Practice Management Member Conversations

This message has been cross posted to the following Discussion Forums: Committee on the Environment and Practice Management Member Conversations .
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The AIA's participation in the development of the International Green Construction Code (IgCC) has revealed two distinct areas for examination and action. The first is the technical side, the content of the code, and just how green the new green minimum will be. The other aspect, one that may elicit the most passionate response by architects to the new code, is the professional practice side of the equation. What happens when we take what has been essentially a best-practices approach to design and turn it into the minimum requirement for every project for every practicing architect? While the technical content will be battled out among the myriad of industry stakeholders (including the AIA) that already engage in the code development process, perhaps even more important are the potential legal and practice related pitfalls.

When public version 2 is released by the ICC in a little over two weeks, AIA will be combing through the text, which incorporates changes made by the Public Comment Committee's dispositions during the first public hearing, but there are a number of important issues that we can already start examining in detail in preparation for the second version.  They include, but are not limited to: 

• the role of the design professional in responsible charge in the code
• potential standard of care changes
• additional responsibility, risk and liability
• expanding the notion of health, safety and welfare to incorporate 'green' principles

There are others big-picture items  to be identified, (please do so in this discussion!) as well as a number of detailed analyses to be done.  This forum is intended for discussion of these items.

Link to the report from the first public hearing:

http://www.iccsafe.org/cs/IGCC/Documents/PublicComments0810/IGCC2010ROH.pdf? 
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Jessyca Henderson AIA
Director of Sustainability Advocacy
The American Institute of Architects
Baltimore MD
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It is great for the AIA to get involved with the qualtiy of buildings,the environment and building codes, however, one of the biggest problems that most small ot mid-size firms are facing is that Owners are cutting out the Architect from almost all CA Phase work.  In fact, many local building departments are touting the fact that there is no need for an Owner to pay the architect or engineer for any CA Phase work since the local building department is already doing said work.  Contractor, Design/Build work is doing the same.  Hence, no matter what is specified or indicated in the Construction Documents, most of us do not have a clue of what is actually built.

Most state licensing laws require the architect of record to perform on-site reviews.  However, this part of the law is seldom enforced.  The name Arhcitect is, I believed, mentioned two (2) times in the IBC codes; once in the definition section and the other in the table of contents.
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David Hauseman AIA
The Hauseman Group, Inc.
Atlanta GA
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