Newsletter Spring 2007
Included Articles:
- Grassroots – Helping Legislators Help Us
- Grassroots – My First Time
- Planning and Implementing a Successful Design Charette
- Pennsylvania’s Top Six Buildings
- Allied Member News: O’Donnell & Naccarato
Grassroots – Helping Legislators Help Us
Jim Spinola, AIA, CSI, AIA Pennsylvania Board Member
After a several year hiatus, I had the opportunity to once again represent the Chapter to our elected officials in Washington, DC. As State Legislative Chair for the chapter, it was agreed to have me attend our national lobbying effort to foster continuity between our state and federal legislative agendas.
Living in the Pocono’s and working in the Lehigh Valley affords me the opportunity to address several of our legislators as a “constituent”. Years past, Congressman Paul Kanjorski (D-11) has been overly gracious in receiving our Pennsylvania contingent. I always enjoyed our 45+ minute discussions while sitting on his stuffed leather sofa. This year, a last minute meeting called the Congressman away after just brief introductions. We did meet and discuss issues with his legislative assistant. This is by no means a setback for our organization. What many people don’t realize is that these legislative assistants are the “clearing house” for our legislators. Meeting with them is sometimes better than meeting with the actual legislator since the assistants research, digest, prioritize and present the eventual issues to the legislators. I also had the opportunity to meet with Congressman Tim Holden (D-17) and Congressman Charlie Dent’s (R-15) legislative assistant.
This years priority issues on the federal level were:
Federal Building Energy Efficiency
Sustainable Design and Water Quality
Energy Efficient Commercial Building Tax Deduction
Rather than going into detail on these topics, I encourage all our members to visit www.aia.org’s legislative advocacy pages to learn detailed information about these issues.
What I will offer is some advice: It is important to get involved with the legislative process. Laws regarding the built environment affect our taxes, our quality of life and our client’s decisions on whether to build or renovate. As our PAC grows and as we continue to develop face-to-face relationships with our legislators, our voice is being heard in Washington and Harrisburg.
We go to Washington, not with our hands out like some lobbyists, but to offer ourselves as resources to our legislators. We are the “expert witnesses” of the profession and stewards of the built environment. By reminding our legislators of this, they will become more and more receptive to our ideas and solutions. We can help shape the future of our communities!
John Arthur Young, AIA, President-Elect
AIA National Grassroots Conference 2007 was a great experience, clearly making my AIA Eastern Pennsylvania Chapter ‘officer tour of duty’ worth the effort. AIA National Grassroots Conference offers great food, great accommodations, great fellowship, and an up close and personal inside look at the DC political scene. Kicking off AIA’s 150th anniversary year events, Grassroots 2007 got underway Wednesday, February 7th at the Grand Hyatt Hotel in Washington, DC. AIA Eastern Pennsylvania Chapter was well represented with five attendees (John Hill, Sylvia Deye, Gene Berg, Jim Spinola and John Young) representing AIA leadership at the local and state levels.
On Thursday, advocacy day on Capitol Hill, the five AIA Eastern Pennsylvania architects, our fellow chapter architects and the state component Executive Director leaned headlong into cold and biting wind for our walk to Capitol Hill. We attended scheduled meetings with Pennsylvania’s (19) nineteen congressional representatives, advocating for three federal legislative issues related to energy efficiency and sustainable design. Eastern PA’s intrepid group of architects met with Joseph Pitts, Jim Gerlach, Paul Kanjorski, Tim Holden and Charles Dent. While some of the representatives delegated their staff aids to meet with us others sat with us face to face and listened as we laid out the basics of the (3) three energy related topics AIA membership is advocating. Joseph Pitts stepped out of the Committee on Energy and Commerce meeting (ala West Wing style) to discuss the virtues of sustainable design, energy conservation and reduction of our nation’s dependency on foreign energy supplies. Our message was not to simply tell our politicians what they can do for us, but rather to offer that “PA’s architects are available and waiting to help…….do not hesitate to call any of us anytime”.
