Mayors' Business Day coming April 19

Todd Pedersen, founder of Vivint

There is a little more than a week before the Mayors’ Business Day, scheduled this year for April 19 at the Shilo Inn.

Hosted by the mayors of Idaho Falls and Ammon, the event began in 2008. This year features presentations and panel discussions on a variety of subjects, the theme is a “Talent Pipeline.” This refers to the reality that a lot of longtime skilled workers are going to be leaving their jobs in the next five to 10 years and that young, trained people are going to be needed to replace them if eastern Idaho’s economy is to keep moving forward.

The keynote speaker is Todd Pedersen, founder and CEO of Vivint, Inc., Pedersen started the company in 1999 as APX Alarm and built it into one of the largest residential security companies in North America. In 2010 he rebranded it to Vivint and launched an innovation center to create smart home products. Under Pedersen’s leadership, Vivint evolved from a dynamic startup into a smart home technology company with 9,000 employees and more than a million customers.

In 2012 it was acquired by the Blackstone Group for more than $2 billion. In 2013, Vivint was named to the Forbes’ list of America’s Most Promising Companies. In 2015, Vivint was one of 500 companies on the Forbes' list of America's Best Employers.

Pedersen went on to launch of Vivint Solar, which had a $1.1 billion IPO in 2014 and became the second largest residential solar power provider in the United States.

He was named an Ernst and Young Entrepreneur of the Year 2010 for the Utah Region. He was also named Utah's Entrepreneur of the Year by Mountain West Capital Network, voted one of Utah’s 10 Coolest Entrepreneurs by Utah Valley BusinessQ, and was inducted into the David Eccles School of Business Hall of Fame.

Tickets to the event are $60 for chamber members and $75 for non-members. For more information, visit www.idahofallschamber.com.

Melaleuca announces record-breaking sales in 2015

Melaleuca released its annual report for 2015 Thursday and, as expected, the company announced another record-setting year in 2015 with annual sales exceeding $1.33 billion.

Headquartered in Idaho Falls since the mid-1980s, the company has grown 40 percent in the last five years alone.

Its U.S. and Canadian operations continue to lead in volume. Melaleuca also saw particularly high growth in its Asian markets, especially China. There are now more than 1.2 million households purchasing Melaleuca products on a monthly basis across the 18 countries where it operates. Melaleuca has more "preferred customers" — meaning loyal customers who order consistently month-after-month-than at any point in its history.

"Melaleuca is experiencing an era of explosive growth. We expect that to continue," said Frank VanderSloot, the company’s CEO, in a news release. "We continue to gain momentum as people experience our products. I think it's safe to say that Melaleuca products are being discovered around the world."

VanderSloot said he expects continued growth in 2016. “We are getting better in all that we do. “Our management team is getting stronger. Our scientists are getting better. Our processes are getting smoother.”

INL seeks housing for summer interns

Idaho National Laboratory through its contractor, Battelle Energy Alliance, is seeking temporary housing options for summer interns. These are typically undergraduate and graduate students from universities across the country who come to work at the laboratory for approximately 10 to 16 weeks. Most INL interns receive a housing stipend to help pay rent.
Temporary housing criteria may include, but are not limited, to:

• Furnished rooms or blocks of rooms
• Furnished apartments
• Ease of access to INL work locations in Idaho Falls and to the INL desert facilities
• Availability between early May and late August
• Clean, safe environment

To learn more – or to be considered for inclusion on the list of temporary housing options for interns – please send a description of the temporary housing and contact information to academic@inl.gov.

INL researchers develop microgrids for diversity, reliability, resilience

INL researchers Kurt Myers, left, and Robert Turk inspect solar panels at Utah’s Dugway Proving Ground.

This is the age of sharing, so in hopes of driving traffic to the inl.gov Web site, I'm posting a link to an article I wrote that was posted today (yes, I wear many different hats.) It's about microgrids, renewable energy and the work that researchers at the lab are doing in those areas.

Having lived here for almost 34 years, it has been fascinating to watch the evolution of what was at the time called the INEL. In 1982, "the site" was about nuclear energy, the Navy, reactors, etc. The non-Navy work was done for essentially two clients, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the commercial nuclear power industry. Today, "the lab" is about nuclear energy, but also about such things as electric vehicles, microgrids, flow batteries, biomass conversion and cyber-security. Stories such as the one I'm sharing here are allowing me to wrap my head around the importance of what's really happening.

Anyway, here's the link:

MICROGRIDS CAN ENHANCE DIVERSITY, RELIABILITY, RESILIENCE

Kneaders plans opening by end of July

Kneaders, a Utah-­based chain popular with many eastern Idahoans, has plans to open in Sand Creek Commons by the end of July this year, according to papers filed last week at the Ammon Building Department office.

