PRESIDENT’S MESSAGE

Tom Buhl

As the calendar year rolls to a close, so does the Academy's year of service for its officers. I've enjoyed every moment of being able to serve the Academy as President this year, and especially enjoyed working with you in the many Academy functions. Thank you for this opportunity

Thanks to the efforts of AAHP Past President Howard Dickson and able support from AAHP Past Secretary Kathy Shingleton, the Academy Special Session in the HPS Annual Meeting in Washington, D.C. continued the high standards of excellence of previous Academy sessions, and was interesting, informative, and well attended. The session focused on the role of radiation experts in homeland security, a timely and important topic for us all.

During the Academy luncheon, the ABHP presented the William A. McAdams Award to Ed Maher for his many contributions to the certification process, including serving as ABHP Chair and Part II Panel Chair. The AAHP Professional Standards and Ethics Committee presented the Joyce P. Davis Memorial Award to Jim Tarpinian for representing the highest of ethical standards while delivering exemplary service to the AAHP.

The Academy, through the outstanding work of the Continuing Education Committee, offered three eight-hour courses on the Saturday before the meeting. The courses covered 1) a review of what is known of radiation risks at low doses, 2) a review and update of nuclear material transportation regulations, and 3) a workshop on the use of MARSSIM and MARLAP in designing sampling programs. Over 170 people attended these sessions. On behalf of the Academy, I'd like to thank the HPS for accommodating the AAHP in conducting those activities during the annual meeting.

The AAHP Executive Committee (EC) held its summer meeting on the Saturday and Sunday before the annual HPS meeting. Because a summary of the meeting minutes is also appearing in this issue of the CHP News, I won't go into much detail, but would like to mention three things. President Elect Frazier Bronson assembled a list of outstanding candidates for AAHP committee membership and for committee chairs, which were approved by the EC. Congratulations to these new committee members and chairs, and thank you in advance for your service to the Academy.

The Professional Development Committee has begun work on a Standard of Qualification/Practice (SQ/P) for being an expert witness in health physics. This would be the third SQ/P the committee has developed, following publication last year of SQ/Ps on a university RSO and a healthcare facility RSO.

AMERICAN ACADEMY OF HEALTH PHYSICS
EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE
Minutes of 2004 July 10 & 11
Washington, DC

1.0 1.0 Tom Buhl alled the meeting to order.

2.0 1.0 Tom Buhl welcomed members and guests.

Attendees:

President Buhl welcomed everyone to Washington D.C., congratulated those responsible for arranging the luncheon with the ABHP, and thanked everyone for his or her interest and attendance. It was noted that those present met/exceeded the minimum necessary quorum as established in the Bylaws.

3.0 Discussion and approval of agenda (Tom Buhl)
The meeting agenda was presented and accepted. Several minor clarifications and corrections were provided to the documented meeting minutes from the Augusta meeting; Following this discussion, the minutes from the Augusta meting were accepted as corrected.

4.0 Report of 2004 Officers

4.1 President’s Report (Tom Buhl)

Tom discussed the highlights from a written President's report that had been distributed with the Agenda packet. He began by expressing his appreciation to the members of the Executive Committee, especially Scott Medling, and Nancy Johnson for their contributions in accomplishing the first electronic balloting for an Academy election. Relative to action items from the Augusta meeting, Tom noted that he had contacted the Academy Nominating Committee with regards to the SOP revision associated with the Academy response to the CESB accreditation requirements. Tom also contacted the Academy Professional Development Committee to task them to begin work on a new Standards of Qualification/Practice (SQ/P) document. He reported that by the time of this "formal" contact, the Committee had already begun work on the proposed SQ/P for acting as an expert witness. Tom also asked the Committee to approach the HPS Academic Education Committee to offer Academy support in their academic accreditation program. This Committee was also reminded of their responsibility for coordinating booth-manning arrangements at the HPS meetings.

Tom reported that he had contacted Kenny Fleming on behalf of the Academy to thank him for his contributions to the ad hoc committee pursuing title recognition initiatives. In view of the experience of the American Industrial Hygiene Association in pursuit of industrial hygiene title protection, Judson Kenoyer has also been contacted by Tom and agreed to participate on the Executive Committee appointed working group. Judson is also a CIH and has previous experience as the HPS liaison to the AIHA.

