Our annual “State of the Industry” issue publishes during an important time in history. With financial uncertainty in a turbulent global market, and in light of a change in U.S. presidential administrations, experts in the pump industry still find reason for optimism and approach current economic challenges as business opportunities.

Even though the optimism is a bit gentle, our expert “Executive Insights” panel of top industry leaders is particularly candid this year and provides a detailed analysis of trends, issues and strategies for 2009. Read the entire report beginning on page 24 of the January issue and let us know your thoughts.

Meanwhile, an issue that will certainly be discussed during 2009 is the stimulus package proposals in response to President-elect Obama's goal of creating 2.5 million jobs by 2011.

The U.S. Conference of Mayors released a report on December 8 (the same week we went to press with this issue of P&S) listing 11,391 “ready-to-go” infrastructure projects in 427 cities in search of economic stimulus funding. “Ready-to-go” in this report means implementing the projects quickly in 2009 with a goal of completing them in 2010.

This 803-page report documents 2,536 water and wastewater projects valued at $15.4 billion for a total of 133,193 jobs.

In the coming months, there will be much water-cooler conversation within our industry about this topic, and Pumps & Systems will be covering it in print and online. We would like to hear from you about this as we anticipate much debate.

Happy New Year!