Horace Mann Elementary School - 2004 Design Award Winner - Architect Moore Ruble Yudell Architects and Planners
The AIACC believes that as a consequence of external budgetary pressures and as a result of its limited role as overseer in the development of K-12 schools, the Division of the State Architect (DSA) has never been in greater danger of either having its current functions diminished or the office as we know it completely eliminated.
Many, if not most of us, have taken for granted the role of the State Architect and have assumed that the person in that position was serving as a trusted advisor to the Governor and the Legislature on all things related to the design and construction industry. This may have been true in the past but it is certainly not the current situation, and we fear the dialogue may be absolved further.
As much as we believe in the importance and need for an architectural voice within state government, we also recognize the power of design to transform and the value of design to deal with our state’s current challenges. Design has the inherent ability to solve problems that are not only physical but also social and economic. Without direct internal access to government decision makers we cannot bring the transformations taking place in our practices to the greater community. Transformations such as new delivery methods that are more efficient and cost effective, designs that go beyond sustainable, and post occupancy evaluation tools that inform future designs regarding both building and human performance to name a few.
In response to these concerns, the Council has brought together our profession’s thought leaders to help research and inform the future of the DSA. This has culminated in the following whitepaper: Maximizing California’s Resources: Recommendations for a Stronger Design and Construction Industry. This paper presents a “comprehensive vision” with specific recommendations toward building a stronger DSA, and furthering the role and relevancy of our State Architect in California government. The whitepaper offers some important suggestions that if considered and implemented could make a marked difference in the quality and cost effectiveness of planning, design, and construction services for future state funded and supported projects – and in many ways the future of the profession itself.
Do you agree with this vision?
Consolidation of the State’s construction related functions under the Division of the State Architect as a single agency responsible for policy and planning of the built environment, oversight of the design and construction industry, and leadership in environmental sustainability.
We hope that this will be the beginning of a dialogue and not the end of an era; please feel free participate by soliciting your comments below.
Camino Nuevo High School - 2007 Design Award Winner - Architect Daly Genik
rene cardinaux aia
Our State has seen an overzealous buraucracy making it more complicated and burdensom to get permits even for the simplest of jobs. Remodeling a kitchen and adding a bedroom to a residence can be turned into a requirement to change all the windows, add complex structural upgrades and mechanical and electrical upgrades. Sure this is all worthwhile, but how many projects never start because of the conditions that will be imposed.
As practicing architects who hasn’t studied all the ADA Standards to remodel some public restrooms, but just to be sure we must take expensive classes to satisfy our requirements to renew our license. I have been doing this for so long that I could teach these classes myself except for the fact that the codes constantly change despite the fact that disabilities don’t.
Certainly our profession changes as technology improves, but instead of using it to improve our designs, we are striving to comply with all the codes and regulations and the exact dimension of a toilet stall. Certainly a builder has to know how to deal with lead paint and asbestos, and he must also worry about safety for his workmen, but his primary job is to build not untie all the red tape required to get a permit.
I will be the first to agree that all this added burden has some beneficial aspects but just how much work is simply not done because it costs $525 per square foot instead of the fewer dollars it could be if we allowed the industry to police itself. Having a License to practice or to build should carry a burden to comply with all codes, but the codes should be easily understood and applied without as much red tape.
I sincerely agree that the State Architect’s role should be enlarged to oversee the Construction industry within the State in a manner that aids progress by working with all the members of the construction and take the local politics out of getting a permit..
Sharon Toji
I would be the first to agree that there is way too much red tape involved in design and construction. However, I don’t think that the ADA should be blamed. I won’t go into all the details, but we do have to add huge paper costs to everything we do in what I think are foolish ways that do not increase honesty, certainly don’t reduce waste, and do nothing to improve product.
As to ADA codes changing — the fact is that those of us who were involved in writing the “new” ADA codes that just were approved (Sept 15, 2010) and will not become legally enforceable until March 15, 2012, please understand that we wrote them in 1998. They have been bounced around politically ever since then. There have been a few changes in the state codes, but most of it has just been to clarify sections that appeared to be unclear, or to bring sections in line with the federal guidelines of 1991.
As for people with disabilities not changing, actually, human dimensions have changed. People have gotten bigger, on the whole — both disabled and not. But the other factor is that the original codes based on federal standards were not all that well researched. and they weren’t based on very much real world experience. There had been little emphasis on disabled access in the past, so the idea was to get some architectural elements out there and see how they functioned. The ADA Guidelines that were first put into the built environment in 1992 were the first opportunity to see a larger number of people with disabilities using ramps, door hardware, signs, etc. It’s been 18 years, so it seems high time to put some of our experience into action.
As far as the DSA is concerned, it stopped being relevant some time ago. The regional offices are still functioning after a fashion, and there are a couple of hardy soles in Sacramento still trying to hold down the fort, but it has become a sham organization, for the most part.
What a shame! In the past, when I went to Washington, I was proud of coming from California. We were always in the forefront. Not, it’s an embarrassment,
Retta
There is a critical shortage of infromtaive articles like this.
jim goring
Hurray Rene!
I too applaud the effort to broaden DSA’s role or at least its vision. Yes – lets have the state architect concerned with architecture and sustainability.
But most architects know DSA as the guardian (or speed bump) of public school construction in the state due to the Field Act and similar legislation passed pretty much every time we get an earthquake. The redundant and byzantine bureaucracy enforced in painful rigor and glacial pace by DSA has added millions upon millions of dollars to the costs of K-12 schools and community colleges throughout the state. Every jurisdiction in the state has a building department that does this work, or can contract with an enclosing district, and schools will NOT be any less safe. Look at our private K-12 schools, UC campuses, universities, sports stadiums, churches, theaters. These are reviewed and permitted by local jurisdictions (or in the case of UC, by itself!). This is a fantastic opportunity where the right and left in the state house can come together in Sacramento and scratch out, or deeply transform, an office that really does not need to exist.
jim goring
oh.. and I forgot. Really, lets see if we can eliminate the catch 22 in public school design we all marvel at – you must be familiar with the DSA process in order to get a school job.. and go through said process. If you design a durable high functioning attractive campus – eh..
chris lovin
The problem of moving review of public schools to the local building departments is that you then subject them to the tedious, long winded, politically minded design review process. Good luck meeting a tight timeline when your mired in design review process that’s pitting multiple, single minded interest groups against each other.