REPORT OF THE PRESIDENT TO THE FOURTH EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE MEETING

 

 

Dear Colleagues,

 

It is a pleasure to be with you again for this new session of our Executive Committee at the occasion of the Regional Seminar organised by our Swiss colleagues.

 

It is all the more satisfying that this seminar has taken place, for it makes up for the disappointment that since our last ECEE, which was 3 years ago, we have not been able to organise such a seminar.

 

Moreover, the subject of the Seminar is of utmost importance for the mitigation of the seismic risk as regards the existing buildings of our cities. However, I shall not repeat here what I already developed in my introduction speech. I would just like to insist that the future Executive Committee, to be elected next year, receive more proposals from our members for the organisation of such seminars.

 

One of the main topics discussed during our last meeting was to improve the efficiency of our Association. We discussed the directions which could be taken to change our Statutes in order not only to develop the involvement of our members in our activities but also the financing of such activities. Atilla Ansal and myself, using as a basis the conclusions of those discussions, drew up a project which was sent to all of you. We hope that it will be possible to finalise the text today so that the project of our new Statutes be sent to all of our members plenty time in advance before the General Assembly. Such an evolution seems necessary if we wish to boost the functioning of our Association.

 

Our General Secretary shall discuss more in detail the work done by our Working and Task Groups. It should be possible during our next meeting, so that final decisions can be made in London, to prepare a final statement regarding the future of each of these groups and perhaps even the possibility, if the need should come about, of creating new task groups if there are volunteers willing to undertake such tasks.

 

I trust that the organising of our next ECEE in London is well under way and that we shall hear a report in that respect. Our next line of thought is the ECEE to be held in 2006, and it is probably a good idea if we start asking very shortly for proposals in order to ensure a good competition for next year.

 

I would like to thank all of you who have been able to attend this meeting and those who have taken an active part in this Seminar, which is most important for the education of young researchers and engineers and also for the promotion of our Association.  Of course, in the name of our European Association of Earthquake Engineering, I also thank very much the Swiss Association to have undertaken the organisation of this Seminar which is on the way to be a very good success, both as concerns the proposed activities and in the technical content.

 

P. BISCH