Welcome once again to the Massachusetts Chapter of the Risk and Insurance Management Society (RIMS) web-site.  My name is Anastos Chiavaras (Anastos.Chiavaras@bc.edu) and I am the Vice-President & Delegate of the Massachusetts RIMS Chapter for the 2008-2009 year.  As you know, we lost our incoming President, Dick L’Europa and, as a tribute to Dick, we are not replacing him for the current year.

Other members of the Board are as follows:

• Bruce Birtwell, Treasurer & Spring Conf. Chair        bbirtwell@statestreet.com
• Stephanie Giancola, Secretary            giancola@mit.edu
• David Hershey, Director & Program Chair             dhershey@spragueenergy.com
• Thomas Masiello, Director & Golf Chair       tmasiello@cumberlandfarms.com
• Barbara Devereux, Director              bdevereux@benchmarkquality.com
• Fred Hughes II, Director         fred.hughes@ironmountain.com

In addition, this year we have three committee members on board who are committed to helping MRIMS achieve their goals.  They are as follows:

• Kathy Clemens, kclemens@mitre.org
• Kara Wordell,   kwordell@tacwordlwide.com
• Joanne Madore,  joanne.madore@bostonhousing.org

The Board and I hope you will take some time to look through the site and consider joining if you are not already a member.

If you are a member, we invite you to become more involved by volunteering to serve on a committee or simply by attending monthly meetings.  Involvement in RIMS is a great way to network with other Risk Management professionals and service providers.  It is also a great way to gain and exchange ideas and information with your peers!

Our educational breakfast meetings are generally held the third Thursday of each month.  Once again, we have scheduled these meetings at the Westin –Waltham Hotel, right off Route 128.  Meeting times also have been kept the same – generally starting at 7:30am for Breakfast and Registration, 8:30am for Speaker Presentation and Adjournment at 9:30am.

We have a great program for the upcoming year, including the Spring Conference, the Golf Outing and Annual Meeting, as well as our October Networking event and Holiday Reception.  We hope you will take advantage of all we have to offer.

As you know, we are always looking for new ideas and topics for meetings as well as volunteers for the Spring Conference Committee.  If you are interested, please feel free to contact Dave Hershey, the Program Chair, or Bruce Birtwell, Spring Conference Chair, if you would like to volunteer to work on the Spring Conference.  As always, please feel free to contact me with any suggestions, questions or concerns.  To facilitate contacting any member of the Board, I have included the Boards e-mail addresses.  We cannot grow and learn without your input!

Thank you for your time, and on behalf of the Board, we look forward to meeting you at the meetings and events and making this year both rewarding and educational. 

Anastos

617-552-8010 (Work)

Anastos.Chiavaras@bc.edu