telling the story” about their most favorite county conservation system in the country! Collectively, WE are forever grateful for your ascending professionalism, pioneering visions of what could be, and shoring up those early CCB bridges – leaving them sturdy & inviting for those who follow. THANK-YOU for sharing the best years of your lives with US – our best wishes on your pending retirements, and may your next life chapters be long & productive too!

Retirement Celebrations on Tap

  

 

  

 

   

We have always had our MyCountyParks.com Facebook presence (see below), but not always are posts for our internal administrative sharing reasons appropriate for the marketing arm of MCP.com. So, as we continue to structure our system for the future, a new location now exists for us to network and share with all 1,100 staff and conservation board members. Frequently we have pictures to share from around the state, and other newsy items of interest – so now we can get them out there for you to download, share, etc. Not a member of Facebook? – Not to worry….similar to the link elsewhere in this Newsletter – if you have the link to a photo album, you can still access and down- load those photos at your convenience! Stay tuned…MORE yet to come….

IACCB: https://www.facebook.com/Iowas-County-Conservation-System MCP.com: https://www.facebook.com/MyCountyParkscom

REAP Assemblies Start next Week!

The 18 regional REAP Assemblies commence next week with gatherings in Spencer for Region 3 on October 4th (Clay, Buena Vista, Dickinson, Emmet, Lyon, O’Brien, Osceola, Palo Alto and Sioux); and for Region 5 on October 5th in Lehigh (Calhoun, Hamilton, Humboldt, Pocahontas, Webster and Wright). The full listing of Assemblies can be found on the REAP Alliance website or the REAP link on MCP.com. You are ALL encouraged to attend, and to also bring along those community leaders and local elected official so that everyone can better understand the importance of REAP for local quality of life, its economic impacts, etc. The 2018 battle starts now!

An Additional CCB Presence in Social Media

www.REAPAlliance.org  

2017 Summit Series Registration is ON

The link is now active (below) to register for 5th Annual IACCB Summit Series in Des Moines on November 1st and 2nd. DEADLINE TO REGISTER IS OCTOBER 23rd.

NEW COUNTY CONSERVATION EMPLOYEE SCHOOL – November 1st An email/flyer was sent to all CCB Directors on September 26th, and we already have 13 employees from eleven CCBs registered! This school is designed for all new employees that have come on board in the past year, as well as previous year folks that may not have been able to attend in 2016 / 2015. New to this year’s agenda will be a “Lunch & Learn” opportunity for participants to have lunch with a “veteran CCB employee” from one of four employee classifications – as determined by type of registered participants. The informational flyer has also been posted on the home page of MyCountyParks.org – here: http://www.mycountyparks.org/

E-COMMERCE SUMMIT – November 2nd This annual assemblage is primarily for MCP.com County Administrators or representatives from those CCBs that are currently or will soon be providing online registrations/reservations via the E-commerce functionalities of our website. Participants will receive various updates about website operations, new functionalities and growth “in development”, and a critical opportunity to provide future visioning for site operation and expansion. (A specific flyer is in the works for these 30 counties and can be anticipated the week of October 1st. If there are certain topics of interest that participants would like to see on the agenda, they will be asked to send those in advance so that preparation(s) can be made as necessary)

REGISTRATION LINK: http://countyconservationregistration.weebly.com/

 

   

nine in ten Americans agree that parks and recreation is a vital service delivered by their local government!

95% of Americans agree that it is important that their local government acts to protect the natural environment, including acquiring, constructing and maintaining local parks, trails and green spaces.

85% of Americans consider high-quality park and recreation amenities an important factor when they are choosing a place to live

87% of Americans support their local government and park and recreation agency in investing in critical infrastructure that would make their regions more resilient and would improve their community’s ability to withstand or recover quickly from natural disasters

Americans, on average, visit their local park and recreation facilities approximately twice each month

These statistics and many more are available from the “Americans Engagement with Parks Survey” from the

National Recreation and Park Association (NRPA)

LINK TO PUBLICATION:

http://www.nrpa.org/publications‐research/research‐papers/Engagement/  

E‐BLAST COMMUNICATIONS FORM  FY2018 IACCB SALARY SURVEY

LAST CALL!

E-BLAST COMMUNICATION INFORMATION – As you will recollect, we sent out a form in early September (5th) to all CCB Directors to provide information for us to upload in to the new E-Blast Communication System that is to be rolled out from MCP.com very soon. Thanks to the 78 of you that have provided this information! We need to provide this new database to our developer this week, so if we do not hear from the remaining 22 of you, I will be submitting our default email address for your CCB that we have on file. (Need to know? Please inquire……or send in form )

FY2018 SALARY SURVEY – Has been in the hands of all CCB Directors since early August. (Deadline was 8/31) We will begin processing the data and incorporating information from the REAP Certification Reports without the updated information from the seven counties as noted above. I hope to have this compiled for your use by the end of October….we are now several weeks behind our original target date as sufficient data to produce was slow to arrive.

 

   

The perfect updated 

resource for CCBs… ….and a new website!  