The President's report included a status of three situations in which individuals were alleged to be posing as CHPs although they were not members of the Academy. He noted that subsequent to the Augusta meeting, Jim Tarpinian had recommended that the Academy drop further pursuit of the California Consumer Affairs complaint associated with one of these circumstances. President Buhl noted that it had been agreed that he would write a letter addressing one of the other two circumstances and that Frazier Bronson had agreed to write the letter to the third individual. Tom also noted that he had received a phone call sounding like an ethics compliant but that nothing further had materialized. Kathleen Shingleton asked for additional circumstances/explanation around the 2 individuals thought to be falsely posing as CHPs. Tom proposed to follow-up in New Orleans. Scott Medling noted that use of an acronym referring to corporate health physicist or consulting HP could result in misperceptions surrounding ABHP certification.

Tom noted that he had been made aware of health difficulties being experienced by one of our colleagues and had expressed best wishes for the individual's recovery on the Academy's behalf. Tom closed his report by summarizing several interfaces with Scott Medling in Scott's capacity as webmaster, including posting of the current SQ/Ps on the web site and provision of access to the Executive Committee restricted area to all the current Academy Committee members.

4.2 President-Elect’s Report
(Frazier Bronson)Frazier Bronson next spoke from his very comprehensive written report as President-Elect. Frazier noted that submittal of nominee recommendations for Academy Committee membership is the only true duty clearly assigned to the President-Elect. He included a written outline of the process he had followed to arrive at committee nominations, and explained his thought process in ranking each individual's degree of interest. Frazier explained how his interactions with individuals to discuss potential committee vacancies had led him to understand the need for a summary of duties, meetings, and member requirements specific to each of the Academy's standing committees. These summaries were included in the President-Elect's written report. The committee members and some officers had assisted with the summary developments.

President-Elect Bronson's report included his resultant committee membership recommendations, including identification of future committee chair successions. There followed a discussion on committee alternates. Frazier specifically explained his research of precedent/process regarding committee alternates. It was agreed that action on these committee recommendations should properly follow later in the meeting under new business. Later in the meeting, the Executive Committee moved to approve the candidates for committee chairs and members.

Frazier summarized his written recommendations deriving from review of Academy Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) 1.2.1. Frazier also echoed Tom's appreciation for Scott and everyone's efforts to kickoff electronic balloting. Several of the recommendations and conclusions from Frazier's efforts were incorporated into other sections of the meeting agenda. Discussion followed regarding where the officer reports "end up". Regis Greenwood explained the difference between open meetings and executive sessions relative to accessibility of all the reports.

4.3 The Past-President’s Report (Howard Dickson)
Past President Howard Dickson referred the Executive Committee to his written report and explained that he had also attended an additional meeting on title protection cooperation held on June 16, 2004. He noted the Academy special session arrangements that would be discussed separately and that the Academy Technical Session agenda was appended to his report. In this context, Howard thanked Liz Brackett and Kathleen Shingleton for their assistance with special session arrangements

4.4 Secretary’s Report (Gary Kephart)
Gary Kephart noted that while it falls to the Academy Secretary to report the outcome of the election, Scott Medling and others who succeeded at inaugural electronic balloting did the real work. James Bogard is the Academy's newly elected President-Elect, Paul Stansbury the incoming Treasurer, and James Yusko won election as an Academy Director. In discussion of annual review of the Academy Standard Operating Procedures, President Buhl highlighted the need to finalize draft SOPs, check existing SOPs for revisions, and to finalize and post missing committee charters to the web site.

4.5 Treasurer’s Report (Ken Eger)
Ken provided some revisions and supplements to the detailed financial reports included in the meeting packets. Some clarification questions followed and Ken fielded these. In summary, the Academy's Financial Report shows that the investments have largely recovered from the economic downturn losses.

Ken went on to explain the Finance Committee's evaluation of the boundaries established in the SOP 2.4.1 decision logic for review of the financial advisor performance. The boundaries as set by the procedure are conservative in that they establish expectation of investment protection in a down market.

