OLIP had the pleasure of meeting with Jeannette Chau, Manager of the Government Liaison Program at the Professional Engineers of Ontario (PEO), and Howard Brown, President of Brown and Cohen. It was a joy to meet with two OLIP partners to talk about how PEO works to expand the interests of Ontario’s regulatory body for professional engineers.
PEO was founded a hundred years ago to ensure high standards for Ontario’s professional engineers, an objective which directly benefits Ontarians through the safety and effectiveness of the built environment around us. PEO also takes in complaints and provides a disciplinary process for Ontario’s professional engineers.
One of the most fascinating projects that PEO facilitates is the Government Liaison Program. PEO wants to ensure that engineers from all over the province have their voices heard, and that Ontario’s elected officials hear from engineers across the province. Considering this, they have introduced the GLP program to ensure that PEO has a representative from all 124 ridings in Ontario to provide a local perspective on issues.
Along with this, PEO releases the GLP Weekly Times to share the accomplishments of GLP representatives and encourage engineers to get involved in the political process. PEO works hard on this task; engineers have a lot to offer to the public policy sector but can often feel discouraged from doing so.
As we enjoyed lunch with Ms. Chau and Mr. Brown, we shared our OLIP research paper findings and generally discussed some of the things we have learned over the last ten months. This reflective discussion was much appreciated given our time in OLIP is coming to an end.
Thank you to Ms. Chau and Mr. Brown for the wonderful lunch and for your support of OLIP!