AIA Central Valley Endorses CORA Initative on AIA National Convention Agenda

by Bruce Monighan, AIA
AIACV Vice President/President Elect

Background
On March 25th there was an open meeting to discuss the CORA position paper and what action if any the Chapter should take on it.

The present condition of the Cora initiative is that the AIA National has accepted a resolution directly derived from the language of their current statement, and it will be presented on the floor of the convention in front of approximately 350 to 400 credentialed delegates. An AIA Architect representing CORA will present a two-minute introduction, the resolution will be read by the chairman/parliamentarian/secretary of the meeting, and again the CORA representative will give a two-minute overview and statement of purpose.

According to CORA there has been direct discussion between the AIA governing committee that accepts these types of resolutions and apparently it is perhaps the only one in the last decade that is welled up from AIA members as opposed from specific committees/chapters. The AIA has been supportive and thoughtful in its efforts to make the presentation as positive as possible. They offered no amendments to the language as they thought the points addressed were both valid and had constituencies that supported them.

At our group discussion it was felt the 8 action items were worthy of continued discussion in a national dialog and that they generally represented the concerns the members and leaders of this Chapter have had for some time. One of the earlier problematic issues was that this was a treatise on the inclusion of residential work as protected under the Practice Act. While that discussion is still open it has become clear in our view that residential construction is incredibly important in our vision of sustainable development, that residential design has a great impact on people’s health and well being and perhaps it is time that we address the potential positive and negative impacts of residential design.

AIA Central Valley Board of Directions motion

“The Central Valley Chapter of the AIA recognizing that certain organizations and institutions may be negatively impacting the process of becoming an architect, the definition of “architect” and the practice of architecture, and that it is time to open a national discussion on who and what best serves our needs as professionals so that we can better serve the public. Further that the value of design related to residential structures has been traditionally undervalued and that in light of the need to have better designed, more sustainable residential structures we should open that discussion as to qualifications for their design. Therefore the Central Valley Chapter of the AIA endorses the CORA initiative and supports its placement on the agenda at the AIA National Convention.”

Want to learn more? Click here to visit the CORA website.