APWA Accreditation: Shakopee's Public Works Journey with Bill Egan, Alex Jordan, and Barb Kraemer

This week we start what will become a series of podcasts chronicling the journey of the City of Shakopee, MN through the APWA Accreditation process. Shakopee decided to take this on several months ago and a couple of months into the process at the time of this recording. This is a great conversation about why Shakopee decided to do this, how they found an internal champion and what surprises they've discovered so far. Joining us are guests Bill Egan (Public Works Director), Alex Jordan (City Engineer) and Barb Kraemer (Administrative Assistant). 

AI Generated Description:

Curious about what it takes to achieve APWA accreditation? Join us on this enlightening episode of the Public Works Nerds podcast as we sit down with the passionate team from the City of Shakopee, Minnesota. Hear firsthand from Public Works Director Bill Egan, City Engineer Alex Jordan, and Administrative Assistant Barb Kraemer, each sharing their unique journeys and roles within the city's public works department. From Bill's extensive experience to Alex's fresh perspective from Lakeville, and Barb's transition from Parks and Rec, you'll get a front-row seat to the dynamics that make Shakopee's team tick.

Discover the motivations driving Shakopee's pursuit of the prestigious APWA accreditation. Despite the rarity of such recognition in Minnesota, the team was inspired by an intriguing article and took strategic steps to gain internal support. We break down the APWA's accreditation chapters, exploring the collaborative efforts across various city departments and the anticipated timeline for completion. You'll hear about the significance of mission and vision statements, the role of parks maintenance, and the invaluable support from APWA community leaders that has propelled Shakopee's public works department forward.

Uncover the financial and operational considerations of the accreditation process, including the costs and long-term benefits that justify this investment. We delve into the extensive involvement required from multiple departments, with critical support from city administrator Bill Reynolds. Through specific examples like managing roadkill, we highlight the practical impact of updated policies. This episode emphasizes the importance of teamwork, professional growth, and industry recognition, offering insights and inspiration for public works professionals everywhere. Don't miss this engaging conversation that showcases the power of collaboration and dedication in public service!

Show Notes:
APWA Accreditation:
https://www.apwa.org/resources/accreditation/

Parks and Recreation Accreditation:
https://www.nrpa.org/certification/accreditation/CAPRA/

I was planning on putting additional links here to other accreditation services for other departments such as Finance or Human Resources, but decided against it as I can't vet any of these advertised programs. If you are interested I encourage you to start with a simple Google search for "Public Agency Accreditation" and you will find several options for Police, Fire, Finance, etc. 

Transcript

Marc Culver: 0:00

Just a quick note before we start the episode. Here today we've really got a great group of people from the city of Shakopee that are sharing their journey through the APWA accreditation process and some of the initial steps and really how in-depth it was, not only for them but also for other departments within their organization. So sit back, enjoy this conversation, this early start of this journey for them, and then check in in a few more months because we plan on having a follow-up, a couple of follow-up episodes on this topic with the City of Shakopee. And then make sure you check the show notes. We're going to have some links in there for not only the APWA accreditation process but also for the National Recreation and Parks Association, and I might see if I can find some other programs for other departments or other specialties within city and county operations. So hope you learn something today and I hope you get inspired.

Alex Jordan: 1:17

Thanks for listening. Welcome to the Public Works Nerds podcast.

Marc Culver: 1:21

Welcome to the Public Works Nerds podcast, a Public Works podcast of the nerds by the nerds and for the nerds. I'm your host, M mark Culver. Thank you for joining us. Today we're going to talk about agency accreditation. This is something that I've talked about a few times in past episodes Once with the APWA CEO, scott Grayson. Ceo Scott Grayson and more recently in an episode with Matt Johnson from the City of Roseville about accreditation through the National Recreation and Parks Association. So today we're joined by staff from the City of Shakopee, minnesota, who are starting their journey through this accreditation process. Joining us is Bill Egan, public Works Director. Alex Jordan, city Engineer, and Barb Kramer, administrative Assistant in the Public Works Director. Alex Jordan, city Engineer, and Barb Kramer, administrative Assistant in the Public Works Department. Let's just take a few minutes here and get to know you three a little bit more. As I kind of said, let's learn your origin stories. Bill, let's start with you.

