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June 2007 |
NCMA
2006-2007 Board of Directors
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President Emeritus/Graalman Chair |
Denver Chapter President 303-445-2437 |
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President-Elect 720-286-2552 |
Secretary and Registrar 303-634-4428 |
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Treasurer 303-707-8545 |
Newsletter Chair 303-676-3516 |
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Membership Chair 303-381-8000 |
Education Chair 303-939-7804 |
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Employment Chair 303-277-1444 |
Facilities Chair 303-445-2435 |
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NES Chair 303-676-3595 |
Scholarship Chair 719-579-9474 |
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Nominations Chair 303-969-2114 |
Fellows and Awards Chair (303) 605-2215 |
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Program Chair & Volunteer Coordinator 303-391-8567 |
Publicity/Photographer/Historian Chair 303-445-2403 |
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Corporate Sponsor Chair 303-688-2159 |
Webmaster 303-937-6979 |
2006-2007
Board of Advisors
Sue Bienulis
CH2M Hill
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Leigh Ann
Bunetta GSA |
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Ken
Degenhart Kaiser-Hill
Company, LLC |
Brad
Duchein Northrop
Grumman Corp. |
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John Godzac Ball
Aerospace & Technologies Corp. |
Tom Hohman Lockheed
Martin Corp.(Retired) |
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Bill Ingram |
Kay
Kishline State of |
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Thomas A.
Lemmer |
C. Richard
Pennington |
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Karla
Smiley Bureau of
Reclamation |
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Missed
connections? If you are not receiving email notifications
relating to Denver Chapter events and newsletter postings, please email Stacey
Gustus or call her at 303-634-4428 to be added to this private email
distribution list.
May’s
Chapter Meeting
Elections were held May’s Chapter Meeting. The new Board of Directors for the 2007-2008 Chapter Year beginning July 1, 2007 consists of the following positions and members:
2007-2008 Board
of Directors
|
President Emeritus/Graalman Chair 303-445-2437 |
Denver Chapter President 720-286-2552 |
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President-Elect 303-346-3256 |
Secretary and Registrar 303-634-4428 |
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Treasurer 303-308-5034 |
Newsletter Chair 303-676-3516 |
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Membership Chair 303-381-8000 |
Education Chair 303-939-7804 |
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Employment Chair 303-277-1444 |
Facilities Chair 303-445-2435 |
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Training Seminars Chair 303-676-3595 |
Nominations Chair |
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Scholarship Chair 303-634-4341 |
Fellows and Awards Chair 303-391-8567(303) 605-2215 |
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Program Chair & Volunteer Coordinator 303-391-8567 |
Publicity/Photographer/Historian Chair 303-445-2403 |
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Corporate Sponsor Chair 303-969-2114 |
Webmaster 303-937-6979 |
Please note that a member is needed to assume the
position of Nominations Chair. Please
contact Dolly Fernandez at Dolly_Fernandez@nps.gov
if anyone is interested in assuming the responsibilities of that position.
Fellows and Awards
There are no individual National awards remaining for the Chapter year. Future Newsletters will provide additional information on the upcoming awards for the new Chapter year with the associated deadlines for application as follows:
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October 15 |
Charles A. Dana Distinguished Service Award |
NCMA’s second highest award. Recognizes extended and distinguished service to NCMA |
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October 30 |
Arthur B. Muller Volunteer Award |
Recognition of exceptional volunteer contributions during the preceding program year. |
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November 15 |
Blanche Witte Memorial Foundation Annual Award |
Recognition of contract management professionals for exemplary achievements. |
From the Education Chair (JUNE 2007)
NCMA is sponsoring an Audio Seminar series on Federal
Contracting Basics entitled “Federal Contracting Basics and Beyond”. The Denver Chapter sponsors, free
of charge, Host Facilities for the various Audio Seminars. The site host information will be sent via
e-mail prior to each seminar. It is the member’s responsibility to contact
the designated Point of Contact in advance so that adequate materials,
certificate of attendance, security badges and facility entrance paperwork (if
applicable) can be prepared for the seminar.
