WSA Member Update 1.15.23

January 15, 2023  Dear WSA Members,  I regret to report that we still have not received the notebooks we need to complete our Membership Renewal Packets. However, they are expected next week and we’ll get them out to the many of you who have already paid your renewal as soon as we can.  As you know, Monday celebrates Martin Luther King Day. On April 9, 1967, MLK uttered what has become the most famous quote in the world about street sweeping and excellence. In the intervening 50+ years street sweeping has become increasingly recognized at the ‘first line of defense’ for water quality. If you’d like an 8.5″ x 11″ copy of a certificate suitable for framing, go to the certificate image located in the right side column on the WorldSweeper.com website’s home page.  FAQs: Get the Most From Your WSA Membership! As we move into 2023 I wanted to provide you with a reminder about the best way to maximize your value with your World Sweeping Association membership.  Early last year I developed a list of 17 different topics and put them into what I called the WSA website’s ‘frequently asked questions’ (FAQ) section. For new members one of these are sent to them in each of their first 17 weeks of WSA membership.  However, all 17 topics may be accessed any time using the FAQs link at the top left of the WSA home page. This reminder topic was spurred when one of our recent new members emailed their thanks upon receiving Tip #5 “Getting your excise tax rebate on auxiliary engine fuel.”  Unfortunately, with the new Covid 19 variants emerging the infection rate is once again on the upswing in many locales. To combat spread through your workforce it’s important that your business has rapid Covid tests on hand to enable checking of any employee that might have contracted the disease.   Ideally, if someone thinks they might have Covid it would be best for them to be able to test at home, not after they come to the office. You should also have a firm Covid policy in place for those who have tested positive for Covid. To assist in this process I suggest you make sure all your employees know they can receive 4 FREE Covid test kits per household by going to www.covid.gov/tests.  Our January Safety First! post by John Meola offers the following good reminder topics.  Happy New Year and Welcome to Nuclear Winter 2023 Winter driving reminders Follow defensive driving rules – the practice that keeps you alive  Applied Safety Best Practices (BMPs) Finally, I recently got an email from a WSA Member who had received a scam invoice for $575 purporting to be from GoDaddy that had included WSA’s name as the sender. When he contacted us we assured him it was bogus. These days it’s relatively easy to ‘scrape’ data from individual computer systems through the internet and then use the information to formulate that sort of thing. If you have any questions about something purporting to be from WSA don’t hesitate to contact us about it.  As always, if you have questions or comments about this WSA Member Update, or anything else to do with the World Sweeping Association or power sweeping in general, please let me know.  As always, if you have questions or comments about this WSA Member Update, or anything else to do with the World Sweeping Association or power sweeping in general, please let me know.  Good Sweeping,  Ranger Kidwell-Ross, Executive Director World Sweeping Association