Bill Egan: 2:17

So I started in Shakopee March 22, 1993. Re Work construction prior to that, winter times you'd get laid off, looking for something a little more stable, consistent. Started having a family, so had a brother that lived in town and told me about the position. It's changed quite dramatically because there was one opening for 199 people, so nowadays it's the opposite of that. So, yeah, started out there. There was a small crew, then I was in addition, so there was 11 of us. Shakopee has grown a lot, so we now have 30 in our department. So kind of worked my way up through the ranks. I think it was 97 was lead man and then 2003 became a supervisor and then 2019 superintendent and then 2023 director.

Marc Culver: 3:21

So so making that move from, well, even from supervisor, superintendent I think that was probably almost like a reclassification maybe or something, I don't know but going from superintendent public works director, were you did you, did you decide you wanted that, were you kind of, you know, encouraged to do that or or what? What was that?

Bill Egan: 3:42

because that's kind of a big, a big step yeah, um, so the superintendent actually my former boss, mike hollander retired so we did an internal um posting on that one. So then, uh, that's how I got that. And then the director is a kind of another, another story. But uh, alex came on at time. Prior to that, the public works director was over engineering and public works, so they separated that. So we were very lucky and fortunate to get Alex through that swap. So, oh, great yeah.

Marc Culver: 4:19

Great. Well, that's a great segue to Alex. Then, alex, how did you end up as the city engineer at the city of Shakopee?

Alex Jordan: 4:28

Yeah, thanks, mark. I joined Shakopee just about a year ago, almost to the date, as a city engineer.

Marc Culver: 4:34

Happy anniversary.

Alex Jordan: 4:35

Thank you, Appreciate it. Time flies. Prior to that, I worked for the city of Lakeville for about 10 years and was in consulting for a little bit. Before that I really started my public works career, interning with the city of Bloomington, laying traffic counters out all summer long, and really through that process I enjoyed local government and the ability to make a difference in communities. So, working with the city of Lakeville, I, you know, continued to develop my career in this position and opportunity came open for I mean 10 minutes from my house and a growing community to a stable government. It was something that I was passionate about and I took the leap to join the city.

Alex Jordan: 5:16

When I came on to Shakopee I was extremely fortunate to have Bill, who's been with the city for 31 years, on the public works side of things. We separated the departments. I was going to be leading the engineering department. Bill would be promoted to the public works director to have. His knowledge and depth of information and the ability to work collaboratively across departments really made my job so much easier joining the city. So I was super fortunate. And then Bill approached me about, you know, wanting to be more involved in APWA and accreditation and you know I jumped at the opportunity to help him here and talk with you about this, Mark. So, yeah, this is a great opportunity and I'm really loving the city of Shakopee. It's a great place, Great, Great Well.

Marc Culver: 5:58

I've had the privilege of working with you and the city on a Minnesota Riverbank restoration project, so it's been good to get to know Shakopee better and yourself, so doing a great job there and I'm not just saying that because you're a client, alex, I appreciate that. And then Barb. So what's your origin story?

Barb Kraemer: 6:18

Yeah, I was working for Parks and Rec at the community center, oh, and I saw this full-time opportunity pop up and I had no idea what Public Works did. To be honest, I knew we sent people there if they were missing sports equipment or had an issue with bees in the park, but had no idea what they actually did. And now I'm there and it keeps me busy. I love it. I love the variety and all the people I work with yeah, so what?

Marc Culver: 6:48

what do you like? What's your responsibilities there um?

Bill Egan: 6:52

gosh. Without her, we would be nothing.

Marc Culver: 6:55

Yeah, no, I know how that goes usually yeah basically to, yeah, support everyone.

Barb Kraemer: 7:00

So I do a lot of tracking different things and keeping records and then whatever they need. Basically I'm there to help.

