[bob.wolff68]

I think your enc.GetDistance() was likely executed BEFORE RobotInit() if it was part of the class definition or otherwise misplaced. Make sure your code that utilizes WPILib classes does not execute before RobotInit(). I think it's safe to 'new' class objects in the constructor of your Robot(), but making calls like GetDistance can't be done before RobotInit() because there are other initialization items that WPI does which happen behind the scenes.