Underground Construction - May 2020 - 35

When PCCA expanded its government aﬀairs eﬀorts in 2015,
a top goal was raising the Form 773 limit so RUS could realize
the full beneﬁt of its resources and more eﬃciently construct
broadband infrastructure in rural America. PCCA will continue
working to ensure that the ReConnect Program contract policy
becomes permanent RUS policy.
"This regulatory action is a signiﬁcant victory for PCCA and
would not have been possible without the steadfast determination
of the Government & Industry Aﬀairs Committee and the active
grassroots members who made it happen," said Eben Wyman,
Wyman Associates, who leads PCCA's government aﬀairs eﬀorts.
Also participating in the Roundtable discussion were Sarah
Tyree, CoBank; Sarah Magruder Lyle, Common Ground
Alliance; Mark Bridgers, Continuum Capital; Dan Shumate, FMI
Corporation; and Ed Campbell and Gerry Harvey, HMI Utilities,
who discussed PCCA's Safe Cable Installation Initiative.

Hurricane relief
While the hard work of PCCA members was clearly evident in
many of the association's accomplishments, the convention also

featured the amazing generosity of PCCA members. Hurricane
Dorian ravaged the Bahamas in September 2019, especially the
Abaco Islands, just some 45 miles away from Baha Mar. PCCA Past
President Herb Fluharty, his wife Chris, and Lisa Wagner, wife
of PCCA President & CEO Tim Wagner, visited the Abacos with
Prayer Breakfast speaker Bishop Silbert Mills. The visitors said the
devastation was overwhelming and the stories they heard were
heart-wrenching. Bishop Mills told his own story at the PCCA
Prayer Breakfast, about how he is now homeless at age 61, how his
family lives in Nassau while he stays in Abaco, and how many in
his community are struggling to survive.
At PCCA's Annual Auction, the Fluhartys and the Wagners
challenged PCCA members to raise funds to replace roofs in Abaco.
"Let's raise the roof!" Herb Fluharty exhorted. And PCCA members
did just that, donating more than $180,000 in less than an hour
to those who need it most. The funds will be donated through the
PCCA Education & Research Foundation, and 100 percent of the
money raised will go to Bishop Mills and his community.
As it did last year, PCCA raised $30,000 for the widow and
children of DCI's Julian Perez, who died tragically when he was hit

Tagliapietra Inducted into PCCA Hall of Fame
The closing party at the PCCA convention
not only celebrated the association's
milestone 75th anniversary, but also
a longtime member who helped make
PCCA what it is today, by inducting Ron
Tagliapietra into the PCCA Hall of Fame.
"The work ethic and character of
individual PCCA members is why this
association and this industry have been
so successful for so many years," PCCA's
Tim Wagner said. "Tonight, we honor one
those individuals, Ron Tagliapietra. 'Tag'
exempliﬁes the qualities of a PCCA Hall
of Famer in so many ways."
Wagner recounted how Tag started
in the industry as a laborer turning a
cable reel on the ﬁrst Michels plow crew
in 1964. Then he volunteered to go to
Vietnam when drafted in 1965, served
as a commanding oﬃcer during the Tet
Oﬀensive in 1968 and returned home as
a decorated First Lieutenant.
He served on the PCCA Board of
Directors for 11 years and held two
terms as president, in 2009 and 2010.
He helped the association survive during
some very lean years and was instrumental in creating the PCCA Auction, even
donating the ﬁrst-ever auction item: four
Green Bay Packers tickets and a tray of
his wife Bonnie's brownies!

Tagliapietra accepted his award with
much emotion and class. "As I looked at
the list of people that have been previously selected to the PCCA Hall of Fame, I am
honored and humbled to be included into
this elite group," he said. "What Bonnie
and I miss the most are the PCCA conventions, which we attended for 22 years.
"We will never forget all the great
conventions and the fantastic times we
had, but most of all it's the friends and
the networking that are missed the most.
The relationships that I have developed
in the industry the past 54 years with
customers, engineers and fellow contractors will never be forgotten.
"In one of Vince Lombardi's ﬁrst
speeches to the Packers, he stated that
he wanted his players to concentrate
on three things: 1) God, 2) family and
3) the Green Bay Packers. If you ask my
family, I think they would make the list
out as: 1) God 2) Family 3) Michels. And
if you would ask the Packers players and
my family, I think they would all say
that, at times, number 3 was number 1,"
Tagliapietra observed.
He thanked the PCCA board and staﬀ
and the many people he worked with
over the years, noting the joy he received
in mentoring so many young people "I

would like to be remembered as being
a mentor to hundreds of employees
throughout my career, encouraging
and helping that laborer to become an
operator, and the operator to become
a foreman, all the way up the line from
foreman, project manager, to vice
president," Tagliapietra said.
But his biggest thanks were for those
closest to him. "I would also like to thank
my family; God only knows the sacriﬁces
they made throughout my career," he
said. "So please remember two things:
always keep your family ahead of
your job and work on building good
relationships." *

PCCA members stood and cheered loudly
when Ron Tagliapietra was inducted into the
PCCA Hall of Fame in recognition of his long
and exceptional career.
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