Nexstar dedicates new Frank J. Blau Jr. training center

The center is named after Contractors 2000 co-founder, contractor and former PM columnist Frank J. Blau Jr.

Nexstar Network — founded in 1992 as Contractors 2000 — dedicated its new 6,891-sq.-ft. training center in St. Paul, Minn., Dec. 3. The center — named after Contractors 2000 co-founder, contractor and former PM columnist Frank J. Blau Jr.— includes rooms with state-of-the-art training pods, meeting rooms, a video studio and break room.

The space includes 6,653 sq. ft. for further expansion, including office space for staff. The best practices group intends to move its headquarters, executives and support staff to the training center once the lease on its current office in Little Canada, Minn., expires.

A reunion of Nexstar executives: Current Nexstar CEO Jack Tester (standing) and former executives (left to right) Marla Coffin, Frank J. Blau Jr. and Greg Niemi.Photo caption: Kelly Faloon/Plumbing & Mechanical

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Kelly Faloon was a former editor of Plumbing & Mechanical as well as the BNP Media Plumbing Group’s Integrated Content Development Specialist. She also was a former editor of the Radiant Comfort Guide the Radiant & Hydronics Report — both official publications of the Radiant Professionals Alliance — and twice-monthly Radiant & Hydronics eNews, an enewsletter for anyone interested in the world of heating with hot water.

Her editorial specialties included women in plumbing, recruiting for the trades, green construction techniques, water conservation, water treatment, hydronic heating, radiant heating and cooling, snow melt, solar thermal and geothermal.

After a 3½-year stint at sister publication Supply House Times, Faloon joined the PM staff in December 2001 as senior editor. She was named PM’s managing editor in 2006 and editor in 2013.

Previously, she spent nearly 10 years at CCH, a publishing firm specializing in business and tax law, where she wore many hats — proofreader, writer/editor for a daily tax publication, and Internal Revenue Code editor.

A native of Michigan’s northern Lower Peninsula, Faloon is a 1986 journalism graduate of Michigan State University.