The building permit filed March 30 shows plans for building of 4,214 square feet, with a kitchen and serving area of 2,226 square feet and a seating area of 1,618 square feet. Occupancy for the entire restaurant is 143. The estimated completion date entered was July 31.

Kneaders dates back to 1997, when it was founded by Gary and Colleen Worthington. It specializes in European hearth breads made from scratch on site daily, as well as gourmet sandwiches, soups, salads, pastries and breakfast items. It also provides catering services for groups of all sizes, from birthday parties to weddings, and offers a variety of retail products including award-­winning gift baskets and holiday­-themed gifts.

So far, the company has 42 locations in Utah, Colorado, Arizona, Texas and Idaho, where it opened its first store in Meridian. Like many chains, there is a mix of franchise operations and company­owned stores. The Ammon restaurant will be company owned.

Eric Isom, chief development officer of Ball Ventures, the co­-developer of Sand Creek
Commons, said that when courting tenants for their projects they have sought a lot of input from locals. Because so many people travel from eastern Idaho to Utah, there has been a lot of interest in Kneaders. “It’s been one of the most common requests in the last two or three years,” he said.

EIRMC recognized as Level II Trauma Center

The State of Idaho has recognized Eastern Idaho Regional Medical Center as a Level II Trauma Center. The hospital had been working toward this goal for three years, and on Saturday it received a certificate recognizing its status.

"To be recognized as a trauma center you have to be either verified by the American College of Surgeons, which we have been since 2007, or state designated, which we recently became," said Brian O'Byrne, director of the trauma center.

A national verification as a Level II Trauma Center from the American College of Surgeons Committee on Trauma is considered to be the highest level of achievement for hospital-based programs.

Level II Trauma Centers provide patient with 24-hour immediate coverage by general surgeons, as well as coverage by the specialties of orthopedic surgery, neurosurgery, anesthesiology, emergency medicine, radiology and critical care.

In 2010, EIRMC's Emergency Department received the Qualis Health Award of Excellence in Healthcare Quality for its work in improving the quality of healthcare and patient safety. O'Byrne also said, they will be able to reach first responders in rural areas of Idaho.

"What we will be able to do in the future is use this system to designate smaller facilities throughout the state, especially rural Idaho."

In addition, EIRMC is home to Air Idaho Rescue (AIR), a mini-fleet with helicopter, a turboprop airplane, and ground transport capabilities. AIR is one of just 136 nationally accredited air emergency transport services in the U.S.

Looking Back | April 1, 2016

Note: Looking Back appears in the Post Register every Thursday.

100 years ago
The Carnegie Library at the corner of Elm Street and North Eastern Avenue opened its doors March 30, 1916.

The event was the culmination of a project that dated back to 1905, when some public-spirited women in the community, led by Mrs. A.L. Campbell of the Village Improvement Society and Mrs. Dymae Jones, president of the Round Table Club, began corresponding with Andrew Carnegie's representatives, eventually securing a $10,000 grant.

Members of the library board, Mayor George Edgington, members of the City Council, Miss Lowry, the librarian, and her assistants, Misses Orr and Brown, stood in a receiving line, shaking hands and receiving congratulations from nearly 2,000.

The building served as Idaho Falls' public library until the mid-1970s. It is now part of the Museum of Idaho.

75 years ago
Idaho Falls resident David Rathbun offered 80 acres of land he owned in Colorado to the federal government, in hopes that a bulwark against Nazi Germany might be built if needed.

Rathbun said the land was "a few counties away" from 9,000 acres the Third Reich had claimed upon the death of its German-American owner. "My land is within easy range of the big guns," Rathbun wrote in a letter to President Franklin Roosevelt. "It would be no worse for the United States government to take the property than it was for Hitler to take it," the letter said.

50 years ago
Fred Waring and The Pennsylvanians played to a sold-out Idaho Falls Civic Auditorium on March 31, 1966. Sponsored by the local Kiwanis Club, it was the ninth time the orchestra had come to Idaho Falls to play.

One of the highlights of the evening came before the final number of the show, when Kiwanis Club President Irv Hock and club member Fred Ochi presented Waring with a watercolor portrait Ochi had painted for the occasion.

25 years ago
Lynn Thomas of Dubois, his daughter, Lynette Rogers of Renton, Wash., and her two children, Nathan, 15, and Anna, 11, made a grisly discovery of human limbs in a cave near Dubois, on March 29, 1991. The family was exploring a cave near another cave that was still stocked with fallout shelter supplies.

The discovery was not entirely unexpected, as the explorers had been discussing a human torso found in the cave in August 1979. Clark County Sheriff Craig King said the limbs were probably the same person, but the case, most likely a homicide, would remain a mystery until a skull was found.