This year the Pennsylvania group of architects achieved the goal of bringing our issues before the Pennsylvania congressional delegation. The value of the personal contacts made, and the continued relationship building with our elected officials and their staffs, is what will keep AIA’s positions in the forefront. Every voice counts – please make yours heard when AIA Advocacy e-mails you to contact your representative or senator on an upcoming vote.
Attending AIA National Grassroots Conference is an experience you should not miss making the AIA Eastern Pennsylvania Chapter ‘officer tour of duty’ highly recommended to all young emerging architects. Thank you, AIA Eastern Pennsylvania Chapter, for sending me as your representative.
Planning and Implementing a Successful Design Charette
Gene Berg, Jr., AIA, President
A successful public design charette begins by building relationships, public interest, and public trust: by establishing a network of “political capital.” Develop a steering committee to ask the question, “Who are the representatives of the local community?” These representatives might be government agencies, politicians, landowners, developers, stakeholders, and residents. Ask these representatives which projects your group can address in a community design format. Broaden your base of expertise by involving your Allied Members, Landscape Architects, and Civil Engineers. Identify AIA members in your chapter with connections to local key players, and take advantage of these liaisons.
The voices of local leadership, familiar to local residents, will have more impact in attracting the attention of the local community. Use their media connections and political capital to motivate the surrounding community. For example, address the public through the mayor’s local public television program. Introduce them to your design issue, capture their interest, motivate their involvement, and invite them to your charette events.
Develop a public component to the project that generates a level of “Community Ownership.” Document ideas belonging to the local residents and key players during public meetings and then repeat these ideas back to the public at the next meeting. This reinforces the value of the public’s involvement and further motivates their participation. Engage in techniques to involve everyone in the community: Provide a Spanish-speaking translator. During open houses, debates, town meetings, workshops, or a design charette, open the floor for general questions with a roving microphone session. During the design charette, seat the community at tables of 8 to 12 people. Introduce the design problem, furnish block plans, aerial photos, streetscape photographs, scratch paper, and markers. Architects might be surprised by the public’s graphic literacy and valuable design input.
Consider these questions: Are there principles for human interactions? Are architects neutrals or advocates? Is an engaged public a threat to designers? Is there an obligation to “de-mystify” design?
Finally, a successful design charette changes the public image of the American Architect, dissolving the misconception of architects as egotists residing in ivory towers. Civic leaders and the community in general will acknowledge the architectural community as a true resource. Architects and the community will forge relationships for future projects, initiatives, and research. Architects will educate and implant important issues into the minds of the public, such as principles of livable communities and issues of sustainable architectural design. Achieve these goals, bolster the public image of the architectural profession, and bridge the gulf between concept and reality.
Pennsylvania’s Top Six Buildings
During Grassroots February 7-9, AIA announced the results of the Harris Poll of “America’s Favorite Architecture.” Check out Pennsylvania’s six buildings that made the list and listen to a web cast of the announcement by Chris McEntee, AIA Executive Vice President / CEO, Rep. Earl Blumenauer, D-OR and RK Stewart, AIA, AIA President at www.aia150.org. The voters were the public, not architects. These buildings will make up an exhibit which will be unveiled during Architecture Week at AIA in Washington, DC, and it will also be at the National Convention. The Wall Street Journal covered the story on February 7, “In the Eye of the Beholder: Public, Designers at Odds on What's a Beautiful Building.”
Dennis V. Mordan, PE, SECB
Promoted to Principal at O’Donnell & Naccarato
O’Donnell & Naccarato, a Philadelphia-based consulting structural engineering, parking consultation and project management firm, is pleased to announce Dennis Mordan as Principal in the firm. Having begun his career as a structural engineer in 1988, Mr. Mordan has been an employee of O’Donnell & Naccarato, Inc. (O&N) for more than 17 years.