Bill Egan: 7:10

She's definitely the face of our department and you know if you call in or get an email in on an inquiry, she's the main contact and I've heard her many times. She gives a friendly voice and good instructions and does a very good job.

Marc Culver: 7:29

Yeah, all too often those frontline support staff are really the key, the glue that kind of holds the department together, provides a lot of institutional knowledge but keeps the guys in line, tells them what to do, where to go, but, yeah, just being that direct contact between the residents and the and the and staff a lot of times. So no I, whether it was at Maple Grove with Linda and Maple Grove or at Roseville with Sally or Beth or Gretchen, you know you have those superstars that play that role, very important role in public work. So glad you're here and glad you're here to talk about this accreditation and that they're putting in some capable hands.

Marc Culver: 8:18

It looks like for leading this so well, good, good, I think that's a great time, great way to then segue into the actual topic here of accreditation. So first of all, I'll just start off here. What is accreditation? We've talked about it a few times and, like I said, you could look back a previous episode with Scott Grace and the CEO where we talk about the goals of APWA and that, and they do manage and offer this accreditation program. But we also talked about it in more detail, like I said earlier, with Matt Johnson from the city of Roseville, where Roseville has had accreditation through their national association since like 1996 or something. It's just crazy.

Marc Culver: 9:10

So, according to the APWA website, the APWA accreditation program provides an opportunity for agencies to earn an accreditation after completion of an evaluation and review process. The evaluation and best practice review process serves to provide a means of formally verifying and recognizing public works agencies for compliance with the recommended practices set forth in the public works management practices manual. They should really come up with an acronym for that. It is a voluntary, self-motivated approach to objectively evaluate, verify and recognize compliance with the recommended management practices. And just as a note, uh, in minnesota I believe, the only currently the only agency that is accredited by apwa is st paul, um so shakopee would be the second agency in the in the state of minnesota. So go.

Bill Egan: 9:58

Yeah, that was you know. Maybe a little red flag on my part. Yeah, why are the cities doing this? But um, yeah, we're confident here yeah, so I I.

Marc Culver: 10:07

That leads great into that question of so why you know with with only one other agency in minnesota? Why do you think this is? Why are you guys doing this?

Bill Egan: 10:16

yeah, I'll just kind of tell you how we got started. So I'm I I've never been, I don excused maybe, but had a busy personal life, just haven't been involved in a lot of the organizations. But I'm a closet, you're a closet.

Marc Culver: 10:30

APWA member.

Bill Egan: 10:31

So when I get these magazines, I do read them. You know, maybe not necessarily every article, but I look at them pretty close, and this was August of 2023 when this one came out. I think it was DeKalb, iowa or Illinois, whatever. I was reading their story and kind of got my interest going. I think most public works throughout the country probably think they're doing things right and they're doing it the best, but this is a good way to kind of match up and see you know how we're doing. So after reading this, I basically went to Barb. So Barb has been with us a few years now, so she's got systems down pretty good. She's very efficient, but we are very busy.

Bill Egan: 11:20

So I thought my first step was going to be Barb, and so I ran up by her and if she said no, I would have threw this in the garbage and we would have just did our job like we normally do. It's all your fault, barb. So she read it and said I think this is pretty cool and this is over a few weeks right, because this was August, we probably didn't announce it for a few months yet. But second step was our city administrator, of course, to see his support behind it, and he thought it was fabulous and so basically he said we think this is something we want to support and and put our resources at um.

Bill Egan: 12:10

And then, of course, after that, the frontline supervisors, you know, kind of ran it by them and I think it was about november of 2023 when we officially told. Everybody kind of went public with it, and I think it was about a day or two later our union employees announced they were going to strike. Oh yeah, last fall. So our tensions were put elsewhere for a few months. So we did Kind of get things started last fall. We really didn't pick things up until about a month ago, to be honest, but Barb put together a very good schedule and supporting materials and so pretty early in the game yet, but we've got a plan.

Marc Culver: 12:57

So you mentioned you've got a schedule put together, so what's your anticipated timeline for this?

