Attachment B

National Speleological Society, Inc.
Executive Vice President's Report

6/12/2004

TABLE OF CONTENTS

(1) AMERICAN CAVING ACCIDENTS COMMITTEE *
(2) AAAS REP- BIOLOGY *
(3) AAAS REP-GEOLOGY & GEOGRAPHY *
(4) AGI DELEGATE *
(5) U.S. EXPLORATION COMMITTEE *
(6) INTERNATIONAL EXPLORATION COMMITTEE *
(7) RESEARCH ADVISORY COMMITTEE *
(8) SPELEO DIGEST *
(9) SPECIAL PUBLICATIONS COMMITTEE *
(10) JOURNAL OF CAVE AND KARST STUDIES *
(11) NSS NEWS *
(12) MEMBERS MANUAL *
(13) BIENNUAL REPORT *
(14) PERMISSION TO REPRINT *

ATTACHMENTS

B-1, B-2

INTRODUCTION / SUMMARY

There are 13 committees in the Department of the Executive Vice President (EVP). A 14th item has been added here to cover permissions to reprint from NSS publications.

Progress:
The NEWS continues on time and within budget thanks to Dave Bunnell. Malcolm Field’s first issue of the Journal was great. Special pubs completed Taming of the Slough and it is for sale. Joel Despain is working very hard to increase the value of the International Exploration endowment. He did not complain about the lack of funding and just ask for more, but took it upon himself and his committee to go out and get it. If there is a "Committee Chairman of the Year" award, he deserves it.

Plans:
Complete the CA with NCKRI for joint publication of the Journal by convention.

Problems:
Cave Conservation and Restoration will not be in print by convention.

Respectfully submitted,
Don Paquette speleo@reliable-net.net

(1) AMERICAN CAVING ACCIDENTS COMMITTEE

Bill Putnam (Chairman)
1865 Eagle Summit Ct
Lawrenceville GA 30043-6669
Phone: 678-371-4517
Fax: 770-682-5536
e-mail: putnam@scci.org

Committee Members
Richard Breisch
Diane Cousineau
George Dasher
John Gookin
Kris Green
Dave Hughes
Buddy Lane
Anmar Mirza
John Punches

Progress:
The 2002-2003 ACA is almost ready, and will be completed before the convention. I had planned to have it published by the end of May, but did not make as much progress as I had expected in May, so I am finishing up this week. I am looking for cover photos - haven't been able to get anything good yet, but I have a few people left to call.

There are 46 incident reports for 2002 (including 4 diving incidents and 8 caving-related incidents), and 44 incidents in 2003 (including 4 diving incidents and 2 caving-related incidents). This issue will have 36 pages of text, plus cover.

As noted in my last report, the quote for this issue of ACA is just over $10,000 for a press run of 11,000 copies. About 60% of that figure is the printing expense, and the remainder is primarily postage and labeling.

Plans:
Obtain photos for front and back covers.

Publish double issue of ACA covering 2002 and 2003 for July 2004 distribution.

Problems:
As noted above, I am having some difficulty finding good photos for the covers. As in the last two issues, I like to use photographs from rescues or rescue training exercises.

(2) AAAS REP- BIOLOGY

Kathleen Lavoie
101 Hudson Hall
Plattsburgh State University of New York
Plattsburgh NY 12901
(w) 518-564-3150
(h) 518-562-1154
(fax) 518-564-3152
lavoekh@plattsburgh.edu

Progress:
Accepted membership on the Journal Advisory Board.

Plans:
I will be submitting the article on the history of the relationship between NSS and AAAS very soon. I will be volunteering for a month this summer at NCKRI, to focus on development of educational programs for them.

Problems:
Just the usual lack of time.

(3) AAAS REP-GEOLOGY & GEOGRAPHY

Daniel L Chess
19 Tavano Road
Ossining NY 10562
Home: 914-945-2479 tieline 862
E-mail: DLCHESS@us.ibm.com

Progress:
I am volunteering to review AAAS proposals for the Geology/Geography section. This activity is something I have done in the past and usually results in reviewing 30 proposals in a week time frame.

Plans:
Between now and the end of the year I was planning to develop a couple of session ideas to present at the February 2005 business meeting. One would be the "Erosion of Earth Science in Education" and the other would be "Caves as Windows to the Past." I was going to e-mail Kathy Lavoie to see if she was interested in helping with either/or or both.