To attend a specific audio seminar, please register with Stacey
Gustus at sgustus@mckennalong.com or 303-634-4428. Please note the
topic, dates and locations for the upcoming seminars.
|
Topic |
Date (10:00 – 11:30 a.m. M.T.) |
Location(s) |
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Negotiations |
June 13, 2007 (9:00 - 10:30) |
McKenna Long & Aldridge LLP and Ball Aerospace (Broomfield) |
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FAR Part 45 Rewrite |
June 26, 2007 |
McKenna Long & Aldridge LLP and Ball Aerospace (Broomfield) |
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FAR Overview (Subchapter A - General) |
July 12, 2007 |
McKenna Long & Aldridge LLP and Ball Aerospace (Broomfield) |
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Contract Law Basics |
August 9, 2007 |
McKenna Long & Aldridge LLP and Ball Aerospace (Broomfield) |
If you have any questions or concerns, or in particular if your firm is interested in being a Host Facility for an upcoming seminar, please contact Blake Couture at dcouture@ball.com or 303-939-7804. Your local NCMA Chapter will reimburse the Host Facility for the expense of the seminar in exchange for providing venues for our membership to gather, hear and interact with one another over a seminar topic.
From the Education Chair
Lots of things
have been written in this section this program year and I would like to hear
back from the membership on area’s to focus next year. What are you interested in and what are the
topics of interest that you would like you hear about?
We will again be
addressing:
Certifications
Leadership
Scholarships
A proposal was
put forth to the BOD to increase the reimbursement to membership for
successfully completing the Certification.
Also, a request was submitted to purchase the study materials and they
will be made available to the staff.
Additionally, if
your firm is interested in hosting future audio seminars, please let me
know. The local Chapter will
reimburse the Host Facility for the expense of the seminar in exchange for
providing venues for our membership to gather, hear and interact with one
another over a seminar topic.
Please let me hear from you.
dcouture@ball.com
As reported last month, Darlene Gonzales,
last year's Denver Chapter president, was recently activated with her Naval
Reserve unit and is now deployed to
Wednesday - It is April 25, 2007. I just arrived in
We flew in on a C130 from
We were cramped in on the C130, all seats were full. Wore full battle rattle, IBA (body armor), Kevlar (helmet), and fully loaded. That is the nature of the dress anytime we go anyway. You get use to it. It is not comfortable and weighs alot, but it will save your life.
The wait at the airport was an all day affair since the
flights do not go to
I’m currently living in transit with small quarters until our Navy team leaves. We are living out of our sea-bags and just using our essentials. Then we will move into larger quarters, not very big though, just enough for a bunk and a little room. It is called a B hut. I will be sharing with Commander Martinez. She and I are the only 2 Navy females that came over for this year tour. She will be working in administration and I will be working contracting. We call it the G7 shop.
Thursday April 26, 2007 - The second day we were here, the existing Navy team took us on a 2 mile convoy to a nearby, so called, restaurant. We went to have lunch with the Afghan National Army (ANA). Fresh to the country and the people, we just stood around and watched our Navy team give out awards to the Afghans Nationals for all the work they did together. It was very nice. The Navy presented Letters of Appreciation which were then translated from Dari (local language) into English by the terp. They are called terps for interpreters.
Now the food! All the
training we had in
Now when it comes to the females, CDR Martinez and I, they completely ignore females in that the female is inferior to the males. But one of our Navy officers did introduce me to the “head of the village”. Nice old man and some Afghan General we work with all the time. Can’t remember nor pronounce their names. It was a really interesting experience!
The food consisted of lamb kabobs, rice, spinach with red beans, cooked garbanzo beans, naan (that is their homemade bread- it is similar to pita bread – really, really good!), cake, apples, and juice/water. A lot of pictures were taken since we were on top of a mountain with 2 villages on the flat land. One of the village people spoke Pastu versus Dari. The reason they spoke Pastu is that the Taliban relocated these people from the north. A little history there. I will be downloading the pictures and send them to you shortly.
The building where we had the event looked like it could have been a hotel at one time. The inside was all marble, which probably in its day was beautiful. It was disgustingly dirty though. The Afghan people are not known to be clean people since there is no water in a lot of the villages. Knowing we were to eat non-American food, we weren’t sure whether our stomachs could handle the way the food was prepared since we just got into the country. However, only two people got sick. Knock on wood it wasn’t me. So far my tummy has been able to handle the variety of food here. We were all told that we would get sick once here. Hopefully, that won’t be the case with me.
The place is very different than what you would imagine in that I have not seen such filth. There is no running water in a lot of the country so of course keeping clean/washing their hands is unknown to them. That is why we are helping them build water systems/dams to help them become more efficient. After we finished eating, the Afghan people (all males mind you, showed us their native dances and danced various songs and also sang. We finished the lunch and headed back in convoy formation in full battle rattle. That was the second day we got here. Wow!
