Success Stories
Before I accepted the presidency of AIA/Houston, I set as a personal goal of my tenure to inspire, identify, attract, and enable emerging talent to realize the full potential of creative individuals leading the AIA. The basic notion that I have operated under is that if we can inspire our committee members to be creative in the way that they serve the organization, which is in reality the profession, and provide them support within an atmosphere where they can enjoy the rewards of their efforts, they will excel, and excel they have.
Before I tell you about some of the successes, I want to reiterate the recurring message of my previous letters: we can mature as an organization by getting mentally and physically younger. We need to enable emerging talent to realize their potential.
Now I will share with you examples of our successes. AIA/ Houston won the Chapter of the Year Award, Associate Level, the highest award given by the AIA National Associates Committee to an AIA chapter for the development of superb programming for fostering the highest qualities of leadership within the Associate membership. Two of our young bright stars Lonnie Hoogeboom, AIA and Ronda Wang, AIA, and two intern architects Peter Newton, Assoc. AIA and Meredith McCree, Assoc. AIA were largely responsible for wining this award. They are the leaders of the Intern Associate Committee that created among other things the Intern Advocate Group, which brings intern and architect representatives from each firm together to explore mentoring/training ideas for the benefit of professional growth of interns.
Brian Malarkey, AIA, the chair of the Environment Committee, and Christina Graham, Assoc. AIA are another example of emerging leadership and talent. They are leading the effort of AIA/ Houston's alliance with the US Green Building Council. They recently organized a hugely successful (attended by over 140 people) "Getting to Green" seminar on LEED certification of green buildings designed to reduce environmental impacts, minimize construction resource use, and create healthier productive environments. Several states, cities, and federal agencies already require LEED certification on architectural projects. These two have taken on the mission of educating us on the green building movement that is here to stay.
Early last year, the Board of Directors and the Urban Design Committee decided that there is a myriad of planning and urban design issues in Houston that needed our attention, so we decided to explore the possibility of having a R/UDAT (Regional/Urban Design Assistant Team) in 2002. A R/UDAT process happens when a local government or community organization recognizes a local planning problem and asks the national AIA for help. The AIA responds by fielding a team of volunteer experts, assembled nationally, to work with that community. After hundreds, possibly thousands of hours spent by many of our members, veteran James Vick, AIA and newcomer David Robinson, AIA have emerged as the leaders of the effort. After numerous meetings with leaders from the community, business, government and other interested groups, we decided to tackle the lack of a comprehensive housing policy in the city of Houston. We have had tremendous success in obtaining endorsement and support for the R/UDAT and are in the process of finalizing the steering committee to be chaired by Council Member Gordon Quan. More on this later.
On a smaller scale, we have initiated an AIA Small Firm Roundtable for firms with less than 10 employees who wish to pool their intellectual and practical resources. This is another creative initiative that was conceived by young architect Michael Morton, AIA. The participants meet twice a month, the second meeting being a "happy hour" at members' offices. The group and topics of discussion are growing. It looks like another success story.
Rey de la Reza, FAIA
