Connie Vaughn

View from the Chair

Reflections...

Dear Members;

I am a procrastinator (those who know me, stop already with the sarcasm). I know I am not alone, yet it is not a trait I am proud of.

If you were to ask most procrastinators, “why?” I think the standard answer is “because I do my best work under pressure or deadline.” …As if we know what it is like to finish early or work without a deadline looming close.

I mention this because I am constantly at or just past deadline for my monthly ASIS column. The funny thing is as my year draws to a close, I find it harder and harder to write the article. I have been thinking about this for the last week or so (as I have used my “procrastinating” time to philosophize about my procrastinating).

It is not the writing. I have a Bachelors in Speech Communications (minor in Journalism for goodness sake!). “No, that’s not it,” I pondered and procrastinated longer. I have come to realize that completing a very rewarding and challenging year, as SFBAC Chair, is bittersweet. As much as I want to look back on our accomplishments, I also want to participate in the continued growth and success.

Yes, I know I can still participate in San Francisco ASIS. No one ever turns a volunteer away. It is just that I should take what I have gleaned from SFASIS and help a struggling chapter grow stronger. It is the right thing to do.

I won’t be a stranger by any means, but I may not be at all the monthly meetings as I have been for the past years. I will make the major events: Law Enforcement Appreciation, May Seminars, Golf Tournament (maybe, if I ever learn how to golf!), and Security Officer Appreciation Day (this year it is October 17th beginning promptly at 11:45 with lunch at the Crowne Plaza in Foster City), but not every meeting. I realize now I will miss the many friends, colleagues, and professional acquaintances I have made. I will miss the people and the unique energy, even synergy that is the San Francisco Bay Area Chapter of ASIS International.

We, the Executive Council, Committee Members, and General Membership, have had a tremendous comeback year. We have made tremendous inroads in monthly member attendance and participation. We have had huge success in promoting professionalism through our educational monthly meetings. As I work with the Executive Council, I see a team ready and willing to work just as hard next year to deliver to the membership what YOU want. How very exciting!

My year is going out with a bang. Our traditional year-end wind down, isn’t winding down at all. Our November meeting looks to be a very educational and eye-opening topic. Hitachi in Brisbane has very graciously offered their facilities on November 21st. Jeanne Perkins with Association of Bay Area Governments (and I thought ASIS was a funny acronym!) will be providing some very clear, and scary, information on road closures and other transportation problems the Bay Area faces during the next major earthquake.

This is one speaker you won’t want to miss. Jeanne knows her stuff and will be able to not only present her information, but also provide additional resources for earthquake preparedness.

Our usually mellow December social luncheon has been replaced. We were able to get Ed Gomez, Director of Security for SFO, to speak to the membership December 12th. I know a lot of you will ask the “tough” questions, but I also know Ed can handle it. We traditionally have not held a full-blown luncheon in a special venue for December. Once the speaker was confirmed, we made an executive decision to hold the meeting either at the San Francisco Aviation Museum, the Airport, or, if those two don’t work out, at a hotel near by.

It is a full plate, but I relish every bite as I face my retirement as SFASIS Chair.

October, November, and December are shaping up nicely. Stay plugged into YOUR chapter—visit www.sfasis.org for the most up to date information on what is happening at SFASIS!

With warmest regards,
Connie Vaughn
chair@sfasis.org
SFBAC ASIS Chapter Chair

Vice Views

Fellow members of the San Francisco Bay Area Chapter:

During the Annual Seminar and Exhibits last month, I happened to run into Ursula Uszynski, who manages many of the educational programs presented by ASIS National. We spoke for a few minutes about miscellaneous programs, then moved to the subject of ASIS National bringing some meaningful programs to the San Francisco Bay Area.

Ursula told me that, until recently, costs associated with conducting programs in the Bay Area have been extremely prohibitive, especially when trying to keep the costs down on programs so they are cost effective for attendees and their companies. This is true not only for the educational program space, but also for meals as well. Post 9/11 however has seen a decline in lodging and meal costs, not only in the Bay Area, but in the rest of the country, as companies reduce costs in an attempt to attract more programs and travelers to their cities.

Many of you are not aware, but the SFBA Chapter’s CPP Committee Chairman, Mr. Rudy DuBord, CPP, spent quite a lot of his time and effort over the last year lobbying National to bring the CPP Review Program to San Francisco. I am happy to report that his efforts have paid off BIG TIME. There will be a CPP Review Course held in San Francisco in 2003, on March 14th and 15th at the Crowne Plaza Union Square. But it gets even better. In addition to the CPP Review Course, ASIS will also be presenting the Assets Protection Course I – Concepts and Methods, on March 17 through 20, also at the Crowne Union Square.