“For nearly 40 years, county conservation boards have worked with the Iowa Natural Heritage Foundation to create and expand public lands. Together, we’ve protected hundreds of wild places – but none of those places could have been saved without willing landowners who shared this vision for their land.” – Anita O’Gara, Vice President, INHF Each CCB Director should have received an introductory letter and a copy of this book from INHF. It has and will always be one of the best resources available to us to assist landowners with questions they may have about options to protect their land. There were several great suggestions from Anita in the letter that arrived with the books – it would be good to keep them top-of-mind moving forward. I found one of the best to be: “Give the booklet to those who own the best prairies, woodlands or wetlands in your county, or to neighbors who could help expand your parks and wildlife areas. We’ll gladly provide booklets to you as frequently as you need. Please contact Diane Graves at dgraves@inhf.org or (515) 288-1846 to request them. The Iowa Natural Heritage Foundation, their staff and resources have proven to be an invaluable resource to so many things that are all about our county conservation system. It’s hard to imagine where Iowa’s county conservation system would be today with the INHF stepping up to partner with us for the past four decades. Thousands of acres would still be unprotected, once-in-a-lifetime opportunities would have been missed, and those bridges we have collectively built for others to follow would be far shorter and fewer. Our joint successes have cemented our resolve to continue – we know that we don’t have to do this by ourselves ……thanks INHF for all that you do!

LINK TO NEW WEBSITE:

http://www.iowalandoptions.org/  

 

   

58th Annual IACCB Fall Conference in the Books!Miss a CCB Event and you MISS A BUNCH! With temps in the 80s and 90s, and warm evenings – a great NW Iowa experience was had by all! Hearty CONGRATS to all the award winners, raffle winners and silent auction high bidders. The Staff and Board Members of both the Lyon & Sioux CCBs should also be very proud of the FANTASTIC JOB they did – hosting everyone to a top-notch conference, and sharing with us all of the pride and sweat-equity that they have in their programs and facilities – lots of “Wows” around every corner! Be sure to mark your calendars for the 59th IACCB Fall Conference in 2018 at the Ramada Tropics Conference Center in Des Moines, September 19-21. Stay tuned for updates on getting your advanced lodging reservations! Polk CCB, our 2018 host is planning and extraordinary event for us that will be held on a Wed. to Fri. schedule – giving something new a try for next year! We are sharing many of the happenings from our event last week with you via the links below. If you happen to be following our new Facebook page – we are here: https://www.facebook.com/Iowas-County-Conservation-System If you are not on Facebook – you can still visit the following two picture albums w/o being a F.B. member. Feel free to download or utilize any of these pictures as needed…..perhaps next year we will capture a picture or two of YOU!!

AWARDS PICTURES: https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.189899591552779.1073741828.189885568220848&type=1&l=a1ce6736c9

ALL CONFERENCE PICTURES: https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.190092231533515.1073741829.189885568220848&type=1&l=3fbf5381c1

For all of you that were either hosting or in attendance – MANY THANKS for participating in this annual networking exercise and educational venue! KUDOS TOO to all of the exhibitors and IACCB Preferred Vendors that were in attendance – we wouldn’t have had such a cool and excellent experience without your support!

   

1.

8.

9.

6.7. 

5.4.3. 

2.

2017 IACCB FALL CONFERENCE PICTURE SAMPLER – (1) Tour stop at the Calliope Historic Village north of Hawarden; (2) Pre-conference kayak trip on the Rock River; (3) Hay-rackin’ on the Lyon County Tour; (4) Exhibitors and Silent Auction in the atrium of the conference center; (5) Scrumptious BBQ dinner on Friday evening; (6) Seasoned CCB Directors (Weiss and Kean) networking with newer Directors (Pollock and Unsworth) at the luncheon on the Sioux County Tour; (7) Hazelton recognizes state IACCB Board member Mike Runyan (Monroe) for his six years of service to IACCB; (8) Saturday Sioux County Tour posed on The Rock after a short hike in Oak Grove/Bix Sioux Park; (9) Sunrise at the Terrace View Conference Center in Sioux Center.

CCBs ROCK!

 

 http://www.mycountyparks.com/Jobs/Default.aspx  

1. BENTON Co. – Park Ranger 2. SAC Co. – Office Manager 3. MONTGOMERY Co. - Director 4. PALO ALTO Co. – Naturalist 5. HARDIN Co. – Natural Resource Manager 6. TEMPORARY POSITIONS – 13 opportunities

listed on website  

Full Time 

Seasonal/Part‐Time 

2017 Annual Meeting PowerPoint in Portal

For those interested in reviewing the PowerPoint presentation from the 2017 IACCB Annual Meeting – it can be found under the FILES tab in the Portal in the “POWERPOINTS FROM IACCB” file. Lots of good information contained therein about future happenings with the CCB industry!

IACCB Silent Auction Raises $2,800!!

With 35 unique and exciting items in the auction – what a great fund-raising effort towards IACCB educational efforts! MANY THANKS to those of you that donated the packages, baskets and items to the auction – AND to all of you that were frantically bidding on each of them. Great bargains were won by all! In addition – the raffle hosted by Lyon and Sioux CCBs is rumored to have brought in a handsome tally too!

FY2017 IWLA Habitat Improvement Awards

CONGRATS TO THE FOLLOWING CCBs for their IWLA Awards!

Under 20,000 Population Category Over 20,000 Population Category 1st Place – Mitchell CCB 1st Place – Linn CCB 2nd Place – Butler CCB 2nd Place – Mahaska CCB 3rd Place – Worth CCB 3rd Place – Fayette CCB

YOUR CCB’s Events on the 2018 INHF Calendar!

DEADLINE FOR SUBMISSION – October 13th! A reminder from our previous newsletter!

Here’s the information they are looking for – your BIG annual events!: * Name of event * Date(s) * Sponsoring organization * Event location (rough location, like city or park name) * Event contact information (phone number, e-mail, website) Feel free to contact Genna with any questions. Thank you for your help!!

Genna Clemen, Graphic Design Intern, Iowa Natural Heritage Foundation designinterngenna@inhf.org