Board of Directors

Next GSOC Board Meeting, Wednesday, August 9th, 2023, 9:00 AM.
You can attend in-person or via video conference

If you would like to virtually attend this meeting, please contact Barb Cederberg, GSOC COO at 651-681-7303 or at Barbara.cederberg@gopherstateonecall.org.

BOARD ELECTION POLICY

Gopher State One Call seeks to review applications for Board membership and/or users’ group participation. In particular, GSOC seeks subject matter expertise from Greater Minnesota municipal water and sewer systems, the agricultural industry (particularly expertise concerning drain tiles and excavations), the pipeline industry, engineering and other industry sectors not currently represented on GSOC’s Board. View the Call for Applications providing more detail below. Thank you for your interest in serving the underground safety stakeholders in Minnesota.

View Board Election Policy
View Call for Applications for Board or User's Group

Gopher State One Call is a non-member Minnesota nonprofit corporation with oversight provided by its Board of Directors, consisting of Directors from a wide spectrum of damage prevention industry stakeholders. For further information, history and background, see the Board Election Policy.

BOARD MEETING MINUTES

Apr 5, 2023 - DRAFT
Jan 11, 2023 - Minutes
Dec 14, 2022 - Minutes
Nov 9, 2022 - Minutes
Aug 10, 2022 - Minutes

Highlights: April 5, 2023

Chairs Report: Currently there are MnOps suggested changes to legislation in the House bill but not the Senate bill. There is industry opposition to several proposals and Representative Kraft wants to see industry discussion to see if concenses can be reached.
COO Report: Q1 ticket volumes are down 25% from 2022. Meet Ticket initiative continues by highlighting them at Spring damage prevention meetings. Attendance has rebounded now that they are back in person and engagement is up. Prototype for the underground utility mapping project was completed in fall 2022. First roung funding is in progress for production level open source software with API's connected to OCC's ITIC system. GSOC has also formed a visioning team to formulate priorities and development application of technologies. Barb, in reviewing non-excavation ticket processing suggested a review of practices and processes for non-excavation tickets. OCC will provide support for the technical side if needed.
PR/Awareness Report: "Click or Call" messaging is being distributed to GSOC's media partners to acknowlege that most tickets are now submitted online. Olivia is attending Damage Prevention meetings around the state. The content has been significantly revised since last year through coordination with MnOps and the 811 Jepoardy game is creating a lot of interest.
MnOps Update: Jon Wolfgram reviewed 4th quarter damage data from 2022. Voluntary damage reporting is down. MnOps is requesting a statutory change to mandate reporting for larger volume facilities so they can more accurately assess the extent of damages in Minnesota. They continue to seek legislative reinforcement through a pair of bills and are still pursuing funding for 3 additional personnel members to assist with investigations. Facility Operators have testified to their concerns at hearings on the bills.
OCC Report: Ticket volume is the lowest it's been in the last 5 years for homeowners, but online submission for all tickets is at an all time high. Dynamic start time has proven effective and the feature was turned back on again as of April 1. OCC continues to evolve its IT department with more experienced leadership and My Ticket Analytics will now be available to excavators and facility operators upon request.
Finance Committee Update: 2022 ended with a smaller than projected operating loss, but also lower than projected revenue. Ticket volumes are down for the start of 2023, but are expected to increase with upcoming broadband projects. Discussion of the cause of the decline pointed towards equipment and employee shortages.