Barb Kraemer: 13:25

every city should have. So hopefully we have most of it and don't have to change anything or too many things, and we can meet that deadline. However, it's fluid. We're working with so many different departments and we all have our busy months. So right now January 1st, but that might change too.

Marc Culver: 13:44

So you mentioned the 10 chapters. So 10 chapters of what?

Barb Kraemer: 13:49

Of the APWA accreditation process. So each chapter has a practice or multiple practices. Some have just four, some have 36. It depends on each chapter, um. But yeah, the first 10 are like hr stuff. So the very first one is mission, vision, value statements.

Marc Culver: 14:16

You know so pretty easy stuff, um did you guys have a a mission statement or a vision statement already?

Barb Kraemer: 14:24

yes, city does, and then um parks and streets do as well. Um, so yeah, and then after that, 11 through 40, are chapters ranging from, you know, airports or cemeteries or beaches um, I'm naming all things that we don't have in.

Bill Egan: 14:43

Chukot. You don't have an airport, you don't have a beach. Those will be easy.

Barb Kraemer: 14:48

So yeah, some of those are NA. It doesn't apply to us. But then there's an engineering one which I know everything pretty much there applies to engineering streets, parks, trails. So then we'll address those in the next.

Marc Culver: 15:07

And so you guys do have parks maintenance under the public works department, right Correct?

Bill Egan: 15:12

Another thing I'd like to mention is when you asked about how we got this started, I knew Alex had been on the board there, and so we sat down with Alex as well and got his I guess expertise on it. He gave us some contact information on some people that we could talk to, which we did, and they were very helpful. So had a little in with Alex and the AWA organization, so that was very helpful as well, knowing we had good support there.

Alex Jordan: 15:45

Well, it was a funny story of how this all came to be, even here today. Yeah, you know I was talking to Janine Clancy at the APWA Fall Conference, just as she's been so involved in the chapter and served on the national board as well that you know, like, what advice do you have for us? And here's Mark standing to the side of us and so it's creeping over towards our conversation and he goes wait, you're going through accreditation. I have a podcast. I want to get you on this podcast. So that was seven months ago to this point and here we are today.

Alex Jordan: 16:14

So you know I appreciate your interest in supporting us as well and hearing from other people throughout the chapter that this was something that other people were excited about. That's a really unique opportunity for the city of Shockview to take on, and when we look at even those first 10 chapters of the manual, most of it touches our entire city organization. So Barb and Bill have done an awesome job sitting down with all of our department heads and walking through a process and asking for their commitment and support to go through this process to not only look at how the Public Works Department functions but also how the city operates and ensure that we have the right policies and procedures in place to support the entire city. So it takes a huge amount of effort and work from people across all departments. I know our finance department is extremely excited to get started.

Marc Culver: 17:01

Are they really?

Alex Jordan: 17:02

Our director. One of his strengths is a uh, a competitor. So he's already reached out to barb and said I want to be done first and it's great, you know. So you've got some champions that they're developing throughout the city as well in our organization. So it's uh, it's been a good start to the process yeah, I want to.

Marc Culver: 17:18

I want to ask some follow-up questions about that particular, about working with some of your other departments in the city, you know. First of all were you surprised by the extent of that, of how many different departments you're going to have to talk to, how wide that was.

Alex Jordan: 17:38

I would say, yeah, I know Bill's been apologizing a lot to a lot of departments.

Marc Culver: 17:43

Yeah, that was my follow-up. Question is what's been the response from the other departments Like what have you committed us to here? Apologize in advance.

Alex Jordan: 17:50

But I do think that the support from Bill Reynolds, our city administrator, means a lot, because you know he's championing this and saying you know this is an opportunity for Public Works to establish themselves as a leader in our organization and looking at their policies and practices and you know it helps influence our other departments and say, well, let's take a step back and see how we're doing things and making sure that you know if there's ways that we're doing it the right way. So I think that's been extremely important having his support.

