Nor Any Drop to Drink

Carmel Mayor Jason Burnett will be unable to make the planned 4 pm stakeholder conversation this afternoon (February 10) at the DLC.  We have a dynamite replacement for Mayor Burnett:  Sarah Hardgrave.

Sarah is a water resources and environmental planner with 18 years of experience, 13 of them in Monterey County.  For the last six years, Sarah worked for the City of Pacific Grove as the city’s Environmental Programs Manager.  During this time, she was actively involved in water issues on the Monterey Peninsula and environmental goals such as protection of water quality in the Monterey Bay, including serving as Chair of the Monterey Regional Storm Water Management Program in 2010 and 2011, Chair of the Central Coast Area of Special Biological Significance Regional Monitoring Program since the group in 2012 and 2013, and Chair of the Monterey Peninsula Water Management District Technical Advisory Committee 2009 – 2013.  Prior to working for Pacific Grove, from 2004 to 2008, Sarah worked for RBF Consulting, most notably on an early iteration of Cal-Am’s water project, including making their initial application to the CPUC for desalination and aquifer storage and recovery projects.  Before that, Sarah worked for Monterey County from 2001 – 2004 on an update to the County’s General Plan.  Recently, Sarah has moved back into a consulting role.  She is now doing work for the Big Sur Land Trust and working on the environmental review for the Monterey Regional Water Pollution Control Agency’s proposed Groundwater Replenishment Project, as well as continuing to assist Pacific Grove with special projects and grant management for water resources related capital improvements.

February 14, DLC, 12:15-4:  bring your lunch and learn a few handy tools, tricks, processes, and techniques to get your competition team hitting on all cylinders.  We’ll talk about ways to improve team processes, relationships, handle conflict productively, ,and more.  Curators for this event:  Bob Cole and Kent Glenzer, with an assist from fellow students who have already successfully competed in such competitions.  Expect practical, competition-focused advice!

On Feb 26, from 5-6:30, at the DLC.  Dan Cort will be on campus for a conversation about the County’s wicked water challenges.  Provocation assured!  Check out Dan’s TEDx talk or his book Downtown Turnaround.  Most important:  be ready to have conventional wisdom challenged, and common mental models shattered. 

Mark your calendars to come here Norm Groot, Executive Director of the Monterey County Farm Bureau, present the perspectives of our County’s agricultural producers.  February 24, 4:30-6 pm, at the DLC.

Learn how to recognize, analyze, and begin to address “wicked problems” with Alfredo Ortiz, Ted Lewis, and Kent Glenzer.  Mark your calendars for Friday, February 7, from 12-3 pm at the DLC.

Find workshop materials and recordings of Alfredo’s, Ted’s, and Kent’s real-world wicked problem stories and participants’ ideas for how wicked problems and social complexity connect to the County’s water challenges here

Mark your calendars for Thursday, February 20, at 4:30, McCone Boardroom.  District 4 Chief of Staff Kristi Markey — long engaged in the Peninsula’s water issues —  will come to campus to engage in conversations with “Nor Any Drop to Drink” competitors.  The conversation is open to the wider MIIS community.

Carmel Mayor Jason Burnett will engage with “Nor Any Drop to Drink” participants February 10, at 4 pm, at the DLC.  The talk is open to the wider MIIS community.  Mayor Burnett is a leader on the peninsula with regard to uncovering creative solutions to the area’s fresh water challenges.  Come here his thoughts and use the opportunity to toss some of your own innovative ideas at him for his responses, or to ask questions that will help you better situate your ideas.  Among other initiatives and ideas, Mayor Burnett was a strong proponent of the creation of a new Joint Powers Authority in early 2012, called the Monterey Peninsula Regional Water Authority.