Greetings from Chicago

The following message was sent to ACEC members on 8/20/24 via email as part of Linda Bauer Darr’s ongoing Tuesday Letter series. To sign up for ACEC’s emails, please visit: https://www.acec.org/email-newsletter/

Greetings from the Democratic National Convention in Chicago! ACEC is here in the Windy City all week, hosting a suite of events with House and Senate Democrats. The Convention kicked off last night with the previous two Democratic presidential nominees: Hillary Clinton and President Joe Biden. Minnesota Gov. and Vice-Presidential nominee Tim Walz is set to take the stage tomorrow night and Vice President Harris is slated to speak on Thursday.

As we did last month during the GOP Convention in Milwaukee, ACEC is spending the week meeting with lawmakers, including members of the Transportation & Infrastructure Committee. ACEC Illinois held a fundraiser Monday night saluting the chair of Illinois Senate Transportation Committee. We also are hosting events throughout the week with the Congressional Black Caucus, including a drop-in event tomorrow morning at which we expect House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (NY).

We are here in Chicago to advance the interests of our industry and to spotlight the essentiality of engineering. Tens of thousands of people are converging on this city this week, using transportation infrastructure designed by engineers, staying in hotels made safe and sustainable by engineers, and gathering in event spaces developed by engineers. So much of what we do is woven into the expectations of modern life. Of course there are roads, bridges, airports, arenas. It’s our job to remind lawmakers that we make it all possible.

Two hundred miles from here, in the state capital of Springfield, an engineering firm was recently instrumental in unearthing artifacts from a site that was recently designated a national monument. The Springfield race riot of 1908 left dozens of homes destroyed – and presumably lost forever. Springfield-based engineering firm Hanson Professional Services Inc. took the lead in searching for buried historical items as part of an environmental impact statement prepared for a rail improvement project in the city. Their search would yield the remains of brick foundations of seven homes – five of which had been torched during the 1908 riot. On Friday, President Biden held a ceremony at the White House to sign the proclamation establishing the site as a monument. In attendance: Hanson CEO and Chairman (and former ACEC Chair) Sergio “Satch” Pecori. Hanson’s work on this site is a great example of the often-untold story of our industry. Engineering doesn’t just pave the way to a brighter future. It also helps preserve our past.

Finally, our Engineering and Public Works Roadshow is set to make another stop next week, this time in Golden, Colorado to celebrate the Clear Creek Canyon Park Gateway Segment. Just in time for back to school, the event will feature educational stations for middle and high school students to conduct experiments along the trail. We’ve always said solving our workforce shortage is a long game that requires a multi-pronged approach. The Roadshow is a very important prong. It’s an opportunity to spotlight the human side of what engineers do, to connect engineering to daily life, and to make the case for how genuinely rewarding engineering can be.