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Publisher’s Perspective
The Arkansas Damage Prevention Summit has shut down.
I’m sure you’ve heard there is no cookie-cutter approach to damage prevention nor public safety. That is certainly true. Dig laws and enforcement processes are as different as night and day. In and of themselves, none are right or wrong, it is typically the commitment to the process that ultimately determines the success or failure of the process.
I just recently learned about the Arkansas Gas Association disbanding. Having been a supporter of the association in this state as well as other states, it
was disappointing news. Someone asked me why. I am not in the know, but obviously, it was either a lack of interest or support for the association that made it impossible for the association to be relevant.
ACTS, the company that brought the Damage Prevention Summits to 11 states since 2007, primarily in the southern part of the United States, was pleased to bring the Summit to Arkansas in 2018. Darryl Boggs, CEO of Arkansas 811 saw the benefit of supporting the effort to raise the awareness of public safety and damage prevention across the state. Of course, all that was prior to the recent passage of the law that brought a much-needed enforcement process to Arkansas.
As support for the Summit waned in Arkansas, it became more difficult to justify the effort and expense to provide the Summit as a vehicle for public safety. Although we greatly appreciated those of you who faithfully supported ACTS and the Summit, we had to make a difficult decision regarding the event. Coupled with changes on the horizon for ACTS created opportunities for us that had to be considered for the bigger picture.
In 2023, discussions between Excavation Safety Alliance, Inc. (ESA) and ACTS Now began to gauge the interest of ACTS acquiring many of the products and services of ESA. National and global products such as the Global Excavation Safety Conference, the Excavation Safety Guide, the Town Hall, the ESA membership program and the Pipeline Safety Ag Alliance (PASA).
After much discussion, ACTS acquired these products and services and looks forward to continuing our commitment to excavation safety across a much larger footprint.
The ACTS team will greatly miss bringing stakeholders together annually in Arkansas for the Damage Prevention Summit, but it is the right time to acknowledge the closing of this chapter in Arkansas. It is with some sadness that I say, there will not be a 2025 Arkansas Damage Prevention Summit.
Our office for the more than 100,000 stakeholders we reach across the globe will still be in Conway. Arkansas is still my home, and I appreciate all of you who work hard every day to keep it safe for me and my family. I hope to see many of you at other conferences across the country and for the rest of you, if I can ever be of assistance to you, reach out to me. Our website is still www.aligningchange.com and my contact information is all over the site.
On behalf of the ACTS team, thanks for the opportunity you gave us!
Roger Cox President ACTS Now, Inc.
2024, Issue 2
Arkansas 811 Magazine • 1