Report to Council

Committee on Local Section Activities

San Francisco, California

August 13, 2014

Mister President and Fellow Councilors:

Last evening, the Committee on Local Section Activities (LSAC) presented the 2013 Awards for Outstanding Performance for Local Sections at the 15th Annual ChemLuminary Awards celebration. I am pleased to announce the award-winning sections. Will the Councilors from the California, Indiana, Nashville, Midland, Brazosport and the Kentucky Lake local sections please stand to be recognized for their outstanding performance?

Additionally, four other sections received ChemLuminary. Will the Councilors from the Indiana, Nashville, South Carolina, and Northeastern local sections please stand to be recognized?

LSAC is pleased to report that the reviews of the 178 annual reports submitted have been completed. After receiving notice of the completed review, sections are encouraged to log into FORMS to download their review. Sections may then provide a response to LSAC within the following 6 weeks. The statistical review which shows a compilation of all local section activity can be found at www.acs.org/getinvolved.

LSAC reviewed the June 30th Innovative Project Grant (IPG) proposals during the LSAC Grants & Awards subcommittee meeting and will award 14 grants totaling $30,033. This brings the total for 2014 to 33 IPG awards totaling over $70,000. Since the inception of the program, a total of 165 local sections have received at least one award.

LSAC will be offering grants during the fall to assist local sections with hosting a strategic planning retreat; hosting a Leadership Development System course in their section; and to assist to travel to the 2015 ACS Leadership Institute. Grant information will be available on the website listed on the screen in mid-September.

National Chemistry Week will be held October 19--25 and LSAC encourages all local sections to celebrate the theme: “The Sweet Side of Chemistry: Candy”. You each have a copy of the NCW Celebrating Chemistry issue and I encourage you to share this and other NCW resources with members of your community. These efforts are just one of the many ways in which local sections are helping ACS to achieve its goals.

LSAC voted and recommended to the Council Policy Committee (CPC) that the Council Agenda for the 2014 fall ACS national meeting be amended to remove the petition regarding the Ocean County territory. CPC approved.

LSAC voted to recommend to Council to dissolve the Ocean County Local Section due to inactivity and the lack of a response to an action plan that would have assisted with reviving the Ocean County Local Section; Mr. President, I so move and CPC concurs.

Mister President and Members of Council, this completes my report.

Martin Rudd, Chair 2014

Committee on Local Section Activities