Ken summarized the spring meeting of the Finance Committee including preparation of the proposed Academy annual budget. Included in the Finance Committee's written report is a comparison of previous expenditures relative to budgeted amounts. This comparison shows only 3 areas of increase: Ken reviewed what these were and reasons for the increases. The three areas of escalation are the executive secretariat office expenses, the initiative on health physics title protection, and the proposed ABHP initiatives (See section 7.0). The proposed '05 budget is slightly over 203K$. Ken noted that a budget for title protection has been requested by Finance from the ad hoc Committee (10K$ authorized by Executive Committee in Augusta). There followed some information exchange regarding the prior day's deliberations on this topic. Other budget detail questions and discussion followed.

Lastly, Ken reported that the Academy books had been audited and conclusion of this audit was successful. Cost of audits are going up and consequently the Academy Finance Committee has evaluated and determined that "review" is adequate for size of Academy as a "business entity".

5.0 Committee Correspondence and Reports (Tom Buhl)

5.1 Appeals Committee (Thomas Murphy)

5.2 Continuing Education Committee (Jeff Kotsch)
Jeff Kotsch had also submitted a written report as Chair of the Academy Continuing Education Committee. Tom Buhl summarized this committee report. It discussed Academy-sponsored eight-hour training sessions in Augusta and Washington DC in conjunction with the respective HPS meetings. Jeff also reported that SOPs 2.2.1 and 2.2.2 had been reviewed by the committee and were deemed current.

Tom also noted under this agenda item that HPS has entered into an agreement with OSHA having to do with radiation safety. Several OSHA people had subsequently expressed interest in the continuing education courses and Tom had agreed they (2 OSHA people) could attend these Academy-sponsored courses gratis. As Executive Committee conversation of this situation ensued, Tom explained that these circumstances had resulted from governmental relations initiatives that the HPS had undertaken. Inasmuch as the current meeting is in DC, Tom concluded that this would be a goodwill gesture.

As of Friday, 168 people were signed up to participate in the continuing education courses at the Washington DC meeting.

5.3 Exam Site Selection Committee (John Ahlquist)
Exam Site Selection Committee Chair John Ahlquist was unable to be present but Nancy Johnson reported that there are twelve identified examination sites (eleven plus DC). Nancy reported that all these preparation and coordination efforts went well during the run-up to the annual examination date.

5.4 Finance Committee (Ken Eger)
Ken presented this information as a combined Treasurer's Report and Finance Committee Report.

5.5 Nominating Committee (Johnafred Thomas)
President Buhl summarized the written report submitted by Johnafred Thomas on behalf of the Academy Nominating Committee. With regard to Committee recommendations for filling ABHP vacancies, it was noted that there are presently two expired-term vacancies, with Liz Brackett's resignation creating a third vacancy. The submitted Nominating Committee report included the list of candidates, resumes, and committee rankings. Following Scott Medling's introduction of discussion, Brian Methé recommended, that resumes be deleted from the formal committee report. The Executive Committee subsequently approved appointment of James Tarpinian and Patricia Milligan to the ABHP vacancies in accordance with the Nominating Committee recommendations. Tom Buhl committed to appoint a replacement for Liz Brackett's unexpired term on the Board with attention to the remaining well-qualified candidates identified by the Nominating Committee.

Professional Development Committee (Bruce Thomadsen/Armin Ansari)
A written report compiled by Bruce Thomadsen for the Academy's Professional Development Committee was provided at the Executive Committee meeting. Discussion of this report, led by President Buhl and Past-President Dickson noted that Bruce's recommendation for 3-year committee chairperson terms would be a bylaw change. Discussion followed as to the legitimate need for some committees to have longer terms for continuity. It was generally agreed that it isn't entirely appropriate to dodge the need for a formal, voted bylaw change (by just re-appointing chairpersons) -- so probably good to face up to the need and capture what the change to bylaw wording might look like. This theme was consequently added as another agenda item.

It was also noted that Armin Ansari's proposal to initiate another Standard of Qualification/Practice on acting as an expert witness in health physics is already well under way with much positive response to the idea. It was noted that Roger Shaw is an Academy member with significant ongoing professional involvement in litigation support that might be another resource for the proposed writing committee. The Committee also provided a draft of a proposed standard operating procedure, SOP 2.6.1 that was included in the agenda packet.

