by Ed Greiner, President

In recapping the activities and events of any year, as in the final President's Message of 2011, it is fitting to emphasize the accomplishments, the rate of productivity and the overall industriousness ("busy-ness") resulting from the year's events and activities. I can think of no previous year, however, more industrious ("more busy") than 2011. Historically, Iowa One Call's annual accomplishments have resulted in highly effective programming and system innovations. With the launch of new systems like ITIC and IMAP and the enhancing of other systems, such as the Design Request and Ticket Search systems, 2011 has indeed been a productive year. What makes the accomplishments of 2011 even more remarkable are the major hurdles and nearly overwhelming transitions that were effectively surmounted.

Back in November, 2010, Iowa One Call reported that its longtime vendor, One Call Systems (OCS), had suddenly closed their doors. This was the start of a major transition that required immediate strategies and tactics. There was no time to schedule planning sessions; the Iowa One Call Board and staff had to react quickly and effectively. Although the entire call center operations had been maintained and managed by OCS, the Iowa One Call Board knew that the ramifications of losing the call center would severely impact the state of Iowa's underground damage prevention system. The transition to in-house operations was immediate, and within one week of OCS closing their doors, the call center was again fully operational.

As previously reported, most stakeholders, and even major facility operators and excavation operations, never realized that anything was amiss. The immediate transition to in-house operations was nearly seamless. The next major obstacle to overcome was the transition to a new call center vendor. After taking bids from a number of national vendors, a new contract was awarded to One Call Concepts  (OCC). The official transition from Iowa One Call in-house operations to One Call Concepts took place on February 1, 2011. The transition resulted in new mapping, ticketing and communications systems - just to mention a few of the major components - that potentially impact every user of the Iowa One Call system. Even with stakeholders having to adjust to these new systems, such as the new ITIC online ticketing system, this portion of the transition was, once again, relatively seamless.

Now, nearly eleven months into this major transition, Iowa One Call continues to explore and develop new programming and system enhancements. The Iowa Call Board and committees, especially the State of the Art Committee, continue to work closely with OCC in designing and implementing efficient user-interface tools, such as the ITIC and IMAP systems. In addition to executing new programs and advancing system efficiencies in 2011, Iowa One Call launched a new comprehensive and user-friendly website, and created a new advertising and public awareness campaign - "Protecting What Really Matters" - which has garnered exceptional praise from statewide media groups resulting in significant media coverage. Finally, Iowa One Call Board also developed a three-year strategic plan. The 2011-2013 Iowa One Call Strategic Plan provides the framework for Iowa One Call to develop and execute strategies designed to further enhance system efficiencies, program effectiveness, user compliance and long-term fiscal strength.
More important than anything else in 2011, there were no deaths or severe injuries reported in Iowa as a result of excavation-related underground facilities damage. Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for all states, and damage prevention remains paramount to the well-being of all Iowa communities.

Protect what really matters. Always dig safe. 

by Ben Booth, Manager Public Relations/Communications 

In 2003, the Common Ground Alliance (CGA) launched their Damage Information Reporting Tool (DIRT) as a means of gathering useful data regarding the occurrence of underground facility incidents. Since its inception, the annual DIRT report has become an important source for identifying the root causes of damage to the nation's underground facilities infrastructure.

The 2010 Common Ground Alliance DIRT Report identified three primary causes of underground facilities damage. The pie chart below, which shows the breakdown of these root causes, was compiled using data from approximately 61,000 damage incidents reported to DIRT in 2010.

Distribution of Known Events by Root Cause Group (2010)

Even a cursory glance at this chart reveals a troubling picture. Why do excavators still fail to make notifications to their respective one call systems prior to engaging in excavations?

Making a notification to the one call system is quick and easy. There is very little that can go wrong! Unlike the complicated and potentially dangerous circumstances often encountered while excavating in the vicinity of multiple highly volatile facilities, placing a call to the one call center is about as straight-forward as it gets-not to mention completely risk free! There is absolutely no excuse for failing to notify Iowa One Call prior to excavation. Period.

In Iowa, failure to make a notification to the Iowa One Call System at least 48 hours prior to the commencement of any excavation (excluding Saturdays, Sundays and legal holidays) is a violation of the law, which subjects the violator to civil penalties and court sanctioned injunctive relief. Regardless of whether or not any damages occur or if underground facilities are encountered during an excavation, simply not "calling before you dig" is a legal violation that could be very expensive for the violator. For example, any excavation taking place in the vicinity of natural gas lines without proper notification having been made to Iowa One Call subjects the excavator to civil penalties up to $10,000 per violation, per day, up to $500,000!

Some excavation activities, such as rural drain tiling operations, terracing projects and sub-soiling procedures, leave our state's critical pipeline infrastructure subject to potentially severe, even catastrophic incidents. The latest actions filed by the Iowa Attorney General against an excavator who failed to notify the Iowa One Call System involved a pipeline that was damaged during a drain tiling installation. The incident resulted in the release of a large quantity of diesel fuel which penetrated the soil, ground water, a nearby stream and a farm pond. In addition to the civil penalty assessed by the court, the excavator who was found guilty may also be held responsible for a much larger bill, including the cost to repair the pipeline, the cost of the lost diesel, the cost to clean the contaminated stream and farm pond and the cost to excavate and aerate the contaminated soil. It would not be unusual for the total cost of such an incident to exceed half-a-million dollars. All of this could have been avoided if only the excavator had made a simple notification to Iowa One Call.

Call Before You Dig!