President's Message: What a Summer! NASBP was Busy!

What a Summer! NASBP was busy!

I hope all of you had an opportunity for vacation, family time, and a favorite activity during the summer. Fall is afoot, which means college and pro football season is right around the corner, so good luck to your favorite team. For me, “Let’s Go Mountaineers WVU!”

I ended my previous Pipeline article sharing news about our new conceptual program, “Making Surety A Career,” for college students in business and insurance schools to learn about surety bonding and surety careers, including internships and jobs. You may recall Professor Kurt Krogull piloted the initial surety class in the spring at the University of Kansas. Great news! We had 40 participating students, with a couple expressing an interest in a surety career. I am pleased to confirm one of those students, Logan Ford, accepted a job with EMC Insurance (Denver, CO) in July. Thank you, Evan Sizemore of Lockton Companies, LLC, for assisting with this opportunity.

NASBP has been working diligently to finalize an “Education Kit,” which will be outsourced to colleges and universities that will be participating in this program. We anticipate this educational packet will be available near the end of the year. We are making an intentional effort to roll out this program initially to Big 12 Conference Schools that offer an insurance and risk management program. I am pleased to confirm all schools were contacted in June and their initial feedback about providing surety as a curriculum to students has been positive.

Zach with Faculty

I was with the many dedicated NASBP School faculty and eager students attending our NASBP Summer Surety School the week of August 5-9, in Reston, Virginia. I had the opportunity to “duck in and out” of all of NASBP classes. I felt privileged to teach the Level II Ethic’s Class. The School’s 159 students participated in: Contract Level I, Contract Level II, Contract Level III, and Commercial Level II. See photo of some of the NASBP School instructors, from left Matt Cashion, Jim Lareau, Susan Hecker, and myself.

Congratulations on another successful School Session to Kat Shamapande (NASBP Director of Professional Development), Michael Baxter (Chair, Professional Development Committee), and Nathan Wonder (Vice-Chair, Professional Development Committee), along with the rest of the talented faculty who volunteered their time to cultivate and develop the next generation of surety professionals. Thank you for sharing your knowledge and intellectual capital! NASBP will hold the next session of the NASBP William J. Angell Surety School in January 26-31, 2025, in Houston, TX. Visit the nasbp.org site soon for registration details. The Most Outstanding Students from the School are announced in an article in this issue.

NASBP conducted its virtual NASBP Board of Directors Meeting on August 6. During the meeting, the Board voted unanimously to have Second Vice President Monica Donatelli serve as the interim Chair of the NASBP Finance Committee to fill the role held by Jennifer Salm, 50, who bravely battled cancer and passed away on June 12. Jennifer was Surety Director of NASBP member Marsh & McLennan Agency, LLC (MMA) of Dayton, OH and is sorely missed. See announcement of her passing in the May-June 2024 Pipeline.

In addition, the Board chose Nicole Coty of North Risk Partners, St Paul, MN as the Director Liaison to the Executive Committee for this year. Later, the Board received updates on the progress of the nasbp.org website redesign, program details for the Fall Meetings, the Surety Careers Program, and NASBP headquarters’ accounting system software transition. If you are interested in learning more about the meeting, contact me or one of the NASBP Board members.

If you haven’t heard already, in July, NASBP and SFAA issued a first-of-its-kind Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) Program Surety Bond Information Kit. This is an amazing accomplishment and will provide guidance to many. The Kit includes bond forms to address the announcement of the National Telecommunications & Information Administration (NTIA) of the U.S. Department of Commerce to accept surety bonds as an additional form of security in lieu of letters of credit (LOCs) for the Bead Program. Be sure to read the CEO column and the advocacy article in this issue how NASBP BEAD advocacy continues.

Finally, we are nearing record registration for the following Fall Meetings. If you have not registered, do so today:

• West Meeting, Carlsbad, CA—Sept 11-13

• Sales Workshop, New Orleans, LA—Sept 24-25

• East Meeting, New Orleans, LA—Sept 25-27

Have a thought, suggestion, or idea that relates to how NASBP efforts can be Backing Our Future? Don’t hesitate to contact me at zach.mendelson@epicbrokers.com.

#BackingOurFuture #MakingSuretyACareer #BondsforBEAD

Zach Mendelson is Principal, Bonds/Insurance/Construction, EPIC/Edgewood Partners Insurance Center, Pittsburgh, PA. He can be reached at zach.mendelson@epicbrokers.com or 412.274.1707.

Publish Date

July 1, 2024

Issue

NASBP Pipeline – July/August 2024

Year

2024

Month

July