Contact: Maridith Geuder
An annual meeting highlighting environmental concerns, federal regulations and potential public improvements throughout a 15-state Southeastern region will be held next month in Biloxi.
Registration recently began for the Sept. 23-25 Southern States Environmental Conference and Exhibition at the Mississippi Gulf Coast Coliseum and Convention Center. Open to all, the event is coordinated by Mississippi State University and sponsored by the Mississippi Department of Environmental Quality, in cooperation with Region 4 of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
In addition to Mississippi, participation will include residents of Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia, and West Virginia.
"We're honored to again host this important information-sharing program about environmental technologies," said Charles Chisholm, MDEQ executive director. "We're also pleased to welcome Jimmy Palmer, the former MDEQ director who now is an EPA administrator, as a keynote speaker."
Palmer's presentation begins at the 10 a.m. plenary session on the 23rd. "This conference is an excellent opportunity for us to address, in a collaborative way, the environmental challenges we face in the Southern states," Palmer said.
Specific topics of the 2003 session range from animal waste permitting to new mining reclamation laws to changes in water- and air-quality standards.
A series of Sept. 22 pre-conference workshops will deal with brownfields grant writing, dam safety training and the development of local comprehensive solid waste plans. An eight-hour Hazardous Waste Operations and Emergency Response refresher course also is scheduled that day.
"The goal of these conferences always has been the dissemination of current information on procedures and processes to help environmental professionals and those in related fields better perform their jobs," said Tamra Swann, conference facilitator at MSU's Division of Continuing Education. "It's for this reason that we've encouraged participation by representatives of the region's affected constituencies."
Swann said the annual event also offers MSU credit for those whose work requires periodic continuing education re-accreditation.
Additional information about registration and conference activities is at www.ssec.msstate.edu. Swann may be reached at (662) 325-8877 or tswann@ce.msstate.edu.