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GREEN MEDIA'S MOST INFLUENTIAL PEOPLE OF 2011 Kris Kiser The U.S. Congress and the state of Indiana's loss in 2006 became the gain of the Outdoor Power Equipment Institute (OPEI) and the OPE industry in 2007. Inspired by a political upbringing and 20 years in Washington, D.C., Kris Kiser, presi- dent and CEO of OPEI, decided to leave his job as vice president of state and international affairs at the Alliance of Automobile Manufac- turers (AAM) in Washington, D.C., in 2005, and return home to Indiana to run for Congress in 2006. Although the move backfired on him — he was defeated by the incumbent in the primary election — he's been able to draw upon that ex- perience in fighting on OPEI's behalf. "It's something I always wanted to do," said Kiser of running for Congress. "And believe me, you learn lessons you can't get in any classroom. It's very hard, it's very hard. It's a very tough en- vironment nowadays. And today, it's the politics of destruction. It's destroy the other candidate." Given Kiser's upbringing and background, it's easy to see why he was inspired to run for Congress, why he was disillusioned by the process, why he landed on his feet at OPEI, and why he was selected as one of the "Most Influ- ential People in the Green Industry" in 2011. Born in Indianapolis but raised in Seymour, Ind., a small agricultural town just north of Louisville, Ky., Kiser said that he was intro- duced to politics at a very early age. "My folks were very active (politically)," Kiser said. "It was always part of the conversa- tion, very aggressive debates. One of my two sisters actually married a politician. My brother- in-law is a prosecutor in Indiana. So, it's just al- ways been a part of our lives." Kiser was involved in campaigns as a youth, became a deputy registrar at age 18, and worked for politicians while earning his bachelor's de- gree in political science and history from Indi- ana University in Bloomington in 1981. Then, before joining the private sector, he had the great fortune of working nine years for noted international affairs expert and former Con- gressman Lee Hamilton, who represented Indi- ana's ninth district for 35 years before retiring in 1999. Kiser served as a special assistant in Hamilton's personal office and two years as chief administrative staffer with the Joint Eco- nomic Committee during Hamilton's chair- manship of the committee, affording him the opportunity to work his way through law 20 SportsTurf | April 2012 school at the University of Louisville. Kiser and Hamilton have remained in close contact and remain lifelong friends; Hamilton has met with the OPEI Board on two occasions and has even been featured as a speaker at the OPEI annual meeting. "Lee is a very substantial man," said Kiser. "He was a highly respected guy and not a par- tisan. He was a problem solver. He was all about fixing things, and he would work across the aisle. He didn't see color. He didn't see party politics. He was a problem solver. He was a very substantial influence on my life." After his failed run at Congress in 2006, Kiser said that he "fell into" becoming involved in the OPE industry. It started when a member of OPEI — who was familiar with Kiser's work with automakers and knew of his fuel expertise and Capitol Hill experience — informed him that OPEI was looking to expand into public policy by hiring a "Hill person," and encour- aged him to apply. So, Kiser met with Bill Harley, president and CEO of OPEI, and was hired in the newly created position of vice pres- ident, public affairs in August 2007. "It was good timing for me, and it was good timing for (OPEI)," said Kiser, "because the biggest thing that's happening that's going to affect every one of my members is this fuel busi- ness, the change in the fuel, whether it's ethanol or isobutanol or what have you." Since joining OPEI, Kiser has sat at many tables, serving as the chief advocate for the OPE industry before the U.S. Congress and Administration on a wide range of issues re- lated to fuels, emissions, manufacturing, envi- ronment and water, and he has won several battles. He has played an instrumental role in an ongoing battle with the U.S. Environmen- tal Protection Agency (EPA) over its Wa- terSense program, resulting in the EPA's recent removal of a landscape restriction that re- quired only 40 percent of a building's land- scape consist of turfgrass. "I always want OPEI to be relevant. I want OPEI to be at the table," Kiser said. "If you're going to be talking about my industry, or some- thing that affects my industry, whether it's a regulation or a piece of legislation, we need to be at the table. And we need to do the work that earns us a seat at the table, because you have to earn a seat at the table."— Steve Noe Mark Chisholm Mark Chisholm is a third- generation ar- borist with the Aspen Tree Expert Company, Inc., Jackson, N.J.; a three-time winner of the International Society of Arboriculture's (ISA) International Tree Climbing Championship (1997, 2001 and 2010); and a highly sought- after consultant and industry spokesman for the world of arboriculture. He is a regular presenter at industry trade shows; he lectures at Rutgers University, Cornell University and Hofstra Uni- versity; and he performs on-the-job training for professionals around the globe. In addition, Chisholm has a daily influence on others via his industry website, Tree Buzz.com, which he launched in 1999 and now has more than 6,000 members and countless visitors who don't sign up as members. The site averages approximately 5.2 million hits per month. "With every tree, every customer, and every- one I've spoken to about tree care, I have tried to display my most professional image to try to change the perceptions about the industry," he said. "I've always tried to touch them with the idea that I'm going to try to make a difference to the image that's out there, and show them that we're very skilled, we're very well thought out, we're very articulate, we describe what we're doing, we're scientifically based — and I make sure I display that." Stephen Cieslewicz With more than 30 years of industry expe- rience, Stephen Cieslewicz has established him- self as a leading expert in utility vegetation management (UVM). In working with utilities, regulators and service providers around the world, he has been directly involved in the bulk of tree and power line issues of note. Cieslewicz, president and chief consultant at CN Utility Consulting, was a principal UVM investigator for the Joint U.S./Canada Power Systems Outage Task Force, a principal author of all UVM-related reports following the black- out on Aug. 14, 2003, and is currently a mem- ber of the North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC) FAC-003 drafting com- mittees. Cieslewicz has testified as an expert at many significant legal, regulatory and legislative hearings. He is a past president of the Utility Arborist Association (UAA) and a recipient of numerous awards, including the UAA Utility Arborist Award, UAA President's Award, and certificates of appreciation from the U.S. and Canadian governments. "While I am extremely proud of the work I www.sportsturfonline.com