Bill Egan: 18:19

Yeah, and one thing that's been you know, shakopee is a pretty good-sized community. Now we've got a lot of policies and procedures in place. But part of this is, you know, we look back on some of them and it's like it seems like yesterday, but it was six years ago, right when we wrote this. Is it still valid today? You know, that's a lot. What I'm looking for. The other part of it is as people retire, you know it's. We've had some people retire and they took a lot of institutional knowledge with them.

Marc Culver: 18:56

So we want to try to spread that out and pass it on. Has there been anything you know? And I don't know how in depth you've gotten into all of the 10 chapters or all of the applicable chapters for you yet, but is there anything in there that has surprised you? Like, oh you know, like we never thought of this, this is a really good idea. Like, does anything jump out at you from that?

Barb Kraemer: 19:17

I know our street supervisor talked about roadkill, that's one of them. Yeah, I was gonna it's such a simple thing, right. I get a call, I tell them they go pick it up, but we also have county roads and you know the state highway and ramps and stuff. So he was like, huh, yeah, it's probably about time. Maybe we have it written down. What is our actual process for this?

Bill Egan: 19:39

you know if it's small or what if it's a big deer, you know so and I think maybe one thing and we've already talked about it, but it's, it's how I didn't think it was going to touch all the departments. I just thought we were going to pretty much do most of it, but as we dissected it, it's like you know, and they say it takes a village, and we want to try to get this done in a timely manner too.

Alex Jordan: 20:03

So, um, and we've had great support, as we mentioned, but I I didn't think we'd be touching so many different departments oh yeah, it really shows you can't operate in a vacuum too, that every department has to work collaboratively together and they have to understand all of our practices and procedures too. So, yeah, it is a pretty large undertaking and that was more of a surprise, I think, as we started to get into it In my engineering chapter such a small component of everything too, that you know I'm excited to get started on my work, but there's so much other things that has to happen first.

Marc Culver: 20:39

Is there any department that's not involved in this at the city, Any department to get off the get off the scot-clear?

Bill Egan: 20:49

One thing that we did is me and Barb went through those 10 chapters in each subchapter or practice and we were going to assign. We got pretty detailed and we finally thought you know, let's just give this chunk. I'll give an example A lot of the emergency management stuff is handled by the police department but fire is included. So we really didn't assign anything to the fire department at this point. But a lot of those chapters we told police reach out to fire, you know, and get their information from them.

Marc Culver: 21:21

Hey everyone, I just want to take a quick moment to thank our sponsor, Bolton and Mink, who is producing and editing our podcasts.

Bolton & Menk: 21:29

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Bill Egan: 21:50

So I think every department probably will be touched by this.

Alex Jordan: 21:54

I think they've done a really good job explaining the reasons why we're doing this, and that's made getting by and a lot easier for them to support us, and it's not just checking boxes as we go through the chapters. A lot of times when you're going through this process, you're like I want to get this done and this done and this done. But when you step back and actually say why are we trying to accomplish this and what are we trying to get out of it and what standard we're trying to set, that's where you're starting to see buy-in across the city and I mentioned when we interviewed with apwa.

Bill Egan: 22:22

we did a virtual interview. They had three different cities across the country that answered some questions and one of them I don't remember who it was, but they had a director public works director that they hired and once he found out that they were accredited he was ecstatic he's all here, right, you know it's my job, roadkill, yeah, yeah.

Marc Culver: 22:47

Well, like you said that you know, that certainly helps make that transition easier. Whether it's a leadership or, you know, a supervisor or even a maintenance staff, it makes that training and transition easier if you've got that, that manual, so to speak, so that's good. Has your council been involved yet?

Bill Egan: 23:11

Are they aware of this, yeah, so our city administrator had met with them when the idea first got brought up. So I'm not sure what those conversations were, but I did speak with some of them one-on-one and they they were very supportive. Good yeah.

Marc Culver: 23:29

What's the financial costs of this?

Bill Egan: 23:33

So as in staff time.

Marc Culver: 23:36

Well, you've paid a fee to APWA.

