After 30 years of serving environmental professionals in California,
the Association of Environmental Professionals, an 1100 member
organization with 8 regional chapters, has voted to affiliate with
NAEP. AEP will become NAEP's official California Chapter
according to the AEP/NAEP Affiliation Plan written by a joint
committee over the past two years.
Gary Kelman, NAEP President, attended AEP's annual 2005
conference and was a keynote speaker at their luncheon. In his speech
Gary described the advantages of affiliation to both organizations and
continued his mission to build the NAEP/Chapter team. Gary said, "There
is strength in numbers and both of our organizations and their members
will benefit from this affiliation. AEP members are encouraged to join
NAEP. In addition, California environmental professionals who are not
affiliated with either organization are invited to join both
organizations.
AEP President Kent Norton writes, "We
recently completed revisions to the AEP by-laws to account for the NAEP
affiliation, and it identified several misunderstandings our members may
have regarding our organization relative to the NAEP. Let me try to
clarify the current relationship of AEP to the NAEP
–
just try to follow the bouncing AEP ball…..o...O...o...O"
AEP is its own
autonomous non-profit organization, and our official legal name is still
AEP. However, we are also now affiliated with NAEP, and they consider
AEP to be a regional chapter of the NAEP, hence we can also be referred
to are also known as the California AEP. Most of our members have chosen
not to be NAEP members too, but those who are both members of AEP and
NAEP are considered to be in the
“California
Chapter of the NAEP.”
Our new NAEP Liaison Brian Smith represents all those who pay NAEP dues
to the NAEP National Board, whether or not they are also AEP members. It
is also possible to be a member of just NAEP and be living in
California. However, these “at
large”
NAEP members have no official representation to the NAEP Board
–
that happens only if they are members of AEP as well. In that case, our
liaison would represent these people as well. Confused yet? The
“Cliff
Notes”
version of our relationship this situation is, whatever organization you
pay dues to, you are a member of, and should receive benefits from, that
organization (seems so it’s
a lot like common sense). There will be a quiz at the end of this
article.
AEP encourages all of its members to join
NAEP. For more information about NAEP visit the NAEP website:
http://www.naep.org/displaycommon.cfm?an=1&subarticlenbr=11