Professional Standards & Ethics Committee (Tom Buhl)
President Buhl provided copies of correspondence from the Professional Standards & Ethics Committee recommending that the Joyce P. Davis Memorial Award be presented to James Tarpinian at this (Washington DC) meeting. Tom reported that Dale Denham would present the award citation. It was also reported that a more comprehensive SOP is being worked up by the Committee to include detail as appropriate for consistent handling of the Joyce P. Davis Memorial Award.

5.8 Liaisons

ABMP(Steven King/David Steidley/Jean St. Germain)
Although there were no representatives from among the three American Board of Medical Physics (ABMP) liaisons present at the Executive Committee meeting, Nancy Johnson provided a written report from Jean St. Germain, CHP and ABMP Vice-Chair. Jean's report noted that David Steidley and Steven King would be attending the HPS meeting with information regarding the ABMP exam and certification process.

CRCPD(Earl Fordham)
Earl Fordham, Academy liaison to the Conference of Radiation Control Program Directors (CRCPD) attended the Executive Committee meeting and offered to communicate anything that the Academy wished to go back to the Conference of Radiation Control Program Directors. It was also noted that Ed Bailey is the Chair of CRCPD this year.

5.8.3 HPS
No report from the HPS.

5.8.4 NRRPT(Kelli Gallion)
Kelli Gallion, Chair of the National Registry of Radiation Protection Technologists (NRRPT) represented the Registry in the Executive Committee meeting and reported 4722 registered members. The NRRPT is working with some interested Canadians to develop a separate international exam at the technologist level. Kelli indicated that this NRRPT initiative is in its infancy stages but that Mexico has also made some inquiries. In this context, John Serabian mentioned some experience that the ABHP Board has gleaned from their interface with émigré's and other "international" flavor from ABHP testing experience.

Kelli reported that regrettably the profession has lost Charles (Bama) McKnight who passed away in June. Bama was a member emeritus of the NRRPT and contributed to Registry leadership over some 20 years.

Howard Dickson asked if the Registry has received and will be responding to the information on professional recognition and encouraged Kelli to stay plugged-in on this effort with ABIH and AIHA.

Ad Hoc Committee re: CESB Public Member Requirement (John Serabian)
John Serabian reported -- on behalf of the Ad Hoc Committee re: CESB Public Member Requirement - that the open commitment from the Augusta meeting had been completed. This item concerned a proposal to address CESB accreditation requirements for public involvement via implementation of an Academy SOP. There was some question during the Augusta deliberations by the Academy Executive Committee as to whether the working group concurred that this SOP alternative (Drafted by George Vargo) would fulfill the intent of the CESB Guidelines for Engineering and Related Specialty Certification Programs. Serabian reported in DC that all working group members had concurred (Serabian, Vargo, Bailey, and Tarpinian.)

Following the Augusta meeting, a member of the Academy Executive Committee had noticed in the Academy of Industrial Hygiene's Diplomate newsletter an item regarding a new ISO standard. The reference, ISO/IEC 17024:2003. General Requirements for Bodies Operating Certification of Persons, and information that ANSI will administer the standard in the United States, were passed through to the Academy leadership. John Serabian indicated that this was also subsequently forwarded to the Board by the Academy for information and consideration. Following brief discussion, the Executive Committee agreed that the Academy President's discretionary fund would be used to go purchase the ISO standard so that both Academy and Board would know what it says and be in a position to assess its relevance to the ABHP certification process.

Howard Dickson credited Kenny Fleming with initially raising the issue of health physics title protection/recognition and Howard summarized the current status from a written report provided as part of the meeting handout. The American Industrial Hygiene Association has been approached for advice and assistance in that the industrial hygiene profession is farther along with title protection initiatives than we are as health physicists. The written report went into some detail on the basis for state-by-state campaigns and the experience of the industrial hygienists with this approach. Howard has both model legislation and actual state-legislation provided by AIHA. It was noted that legislative protection has to be sold based on protection of the health and well being of the general public.

Past-President Dickson noted that he'd had some concerns about entering into this initiative without having the HPS also involved; they are involved now. Ken Kase has been representing HPS in the discussion to-date. Recently the AIHA has made a proposal to AAHP/HPS pursuant to the earlier discussions. Howard reported on the status of negotiations ongoing around this proposal. The AIHA has also offered a legislative summary service that Howard provided separately to the Executive Committee for information/consideration/action. Discussion followed associated with previous allocation of 10K$ by AAHP, and the costs proposed by AIHA.

