Comment

Comment by Deborah Frankhouser, IALD, LC on May 29, 2009 at 9:32am

Agreed. Sounds like the next big blog topic??! :)

Comment by Richard Cadena on May 28, 2009 at 6:37pm

Wise words indeed Deborah. I'm spent from juggling this and closing the June issue of PLSN and to be honest the thought of writing a thank you letter to the legislators never crossed my mind. Thanks for the great suggestion. And this is not over by any means. The next step is to help shape the new legislation to properly define who a lighting designer is and who is not. This is a great opportunity to keep anyone from coming in off the street and representing themselves as a lighting designer. Let's embrace it!

Comment by Deborah Frankhouser, IALD, LC on May 28, 2009 at 4:38pm

As you have seen below and from the IALD report, the lighting design language will be
removed from the bill completely. This is technically unofficial, but it comes
from a committement from Averitt's office to the IALD directly along with several others that their office has contacted.

What we must do now:

EVERYONE who called and complained, must now write a thank you letter
congratluating these representatives and senators for taking the time to
understand this issue and do the right thing. Also, PLEASE CEASE to call their
offices unless it is to say thank you.

Please take extra time to thank Rep. Wayne Smith for enduring a firestorm that
he did not create and for helping to do what needed to be done.

Special thanks also needs to be sent to John Martin at IALD (john@iald.org) and
othe IALD staff for being the voice and advocate for all of us over the last few
days.

Also special thanks to Charles Thompson, AIA (ckt@archillume.com) for
discovering this in the first place. Without his alerting John, this would have
been passed right under our noses.

Thanks to blog sites Jimonlight.com, Dark Texas on Facebook, and
prolightingspace.com for their continual coverage of the issue.

And finally thanks to EVERYONE who called, wrote, and otherwise spent time and
energy on this issue. Turns out we do matter and every single person's
participation was critical to this turn out.

Congratulations everyone,
Deborah Frankhouser, IALD, and now, officially, Lighting Designer in the state
of Texas once again.

Comment by Richard Cadena on May 28, 2009 at 4:31pm

VICTORY! Just got a call from Senator Averitt's office saying he will pull the language about lighting designers from the bill and recommend an interim study to address the situation. The study might be done by the Texas Department of Licensing & Regulations or by a business & commerce committee. They said they received a lot of calls, some of which were hostile, but what convinced Senator Averitt were the people who came in and presented logical arguments. One of those people was Robert Mokry, who I ran into while I was sitting in the waiting room of Senator Averitt's office. After both he and I met with a representative individually, we went to lunch. Mokry's point of view was that it is not a safety issue b/c there aren't lots of fires due to poor lighting design. He suggested that there is already a licensing agency, the IALD, and that they should work with them to license architectural LDs in Texas. I suggested to the representative that they should distinguish between theatrical and architectural LDs.

Thank you to everyone who helped make this happen, especially Deborah Frankhouser, who first alerted me to the issue. Great work.

Comment by Nook Schoenfeld on May 28, 2009 at 2:37pm

Lighting Designers calling up govt representatives and being rude certainly will not help this problem.
From the looks of all this I'm getting the idea that some architectural LD failed to complete some lighting installation they had been paid for and this guy has a sore spot for people in our profession. Unfortunately the trickle down has gone to the extreme. Thanx to Richard and Deb for looking into a way to defuse this before it becomes a huge issue.

Comment by Richard Cadena on May 28, 2009 at 1:17pm

I'm writing this from the hallway at the state Capitol. Just spoke to a source off the record and the bill is in committee. It will go to a vote probably on Monday. They are aware of the issues and they will discuss. I made some suggestions in an effort to remedy the situation. I'll be in touch with the process as it develops.

Comment by Deborah Frankhouser, IALD, LC on May 28, 2009 at 11:48am

Greetings again,

Our effort to gather folks has been very successful and there is a conference meeting scheduled between Rep Smith’s office, Senator Avaritt’s office and possibly the governor’s office. They will be discussing altering or removing the language.

I have spoken with the public relations rep for the IALD, John Martin, and he feels it is very important at this point to back off and let them try to get it fixed. Rep. Smith DID NOT write the language pertaining to the lighting, but because he authored the original bill, his office has been overwhelmed with calls and some of them have apparently become rude. John is worried this will have a backlash on our efforts.

Please forward this information to folks and ask everyone to sit tight and quiet Rep Smith’s phones for awhile. They understand the issues and are attempting to fix the situation.

Thanks for everyone’s effort. It appears at this point to have been very effective and we want it to have a positive ending.
Deborah

Comment by Deborah Frankhouser, IALD, LC on May 27, 2009 at 2:47pm

Also, Yahoo group site is set up. The link hasn't been working very well, but here it is...http://groups.yahoo.com/group/NOHB2649/

If you want to sign up, and the link doesn't work, email me at deborah@fourpointlighting.com and I will send you an invitation.

Thanks,
Deborah

Comment by Richard Cadena on May 27, 2009 at 1:08pm

This just passed in the Senate today (Wednesday). Now it goes to the House tomorrow. Please call and register your opposition NOW!!!
Wayne Smith 512. 463.0733
Bob Deuell 512.463.0122
Kip Averitt 512.463.0102

Comment by Deborah Frankhouser, IALD, LC on May 27, 2009 at 12:44pm

The history behind this is as follows: There has been a long standing debate about the role of Engineers vs. Architects. This bill was originally written to establish the role of engineers in certain areas (foundation work). It is my understanding that these bills, defining this bill has been endorsed by their respective groups. (For architects that is the Texas Society of Architects) The original House Bill did not contain any language regarding lighting.

HOWEVER, Senator Kip Averitt received a complaint from presumably a donor type constituent who said a Lighting Designer was paid to do some work and ran off with his money. All of the sudden, this language appeared. It was clearly done with no knowledge or our industry or that even professional lighting designers exist. (regardless of their project types) It went through Committee May 23rd and came up for vote May 27th. It was so fast and under the radar that no one has had time to even react. There is also some rumor (and it is just that) that this senator was warned about the ramifications of this language and actively chose to ignore it.

This is very serious and threatens a lot of people's livelihoods. I am getting emails from IALD members, IES members, vendors/sales, and I am speaking with USITT who has notified USA829. Because of all of the people involved, I have proposed starting a Yahoo site to try to manage all of the info flying around. If/when I get it up (and I hope today) I will invite anyone to join who is interested in this issue.

Thanks,
Deb

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