I have attended both programs, and frankly, the Assets Protection Series (I, II, and III) were some of the best courses I have taken in the security industry. Each APC program is four days long and delivers some high quality education.

Back to Ursula – One of the problems National has in certain locations is attendance at some of these programs. San Francisco events apparently have not been well attended in the past, and we have been asked to promote these events as much as possible. There are several benefits to SFBA members for attending courses locally.

• Reduces travel costs
• You can still go home to your wife, husband or significant other at the end of the day.
• You get a valuable education at a great price.

In the next few months, we will be heavily promoting these events, and will also look at ways to sponsor some members for attendance through some of our education funds and scholarships. In the meantime, you can also help us continue to have these programs offered locally, by registering for and attending the events, so we help National ensure a good turnout.

For more information on these, and other ASIS educational programs, please see the following links:

http://www.asisonline.org/pdf/cpp2003.pdf
http://www.asisonline.org/calendar2003.html

As always, email comments and feedback are always appreciated.

Sincerely,
Brad Minnis CPP
Vice Chair SFBA Chapter
vicechair@sfasis.org

2002 Chapter Officer Elections

NOTICE

Elections for Chapter Officers will be held during the November 21, 2002 Meeting.

The following candidates have been nominated by the Chapter Nominations Committee:

Chapter Chairman:
Brad Minnis, CPP, Juniper Networks, Inc.

Chapter Vice Chairman:
Patrick Sharkey, CPP, Guidant Corporation

Chapter Secretary:
Larry Reid, Strategic Security Services, Inc.

Chapter Treasurer:
Curtis Given, CPP, Symantec Corporation

Respectfully submitted by,
Dennis T. Haw, CPP

Internet Interests

Looking at Internet Growth

Six years ago when I decided to become a professional website developer, I remember excitedly calling for my wife to come and look at a television commercial that also listed the advertiser’s website address. It was exciting to see that big companies were now investing in the Internet and that if the trend continued; it wouldn’t be long before having a website was as commonplace as having a telephone number. However, there wasn’t a whole lot of information available on the Internet yet.

Back then, using an Internet Search Engine would yield perhaps as many as a few hundred hits when you tried to look up something. Today, searching for a topic on the Internet can yield literally hundreds of thousands of hits about your chosen topic. What a great way to judge just how much content has been contributed to the Internet over the last few years.

The Internet has grown in many ways and it is even now being used to perform, what some people might call, miracles. Online doctors have been able to save lives in remote regions of the world. Internet collaborations have found previously unknown resources suddenly joining in and making significant contributions to their cause. Ecommerce has revolutionized the way that our global economy works. And email has changed the way that we communicate with each other both personally and professionally.

Internet Researchers comb through the Internet performing research in a few hours that might have taken weeks to gather before the Internet became so rich with useful information. Considering how much information has now come online, and how quickly more information is being added every moment of every day, it quickly becomes very clear that in the next few decades we will probably be able to find the wealth of human knowledge at our fingertips and available on the Internet.

No longer do you need to wait for the evening news shows; nowadays you can jump on the Internet and find instant news updates and more information about each topic than you will ever be able to get from the evening news shows alone. Perhaps the most dramatic difference in getting your information this new way is that you can make up your own mind on how you feel about the news without being influenced by half-truths or sneering news announcers. With the Internet, you can get your news from a variety of perspectives and in a variety of delivery methods including emailed news flashes, streaming video feeds, in-depth articles, pictures, interactive maps, audio feeds, live video feeds, and even more ways are being devised all the time.

If you avidly use the Internet, you have undoubtedly already developed quite a few friendships through the Internet. You’ve probably never met these people face to face or perhaps even over the phone, yet you’ve shared personal information with them and you have come to trust these people. If you never had a pen-pal when you were growing up, take a good look at your emails these days and you will see that you probably have a lot of pen-pals now. If you’re trendy, you may even be communicating by using some form of video feed through the Internet.

Looking back over how much has happened to the Internet in the last few years, it is easy to see why many people are reeling from the culture shock. The recent successes and potential for so many more successes in such a small amount of time is going to take many people a while to become accustomed to. The moral and legal issues of the Internet are still being debated in many forums and the growing power of the Internet seems to be taking everyone by surprise. Some are even questioning whether or not we have created humanity’s first “global brain”. They question its maturity and in what directions it should be driven.

