Words, Is There A Better Way To Use Them? From 35 Years Of NEPA Writing

Presented by: John Irving, Retired INL 

John started his ‘NEPA’ career as an individual contributor for the discipline of aquatic ecology … anything dealing with streams, rivers, lakes, and reservoirs. Most of his time was spent reviewing the work and data of other professionals and making statements of potential impacts on those ecosystems. The choice of words and phrases to describe the proposed action, affected environment, environmental consequences were often obscure and confusing … written for government agency personnel or a college professor. John ended his career as a ‘document manager’, the person responsible for preparing the document – from project concept, through scoping, draft, and final phases. He was responsible for making sure that the document was well written, made sense, and that the decision makers and the public could understand. Along the way he became obsessed over ‘words’ and ‘phrases’ that drove him to develop a list of ‘pet peeves’ that he is sure drove contributors crazy. We all have them … pet peeves … words or phrases that we don’t like or try never to use. Join the webinar to see some of John’s and what he does to eliminate or substitute them. Remember ... language is important, clear language is even more important, clear and simple language is most important.

The presentation will be available the morning of the webinar. John will send other tools and documents to registrants after the webinar is over.

'Words, Is There A Better Way To Use Them?'

Webinar login information will be sent upon registration. This presentation is free to Idaho AEP members.