Metro Gold Awards Honor Compliant Industrial Users

On June 19, Metro Water Recovery hosted the 2024 Gold & Platinum Award ceremony. This ceremony has been hosted by Metro since 1992 to formally recognize Industrial Users who have met all their pretreatment requirements and demonstrated a commitment to environmental excellence. This year, six companies were recognized.

Metro’s Industrial Pretreatment Program (IPP) team members work alongside businesses that discharge to our connectors. The Environmental Sampling Team (EST) which is part of the Quality Assurance and Sampling Division (QASD), collects the samples to support IPP. The QASD also evaluates the analytical results from Authority Monitoring (the sampling events Metro conducts) for Quality Assurance and Quality Control, before passing the final results to our team. IPP then evaluates the results, which passed QA/QC for compliance with the industry’s discharge Permit. For those in violation, action is taken (14 companies faced significant non-compliance in 2024), but those that met compliance were rewarded by Metro. The companies honored were given awards by Metro Board Chair Sarah Niyork and Metro Chief Executive Officer Mickey Conway.

“Getting recognized for perfect compliance is something that’s not celebrated in the news, so most people don’t get to hear about your efforts. Today you can take pride in all the hard work you’ve done,” encouraged Niyork during her opening speech.

This year, Metro recognized five companies that reached Gold Status, which is presented to Industrial Users that had a full year of 100 percent compliance with our pretreatment program, and one company was honored with the Platinum Award for five consecutive years of Gold Award status.

Metro Chief Technical Officer, Sherman Papke, served as this year’s guest speaker. In his address, Papke praised Metro’s pretreatment team as well as the award winners. “It’s important that we cooperate as a regional provider,” explained Papke. “It’s also important that you all do your job to be compliant to protect the environment.”

For first-time winners Kärcher North America, it was an exciting accomplishment to be recognized. “It means a lot to us,” reflected Daniel Kurrie, Sustainability Engineer. “We care about efficiency and doing the right thing for the environment.”

The sentiment was similar for the Lowry Landfill Superfund Site, which got recognized this year with Platinum status. “We knew we got Gold a few times and were happy to see that we earned platinum status this time,” exclaimed Manuela Seewald who serves as a Project Manager with Lowry Landfill. Seewald continues, “we’ve been very proactive and we’ve been able to take care of unexpected surprises because of that.”. Lowry Landfill Environmental Technician Mike Gelwick agreed with Seewald, adding that attention to detail is a must for their team to reach this level of recognition.

For Metro Industrial Pretreatment Manager Jack Mirabile, the Gold Awards presents an opportunity to showcase the team’s strengths. “Since taking on the responsibility of organizing the Gold Awards in 2020, I’ve had the privilege of working closely with the Board Chair, Metro CEO, and industry representatives, including their leadership teams. Through these interactions, I can confidently say that everyone involved in the program demonstrates a strong commitment to environmental excellence and a shared passion for responsible stewardship in delivering clean water for future generations. Every award recipient has expressed that achieving 100% compliance isn’t easy, but they understand the significance of our collective goals and the critical role they each play in making them a reality.”

With 2025 now surpassing the halfway point, next year’s Gold Award hopefuls are in the home stretch, and if all goes to plan, they will be recognized next summer.