DAQ Recognizes Employee, Team of the Year for 2010

RALEIGH - The N.C. Division of Air Quality held its 12th Employee Recognition Awards ceremony on Wednesday, with Heather Hildebrandt of the Raleigh Central Office named the 2010 DAQ Employee of the Year. The Raleigh Regional Office Air Monitoring Team was named the 2010 DAQ Team of the Year.

DENR Secretary Dee Freeman and DAQ Director Sheila Holman presented the awards.

Hildebrandt, an environmental engineer in the Technical Services Section, was recognized for her regular duties analyzing conformity issues for the Mobile Sources Branch as well as her extra efforts as temporary supervisor of attainment issues for the Planning Section. In her temporary duties, Heather completed several time-sensitive projects - notably interviewing and recommending candidates for several open positions and explaining the sulfur dioxide nonattainment issue to local officials and citizens in the Wilmington area. During this time, she also retained responsibility for several mobile sources projects.

The RRO Monitoring Team was recognized for its efforts in running an extensive ambient air monitoring program for the 16-county Raleigh region. The RRO Monitoring Team often gets called on to perform extra tasks due to its proximity to the DAQ Central Office. During the past year, the team also installed and began operating new ozone and TEOM monitors at the Leggett station in Edgecombe County. Team members helped develop new testing procedures and logbooks, train operators from other regions and interview candidates for monitoring positions. Members of the team included: Patrick Butler, Marshall Cannon, Roy Doster, Travis Funderburk, Mike Pleasant, Jimmy Reske, Timothy Skelding, Rik Tebeau and Eddie Todd.

Other nominees for DAQ Employee of the Year included: Marshall Cannon, Paul Chappin, Frank Corduan, Wade Daniels, Charles Davis, John Gittings, Kim Gold, Steve Hall, Heather Hawkins, Arni Hopkins, Regina Hudock, Pernell Judd, Deborah Manning, Jennifer Manning, Jim McGaughey, Brad Newland and Mike Parkin. Other nominees for the DAQ Team of the Year included the: Bulk Plant Inspections Team, DAQ Ambient Monitoring PM Lab, Electronic Calibrations Branch TEOM Team, MACT Taskforce, Ozone Monitoring Team and Washington Regional Office Ambient Monitoring Team.

Also at the awards ceremony, DAQ presented service awards to employees with 10 years or more with the state.

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