Idaho Society of Professional Engineers
Friday Update - 03/04/05
UPCOMING EVENTS:
● March 5, 2005 - State
MATHCOUNTS Competition - Boise
● April 14 - 16, 2005 -
ISPE Annual Meeting, Pocatello, Idaho
● July 7 - 9, 2005 - NSPE
2005 Annual Convention, Chicago, Illinois
PUBLIC WORKS CONTRACTORS
LICENSING TASK FORCE -- UPDATE
The House of Representatives, Business Committee, held a hearing on HB 263 that
relates to public works procurement for political subdivisions of the State of
Idaho and proposes changes to the Public Works Contractors Licensing statutes on
Friday, February 25, 2005. The committee voted unanimously to pass the bill on
to the full House with a “do pass” recommendation. ISPE offered testimony urging
the Committee to support the proposed legislation. When the time nears for the
bill to be heard on the House floor, we will be requesting all ISPE members to
contact their Representatives to urge them to support the legislation. A copy of
the bill and current status information is available at:
http://www3.state.id.us/legislat/legtrack.html. On that web page, click on
“Mini-Data Status Bill Information”. If you have questions, please feel free to
contact Jerry Eggleston at 208-867-3611 or at email:
jegglest@mindspring.com.
STAFF ENGINEER WANTED
Idaho Department of Parks & Recreation has an opening in Boise for a civil
engineer to serve as the Department’s statewide engineering expert. This is a
great opportunity for a licensed Professional Engineer to work with a variety of
professionals and travel to Idaho’s beautiful state parks and recreational
facilities. If you enjoy a wide range of responsibilities including design,
contract management, project administration and technical assistance, this could
be the job for you. For more information, see the position announcement at
www.dhr.idaho.gov and follow the job
links to Engineering. To contact the Department of Parks & Recreation, call
(208) 334-4180, extension 304.
EXCLUSIVE INTERNET DOMAIN RESERVED FOR PE'S
A new Internet domain reserved exclusively for professional engineers
was unveiled in late February. The domain, eng.pro, is designed to give the
public and clients a guarantee that they are reaching qualified members of the
engineering profession. For more on this click on
http://newsmanager.commpartners.com/nspeupdt/issues/2005-02-24.html
MATHCOUNTS PROBLEM OF THE WEEK
Can you solve this MATHCOUNTS problem? The answer will appear in next
week's edition of the Friday Update!
Pain Relievers Undergo Scrutiny
Three pain relievers have been receiving a lot of attention lately, and their
safety has been questioned. The FDA took a look at the possible health risks and
decided that Celebrex, Bextra and Vioxx could return to the U.S. market in spite
of the fact that all three medicines posed some level of heart risk (Reuters
2/25). The New York Times, however, reported that 10 of the 32 government drug
advisors involved in examining these drugs were people who had worked with the
drugs’ makers in recent years. What percent of the advisors had not worked with
the drugs’ makers in recent years? Express your answer to the nearest whole
number.
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It was reported that if these 10 people had abstained from voting, the committee
would have voted 14 to 8 that Vioxx should be withdrawn from U.S. markets.
According to the Times’ article, these 10 people voted 9 to 1 to keep the drug.
When considering the entire advisory panel, by how many votes did this drug end
up passing?
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When voting on Bextra, these 10 people in question again voted 9 to 1 to keep
the drug. However, the other members of the panel voted in the ratio of 3 to 2
to withdraw the drug and had two members that did not vote either way. What was
the final number of votes in favor of keeping Bextra?
For the complete story go to:
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/nm/20050225/us_nm/health_fda_painkillers_dc_2
Answer to last week's JETS Challenge problem:
Total is 103
If you want to see last week's problem again, click
http://www.jets.org/latestnews/Challenge%2012%20%97%20The%20%20Challenge%20of%20the%20Leap%20Year.pdf
Idaho Society of Professional Engineers
PO Box 170239
Boise, ID 83717-0239
208-426-0636
Fax: 208-426-0639
E-Mail: ispe@rmci.net
Web Site: www.Idahospe.org
Idaho
Society of Professional Engineers
