​Utility bills are a great communication tool.

1. You’re already sending utility bills to your customers every month anyway.
2. Utility bills are almost certain to get read by customers.

 
Carve out a specific space on your utility bill template for any important messages that you want or need your customers to get. If you use a vendor to generate your bills, work with the company to add the area for you.
 
By creating a specific space, customers will learn to check out the message each time they open bills. If the message is too much for the space that you have, consider a brief sentence or two with a call-to-action (CTA) to go to your website for more information. Also consider making the additional information available as an audio recording that people can call in to hear if they don’t use the Internet. 

Registration is open for the IAMU Golfing Fore Scholars fundraiser. This event will be held at Beaver Creek Golf Club in Grimes on Monday, June 27, 2022. Registration information and sponsorship opportunities can be found here.  See you there!
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For More Info: Contact IAMU at (800) 810-4268 or email smarsh@iamu.org.

IAMU Safety Services will be holding a Drug & Alcohol Employee/Supervisor Training Webinar. This webinar will address the following:

• The effects of drugs and alcohol on the body

• Recognize the signs, symptoms, and indicators of substance abuse at the workplace
• Comply with federal DOT regulations requiring 2-hour reasonable suspicion training for supervisors

60 minutes will be spent on symptoms of alcohol abuse; 60 minutes will be spent on the symptoms of drug/controlled substance abuse.

*A Certificate of Completion will be emailed to participants upon confirmation of participant’s full attendance in webinar.

Who Should Attend?
Employees and supervisors involved with CDLs and/or gas operations.

Webinar Time and Length:
Thursday, July 14th, 2022 – 10:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m.

All registered participants will receive an email from Zoom on July 13th with the webinar link. Please provide the email you want this to be sent to on your registration.

Cost:
$50 per IAMU Member participant
$70 per Non-IAMU Member participant

Questions?
Contact Don Heck at dheck@iamu.org, or (800) 810-4268.

Registration is open.  For additional information and online registration, please click HERE.
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(Webinar instructions and information will be sent to the registered participant’s email on July 13th.)

IAMU will be hosting a Cyber Security webinar on June 13th.

The presentation will include an overview of the current cyber threat landscape as it applies to municipal utilities and with utility recommendations for best practices and overview of the resources CISA has available to help Critical Infrastructure owners and operators enhance they security programs.

Chris Cockburn, CISSP Cybersecurity Advisor, Region 7, and Chris Judge, Protective Security Advisor, Iowa, from the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security will be the presenters.

Please click here for more information and to register.
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This event is open to IAMU member utilities only.  For help logging into our website to complete registration, please contact Josh Trout at jtrout@iamu.org.

Press releases, flyers, social media posts, oh my! You have several communication tools at your fingertips to get out important messages but covering all your bases can be overwhelming. Make the process of delivering messages more efficient and effective with templates.
 
Taking time to develop templates that you can use over and over again means you can grab what you need when you need it and fill in the details. Plus, the communications will have a consistent look, feel, and voice that your customers will begin to recognize as yours.
 
Here are a few templates that you might want to create. With each, be sure to include your utility’s logo and color scheme.
 

• Press releases: Use Word and add the standing elements that you would find on any release.
  • The words Press (or Media) Release in ALL CAPS under your utility’s logo
  • Contact name and information
  • A designated area for a headline and subhead (if needed). Center this element below the contact block
  • Boilerplate language that you will include at the end of the release. Boilerplate language is a few sentences about your utility. For example, IAMU’s boilerplate is “Organized in 1947, IAMU represents 754 municipal broadband, electric, gas, and water utilities statewide, and maintains a marketing relationship with a large number of associate member businesses.”
• Flyer and social media posts: Create a frame that you can use with both pictures and text. Incorporate your utility’s color scheme and logo. You may need a design program for this, or you can use online services such as Canva, which makes it easy to design professional-looking flyers, social media posts, and more without any experience. 

On May 17, 2022, Governor Reynolds formally signed House File 2475, ending ambiguity over the process that applies for dismissing municipal utility trustees.  The independence of municipal utility boards has been at issue in many communities and in front of the legislature over the last few years.  During the 2022 legislative session, the Iowa Legislature amended Iowa Code Chapter 388, Iowa’s Municipal Utility Board Law, to clearly outline the process for removing municipal utility board members.  The new law takes effect immediately.
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House File 2475 makes three primary changes to Iowa Code Section 388.3, as follows:

• Specifies that municipal utility trustees can only be removed from office by the Mayor with the unanimous approval of the city council for the following reasons:
  • Willful or habitual neglect or refusal to perform the duties of the office
  • Willful misconduct or maladministration in office
  • Corruption
  • Extortion
  • Upon conviction of a felony
  • Intoxication, or upon conviction of being intoxicated
  • Conviction of violating campaign finance laws
  • Failure to pay a fine imported for election misconduct
  • Habitual non-attendance of board meetings
• Adds that written notice of removal must be sent to the trustee, and they shall be entitled to a hearing within 30 days of removal.  After the public hearing or the passing of 30 days, the city council must vote on the approval to remove the trustee.
• The new law does not apply to cities with a population over 200,000 as of 2020.

