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2008 Fall Tour of Homes Magazine!

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Tampa Bay Builders Association
2008 Fall Tour of Homes,
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            This will be the year of getting back to the basics, and involvement with your association is more crucial now than ever.  This will be the year of opportunity, and also of challenge.  Our community has opportunities with the government-planning initiative to move away from the continued suburbanization of Florida, and with the governmental prioritization of alternative means of transportation mobility, as well as regional planning initiatives.   Our industry has opportunities and challenges, including adapting to the present painfully-slow market, the likely impending impact of much tougher government regulation of development patterns and density, stormwater design, water supply, and finally, future limitations on carbon emission and related energy use. 

            Our association has opportunities, and challenges, in now representing all three major counties of our metropolitan area, in adjusting to lower dues and non-dues funding sources, in providing needed member services with a smaller professional staff , and in making a transition from seventeen years of seamless, dedicated service from Joseph Narkiewicz, as executive vice president, to the thoughtful and enthusiastic stewardship of Jennifer Doerfel.  I have had the privilege of knowing, and often working with, Joseph Narkiewicz, for all of those seventeen years, and with Jennifer Doerfel for the three years plus she has been with us.  I cannot imagine two finer individuals for guiding the association to here and now, and for taking the association forward.

            Changes are coming this year for the association.  Change is usually slow in coming, and change is not always right.  We all take comfort from, and have good memories of, our past events, our ways and procedures, and the culture of our organization.  Yet building trade organizations are no exception to the reality that things always do have to change. We really don’t have any option today, any more than do any of our member companies in seeking market efficiency.  You will see changes in the coming months in our committees, our governance structure, meetings and scheduling, the way events are conducted, and the forms and types of events we schedule.  I would like to say that everything we do will work and be successful, yet there will certainly be some results less than ideal, as there always are.

            This is where your involvement with the association is a key to our success.  The more members who participate in a decision, so long as there is an efficient process to follow, the better the decision will be.  I invite your participation, as a member, in everything the association does this year.    If you are not already involved in association leadership, choose a committee to attend and provide guidance.  References to and meeting times of committees are found throughout this publication and on our web site, and cover all areas of association activity.  Our committees will be the initial source and place of discussion for making the best of all the opportunities this year will present, and are charged with making certain that we take advantage of opportunities, not merely react to challenges.  Be a part of our association’s success this year!  We need you, and your industry and business will glean the benefits!