Can you hear me now?

More of the same from the LLR and AIA. After a statewide email to the AIA/SC Board Members, the response from our AIA/SC president was prompt, courteous and useless. My request, in a nutshell, was for communication between the LLR and the state's architects to be 2-way instead of the "I'll tell you what we are doing" method. Her answer? I'll tell you what Dennis Ward said in our next newsletter. Not "Good idea, I'll give you a call to see what we can put together." But the same old - don't call us, we'll call you.

As the board members polish off their resumes with respectable positions in our state and professional groups, they thrive on meaningless issues while the architectural profession slowly becomes irrelevant. They are content wondering about recycled materials and alternative energy and have let basic public safety become compromised.

So far this year, AIA/SC claimed statewide support from architects for a "tort reform" measure to make ignoring the building code acceptable. No vote was ever taken. The president then flew to Florida to the National AIA convention to discuss why non-architects should not be Regional Directors of the AIA. Why this was ever considered, I'll never know.

The LLR punished more architects with thousands of dollars in fines for not recording continuing education activities. Meanwhile they imposed no fines on people practicing architecture without a license. The LLR continues to send Jan Simpson (not an architect) to represent our profession at national meetings. We can't find one architect to represent architects in our state?

As I've mentioned before, Jan stated the the LLR Board is definitely not "pro architect". When I last presented my request for better communications to the LLR Board, Jan said that the architects in Virginia were kicking and screaming when they passed the mandatory continuing education law. What Jan saw as "kicking and screaming" were actually legitimate comments from the architects in that state. Since Jan thinks that architects' comments are not worth anything, better communication with the LLR may be impossible. If she was a practicing architect, maybe she would understand what I was talking about. I cannot support sending this woman to represent me at national meetings. No architect can.

I'm going to try again and get this ball rolling. The state cannot continue to make laws that affect us without some sort of dialogue and accountability. The AIA cannot sleepily go along with everything. Oh, and congratulations LLR, for finally allowing electronic seals on drawings instead of rubber stamps. I've been putting electronic seals on drawings since 1985. You're 25 years late.