Problems:
None

(4) AGI DELEGATE

Harvey R. DuChene
7216 East Bentley Circle
Englewood, CO. 80112
Home 303-694-3472
Work 303-292-0949 x101
Fax 303-292-3901
E-mail: hduchene@earthlink.net

American Geological Institute Representative's Report

Progress:
I attended the AGI Meetings (April 18-21) held in conjunction with the annual meeting of the American Association of Petroleum Geologists in Dallas, Texas. During the Member Society Council Meeting, I made a presentation on the need for funding to support the National Park Service’s Geologists in Parks (GIP) Program. Currently, the GIP program receives financial support from the Geological Society of America’s GeoCorps Program, and from the Association of Women Geologists (AWG).

Although AWG support has been consistent over the last several years, funding for GSA’s GeoCorps program has been shrinking. This fact, coupled with severe budgetary problems within the National Park Service (NPS) severely limits the number of placements that can be made to the GIP program.

Why is the lack of funding for the GIP program a problem that concerns the National Speleological Society? Much of the work that NSS members do in National Parks either directly or indirectly relates to the geosciences. It is not unusual for NSS members to identify problems that impact caves within National Parks, such as pollution, construction projects, damage to resources by the visiting public, and general cave management issues. These problems are usually reported to managers within Parks, and they decide if they are important enough to require further study. The National Park Service has less than 100 geoscientists in its entire work force, and most are not doing geoscience work. Only a few are located in Parks and in a position to work on geological problems. The GIP program provides money to place qualified geoscientists in Parks for two months to study these problems and recommend solutions. By supporting the GIP program, our Society has an opportunity to place its scientists in positions within National Parks and specifically address these problems. Conversely, a lack of support by NSS could mean that critical problems are not addressed, or that geoscientists unfamiliar with caves and karst are assigned to the problem.

The cost of placing one geoscientist as a GIP is about $5,000. The stipend for the geoscientist is $2500, and the remainder goes to administrative costs and housing. Some of the Member Societies of AGI choose to contribute $2500 (the stipend), and look to the National Park Service for the remainder, usually in the form of temporary housing within or near a park. In the near future, AGI will be sending a letter to all of its Member Societies asking for support for the GIP Program. The Geological Society of America has offered to administer funds through its GeoCorps Program. To date, AGI and the American Institute of Professional Geologists (AIPG) have contributed to the GeoCorps/GIP programs.

Other AGI-NSS activities include participation in Earth Science Week and in the AGI Leadership Conference held in Washington, D.C. in May.

Plans:
I will attend the AGI meetings in Denver (November 7-10, 2004). I will also be submitting a recommendation to the BOG requesting financial support for the GeoCorps/GIP program, which will include at least partial matching of NSS’s contribution from individual NSS members.

Problems:
None that I am aware of.

(5) U.S. EXPLORATION COMMITTEE

C. William (Bill) Steele, NSS 8072, Chairman
PO Box 166332
Irving TX 75016-6332
Phone 214-770-4712

Committee Members
Dave Black, NSS 15419, Indiana
Don Broussard, NSS 9514, Texas
Jim Chester, NSS 6946, Montana
Scott Davis, NSS 15937, Arizona
Tom Shifflett. NSS 14207, Virginia
Jim Smith, NSS 14529, Georgia

Progress:
No grants awarded in this quarter, and no requests for grants received.  A handful of letters and e-mails were received from NSS members, inquiring about caving possibilities in areas of the country.  Through the members of the committee answered their questions.

Plans:
To continue as have been.

Problems:
None

(6) INTERNATIONAL EXPLORATION COMMITTEE

Joel Despain
HCR 89 Box 211
Three Rivers CA 93271
(day) 559-565-3717
(evening) 559-561-4972
joeldespain@wildmail.com

Committee members:
Carol Vesely
Kevin Downey
Cyndie Walck
Rebercca Jones

Progress:
Things have generally been quiet with the grant fund since we spent our final money for the last fiscal year some months ago. We do have a new request for funding for a Tasmania expedition that we will forward in the next few days, since we are now in a new NSS fiscal year.

Plans:
Arrangements for Speleobooks to sell the 2000 Gunung Buda Project Report and the remaining 1997 reports with the proceeds to be donated to the quasi-endowment for the International Exploration

Fund have been completed. We owe a great thanks to Emily Davis for doing this. In addition a direct donation to the quasi-endowment from the Gunung Buda project is expected once the project pays its

final bills to their printer, Terry Raines. Around $3,500 will be donated.

An article soliciting additional donations to the quasi-endowment from NSS members will appear in the next issue of the news.

