Executive Vice President's message

Executive Vice President’s message

I hope everyone had a wonderful and safe holiday season. Frankly, however, I couldn’t be more excited to see the calendar turn and start the new year. While our industry successfully navigated many challenges in 2021—an anti-housing governor and Legislature; unprecedented supply-chain delays; skyrocketing increases in materials costs; labor shortages; and the continued pandemic—to thrive, I am hopeful we’ll begin to see improvements in 2022.

One reason I am confident is that BIAW once again has outstanding leadership in 2022. Building upon the exemplar senior officers who successfully guided the organization through the pandemic the past two years, this year’s officers, led by 2022 President Joseph Irons, are engaged and focused on serving our members.

Legislative session

While I am optimistic about 2022 in general, unfortunately, I can’t say I have much hope regarding the Legislature, in particular. The 60- day legislative session opened on Jan. 10. The BIAW advocacy team, led by Government Affairs Director Jan Himebaugh, is offering bills to reform permit deadlines and increase the exposure for careers in residential construction in schools.

BIAW’s policy goals are simple: promote or oppose legislation to ensure more Washington residents have access to homes they can afford. Like last year, much of BIAW’s time will be spent on killing anti-housing legislation from legislators in the majority, proposals that only increase the cost of housing for everyone.

The Legislature has also made the disappointing decision to proceed with a virtual session once again. Like last session, lawmakers will greatly limit the public’s access to them and ability to participate in the legislative process. So, it is more important than ever that BIAW members engage and participate on legislation critical to our industry. Please follow the weekly email updates in the Lawmaker Review and sign up to testify or just support or oppose bills as they move through the legislative process. It’s important for voices from our industry to be heard!

BIAW’s new service provides you access to contracts

BIAW will be launching a terrific new service on Mar. 1, one that many members have inquired about for the past few years—access to contracts that can be customized for use in their businesses. The two-year subscription, available only to BIAW builder members for a reasonable fee, will give subscribers access to nine of the most common and requested contracts for builders and remodelers, along with written instructions and video training on how to use each template. For a sneak peek of the construction contracts hub, attend the BIAW winter board meeting in Olympia.

Winter board meeting

Join us as we host our first meeting of 2022—Feb. 21-23 at the Olympia Hotel at Capitol Lake (formerly Hotel RL). I hope to see you all there!