MCEER Annual Meeting to be Held in Sacramento

On February 25-26, 2005, the Multidisciplinary Center for Earthquake Engineering Research (MCEER) will hold its annual meeting at The Sacramento Marriott Rancho Cordova, on the outskirts of Sacramento, California.

Under the theme of “Involving Stakeholders … Igniting Innovation … Securing Resilience,” MCEER’s 2005 Annual Meeting reaches out from California’s state capital, to engage stakeholders at the start of a process that will ignite innovation and engineer solutions to help communities secure heightened resilience against earthquakes as well as other disasters nationwide. It is being held in Sacramento at the invitation of the California Office of Statewide Health Planning and Development (OSHPD).

The meeting will feature a “Practitioners Day Forum” on Friday, February 25, inviting participation from the practicing community and public officials throughout California and beyond. The purpose is to more fully engage critical stakeholders up-front, in a process that will shape and develop solutions to attain greater community-wide earthquake resilience.

This year’s MCEER Annual Meeting features a number of very special events:

Icebreaker & Early-Bird Reception

On the evening of Thursday, February 24, all Practitioners Day registrants are invited to join MCEER Industry Partners, Students and Researchers in engaging conversation at the California State History Museum, in downtown Sacramento.

Practitioners Day Forum:
Meeting Today's Earthquake Engineering and Emergency Response Challenges

Practitioners Day on Friday, February 25, invites participation from the practicing community of architects, engineers, planners, owners, emergency managers, policy makers, and public officials in Northern California and beyond. The purpose is to more fully engage these critical stakeholders up-front, in a process that will shape and develop solutions to attain greater community-wide earthquake resilience.

Format

MCEER’s 2005 Annual Meeting will open with a Practitioners Day Forum on Friday, February 25, 2005. Open to all interested stakeholders, the Practitioners Day program will include plenary and breakout sessions focusing on three components critical to community resilience:

• Seismic Evaluation & Retrofit of Electric Power & Water Systems
• Seismic Retrofit of Hospitals/Acute Care Facilities
• Earthquake Response & Recovery

Practitioners Day participants will be asked to provide input and insight (via presentations and discussion) on critical challenges to achieving resilience in each of these three areas. Further interaction and discussion is encouraged through the Annual Meeting Luncheon and Banquet on February 25.

On Saturday, February 26, the meeting is open to MCEER industry partners, students and researchers only. All three of these “member” groups will meet in plenary and breakout sessions to factor the previous day’s practitioner comments into Strategic Research Planning, for the year ahead.

Who Should Attend?

MCEER’s Practitioners Day Forum is open to architects, engineers, planners, owners, emergency managers, policy makers, public officials, and technology manufacturers who have an interest in the development of cost-effective retrofit tools and techniques for improving the seismic resilience of communities, and specifically, hospitals, electric power, water delivery, and response and recovery systems.