Regis Greenwood reminded the Academy Executive Committee members that the origination of the Academy had some basis in the perception that the ABHP was a "self-perpetuating elite". Regis cautioned that this perception could resurface if the AAHP is perceived as rubber-stamping the Board recommendations. Discussion followed. John Serabian noted that this same issue had arisen in the Board meetings.

Discussion followed as to how Nominating Committee is charged with soliciting nominees. This led to Executive Committee consideration of the proposed revisions to SOP 2.5 (Standard Operating Procedure for the Academy Nominating Committee). The primary driver for the proposed revision has to do with fulfillment of the CESB requirements for participation in the process. John Serabian discussed the actual language of the subject CESB requirement. Accreditation Guideline 4.b states: "Provide the public, consumers, and sponsoring organizations with an opportunity for input into the policies and decisions of the certifying body." Public is "your served community". It was noted that the Academy's "served community" could be deemed to be the general public, but that the CESB does not seem intent on such a broad definition; e.g., we could conceive of the HP profession or the nuclear industry as the relevant "served community". This line of discussion led to a consensus that active solicitation of nominations from a broad cross-section of the Health Physics profession would result in a representation on the Board that was defensible as representative of the Academy's "served community".

Frazier Bronson noted that SOP 2.5 doesn't include explicit explanation of why we are putting the additional requirements (for solicitation of nominees) into the SOP. This was further discussed in the context of objective evidence appropriate to address the CESB guideline conformance. Later in the Executive Committee deliberations, Bronson compiled clarifying wording for the proposed SOP changes and the Executive Committee acted to approve the SOP as revised.

6.0 Reports from the Editor & Webmaster

6.1 Newsletter Editor (Kyle Kleinhans)
Kyle Kleinhans attended the Executive Committee meeting and provided the Newsletter Editor's report. He reported that there had been no submittals provided for a July edition, and consequently there will not be any CHP Corner in that edition of the Health Physics News. Discussion followed regarding appropriate articles and potential contributors. Tom Buhl offered to apply leverage to the Academy Committee Chairs to get them to assist.

6.2 Webmaster (Scott Medling)
Scott Medling provided the Webmasters report to the Executive Committee meeting. Scott summarized his written submittal for those present. Academy web site hit frequency is fairly static with exception of 2004 hits on member listings. Scott attributed the cause of this increase to be the roll-out of the electronic ballot. 152 of 187 candidates used the web site to get their individual exam results after the results were finalized by the ABHP on November 22, 2003.

The website was enhanced to allow members to view address changes and similar data submittals to verify their changes have been updated. Scott noted that the 2004 salary survey was ongoing at the time of the DC meeting. He stated that the 2003 participation was down slightly for HPS but up for CHPs.

Considerable discussion followed in regards to the Academy experience with electronic balloting, path forward, and lessons-learned. It was noted that Academy member participation in the election was slightly down from the previous snail-mail method, but probably unchanged overall. Frazier Bronson suggested that the experience and successes from the 1st e-ballot effort should be captured in a SOP for future re-use. Discussion followed regarding how the online election is audited/certified from a process standpoint. Scott explained how verification and validation of the electronic balloting process was accomplished. Nancy re-viewed the wording of the Bylaws as previously established to allow electronic balloting.

Tom Buhl asked Scott Medling for his reaction to Frazier Bronson's suggestion that we gear up for electronic payment of dues via website. Frazier led/introduced this discussion.

• Advantage: less mailing expenses;
• Disadvantage: maybe perception of less importance than snail mail. Nancy Johnson recommended that the Academy set up to notify members via snail mail but in addition to providing pre-addressed return envelope, we also allow electronic payment. Discussion followed regarding whether web-based payment would increase the credit-card fee costs to the Academy. Paul Stansbury suggested that auto-renewal could be set-up such that the member can authorize the Academy to bill against the credit card annually (no subsequent member action year-to-year).

Tom proposed the appointment of someone to further research of electronic payment pros and cons. Frazier emphasized that intent needs to be that this simplifies work for webmaster and Executive Secretariat's roles -- not complicates it. Jim Eger, Nancy Johnson, and Scott Medling accepted this assignment from the Executive Committee.