Beginning with Oskaloosa in 2013, some Mayors have interpreted their general removal powers to extend to independent utility trustees.  The issue recently came to notoriety in 2021 when the outgoing Indianola Mayor attempted to unilaterally dismiss two utility trustees in her last 30 days of office.  Without legislation to clarify the process that applied to the removal of utility trustees, cities and utilities would have continued to engage in costly litigation to resolve questions of utility board independence.

More than 80 municipalities across Iowa have voted to form independent utility boards to insulate their utility from city politics and manage their utility so that there would never be any diminution of service.  IAMU worked to ensure the passage of HF 2475 because it preserves local control, the will of voters, and the independence of municipal utility boards.  The newly enacted law removes the ambiguity over the removal process as it applies to utility trustees and allows trustees to do their job in the best interest of ratepayers without fear of political retaliation.
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For additional information on the new law and its applicability, contact IAMU Director of Government Affairs, Attorney Alex Cutchey at 515.289.5218 or acutchey@iamu.org.

Effective January 1st, 2023, a new DOE rule will effectively prohibit the manufacture, distribution, and sale of most incandescent and halogen lamps in the US. This rule applies a minimum efficiency of 45 lumens per watt to general service lamps which is understood to be unachievable by incandescent and halogen style lamps. This rule, therefore, will accelerate the full market transition to LED bulbs.

The rule is being applied to retailers along with manufacturers, distributors, and importers. Penalties will start being applied in the first quarter of 2023 and then increase later in the year. Because these penalties are being applied to retailers, we expect to only see LED style bulbs on shelves come January.

How does this affect IAMU Members? First, the full transition to more energy efficient bulbs should reduce your wholesale power consumption. Second, for those members still offering an efficiency rebate for purchasing efficient bulbs, you may want to consider repurposing that budget for other efficiency or load-growth incentive programs.
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There is still plenty of time to enroll in MunEEBuck$, and have your rebate program fully launched by July 1st. Please contact Jeff Gorrie (309-678-5579) soon if you would like to move your current rebate program onto our shared platform or if you would like to consider launching a new program.

SEER is a measurement of cooling mode efficiency for refrigerant-based HVAC systems including air-conditioners and heat pumps. HSPF is the heating mode efficiency counterpart. The higher the SEER and HSPF, the more energy efficient the equipment. In Iowa, the minimum efficiency for a central air conditioner is 13.6 SEER. For a heat pumps, the minimum efficiency is 14.4 SEER and 8.2 HSPF.

Beginning next year, SEER and HSPF are being replaced by SEER2 and HSPF2. This change will allow for a new testing method that better represents actual operating conditions, and it will coincide with a 1% increase in baseline efficiency. That means a SEER2 and HSPF2 rating will be lower than the equivalent SEER and HSPF rating. As an example, a heat pump rated at 15 SEER and 8.8 HSPF equates to 14.3 SEER2 and 7.5 HSPF2.

How does this affect IAMU Members? Members still offering a rebate for a 14 SEER air-conditioner should reconsider and all members should plan for a transition to SEER2. For heat pumps, members should also plan for a transition to SEER2 and HSPF2. However, this event may be less of a concern for heat pumps because most heat pump rebates are load-growth incentives or otherwise reward the inherent efficiency available through a transition to heat pump technology.
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There is still plenty of time to enroll in MunEEBuck$, and have your rebate program fully launched by July 1st. Please contact Jeff Gorrie (309-678-5579) soon if you would like to move your current rebate program onto our shared platform or if you would like to consider launching a new program.

In this era of e-everything, you may be tempted to toss your print communication efforts in the recycle bin. However, focusing only on electronic media may not be the best approach.
Print is not dead. Print and electronic media efforts can – and should – coexist. The two can work together to help enhance the reach and effectiveness of each other. Direct mail, posters, newsletters, calendars, and brochures can lead people to websites, videos, and social media sites — and vice versa.
 
How much you focus on which efforts may depend on a few factors:

• The age of your audience: Younger people will typically be more comfortable with electronic communication versus older folks who have used printed communication most of their work life.
• Where and how your audience works and lives: If customers have access to and use computers and smartphones or tablets during their daily lives, they may be more likely to look at electronic communications. If customers do not access electronics often, they may be more likely to look at printed communications mailed to them or displayed in locations throughout your community.

 
David Johnson, a journalism professor at the American University School of Communication, may have summed up the print versus electronic debate best when he wrote: “The smart answer isn’t putting digital or print first, but to put design and usability first, using each product for what they do best and let them do it together.”​

The Iowa Department of Homeland Security and Emergency Management in partnership with the Texas A&M Engineering Extension Service (TEEX) is offering a free class on Cybersecurity.

The class will be in person only, on July 19th, 2022 from 8:00 AM – 5:00 PM in Johnston, Iowa.

The Cybersecurity Resiliency in Industrial Control Systems course is designed to enhance understanding of the critical nature of Industrial Control System environments and the associated risks, threats, and defenses within an organization, business, or government entity.

Course and registration information can be found here.

If you have any questions, feel free to call Brenda Grays of Texas A&M Engineering Extension Service at 979-320-6154.