Bill Egan: 23:41

We, we actually have. We got the supporting book and the software, but we have to apply, and at that, so they go by your population what number that is and then how many chapters you will be Like. Cemeteries would not pay for that one, so we actually haven't paid the big fee yet, but it's probably going to be your own $10,000. Okay, well, it's not. It gives or take. That's not so bad.

Marc Culver: 24:14

It really gives you if you think about what you're getting out of it. Obviously there's a lot more than $10,000 in staff time, but again, that investment should pay dividends in the future.

Bill Egan: 24:22

Yeah, I guess. I feel it's going to validate our processes rate against best practices throughout the whole country and Canada. I guess there's some cities of Canada too that are credited.

Alex Jordan: 24:34

Yeah Well, and it's not just going to benefit the public works department either. I mean, there'll be systems and practices and policies that will come out of this and establish through all departments. So the small amount of money that this cost to go through this process is going to provide an immense value for across the board, for the city.

Marc Culver: 24:52

Yeah, absolutely. Um, have you, have you kind of figured out which task or chapter, or or?

Bill Egan: 25:13

practice or whatever is going to take the most amount of time and effort. Hr has a lot. Yeah, um, you know they have a lot of, and our hr director is is new, so I kind of felt bad. That was one of them I apologized to, but in a way it's maybe good right. They're going to have to go through all these practices and see what our procedures are, so I think it'll be a good exercise. It just might be a little hard up front here, but in the long run it'll pay off.

Alex Jordan: 25:41

Yeah, christy couldn't really say no, could she? She was only here for about a month before you sprung this on. Yeah, she's on probation for a year right.

Barb Kraemer: 25:50

I dare you to say no one thing that's kind of interesting, too, is the chapters 11 through 40. We only have to pay for them if public works is involved 50% or more.

Marc Culver: 26:08

Oh, okay.

Barb Kraemer: 26:08

So for engineering, for example, now that we're separated, I actually reached out to the accreditation team because I was like we just newly separated but we were so involved with engineering before. What do we do with that chapter? And she's like, if each um management practice, if you help out 50, then you got to do it. If you don't, you don't have to do it. But they can do it, you know, and um, we won't have to pay for it. And I know there's a few departments that are like no, I've, can you please send me my stuff right now? I want to see. And yeah, basically compare that to what they're doing and maybe improve their department. So it's kind of cool.

Marc Culver: 26:53

I'm assuming you're going to do the engineering chapters. Oh, of course you kind of have to now.

Alex Jordan: 26:58

We're in the droves of budget and CIP season, so Barb's going to wait until July to send those to me. But yeah, we're really looking forward to diving into it, especially being new with the city as well. This provides a really good opportunity for me to, you know, inform the decisions that we've made in our practices and policies and ways that we can improve and do better, so I'm super excited for it. Good.

Marc Culver: 27:18

Good. So you mentioned that your timeline is January, so what happens by January?

Barb Kraemer: 27:29

Then we have a review team that we're putting together. We kind of have an idea of who we want on there, so we want to include, you know, some operators and middle management and have them review it after everyone submits it and see if they still agree that it applies, and then send what we need to to council and start working on the other chapters.

Alex Jordan: 27:56

Okay, because there's going to be policies that come out of this and ordinances that more than likely need to be updated as well. So we talked about a clean the sweep year and December council meeting where we can clean up a bunch of our policies and ordinances, as we normally do through the city typically. So that'll be bringing those steps to council and working at it, not just one meeting after the next, but bringing it all holistically together.

Marc Culver: 28:19

Yeah, yeah, that's a good plan. So, and I know that you will have an external review team, so once you submit your manual or your documents, whatever to apwa, then after a period of time they'll review it and then they will bring a review team or something in yeah they.

Bill Egan: 28:42

They come on site, and that'd be towards the end, but I believe we'll do a virtual one, right first yeah, yeah first, um, but in the end, yes, they send a team out and and go through the all your materials and then are you gonna make them come out in january? You know it's funny. We joked about that when we met with the team. Yeah, we did say that.