Problems:
None

(7) RESEARCH ADVISORY COMMITTEE

Donald A. McFarlane
Associate Professor,
W. M. Keck Science Center, The Claremont Colleges
925 North Mills Avenue
Claremont, CA 91711-5916
USA
Ph: 909-607-2564
fax: 909-621-8588
e-mail: dmcfarla@jsd.claremont.edu

web page: http://jsd.claremont.edu/faculty/mcfarlane/index.htm
Extinct Mammals of the West Indies Website:
http://jsd.claremont.edu/bio/extinct/extinctmammals/
National Speleological Society Research Advisory Committee:
http://jsd.claremont.edu/bio/nss/

Committee Members:
Joyce Lundberg, (Assoc. Prof, Carleton University)
William White (Prof. Emeritus, Penn State U.)
Joseph Troester (USGS)
Donald Davis

Progress:
We awarded four research grants in the past financial year:
Joshua Reece, "Anoxia in Florida Caves"; $871.
Scott Cardiff, "Bat cave occupancy in northern Madagascar"; $1,500
Chris Wurster, "Use of stable carbon isotope values from bat guano"; $1,000
Morgan Perrone, "Experimental determination of the biogenicity of moonmilk"; $1,200

One additional proposal was not awarded funding, and several enquiries pertaining to projects outside the scope of the RAC were re-directed elsewhere.

The 2004 Ralph Stone Graduate Fellowship attracted eight applicants, and the RAC felt that the standard of competition was very high. The 2004 award was made to Ms. Reiko Ishihara, for her thesis on the "Aguateca Grieta (Guatemala) Archaeological Project."

Plans:
The listing of NSS Projects was re-worked for the NSS Members manual, but we still suffer from a lack of communication with Project leaders. Approximately one half of Projects do not routinely submit the required annual reports, or update defunct e-mail addresses. We hope to place a prominent reminder in a late-Fall '04 NSS News, and I will revert to snail-mailing last-known contacts in the hope of improving response for 2005.

Problems:
None

(8) SPELEO DIGEST

Scott Fee
2324 Carraway Street
Birmingham, AL 35235
205-854-9177
E-mail: scottfee@caves.org

Progress:
The second special reprint of 75 copies of the 1958 Speleo Digest was offered about a month before Christmas. We have only 11 copies remaining. The Committee feels this book has now reached market saturation and will not suggest further reprints.

A special reprint of the 1989 Speleo Digest is in the works and may be available for convention.

Multiple Internet based ads have been circulated in hopes of identifying an editorial team for the 2003 Speleo Digest. All the 2003 newsletters have been collected and are ready to be assigned.

2004 Newsletters are coming in daily.

Plans:
Find a qualified volunteer to lead the 2003 team and complete the 1989 Reprint. (Also see Problems.)

Problems:
The 2001 Digest editors have nearly completed assembling the information in electronic format but we need to identify a volunteer or group of volunteers to complete the layout of the book. I have been discussing this project with some Birmingham cavers who may be wiling to take it on over the summer. The soonest this book would be available, if everything falls into place, would be in late fall or early winter 2004.

(9) SPECIAL PUBLICATIONS COMMITTEE

David McClurg
104 Graves Ct
Vallejo CA 94591
Phone and Fax: 707-642-5528
dmcclurg@planeteria.net or dmcclurg@value.net

Tom Rea (Committee Member) ( tomrea@ccrtc.com )
Gale McCoy (Committee Member) ( tmathey@concentric.net
Janet McClurg (Committee Member) ( dmcclurg@planeteria.net )

BOOKS IN PROGRESS

The Taming of the Slough––
The Exploration of Peacock Springs

Sheck Exley

Edited and Expanded by Sandra Poucher

Progress:
In our last report, we said that, 2,000 printed books would be delivered to the NSS bookstore in April, and 1,000 books would go to the NSS Cave Diving Section bookstore in Florida. The shipping instructions we gave to the printer were abundantly clear on this quantity split.

The book was indeed completed in mid April, and copies were delivered to Huntsville on April 15. Unfortunately, the printer got the whole thing backwards and delivered 1,000 to Huntsville and 2,000 to Florida. Since the mistake was entirely the printer’s fault—which they immediately acknowledged with abject apologies— they paid the shipping costs to send the 1,000 plus copies back to Huntsville. In the end, after some checking and rechecking, the total number of copies received by the NSS was 2,192, and by the Cave Diving Section was 1,092.