7.0 Report of the American Board of Health Physics (John Serabian)
John Serabian provided verbal report including candidate statistics. He explained that the increases apparent in the ABHP budget proposal derive from proposed enhancements to: exam security, productivity enhancers, train Part I Panel on question writing and interpretation, understanding, and application of the item performance statistics. John summarized each of these items for the benefit of the Executive Committee. John noted that the McAdams award would be presented in the course of this (Washington DC) meeting. There followed a summary of the Board deliberations regarding the replacement of Panel members and chair succession. It was noted that this involves a balance between bringing in fresh ideas, versus promoting the continuity of operations/initiatives across the transition associated with succession.

There followed a discussion of ideas John conveyed from the ABHP deliberations on Panel member recruitment. These included additional web site and newsletter solicitation. This led into further discourse on broadening the pool of Board membership. John noted in the ABHP report that the ARC Examination Service is going to list ABHP as client on their web site. It was also noted that the ABHP is going to try to work to develop a more focused set of document listings for exam preparation (e.g. move away from listing of "all ICRP reports, all NCRP reports").

John mentioned that a portion of the last meeting of the Board had addressed clarification of guidance on units use in question construction. Implementation of standardization to SI has led to some issues such as regulatory questions - where SI may introduce un-intended confusion. Jim Willison has championed this Policy Manual clarification effort. Section 4.1.6 of the Policy Manual will be revised to read:

Section 4.2 of the Style Guide will be revised to read:

John reported that the Board discussion had also included recognition of Scott Medling's contributions as webmaster. Examination review, exam QC, and numerous other aspects of conduct of Board and Exam Panel activities have been greatly supported via Scott's contributions. The Executive Committee subsequently took action to ensure that Scott's efforts were "publicly" recognized during the Academy Business Meeting.

Although John had information included in his report in regards to Academy action necessary to replace an ABHP Board member, this action had been combined with previous discussions so John was able to simply summarize the Board's appreciation for the significant contributions made by Liz Brackett.

8.0 Report of the Secretariat (Nancy Johnson)Nancy summarized the written report provided by the Secretariat's office. She noted that there were 210 candidates for the 2004 examination as of the end of June, with 1307 CHPs. The kudos for efforts associated with implementation of the initial electronic balloting were reiterated from Nancy's standpoint. Nancy also summarized her preparations for the 2004 Awards Luncheon. Tom Buhl asked if this was a contract year and Nancy Johnson responded that the Secretariat Office contract does come up in August [2004] for a 3-year renewal.

9.0 Executive Committee Meeting
The Executive Committee also undertook consideration of the proposed Standard Operating Procedure for the Professional Development Committee (SOP 2.6.1). President Buhl noted that there already exists a SOP with this number (SOP for writing SQ/Ps). Regis Greenwood noted that the draft submitted reads more like a committee charter. Paul Stansbury recommended that the draft SOP could be recast as a revision to the Committee Charter. The full Executive Committee concurred with this recommendation and determined that the Professional Development Committee would be charged to this effect.

There was a lengthy Executive Committee discussion around the prospect of an Academy Bylaw change to extend committee chair terms to 3 years. Les Aldrich said it had been previously proposed that any re-appointment of a committee chair would be for a 3-year term. John Serabian noted that a parallel issue has arisen over Exam Panel chairs' length of service. John also noted that the Examination Panel chair positions are also examples of jobs so large that it might be unrealistic to expect that any one individual would commit to so long a term of service. It was also emphasized that we have to assume high confidence in the chairman selection process if the Academy extends the term; i.e., virtually have to be selecting all chairs from within the committee membership.

At length it was determined that the Academy would poll the current committee chairs for additional input as to whether their committees would function better with greater longevity of chairmanship. President Buhl appointed a committee to assist with the completion of this poll of the Committee Chairs. As an interim action on the committee continuity concern, the Executive Committee also moved and passed that any Academy Committee Chair appointment must have served on the subject committee as member for at least one year.

Tom's appointed committee (Regis Greenwood and Brian Methé) was charged to complete the poll and to make recommendation including potential bylaw change wording for Executive Committee consideration in New Orleans.

