"We're not environmentalists": Corporation for Environmental Management looks for solutions that make business sense.

David W. Hogue and Pamela Harvey Hogue own Corporation for Environmental Management, but say they're not environmentalists.

Aren't they concerned about the environment? Absolutely. Doesn't their business work to identify environmental problems and find solutions? Positively.

But are they "environmentalists" in the radical sense? In a word, no.

"We'd be among the first to admit that the explosion of environmental regulations is not necessarily a good thing," David says. "We think environmental regulations should be in place if they can have an identifiable and clear impact on a real environmental concern. We have seen environmental regulations come down the pike just because some particular special-interest group has been hollering. We want to help our clients comply and stay out of trouble, but we want them to do that in as cost-efficient a manner as possible. Because if a company goes broke trying to comply with environmental regulations, what good does that do anyone?"

Since the Hogues founded CEM four years ago out of their Indianapolis home, David says they've learned to appreciate even more the challenges faced by other business owners - and that helps them develop environmental solutions that make business sense.

It's that mentality that led them to adopt the slogan, "We are not environmentalists." "We took a bit of a chance with that ad campaign, because admittedly we could have offended some people with it," David says. "But at the same time, we wanted to make the point very clearly that while individuals within this company certainly can support any environmental issue they want, this company is not here to support an environmental agenda."

Today the Hogues' company has eight full-time staff members and two support people, plus a regional network of specialists. CEM's services include industrial hygiene, indoor-air-quality investigations, environmental-regulatory compliance audits, environmental site assessments, subsurface investigations, asbestos and lead services, hazard-communication programs, environmental training and environmental data management.

And it all came about because of two T's familiar in the business world: a transfer and a takeover.

The Hogues were working for an Atlanta firm when they met in the late 1980s. Pamela was an industrial-hygiene graduate of Indiana University; David, a geologist, was a graduate of Cleveland State University. Yes, that's the same Cleveland State that knocked off IU in the NCAA basketball playoffs in 1986, a fact Hoosier fans have reminded David of many times.

"That's probably the only thing the Cleveland State Vikings ever did of note on the basketball court," David chuckles.

Just when their relationship was getting serious, the company offered David a serious opportunity - branch manager at a new Indianapolis office. Pamela's Hoosier ties sparked their interest. He took the position, and she returned to work in environmental health and safety at Indiana University-Purdue University at Indianapolis, where she had worked before moving to Atlanta.

But shortly after the Hogues made that big change, they were confronted with another. The Atlanta company was bought out. The new parent firm had plans to fold the Indianapolis operation into its existing regional office in Cincinnati. Since his and Pamela's two fields - geology and industrial hygiene - encompass many areas of environmental management, they began to think seriously about starting their own firm.

"We sat down one night with a bottle of wine and talked about it, and incorporated a week later," David recalls.

So in October 1990, the Corporation for Environmental Management was born. When CEM started, David Hogue ran it out of a spare bedroom in the couple's house in the Irvington section of Indianapolis, while Pamela kept her job at IUPUI.

CEM focused first in the field of asbestos, an area in which David had worked extensively. That work gave him name recognition with Indiana firms, and many of those clients still needed services.

Asbestos management has evolved greatly. For example, whereas in years past the preferred solution was always to remove asbestos, David says it sometimes can be integrated successfully into renovation projects. "We've become a fairly sophisticated asbestos-consulting firm," David says. "We help them manage their asbestos, and asbestos removal is just one of the management options they have. So we haven't evolved out of asbestos. We still do quite a bit of asbestos work, but we do it on a high-tech end."

Asbestos work helped CEM land two major clients in its first six months: Eli Lilly & Co. and the Indianapolis Public Schools. Soon thereafter the firm added Indiana State University to its client list, and Corporation for Environmental Management moved out of the Hogues' back bedroom and into an Indianapolis office.

CEM steadily expanded its services and slowly added to its staff. The first additional employee was added in the spring of 1991. Ironically, it wasn't Pamela, who was still working days at IUPUI and nights helping the family firm. She didn't join full-time until January 1992, when it made sense because of the business volume.

"We started the company in a recession, which is a difficult thing to do, but what it focused us to do was to think lean in everything we did," David recalls. "Don't get extravagant, don't get carried away with costs. And we carry that philosophy with us to this day."

Right now, two services are becoming big growth areas for CEM: managing the data required to comply with environmental laws, and testing for and dealing with lead.

Data management is growing as rapidly as the myriad of forms required by the myriad of environmental regulations. CEM can manage a company's data for those forms and/or teach the company to manage the information itself. CEM also serves its clients as an information disseminator. The Hogues have their company's computers plugged into the Internet. This allows them to download new regulations almost as soon as they're posted by regulatory agencies, and get the word out quickly to their clients. It's a mixture of marketing and prudence.

"If we can stay one step ahead of OSHA in getting our clients covered and trained, and get the programs initiated, then OSHA is a lot less likely to pick on them," Pamela says. "They'll pick on the people who don't even know about the regulations."

While data management is an emerging new field, lead is an old environmental problem gaining renewed attention. New regulations now supplement existing Housing and Urban Development rules for houses with lead paint. There also are new regulations proposed for the training and certification of workers involved in the control of lead hazards, and proposed new disclosure requirements pertaining to lead problems.

The Hogues prefer to stay neutral in the political fray, but are aware of the shifting winds of politics. As to when, how much, and, more importantly, if those changes will affect environmental regulations, they're taking a wait-and-see approach.

"Certainly a major rollback in regulations would impact the way we do business and, potentially, the markets we serve," David says. But, "I don't think anyone believes that the major regulations out there - which have a firm foundation in science and are there to deal with known problems that affect humans or the environment - are going to disappear."

Instead, he believes Congress will focus more on lightening the paperwork load and making it easier to manage environmental problems. And he wouldn't mind seeing the regulators change a few rules he sees as counterproductive.

Take radon gas, a known carcinogen. Neither the Environmental Protection Agency nor the Indiana Department of Health currently require businesses to test for radon, David says. But if businesses do decide to test, the results of the tests must be reported to the state - and bad results could bring an inspection. Naturally, businesses shy from radon tests.

"If you want to entice organizations to deal with an environmental concern like radon," David says, "the way to do that is to set up a support system to allow them to do it as cost-effectively and with as much knowledge as possible."

David concludes: "We're here to help corporations and other entities deal with regulations. But we approach it from a fiscal end, and a technical and a protection end, and we think that's somewhat unique."