Almost immediately, another problem arose. Until he got his copy of the book, the author of the geology chapter apparently never saw the caption for one of the photos used in his contribution. The editor Sandra Poucher (and her husband Michael, now chairman of the Cave Diving Section), took full responsibility for this mistake—and also for a typo in the text of this chapter. Several back and forth discussions on errata sheets then took place between the principals in the NSS, the CDS, and this committee. As a result, editor Sandra Poucher agreed to travel to Huntsville at her own expense, bringing with her an errata sheet. This was also printed at her expense (not ours). Over a busy weekend, she inserted this errata sheet into the shrink-wrap of all 2,192 books at the NSS Bookstore.

On the upside, as a result of the galley mailing in February, one of the largest book wholesalers, Quality Books, has accepted this book for sale and ordered an initial quantity for stock.

Plans:
As a follow up to the galley (final layout) mailing to review publications and key wholesalers, a mailing of printed copies of the book will go out in early June to these and to some additional publications Included with the printed book will be a cover letter individually addressed to each publication, the same press release sent earlier describing the book, and the catalog sheet describing NSS books.

Problems:
None.

Techniques of Cave Conservation and Restoration

Jim Werker and Val Hildreth-Werker, Editors

Progress:
In late April, we received from the editors some 386 transparencies, as the final illustrations for this book (we has been expecting something on the order of 100 plus). These were immediately sent to a color processing house for scanning by a high resolution Kodak scanner and placement on four Kodak Photo CDs.

With these new photos we are now completing the remaining chapters. Most of these deal with restoration and use multiple photographic images to show the sequence of restoration and repair.

As required by a Board Motion, copies of the final layouts are being sent to the executive committee for review. So far two CDs have been sent using Flat Rate Priority Mail.

Plans:
It is now clear that we will not have printed copies done in time for the 2004 convention. So in order to take orders at the convention, we will prepare display binders with color covers and a complete set of finished layouts (often called galleys). These will be on display in the NSS Bookstore and one or two other booksellers who regularly have sales booths at conventions.

Printed copies should be completed in September if not before.

Problems:
None known at this time.

NCRC Rescue Seminar Manual

Members of the NCRC

Progress:
The manual is undergoing editorial review by selected individuals. It is not ready for a beta test at this year’s weeklong seminar.

Plans:
Acquire photographs at the weeklong for the needed illustrations. Have the manuscript completed by August of 2004.

Problems:
As stated earlier, we will establish a budget for this book––whether it’s to be printed conventionally or using the latest Print-On-Demand technology––when we get a complete character count and an estimate of the number of illustrations.

A Personal Note

I will be retiring as chairman of this committee when the cave conservation book described above is completed.

As some of you know, I am expecting to undergo spinal surgery to correct a condition that causes leg pains and makes it difficult to walk. The good news is that this type of surgery usually corrects the problem successfully—and in something like 65% or the cases, with no recurrence after five years. (Several other cavers have also had this procedure with good results.)

As reported in previous reports, for many years I have prepared a wide range of promotional materials for the NSS bookstore and the NSS office. These include:

• Ads for the NSS NEWS promoting NSS books, clothing, and symbolic devices.

• Membership renewal flyers.

• Catalog sheets describing NSS books, for mailing to wholesalers and reviewers.

• Promotional flyers for Hidden World of Caves, Speleogenesis, Cave Minerals, and other books.

• Ads for placement in Geotimes, Karstologia (France), and other publications.

• Flyers and tip-ons for special promotions, as the ones done last October for the National Caves Association convention.

When a new chairman is appointed for this committee, I hope to be able to continue as a committee member and to continue providing promotional materials as needed.

––David McClurg, Chairman, Special Publications Committee

On Caves and Cameras (In Capital Budget)

Edited by Norm Thompson

Progress:
I wrote a replacement chapter on digital photography. This was reviewed by David Bunnell, Peter Jones, and Kevin Downey (all of whom have lots of experience with digital photography and photo editing) and I folded their suggestions into it. Dave Bunnell provided illustrations for the chapter and provided a good example of digital manipulation for the color section. These have been put in the book, replacing John Woods’ chapter and color photos. The book is now 16 pages shorter, which saves a bit on the cost, and the chapter is more focussed on the practical aspects of digital techniques for cave photography, compared with Woods’ which was more general.

I reread the entire book one last time and redlined it with various corrections that David Anderson has incorporated.

Plans:
Still to do:

I have done final prepress on the illustrations in 8 of the 33 chapters, leaving 25 to go.

Kevin Downey and I still need to do prepress on almost all of the photos for the color section.