April 27, 2007 - The third day went something like this.
We are trying to figure out what we will be doing. Two of us
will be performing contract functions here, LCDR Dennis and I. We have a little
office; whereby, our daily routine is for CDR Dennis to go to the ANA side of
the base in the morning while I make contracting calls back to
The contract shop was left a little unorganized. I am in the process of trying to locate all the open contracts and determine what issues are outstanding. I also contact the bases down range to see if I can assist them in their contracts since they don’t get up here much.
I get up around 6:30 to either make phone calls back home or get ready to go to breakfast. Have breakfast, go to the office around 0800/0900 and start the day. The thing you have to remember is that we work all the time so 0800 is not late to us because we work everyday. The Afghan Army is off on Fridays so that is our day we don’t have to work as hard. But my job doesn’t concern the Afghan Army so I can work all the time if I want to. If we have to convoy to the airport or to another base, the times change.
This afternoon we went out to the range to zero in our weapons. That means that we have to lie down in a prone position on the gravel and shoot at this little target and get our shots in a really, really small grouping. If you don’t, then the Army adjusts your M4 (rifle) and you continue to shoot. Of course, this isn’t my favorite thing to do, so once again it took me all afternoon but I re-zeroed and all is well.
The Public Affairs Office does a lot of humanitarian convoys to the local villages to win them over. We give them all the donations you send us such as school supplies, shoes, clothes, anything that poor people need. In return, we ask them to tell the Army where the bad guys are. Apparently, we have made a lot of friends, and the villagers have been telling us where the bad guys are. So then we send in our Special Forces team and they are gone! Whammy! This is a big plus for us.
4th day – 27th Friday
One of the local Afghan contractors on base, the only one that has a security badge to be permanently on base, provided lunch for the incoming and outgoing Navy personnel. His wife made all the food which was very good. Once again it was rice, beans, naan, lamb, and spinach.
The G7 office is the facilities engineering and contracting office where I work. We have an interpreter to translate in English everything we want. He speaks really good English so that is good.
Fridays are bazaar days here in the Afghan National Army
(ANA) base. We walked over for the first time. You need to realize that
everything is within walking distance around here. Walk, Walk, Walk!!!! Nothing
I couldn’t live without except maybe some rugs.
I went back a second time because my roommate, CDR Martinez wanted to go. She and I went and the reaction was completely the opposite. It is really interesting to see how the Afghans react to the females. But they are always friendly because they know we have money, and they are so poor.
The local ANA’s are also very friendly in that they understand that American service women are here to assist and are knowledgeable in their field of expertise.
April 28, 2007 – Apparently I can’t remember what I did on this day! That is what happens when I get behind in writing.
April 29, 2007 - It’s Sunday now. I missed church (Mass) which was on Friday so went to a Protestant service today. The Mass is given in Italian on Friday’s at 11 a.m. So it is kind of hard to remember that time since it is right in the middle of the day. Next week will be different.
April 30, May 1, May 2 - Monday/Tuesday/Wednesday
On May 2, 2007, we will be here one week. Well, have gotten into work and as normal as possible routine. Knowing a little more about the base, we have little PX (our ships store where we can buy varies different things), post office, morale, welfare, and recreation facility (MWR) (where there are phones that we can use to call back to our families) and watch TV, and a dining facility. And that is about it. So you can see that there is not a lot here. Every night I work out for an hour. Depends on the day, but we try to at least get ½ hour in at least, check email from home, and call home. That is our day! Exciting ha! We don’t have much water here so if you work out every day you can take a short shower. If you don’t, you are supposed to shower every other day. Some people take what we call “Hollywood Showers” and not the 5 minute showers we are allotted. It is no problem with me since I have short hair.
MySpace account has been closed due to security reasons. So you can just email me at this address dmgonzales@viawest.net. Our internet is pretty reliable even though it goes down occasionally. So if you don’t hear from me for a while, we are having high winds and all communications are down. By the end of May, we are supposed to get 120 days of 40+ mile an hour winds. Guess at that time, we will have sporadic internet and phones service. It is hard to believe but I will see it first hand shortly.
Well this is the first letter of many. Hope you enjoy it!
I will be thinking of you all. Pictures will be coming later.
Dar
The
Chapter sends their collective best wishes and thoughts for her well being and
safe return for Darlene and all who are deployed serving our Country.