Marc Culver: 29:02

Hey, you want to see Public Works in action in Minnesota. You got to come in January.

Bill Egan: 29:07

February.

Marc Culver: 29:10

Well, good, what were the cities that you met with?

Bill Egan: 29:14

Do you remember? I don't, do you.

Barb Kraemer: 29:17

On the.

Bill Egan: 29:18

When we had the virtual.

Barb Kraemer: 29:19

Oh gosh, it was a combination of cities.

Bill Egan: 29:22

It was just three of them, okay.

Barb Kraemer: 29:23

Yeah, I want to say. I was like a month ago or so. Yeah, I can't remember the cities, but the accreditation team was also there answering questions as well, so it was cities that went through it. The accreditation team and then anyone that wanted to sign up thinking about going through the process are currently going through it. Yeah, and the accreditation team has been amazing Good. They respond right away and help as much as they can.

Marc Culver: 29:54

Well, that's good. I know that APWA wants to promote this more, so they better be good. Yeah, so that you guys can give a good review of the process and everything.

Bill Egan: 30:06

And part of their team, and I don't remember the gentleman's name, but he was part of the original putting this together back in 97, was it? So that was one surprise. When you ask about surprises, it has been around for decades.

Marc Culver: 30:20

Right, right, yeah, almost, as long as you, right, yeah, almost, as long as you, yeah, quite. What's been the response of the maintenance staff to this idea?

Bill Egan: 30:33

Well, we did take the guidance of the APWA and getting everybody on board, and one of them was the union employees. So we did have a meeting with our two stewards early on and they were, I don't know, lukewarm right away. You know what's this mean and kind of explain the process and what it could do.

Bill Egan: 30:55

And of course, you know, you know management's always looked down upon, maybe or they don't know what they're doing, you know, so they, I think, in a way thought well good, you know, this will validate some of the decisions we're making. So so they, they're going to be doing the work as far as putting material in. So probably not a lot of day-to-day workers will have to do anything in here. Yeah.

Marc Culver: 31:31

Yeah, Is there anything in the, in the manual, in the, in the practices and that that you look at, seeing? Oh, this might really make us. You look at seeing, oh, this might really make us, it might guide us towards making changes in, like, how you manage your ships or things like that. I mean, without giving anything away or without trying to get too controversial if you don't want to. I mean, is there anything in there that you're kind of looking at like man, there might be some changes here well, that's one thing.

Bill Egan: 32:04

Early on, when I was going through my thought process, before I told anybody you know, you kind of wonder should, should you even open up this door, right? Um, because you might find some vulnerabilities. But I think that's the reason we're doing it. Yeah, so if you're not uncomfortable, you're not growing, in my opinion.

Marc Culver: 32:27

I think that's a great answer. I think that's a great answer. You know, if you're, if you're going through this and there are no, there aren't any of those uncomfortable moments. What's the point, yeah, yeah, I think this has been a great conversation. When do you think would be a good like check in point, like? So I, you know, I'm really looking forward to like checking in on you guys on how the process is going, and so when do you think would be a next, a good next stage to check in on you?

Bill Egan: 33:05

So I think I said it already, but Barb has done a wonderful job of like organizing this. We are having monthly meetings. You know you mentioned we haven't got a lot of progress yet, but there's been a lot of planning. I would think in the next two to three months, I mean, we're going to see some stuff coming in pretty, pretty fast and furious. We do have budget this time of year, so that takes precedence. But of course I don't know. Our deadline is January, maybe midpoint.

Alex Jordan: 33:39

OK, here to there, but if you talk about a year from now, we'll have gone through the process of putting together and we'll uncover a lot as we go through this process too. So try to give yourself a little bit of buffer and then at that point you'll submit it to apwa and have gotten feedback to and have gone through that review process. It might be a good opportunity to provide an update of here's where we're at now. Here's what we went through.