I need to rework the index some because of the John Woods chapter replacement.

David Anderson will have to insert the final, edited photos into the layout, replacing the for-placement-only images (this is fast).

David and I still have some details to work out on dust jacket and cover layout, such as logo and UPC.

Once layout goes to the printer, I will need to review and correct layout issues based on the proofs.

With roughly 225 photos still to do prepress on, that’s roughly 225 person-hours. That is by far the biggest task. (Reworking the index is probably about 4 hours of work.) I can typically find time to spend roughly 15 hours per week on this project. If we assume Kevin does most of the work on 25 of the photos, that leaves about 200 photos for me to do, or 200/15 = 13 weeks. I’m also going to be out of town on vacation three weeks this summer (two 1.5-week trips). That puts us to approximately October 1st for going to the printer. That’s a long time yet to go, and I would love to move the book along faster, but I just don’t see any really practical way around that timetable.

Problems:
None

(10) JOURNAL OF CAVE AND KARST STUDIES

Malcolm Field (Editor)
National Center for Environmental Assessment (8623D)
Office of Research and Development
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
1200 Pennsylvania Ave NW
Washington DC 20460-0001
Work: 202-564-3279
Home: 301-349-5712
E-Mail: field.malcolm@epa.gov

James A. Pisarowicz (Production Editor)
Wind Cave National Park
South Dakota SD 57747
Home: 605-673-5582
Work: 605-745-4600
E-Mail: pisarowi@gwtc.net

BOARD OF EDITORS
Steven Taylor (Life Sciences)
Julian Lewis (Conservation)
Paul Burger (Exploration)
Greg McDonald (Paleontology)
Ira D. Sasowsky (Earth Sciences/Journal Index)
Marion O. Smith (Social Sciences)
Patty Jo Watson (Anthropology)
Ernst Kastning (Book Reviews)

ADVISORY BOARD
Chris Groves
Carol Hill
Horton Hobbs III
Dave Jagnow
Julia James
Kathy Lavoie
Joyce Lundberg
Donald MacFarlane
William White

Progress:
Volume 66, number 1 (April 2004) has now gone out. The issue was slightly delayed but not significantly. Last December Malcolm Field had taken over Acting Editor. At the March Board of Governors meeting Malcolm was approved to be the Editor.

All invitations to serve on the Journal Advisory Board were accepted so that the Journal now has a full contingent of nine members (see above for names). When determining who to select to invite as new members, emphasis was placed on diversity (professional, geographic, etc.) to help ensure a spectrum of opinions regarding issues that need to be addressed.

The example standardized table has been completed and sent to Jim Pisarowicz for uploading to the NSS web site. It may be appropriate to consider including it in a future issue of the Journal for prospective authors to examine prior to developing a paper.

Efforts to develop draft manuscript templates in MS Word, WordPerfect, and LaTeX have taken a "turn for the worse." As mentioned in the previous EVP, this is a fairly significant undertaking and it was expected there might be quite some time before they are completed. I found that my original efforts caused some unforeseen problems using MS Word so I have had to restart the process but my current workload has forced me to put this effort aside for now.

Plans:
Volume 66 number 2 (August 2004) is being worked on. To date several manuscripts have already been forwarded to Jim Pisarowicz for typesetting and I am expecting more. Some biology papers may also be ready before the August issue is sent to the printers. I am hoping that this issue will have more than four strong articles.

One or two encyclopedic book reviews should be ready for the August issue. A draft review of the Encyclopedia of Caves and Karst Science has been completed; revisions are in the works. A draft review of the soon to be released Encyclopedia of Caves is being worked on but may not be completed in time for the August issue and it may not be appropriate to include both reviews in the same issue given the similarity between the two. (Note that I am preparing these reviews because Ernst Kastning’s workload is excessive.)

As mentioned in the previous EVP I feel that in keeping with Journal’s standing as the premier karst journal in the world we should encourage a wider variety of papers. To this end I spoke with some foreign colleagues who have expressed interest in publishing in Journal. Well, some of these papers have already come in and are in the review process now. Although these papers will not necessarily be representative of our preferred North American perspective, I feel that they will represent a valuable contribution to the scientific literature and be of interest to many of our subscribers.

