Place: L’Olivier Restaurant, 465 Davis Court, San Francisco in the Club Room. (415-981-7824) The restaurant is easily accessible via BART (Embarcadero Station) and $5 valet parking is available.

NOTE: The dinner is being partly subsidized by the chapter, so the cost is a low $37 for members and spouses; $50 for guests (includes tax, tip and wine!)
RSVP NOW please to Secretary Jack Young at jack@norcalvaluation.com and let him know you are coming. Do not reply to the Newsletter address—Jack is the one who needs to know!

Dr. Bill Mulligan

The Future of Energy and Asset Values

SunPower VP Dr. Bill Mulligan

With renewables on everyone's radar and in the news almost every day, there's a lot to learn about solar and SunPower. SunPower has been developing world record-breaking solar technology since the 1970s. Their history has been marked by creativity, craftsmanship – and coincidence. Today, they are the global leader in developing high-efficiency solar solutions for homes, businesses, commercial buildings and utilities.

Dr. Bill Mulligan, SunPower’s vice president of technology and development, will be speaking at our chapter meeting about the economic outlook for alternative energies and the impact on the related underlying asset values. Although Bill's expertise is in Solar Energy he will also be discussing other technologies such as wind and alternative fuels.

NASA’S HELIOS

As SunPower’s vice president of technology and development, Bill leads product development for solar cells, solar panels and solar systems.

Mulligan has worked in the solar and semiconductor industries for over 20 years and has held positions at Fairchild Semiconductor, AstroPower, the National Renewable Energy Lab, and JX Crystals. He has experience in thin film, III-V, and silicon solar technologies and is the author of more than 35 technical papers and patents. Mulligan earned a Ph.D. in materials science from the Colorado School of Mines and an M.S.E in chemical engineering from the University of Michigan. He also holds dual undergraduate degrees in chemistry and history from the University of Washington.

President’s Message

By Doug Baxter

We had another good turnout for last month’s dinner speaker and ASA SoCal Chapter president, David Eichner, ASA. This attendance indicated to me that providing consistent and relevant speakers appeals to all disciplines and face to face networking is still an integral part of our business. David covered a lot of ground Thursday night discussing how to order and read an appraisal. Although this talk was a beta test for future lectures, the feedback was lively and touched on the many ways we can differentiate our superior appraisal practices to gain an advantage in selling our services to the public and private sectors.

On the California legislation and lobbying front, our appraisal profession will continue to be monitored by the CCA (California Coalition of Appraisers) and the CAC (California Appraiser’s Council). As members of this ASA chapter, we have been charged an annual assessment to both organizations over the past ten years which is then paid directly to the organizations through the treasurer of our chapter. We are working with the ASA SoCal chapter to transition to a single account with regular quarterly reports. Our ASA chapter board will keep you updated at meetings on all developments via our newly appointed liaison, Ray Mattison, ASA MAI. California chapter presidents have all voted to take full accounting of any outstanding balances due to these organizations so we have a strong pool of funds as lobbying efforts are needed.

QuickBooks online for our chapter accounting is now up and running and website fine-tuning continues. Please make sure you are checking your personal page profile on a regular basis.

Don’t forget to sign up in advance for our next two meetings, May 13 and June 10th. Also mark your calendars for our annual Board of Director’s retreat at the Orinda Country Club Friday, August 27th to help plan next year’s programs!

Regards,

Doug Baxter, ASA

Upcoming Events

JUNE 10, 2010 (Thur) Chapter Meeting, Stephen Braitman: “Can You Take Me Higher: An Appraiser's Perspective Of Music Memorabilia”

Join us on Thursday, June 10 to learn about the area of appraising music memorabilia! This should be a fascinating and enlightening presentation by our own Stephen Braitman.

The increasing valuations of rare and desirable records, posters, and music memorabilia have caught the attention of major auction houses and Wall Street. Stephen M.H. Braitman will present a snapshot of the music collecting field and some of the appraisal challenges.

You can register now with Jack Young at jack@norcalvaluation.com . Sign up for May and June at the same time!

Membership Matters

By Ray Mattison, RP Director

We welcome Lauren Hickey as a new real property member to the NorCal-SF chapter. Lauren is a candidate for the real property – urban designation. She has been a real estate appraiser for about 6 years, specializing in commercial and industrial properties. A resident of San Francisco, Lauren’s business practice is in Santa Rosa. Welcome Lauren! We hope you will be a frequent attendee at our monthly meetings.