Marc Culver: 33:59

Here's what we've learned through this process, if anyone's trying to take the leap for what they want to actually plan for as they started okay, yeah, I think that'd be great and I and I also think, even after you're done, it would be cool to do a one-year follow-up. You know, like one year after you get your accreditation. You know how has how have things changed, how your processes changed, and you know good and bad. What do you think of that? So you know, we'll definitely set that up and so, if you're listening, look forward to a series of podcasts on this.

Alex Jordan: 34:38

I do want to put a plug in for our parks department yeah, also diving into the Capra accredited. They are Okay, they're following Bill's lead. Kelsey, our new parks director, is going to take all the hard work that Bill does through this process and she's going to go through it and go through the Capra accreditation and she's super excited about it too.

Alex Jordan: 34:57

So you're already seeing it starting to spiral downhill through our other departments and having other people support and have champions. It's just going to make it easier. So, um, I know she was excited to listen to your previous podcast with uh, with city of roseville. Um, I had sent her the link forward and she was super excited about what she thought well good um, yeah, we're.

Marc Culver: 35:16

It's really gaining momentum great um, once you're accredited, I know know with with Capra, I think it's a a five-year reaccreditation. Is that the same for APWA then?

Barb Kraemer: 35:27

It's four years.

Marc Culver: 35:27

Oh, it's four years. Yep, okay, right, okay, all right, so every four years. Yeah.

Barb Kraemer: 35:33

So a couple of years after we get accredited we'll probably start the process over again. Um, obviously it'll be a lot more smooth sailing through that one Right. But yeah.

Bill Egan: 35:45

So accreditation team recommended starting at year two. You know of your four year accreditation, so yeah.

Marc Culver: 35:53

Well, I'm also, you know, I'm going to put this on tape as well. I'm going to commit you guys. I'm not on any of the planning committees or anything for APWA, but I think you guys should definitely do a session on your lessons learned and the process and that and then hopefully, you know, persuade some other agencies in Minnesota and beyond to do this.

Bill Egan: 36:14

Yeah, I know we're a long ways from spiking the football. I'm not one to say we're going to do something and not finish, but yeah, we'll definitely learn some lessons along the way. Good.

Marc Culver: 36:26

Good, well, great, well, you know this is. I just want to applaud you guys for taking this on, for being excited about it, for volunteering to do this and saying yes when Bill asked you, when Bill asked you. So, yeah, congratulations, and I look forward to seeing the end result and listening to you guys talk about what you did change through this, and then maybe we'll get a couple of the other department heads in here to gripe. Anything else you want to add?

Bill Egan: 37:05

no, I guess I kind of like your title of your podcast here the nerds, because you know I'm a public works nerd and bob's become one.

Marc Culver: 37:15

Yeah, so you like it well good, I'm glad you like you like it. Yeah, my wife actually came up with the title, so I got to give her credit. It's great, it's perfect.

Alex Jordan: 37:28

It shows what she thinks of you Right.

Marc Culver: 37:30

Exactly, exactly, but it fits all of my guests to a T. I mean, we have some more nerdy than others, but we're all nerds, we're all experts in our areas and for the most part, we like to talk about it.

Alex Jordan: 37:47

You know we like to nerd out about it, so yeah, yeah, we appreciate you promoting public works in the industry and bringing it to a level that people can relate to and understand. I just sent your last episode to our planning director on the EV. Oh yeah, dynas EV lighting up and just dropped yesterday. He was excited about it last night when I sent it to him. So I mean, you're doing a lot for the industry. Well, I appreciate it. Well, thank you.

Marc Culver: 38:11

And you know it's. It's really a matter of lifting up the people who are actually doing all the work. So thank you guys for doing the work. So in the work. So All right, all right With that. All of that great stuff that we're saying about each other, all that out of the way. So all the nerds out there, thanks for joining us on this episode. Hope you learned some. I hope you are inspired to maybe look at your own practices and policies and maybe even look at that accreditation webpage. We'll put the link in the show notes. Check it out. Maybe you know, give it some consideration, get uncomfortable a little bit. So, and if you have enjoyed the episode, obviously tell your nerd colleagues out there to listen in to this and other episodes. Until next time, nerds out, bye.