Mr. Mordan was promoted to Project Executive in 1998, where he oversaw the design of many projects including healthcare facilities, commercial structures, educational buildings and more. One notable project was Teknion Corporation’s U.S. headquarters, located in Mt. Laurel, NJ, a 4-year, 92,000 SF project with unique structural features such as conical turrets, irregular angles, as well as a glass cylindrical tower containing four circular conference rooms. Mr. Mordan also managed the structural design of The National, a major residential complex located in Old City, Philadelphia. This project incorporated 134,000 square feet of residences in three new hi-rises, loft-style buildings and the adaptation of a four-story commercial building for residential use and related structured parking areas. The Moravian is another notable project on Dennis Mordan’s resume. Located above the historic Old Original Bookbinder’s restaurant in Philadelphia, PA, this new seven-story, 54,000 SF condominium complex involved a retrofit of several historic buildings, construction of a new, connected residential tower and sensitive restoration of a historic façade.
Most recently, Mr. Mordan was promoted to Director of Engineering Operations in 2005. As Director of Engineering Operations, Mr. Mordan expanded his responsibilities to include managing, supporting and assessing the organization’s needs, as well as designing, implementing and evaluating programs and procedures that facilitate efficiency, client service and the professional development and continuous learning of O&N project teams.
Mr. Mordan joins Principals Nick Cinalli, PE, SECB; Anthony Naccarato, PE, SECB; Mark Lunden, PE, SECB; and Margaret Hart in leading O’Donnell & Naccarato into the future. Nick Cinalli, President & CEO of O&N comments, “I am personally very excited about Dennis’ transition to Principal here at O&N. I have worked with Dennis for the past 17 years and have watched him grow into a well-respected member of the engineering community. We are fortunate to welcome him on the management team that will continue to lead O&N into new directions.”
O’Donnell & Naccarato finalized its ownership transition in 2004. The ownership of O’Donnell & Naccarato was legally turned over to the current Principals, as well as every employee by way of a partial Employee Stock Ownership Plan (ESOP). The firm has thrived under this new ownership, unifying every employee-owner in the firm, generating a shared sense of responsibility and pride in the workplace. Previous to the transition, the firm had been owned by the two founding Principals, Bill O’Donnell and Pete Naccarato. Dennis Mordan’s new role as Principal will include growing O’Donnell and Naccarato’s expanded scope in its four main divisions: Structural Engineering, Project Management, Parking Consultation and Façade Restoration. These departments operate within four offices located in Philadelphia, PA, Princeton, NJ, Lehigh Valley, PA, Washington DC and with affiliates in West Palm Beach and Orlando, FL.
Mr. Mordan graduated from Villanova University in 1988 with a Bachelor of Science degree in civil engineering with a concentration in structural engineering. He is certified in the practice of structural engineering through the Structural Engineering Certification Board (SECB) and is a registered Professional Engineer. His work has been honored with awards from many prestigious organizations, including the Delaware Valley Chapter of the American Concrete Institute, Concrete Construction Committee of Philadelphia, Villanova University and more. Dennis Mordan maintains professional affiliations with the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE), Delaware Valley Association of Structural Engineers (DVASE), Chi Epsilon Civil Engineering Honor Society and the Villanova Engineering Alumni Association. He lives in Bensalem, Pennsylvania and has a son, Tristen, age 8.
O’Donnell & Naccarato, a 120-member firm, provides consulting structural engineering and professional project management services. For more than 50 years the firm has been recognized among owners, architects, developers and contractors as an engineering and project management organization committed to professionalism and excellence. In O’Donnell & Naccarato, clients find a partner who can accurately evaluate situations and deliver innovative and cost-effective solutions. Headquartered in Philadelphia, PA, it has offices in Bethlehem, PA; Princeton, NJ; Washington, DC; West Palm Beach, FL; and Orlando, FL.
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