Letter from the President

Advocate!

By STEPHANIE GRAVES, CAPS, CAM, IROP, 2023 HAA President

DO YOU KNOW HOW HAA WAS FOUNDED, OR THE LEGACY IT WAS MEANT TO LEAVE BEHIND? OUR MEMBERS SHOULD NOT FORGET A KEY PART THAT MADE OUR ASSOCIATION WHAT IT IS TODAY – A MEMBERSHIP ORGANIZATION FOUNDED ON LEGISLATIVE ISSUES AND ADVOCACY.

The other day I was thinking about how the Houston Apartment Association was started because of legislative issues that a group of prominent apartment property owners were having. This group of Houstonians, which included industry icons such as Harry Reed, Lester Prokop and Bill Dinerstein, met at Kelly’s on South Main to discuss a City Hall problem dealing with sewers, bad checks and evictions. This group was the catalyst for a series of events that would eventually lead to the founding of HAA in efforts to protect their rights with the city. And a few years after the formation of the association, HAA’s Political Action Committee, known then as the HAA Better Government Fund, was created to start a legacy HAA would be proud of in 100 years. And a few years later, our first women president was named. You can hear more about Eileen Subinsky and her industry journey starting on Page 46.

So, the Houston Apartment Association has been around for a long time, and to keep it here for much longer we must keep that catalyst going. It’s so important to understand where we come from and what this association is about, and not forgetting those key people and key things that have held the legacy amidst the growth and changes we have seen. As we move forward, and slowly pass the torch to new generations, we need to instill what we were first rooted in, who laid the foundation for the association and what made us successful, so we are always moving forward.

Over the last 10 years, we have seen a shift in membership where suppliers and management organizations are more and more prevalent in what we’re doing at HAA, which is great! While suppliers do play a key role, we must have a happy medium of owners involved in our association as well. Ironically, as I was visiting with Eileen Subinsky and learning more about her journey, my thoughts were reiterated with her comments regarding owner and developer involvement in HAA. She, too, from her legacy point of view, is concerned about the balance shifting. As we look in the direction of where the organization is going, it is the ownership members that need to speak to our political leaders about what needs to happen in legislation, so we can continue to protect the rights our founders created this association for. That balance will help us curate a strong organization that will stand the test of time and that would make our founders who sat at that café in 1959 proud!

So what can we do for HAA? Well, Ambassadors has done an amazing job of building membership of supplier partners; I challenge owners and management teams to set targets of ownership involvement and to rebalance the membership and ensure a solid future and focus for the association. When we focus on getting more ownership involvement, we honor the principles of HAA, as well as ensure supplier members can connect and build this organization to its full potential. Let’s be the catalyst that they will still be talking about in 50 years!