Howard Dickson proposed that the Executive Committee take action with respect to enabling the furtherance of the title protection/recognition initiatives addressed in the report from the subject ad hoc committee. The Executive Committee subsequently approved the tri-partite agreement "in-principle" (Howard indicated agreement between AIHA, AAHP, & HPS is close.); they then enabled the current ad hoc Committee on Title Protection to act on the tri-partite agreement in order to allow the initiative to move forward between the DC and New Orleans meetings. Also, the Executive Committee charged the existing ad hoc Committee to plan for the succession necessary to transition functions to a standing committee and to bring the plans to the New Orleans meeting.

10.0 Old Business

10.1 Professional Liability Insurance (Brian Methé)
Brian Methé provided the Executive Committee with a status report regarding his efforts to identify potential providers through which the Academy could make professional liability insurance available by establishing a "group" policy that would leverage the number of interested Academy members to obtain lower liability insurance premiums -- as a service to the membership. Brian reported that he had contacted three potential providers and that Hays Affinity, the current provider utilized by our colleague industrial hygienists, was also the provider that had been most assertive in responding to Brian's inquiries and providing useful information and communications.

Brian summarized that liability insurance premiums would be Very dependent on number of interested members, consequently, the Academy's path forward would have to start with conduct of an interest survey. Brian provided a draft survey as an attachment to his handout. He also provided the Executive Committee with web site background information about Hays Affinity. Discussion followed as to whether and how the Academy could provide the survey electronically. Nancy Johnson asked if this was an initiative that the Academy should pursue jointly with the HPS. Consensus was that it would be to everyone's benefit to increase size of pool. It was agreed that Tom Buhl would bring the topic of liability insurance to the leadership meeting (at DC). Depending on HPS interest, Brian will pursue survey of membership interest to estimate size of potential customer group.

10.2 CHP Trademark (Frazier Bronson)
Frazier Bronson led the discussion on the subject of the CHP "Trademark". It was noted that although we have a SOP in place regarding the use of the designation and logo, previous pursuit of legal trademark application had died. Frazier noted that the previous application had never been completed. There followed some discussion of trademark versus service-mark versus patent. Frazier noted that his research of the files suggests that the legal support the Academy had contracted to assist with this initiative might have discouraged us from continuing to pursue it to completion. President Buhl suggested we should resurrect this initiative and try to drive it to conclusion. The Executive Committee concurred and Frazier was assigned as a committee of one to look into actions necessary to re-apply.

11.1 Maintenance of AAHP Documents (Regis Greenwood)
Regis Greenwood led the discussion regarding maintenance of AAHP Documents. He indicated that the progress made on the action item from the Augusta Executive Committee meeting consisted of Frazier Bronson's comprehensive notes expanding and clarifying the contradictions and shortcomings of the document hierarchy, committee charters, and questions concerning order of precedence. It was agreed that Regis' Action Item from Augusta would remain open with additions/clarifications from Frazier's research. Documentation issues and needed enhancements include:

• Inconsistencies within/between the Charter, SOP 1.2.1, and By-Laws as regards the Committee selection process.
• Two SOPs presently numbered as 4.5.
• Some SOPs listed on web as in draft; others not posted/available.
• Establish simple, consistent filing system.
• Need for a SOP or charter to address duties and responsibilities of the Liaisons; appointment and transition processes for consistency, etc.
• Make documentation web-accessible to all of Academy, not just Executive Committee members.

11.2 CHP Rubber Stamp (Scott Medling)
Scott Medling had brought forward a suggestion from Drew Thatcher that the Academy make available a rubber stamp in conjunction with the embosser program currently in place. Thatcher had pointed out that documents converted via scanning into PDF files would be more readily amenable to the stamp reproducing in a scan whereas the embosser would be difficult to read. Discussion ensued regarding whether an electronic file format could be made available to the membership for utilization in business applications such as business cards or letterhead. Nancy Johnson indicated that she thought she could recover the electronic files from which Joe Alvarez had initially set up the embosser program. Buhl and Bronson committed to pursue this idea for the Academy.

The Finance Committee Report is contained in the Executive Committee’s notebook and was briefly reviewed. Tom noted changes made to the budget comparison table (see page 30 in book), where ‘investment income’ was separated into short-term interest, realized gain, and unrealized gain. The latter two were placed into their own categories since the AAHP doesn’t do anything with those values. The interest, however, is part of the real budget. The FY01-02 budget is what was approved in Cleveland. A financial review report is contained in the Executive Committee’s notebook. A formal audit is conducted every 3 years. Tom reported that everything looked fine.

