Highlights: Nov 9, 2022

• Chair’s Report: Approval of Minutes, legislative report – MN Senate has minor democratic lead. There is speculation that this, along with a democratic Governor’s office could result in a larger infrastructure bonding bill next year, thereby effecting the amount of excavation in the state next year.
• COO Report: Review of the core values developed in the GSOC strategic plan. Y-T-D ticket volume is down roughly 5.4% even though volumes in May-August were higher than last year. Continuing efforts for the Meet Ticket Initiative include development of an educational program, addition of expiration dates on meet tickets, discussions of a voluntary meet ticket calendar for the metro area, excavator damage prevention videos expected in the spring, and design engineer education. GSOC is reviewing facility operator feedback questioning why all field contact information is the same for certain excavators. The utilities mapping project has received positive feedback from the CGA next practices committee and will now be entering a second phase. In attempt to further the meet initiative goals, a board subcommittee has been formed to follow up with Barb and review documentation for meets. Delayed field marking and projected increases in excavation volume are considered the critical issues for 2023.
• PR/Awareness Report: 811 Run and State Fair had record turnout this year. New relationships are being developed with KARE 11 TV and the Minnesota Gophers. GSOC will be increasing it’s presence at the Home and Garden Show.
• MnOPS Update: Third quarter damages have held relatively consistently at approx. 1.43 per 1000 locates. Top 5 enforcement issues remained the same in 2022, the top being failure to mark or mark on time. MnOPS would like to shift to holding regional pipeline safety meetings that are shorter and more locally held to try and increase participation by operations personnel.
• OCC Report: No additional hiring expected until March. 5.4% decrease in Y-T-D ticket volume, though online submission using ITIC is at an all-time high of 83.7%. Total homeowner ticket submissions and use of ITIC lite are both down from this time last year. There was brief discussion of potential new efforts to reverse this trend. Online ticket submission review is averaging a little over 7 minutes. Efforts to lower this time include education during the callback, email alerts and training for direct release, and continued work on automatically generated marking instructions. Emergency and meet tickets quantities have remained mostly unchanged. Non-excavation ticket numbers have increased significantly, but this is likely due to a policy change allowing only one update before requiring creation of a new ticket. Numerous security improvements are in the works from OCC’s new Senior Manager of Infrastructure. Damage reports to the call center have gone down slightly, however reports of utilities not marked has risen substantially. Tableau phase two developments continue. The board received a demonstration and board members were asked to volunteer for additional beta testing.
• Finance Committee: Third quarter audit appears to be in order and financial projection will be covered at the next meeting.