We have several new BV members as well. If you will send me a short notice about your experience, specialty area and your membership degree (Candidate, Accredited Member or Accredited Senior Member) I’d be happy to put it in next month’s Newsletter. If you send a photo, please make it a small jpg, not in a document. (nancy@appraiser.net )

Tech Tips

Find an Appraiser

“I Don’t Come Up on ASA ‘Find an Appraiser!’ ”

If you updated your preference on the new ASA website perhaps you didn’t make the search parameters wide enough.

Try going through the new preferences page again, with this in mind. Sign in . . . . wait a sec . . Click on “members” then “My ASA” then “For Me”. (That’s half the battle, right there!) Then check through what you have chosen before and try to broaden it. I don’t think it is very helpful, however, to list the entire country as your work area. It might be more helpful to widen the geographic search radius.

Especially, check the keywords. It looks like users need to enter a type of property to get a result.

When I searched my own zip code, I got me, an appraiser in New York, one in Florida and one in Michigan. They had obviously stipulated the entire US as their work area.

USPAP Discussion Group

There is a new Linked In group for discussing (and perhaps help to change) USPAP regulations for Sections 7 & 8, Personal Property appraisal. There is considerable interest in this forum from some very qualified appraisers. Check it out and join by clicking http://tinyurl.com/Linked-In-USPAP

Get Published!

Share your experiences with your fellow members. We’d love to publish short articles about courses or appraisal-related events you have attended. Have you had an interesting appraisal experience where you learned something new? Share it with the rest of us. Have you received an award, taught a class, authored an article, book or course? Tell us about it!

We are also looking for material to place on our ASA-NorCal website. If you have material that would be helpful to other members of your discipline, your Discipline Director (below) would be very happy to hear from you. Speaking of Discipline Directors, we still need one for MTS. Call Doug Baxter if you are willing to serve. It’s fun.

Just write it up and email it to me at nancy@appraiser.net. If you have photos, please do not put them into the document—attach them to the email as small jpg’s.

Events Calendar

MAY 2010

· 13^th (Thur) Chapter Meeting, Bill Mulligan: “Alternative Energy Outlook”

JUNE 2010

10^th (Thur) Chapter Meeting, Stephen Braitman: “Can You Take Me Higher: An Appraiser's Perspective Of Music Memorabilia”

JULY 2010

· 8^th (Thur) No chapter meeting

· 26^th-28^th International Conf. Las Vegas

AUGUST 2010

· 12^th (Thur) Chapter meeting, Installation of new officers TBA

· 27^th (Fri) Chapter Retreat

SEPTEMBER 2010

· 9^th (Thur) Annual Meeting/Candidate’s Night

October 2010

14^th (Thur)

November 2010

11^th (Thur)

December 2010

9^th (Thur)

NorCal Officers & Directors

Your Board of Directors serves you, the membership first, and would like to know what needs and issues are most important (or problematic) to you. We seek your cooperation and help in communicating your needs regarding programs, seminars, courses, accreditation, etc. Contact information is on our chapter website at www.ASA-NorCal.org. Thank you.

L to R:, Gil Mitchell, ASA, Treasurer; Robin Erdmann ASA, Past President & Membership, Doug Baxter ASA, President; Bob Lentz, ASA, Vice President; Jack Young ASA, Secretary (not pictured)

L to R: Gil Mitchell ASA, Treasurer; Doug Schnitzer ASA; Nancy Stacy ASA, G&J Director & Newsletter Editor; Robin Erdmann ASA, Past President; Doug Baxter ASA, President; Roger Rapport ASA, PP Director, Bob Lentz ASA, Vice-President; Directors not pictured: John Barnet AM, BV Director

Chapter Officers

Chapter President Douglas S. Baxter ASA (PP)

Chapter Vice President Robert P. Lentz III ASA (BV)

Chapter Secretary Jack Young ASA (MTS)

Chapter Treasurer Gil Mitchell ASA (MTS)

Chapter Past Chair Robin J. Erdmann ASA (RP)

Discipline Directors

Business Valuation John Barnet AM

Gems & Jewelry Nancy Stacy ASA*

Machinery & Technical (Orphan - Need a volunteer Jack Young ASA filling in)

Real Property Ray Mattison ASA

Personal Property Roger Rapport ASA

International Officers

International President Mike Evans ASA

Region 5 Governor Greg Ansel ASA

Anyone interested in being an active participant in the chapter should contact Doug Baxter at DBaxter@hobartappraisals.com and attend a BOD meeting.

Images from the April meeting:

Appreciation plaque presented to BayDelta Maritime letting our ME208 students inspect their tugboat	Matthew C. Dianich, AM: MTS/M&E
James Timmins, ASA: BV





	David Eichner, ASA SoCal President