Problems:
None

(11) NSS NEWS

Dave Bunnell
PO Box 879
Angels Camp CA 95222
dbunnell@caltel.com

Conservation
Jim & Val Hildreth-Werker
PO Box 207
Hillsboro NM 88042-0207
505-895-5050
werks@zianet.com

Technology Reviews
Mike Fraley
cheshire@prairienet.org

Science of Speleology
Greg Springer
laramide@bedrockstreams.org

Newsletter Review
Bernie Szukalski
1224 Mira Monte Dr
Redlands CA 92373-6542
909-798-5986
bszukalski@esri.com

Spelean Spotlight
Bill Steele
oksteele@aol.com

Safety & Techniques
Anmar Mirza
812-388-6917
sseg@kiva.net

I’ve dropped Bill Klimack from the list as I’ve not seen a column (in the media) from him in over a year.

Progress: I instituted a change in the cover weight used in the News beginning with the May issue, going from 80-pound to 100-pound paper. My hope is that this will handle mailing better and result in fewer damaged covers. It gives a more permanent feel to the magazine as well, and the best part is that it didn’t incur a higher cost.

Terry Raines has acquired a new printing press this spring that will allow him to print the News more quickly by doing two sides at once.

To potentially gain more ad revenue, we instituted some smaller display ad sizes, but no takers yet.

Other than that, the News continues to come out on time and within budget.

Plans:
Continue as usual and troll for more articles. We have an issue coming on the Megahalaya expedition and future issues on other foreign expeditions supported by the internationsl exploration grants. I have some promises for more domestic exploration articles to follow up on as well.

Problems:
None other than a slowdown in feature exploration submissions. As always I have leads to pursue though.

(12) MEMBERS MANUAL

Gordon Birkhimer, NSS 42778
45372 Woodlawn Dr
California Maryland 20619
301 862-4619
birkhimergl@navair.navy.mil

Committee Members:
Meredith Johnson - Proofreader
Bob Hoke - Database Manager
Melody Eady - Layout and Design
Keith Wheeland - I/O
Evelyn Bradshaw - I/O
Stephanie Searles - Members Listing
David Taylor - Survey Information
Phil Winkler - Database

Progress:
I originally had asked that submissions be received by April 1st. We actually received the last submission on April 30th, which threw our schedule off about 30 days. To compound those delays to our schedule, the unfortunate and unforseen passing away of Mel Eady's father caused further delay as she put the MM on hold while she attended to family and personal business. The bottom line is we have rescheduled the printing and delivery date of the MM to adjust for the delays we have experienced.

Plans:
Currently, Mel is now assembing the sumissions for the layout and design. Mel has given us June 15 as a firm date she will most likely complete her task.. That will mean the MM may be mailed just before the 2004 NSS Convention or, more likely, during the Convention. It is likely NSS Members will not have them in their hands before that event.

Problems:
I personally am dissapointed we were unable to provide the MM before Convention, as we did last year. The MM Committee did strive to duplicate that goal, but fell short due to circumstances beyond our control. It remains our goal to provide the MM with the same quality and attention to detail as we have done in the past. I'm sure when it is completed everyone will be happy with the document we have produced.

(13) BIENNUAL REPORT

Bert Ashbrook
107 Avonbrook Rd
Wallingford PA 19086-6001
610-627-2378
caveman@craftech.com

Progress:
I have completed the text of a second version to the biennial report for fiscal years 2001-02 and 2002-03. Tom Rea reports that he will do the layout after convention. I am circulating the second revision for comments. The people who reviewed the first version were very, very helpful. The only substantive comment to the first version that I did not "fix" was a question about why the particular cave rescue I chose to feature was selected. My criteria were: (a) the rescure occurred during the two fiscal years covered, (b) the NCRC and the NSS had leading roles, (c) the rescue had a successful outcome (that is, no death or major injury), (d) the event did not portray organized caving as overly dangerous (that is, the need for rescue could easliy have been avoided with proper training, and it did not involve cave diving or vertical caving), (e) it was well publicized.

Plans:
I floated the idea of publishing the biennial report only as a .pdf file, in order to save money on printing. The only comment I got back was negative. The substance of that comment was that if we want to impress someone (that is, at a governnment agency or someone deciding on a grant), we should give them a paper copy. Tom Rea will try to find a print-on-demand shop that can give us a dozen or two color copies at a time. If so, we can probably get the best of both worlds: save money by printing only what we really need, but make it available to anyone on the website.

Problems:
None

(14) PERMISSION TO REPRINT

Don Paquette
NSS EVP
3530 Moulton Rd
Martinsville IN 46151
765-349-0211
Fax 765-349-0356
speleo@reliable-net.net

The following permissions/contacts/non-permissions were made for reprinting NSS copyrighted materials and release of NSS Member information:

6/21/04