Changes in Medical Health Physics Certification Eligibility (Tom Buhl
President Buhl provided copies of an ABMP Letter from Geoffrey D, Clarke, Ph.D., ABMP Chair. Of note in this report to the AAHP, the ABMP has established changes in the Medical Health Physics certification eligibility requirements to accommodate members of the Health Physics Society:)

Discussion ensued regarding how best to ensure that this information was well-communicated to the medical colleagues within the Academy membership.

11.4 Position Descriptions (Frazier Bronson)
Frazier Bronson recommended, and the Executive Committee acted to request that each officer, committee chair, and appointed position holder prepare a draft of the duties of their position, and to provide details on the steps and good practices of any recurring functions that should be passed on to future position holders. Incumbents will be tasked to use the description of position from the Academy Bylaws as the initial starting point, and to parallel the ABHP Manual as a template.

Also under new business, it was agreed that the Academy should document the "handshake" process already established to cross-reference the AAHP/ABHP rosters between the Executive Secretariat and the website.

11.5 Document Process to Cross-reference AAHP/ABHP Rosters (Frazier Bronson)
It was agreed that the Academy should document the "handshake" process already established to cross-reference the AAHP/ABHP rosters between the Executive Secretariat and the website.

11.6 NESHTA/ASSE Initiative Regarding Safety Training (Howard Dickson)
With regards to an agenda item concerning an NESHTA/ASSE initiative under consideration regarding accreditation of safety training, Howard noted that the survey being conducted by ASSE raises a parallel health physics question. Although the issue was tabled for time constraints, Howard urged members of the Executive Committee to review the survey at the website: http://www.asse.org/a/q/asse-dec-survey-a.asp

11.7 HPS Mid-year 2005 Meeting Dates
It was noted that the current schedule for the HPS Mid-year meeting in New Orleans calls for the program to run from Sunday February 12 through Wednesday February 16, 2005. The Executive Committee concluded its next meeting would be held on Wednesday, February 16, 2005.

NOTE: Term expires at the end of the year indicated.

THE 2004 CHP SALARY SURVEY

Gary Lautenschlager

Introduction

he 2004 Certified Health Physicist (CHP) survey data was collected by having CHPs submit their responses to survey questions on a web- based data entry form. As was done last year, data was collected in coordination with a salary survey of the entire Health Physics Society (HPS).

Chris Graham and Andy King will report the HPS salary survey results separately in the Health Physics Newsletter.

The survey was also available in hardcopy form for those who preferred to fax or mail their responses.

Questions about this survey should be directed to Gary Lautenschlager, via email: click here for Email

Data Analysis

The salary ranges marked by CHPs on the completed survey forms were rounded to the midpoints of those ranges before statistical analyses were performed. For example, if a CHP marked the salary range $50,000 to $52,499; their salary was rounded to the midpoint value of $51,250.

Responses from CHPs who were either part time or retired were not analyzed, since the data did not appear to allow meaningful comparisons to be made.

To avoid skewing the results, data from three survey respondents were excluded from the data analysis because they indicated that they earned $174,499 or more per year.

Of 52 respondents who reported receiving a significant (10 % or more) salary increase upon attaining ABHP certification: 19% received this increase from their current employer, 19% from a promotion with their current employer, 56% received this increase from a new employer, 2% from part -time consulting, and 4% did not specify.

CHP salaries by region are also presented in this report.

Data Presentation

In an effort to make the results of the survey interesting and useful, CHPs were subcategorized in several ways by education, primary job responsibility, years of experience, and combinations of these subcategories.

Readers are cautioned that for statistical validity, results were usually given only if there were 10 or more CHPs within that subcategory. Data presented for one subcategory of CHPs may not be possible for another subcategory. However, some exceptions were made for general interest.

The subcategories in the tables may also change from year to year, depending on the number of responses received. Every effort was made to keep the subcategories consistent with previous surveys, but if there were an insufficient number of CHPs the results were not given.

Tables and Figures

Tables show results for full-time CHPs who received health, vacation, and retirement benefits from their primary employer unless otherwise noted.

All of the following tables are for fulltime CHPs with health, vacation, and retirement benefits unless otherwise indicated.