No matter what your Internet philosophy may be, the Internet has definitely had a profound effect on our world and there doesn’t appear to be any way to keep it from continuing to influence our view of the world for many years to come. Security surveillance operations can now be performed remotely and there are many other plans for a wide variety of security controlled situations via the Internet. When these plans are implemented, we will all be living in a much safer world, albeit a little less private.

The next time that you turn to the Internet for an answer, take a moment and reflect upon the wonder of its power because it represents the power of the collective human mind. Our destiny is being shaped and the Internet is the tool.

Respectfully submitted by Steve Duell
SFBA Chapter Webmaster
Send replies to webmaster@sfasis.org

ASIS International
San Francisco Bay Area Chapter
Treasurer's Report

August 2002

Respectfully submitted by:
Patrick Sharkey CPP
Chapter Treasurer

What You've Been Missing

More Scenes from ASIS SFBA Events in 2002

Images from our 30th Annual Seminar & Exhibits
(Images contributed by Ron Kane, SFBA Photographer)

Images from our 30th Annual Seminar & Exhibits
(Images contributed by Security By Design)

Images from our Law Enforcement Appreciation Day 2002
(Images contributed by Ron Kane, SFBA Photographer)

Images from our April 2002 Chapter Meeting
(Images contributed by Ron Kane, SFBA Photographer)

Images from our June 2002 Chapter Meeting
(Images contributed by Ron Kane, SFBA Photographer)

Scenes from the 30th annual ASIS International
San Francisco Bay Area Chapter
Seminar & Exhibits

Photos courtesy of Ron Kane, Chapter Photographer

Click HERE for the Photo album of this event donated by Security By Design.

Chair Vaughn introduces guest speaker Dr. Mortimer Feinburg		Linda Florence, CPP Member ASIS Int'l Board of Directors	Chair Vaughn accepts awards from Linda Florence, CPP
Some of the Exhibitors
	Guest Speaker Dr. Mortimer Feinburg	(Images: Above, An attentive audience Right, Dr. Feinburg works the crowd)
Chapter Chairs (left to right) Kathy Goelkel 2000 Ron Sathre CPP - 2001 Connie Vaughn - 2002

All images are copyright of ASIS San Francisco Bay Area Chapter, 2002.

Scenes from the 30th annual ASIS International
San Francisco Bay Area Chapter
Seminar & Exhibits

Photo Album courtesy of Security By Design

Click HERE for the SFBA Chapter Photo album of this event

		See you next year!

Copyright by ASIS International San Francisco Bay Area Chapter, 2002.

Images from the
2002 Law Enforcement Appreciation Day

March 2002

Photos courtesy of Ron Kane, Chapter Photographer

Happy St. Patrick's Day from Connie Vaughn and Ed Loyd	Chair Vaughn opens the meeting	Sunnyvale P.D.	JR gets in the spirit
Fellow Law Enforcement Officers	A full house	Brad Minnis CPP introduces our Luncheon Speaker	Pastor Willie Harper gives the Invocation
Former 49ers Pastor, Willie Harper	Thanks Willie!	Great Door Prize!	Grand Prize Winner

All images are copyright of ASIS San Francisco Bay Area Chapter, 2002.

SFBA Chapter Meeting

April 2002

Photos courtesy of Ron Kane, Chapter Photographer

Chair Connie Vaughn opens the meeting	Panel Discussion	Hollie Stone, Hinman Consulting Engineers discusses Fundamentals of Explosions
Hollie Stone presents "Mitigating the Effects of Terrorist Attacks on Buildings Through Blast Engineering"	Dr. Lorraine Lin discusses Design Criteria and Protection	Attentive audience
Thanks!	Meeting Host Mark Domnauer, Adobe Systems

All images are copyright of ASIS San Francisco Bay Area Chapter, 2002.

SFBA Chapter Meeting

June 2002

Photos courtesy of Ron Kane, Chapter Photographer

	Chair Connie Vaughn opens the meeting	Neighborhood Electric Vehicle from Pathway Research
Chapter Treasurer, Patrick Sharkey CPP delivers our financial report	Edward Gee, AIA speaks on Strategic Architectural Design for Mitigating the Effects of Terrorism	Thanks, Mr. Gee

All images are copyright of ASIS San Francisco Bay Area Chapter, 2002.