It seems like everyone is heading to Washington. Over the
next several months, three industry associations are holding events in or near Washington, D.C.
The Air-Conditioning, Heating, and Refrigeration Institute will hold its spring
meeting outside the nation’s capital in Arlington,
Va. The Plumbing-Heating-Cooling
Contractors-National Association holds its legislative conference April 25-26
in D.C., while the Heating, Air-conditioning and Refrigeration Distributors International
will visit one month later June 4-5 for its annual Congressional
Fly-In.
Since it’s an election year, Washington, D.C., is
obviously a hot spot. I have a feeling that for some of these events,
there may be a good number of people in attendance.
For the
HARDI event, members have the opportunity to visit with members of Congress.
HARDI arranges the meetings, and aims to get members to speak with their local
representatives. The organization even preps the members ahead of time on what
to expect from their meeting, and how to best get their points across. The
event is a great opportunity, as a business owner and as a member of the HVACR
industry, to voice opinions and concerns to elected
officials.
The PHCC event will also give members
face-to-face meetings with members of Congress. Some Congressional
representatives are even scheduled to speak at the PHCC conference, along with
some other high-profile government officials and
insiders.
The upcoming events made me wonder what some of
our readers would tell their representatives if they had a chance. If you could
have a face-to-face meeting with a person in Congress, what concerns would you
have? What is the biggest issue your business faces and what can Washington do to fix it?
