Society of Plastics Engineers – Color and Appearance Division (CAD)
In 2005, our CAD RETEC® conference was scheduled to be held in New Orleans, Louisiana in mid-September. On August 29th New Orleans was slammed by Hurricane Katrina, one of five most deadly hurricanes in the history of the United States. At least 1,800 people perished and more than $80 billion in damages to property was caused by Hurricane Katrina.
Due to the failure of the levee system surrounding New Orleans, 80% of the city was flooded. Though no trivial matter in that short a timeframe ,we were able to shift the conference to Charlotte, North Carolina at the last minute and hold a successful event with 440 attendees (better than 95% retention of the original pre-registrants) and 62 tabletop exhibits.
While CAD RETEC® recovered from displacement, tens of thousands of homes in New Orleans were flooded or destroyed and hundreds of thousands of New Orleans’ citizens were displaced. In recognition of this tragedy, the CAD Board of Directors voted to donate 25% of the net proceeds from the 2005 CAD RETEC® Conference to one of the charities helping in the disaster recovery. It was ultimately decided that the donation be made to Habitat for Humanity for their efforts in the construction of new housing for the people of New Orleans.
Since then CAD has continued the tradition of giving back to our conference city by donating the proceeds from the annual CAD RETEC® 5K Fun Walk/Run to the Habitat for Humanity Chapter in the city where the CAD RETEC® is held. For every person who signs up fo the Fun Run/Walk, CAD matches their Fun Run/Walk registration fees to double the amount donated to Habitat for Humanity.
Our goal is to have more and more CAD RETEC® attendees participate in the Fun Run/Walk each year to support Habitat for Humanity and to support living a healthy lifestyle.
Since 2005, SPE CAD has helped raise $40,694.44
| Event | Recipient | Donation |
|---|---|---|
| 2005 CAD RETEC® | New Orleans | $19,077.76 |
| 2006 CAD RETEC® | Cincinnati | $130.00 |
| 2006 BOD Pledge | Cincinnati | $130.00 |
| 2007 CAD RETEC® | San Antonio | $1000.00 |
| 2008 CAD RETEC® | Detroit | $800.00 |
| 2009 CAD RETEC® | Savannah | $520.00 |
| 2010 CAD RETEC® | Nashville | $1200.00 |
| 2011 CAD RETEC® | Lombard | $1,130.00 |
| 2012 CAD RETEC® | Louisville | $1,603.68 |
| 2013 CAD RETEC® | Baltimore | $1,480.00 |
| 2014 CAD RETEC® |
New Orleans
|
$2,500.00 |
| 2015 CAD RETEC® | Indianapolis | $1,880.00 |
| 2016 CAD RETEC® |
Ponte Vedra
|
$1,840.00 |
| 2017 CAD RETEC® | Milwaukee | $1,560.00 |
| 2018 CAD RETEC® | Charleston | $1080.00 |
| 2019 CAD RETEC® | Cleveland | $1330.00 |
| 2020 CAD RETEC® |
Virtual (Orlando)
|
$700.00 |
| 2021 CAD RETEC® | Atlanta | $1583.19 |
| 2022 CAD RETEC® | Orlando | $1150.00 |
| 2023 CAD RETEC® | Columbus | $1430.00 |