Chairs Report: Nov. 9th, 2022 and Dec. 14, 2022 meeting minutes approved. Proposal for government relations services from the legislative firm Lockridge Grinal Naun P.L.L.P approved.
COO Report: Review of GSOC core values as listed in the Strategic Plan. Review of overall ticket volume for 2022 which was down 7.2%. Continuing major projects include video education for the meet ticket initiative and possible meet ticket calendar for the metro area, design engineer education, and the web analytics project. Details in full minutes. Barb has met with a small group of board members, MnOps, and GSOC representatives to establish directions for technology development. The UUMPT Mapping Improvement Project has gained significant industry interest and is working on next steps for a more widely usable platform.
PR/Awareness Report: 29 DP meetings are scheduled around the state in march and April. GSOC will also be making use of an outside marketing consultant to conduct a marketing audit and generate new ideas.
MnOps Update: Q3 numbers are up and Q4 will be up as soon all reports have been recieved. Very slight decrease in damage rate per thousand locates recieved by MnOps in 2022. MnOps is looking to host a pipeline safety conference in mid-April and developing a survey for stakeholders about current industry issues.
OCC Report: Public awareness messaging is being revised to emphasize "Click or Call." Improvements to generated marking instructions continues. Online ticket percentage remains strong at 83.9% even though the annual ticket volume decreased for the year. The next phase of the data analytics project allows companies to customize and analyze their specific data and has 8 companies participating. Over 10,700 map updates were made in 2022. More discussion of automated marking instructions concluded that until the wording of the instructions is vetted, approved, and consistent, they will not be used in Minnesota.
Board Elction Summary: See full minutes for officer and committee appointments.
Board Election Summary

Mark Sellin advised the board that he had attended a recent AGC legislative meeting and anticipates submission of proposed legislation in 2023. Dean Parker advised that MnOPS also intends to resubmit it's proposed legislation in 2023. GSOC will likely remain neutrak regarding statutory changes that do not directly affect GSOC.
Pat Warden introduced the 2023 financial projection.
Barb Cederberg reviewed the communications budget in detail. Several changes are anticipated in the coming year including discontinuing some awareness programs, though relationships with iHeart Media, Star Tribune, and Linder Farm Network will continue. There will potentially be special awareness initiatives with KARE 11, the Minnesota Vikings, and Gopher Sports.
The board approved the 2023 Financial Projection and delegated responsibility to the Executive Committee to finalize salary adjustments for the GSOC employees.

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.

Chair’s Report: Approval of April minutes. Thank you to Barb and Olivia for Saints Game social event and encouragement for board members to attend OCC Users' Group.
COO Report: Overall ticket volume still down 9.3% from last year, but the last 3 months have been busier than they were in 2021. Meet ticket initiative continues. Feedback from stakeholders has been very helpful and an education program is beginning in October. Public awareness efforts continue with excavator damage prevention videos, landscaper education amd design engineer education. Next Gen interface will be retired in October. GSOC will be assisting OCC in longer term user visioning and Barb would like a small group of board members to discuss what future capabilities they would like to see the notification center provide. Development of a map sharing sytem continues with participation from several Facility Operators and is garnering some national attention. Barb has proposed to present at OCC's User Group as well as the 2023 CGA Conference.
Automated Marketing Instructions Project: Extensive discussion on the continued development of automated marking instructions to minimize necessary callbacks and locator confusion from manually entered user instructions.
PR/Awareness Report: Upcoming events - 811 run and MN State Fair. Continued PR efforts with Star Tribune, iHeart Radio, and All Over Media. Potential advertising with MN Vikings. Review of 2022 in-person DP meetings and blog article about Meet Initiatives.
Board Discussion: Delayed Locates: Anecdotal evidence from both GSOC and MnOps would suggest an increase in delayed locates this year. Comments were solicited regarding board member experiences and suggestions to help reduce delays in the future.
MNOPS Report: Damage reporting, while still only on a voluntary basis, shows a slight reduction in the rate of damages. Top violations for this year are delayed locates, no ticket, failure to pothole, and failure to maintain clearance.
OCC Report: Phase II of the Data Analytics projects is underway. The consultant from Tableau, Philippe Barzin, explained the goals of phase two, and gave a demonstration of the pilot that is being released to 4 testers for feedback. Total tickets are down for the year, but CSRs are still performing critical functions even though most tickets are filed online. The work from home model continues and while the average speed of speed of answer and review times are higher than last year, it is due mostly to two specific days where a large number of CSRs were unexpectedly absent. An aditional 10 CSRs have been hired and is helping with response times.

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