mark foster

Heather,
From what I know (from this site & not seeing your portfolio), you and your husband have many great personal qualities that an employer would LOVE to have (stability, maturity, commitment, eagerness, and “hands-on” field experience–not to mention the “two-for“: him full time and you available for short contract hire stints). U…[Read more]

I like blunt.  If he has “a very small firm”, he will appreciate it.  If you haven’t talked to him in 3 years, he will be annoyed at a coy approach. 

Sure, but I am Design Build– so you will need to have good graphic skills and a CDL!  Ha!

Amen Gene.  How about those of us who started firms with the attitude that we would never treat employees the way we were treated?  I’ll bet there are a lot of us out there.

Ha!  Lee that is hilarious.!  I propose Brother Martin for union president!

I agree–behave!  Don’t make us stop this car….
Apart from the all too real grim realities of (un)employment out there, I just find the idea of an LA union kind of bizarre and funny–especially given the kind of people who are attracted to this profession.   Sort of like cats doing synchronized swimming.  (Caution: the following is intend…[Read more]

Not all D/B firms are set up as “sell or be gone”.

I don’t know if this applies, but I live outside of a small town near a larger city, and I have seen outright hostility to anything which would attract low paying jobs or housing.  Everyone wants all the services and yard work, but they don’t want more of the people doing them to live there, and the local rules are written to keep it that way.

Sounds like crazy talk from people who don’t get out much.  How are they expecting the developer to mitigate it–build subsidized housing for 7 people?
Maybe he/she should put a local job posting up and bring in the long list of the people already living there who would love one of the 7 jobs.  Better yet, bring all of them to the next meeting. 

I may rant, but I don’t feel disgruntled or disenchised.  Far from it.  And that after 30 years. 

“I am beginning to wonder if people posting have ever worked in other fields like retail or even design/build.”
Since when did design/build become another field?

I am neither pro or anti union.  To take Andrews point a bit further–whether we need one or not, I just don’t think it would work in this profession.  3 reasons:
1.  Our profession is intrensically rewarding.  There will always be more people wanting to do it than there are jobs.  In good times this is not as apparant as it is now, but it has al…[Read more]

Great points all.  I am in the “college is long enough, learn the rest in the world” crowd.  However, that doesn’t mean we can’t look at improvements to formal ed. 
Jason’s 3+2 is intriguing.  I will say for myself, I would not have been able to make a decision about the next 2 after 3 in college, but…..interesting idea.  I remember taking the L…[Read more]

If I understand your question, the main concern here is process, which would be project review.    If a project is within the current zoning, eveything is ministerial (sp), and pretty cut and dried–  fair enough.  
But upzoning to a higher density (which is almost an automatic reflex when a developer seeks a new project) requires review, a…[Read more]

Thanks for the imput. Let me expand a bit to try to answer your questions (I always try to be succinct in this forum, and sometimes don’t fully explain).
We live in an area much like Trace’s. We also have a planning process which is a vicious circle–risk averse developers build the same thing over and over and over. They justify this by the mar…[Read more]

Not interested in theory, just need some resources.

Excellent points.
I just had a conversation last night about being “over-plugged in”.  Maybe it’s a generational thing.  I remember a time when it took planning and effort to connect (doesn’t trying to find a pay-phone sound quaint?).  Now it seems it takes the same amount of effort to be left alone!   
Maybe we are in an age where we need to…[Read more]

Well, I am in the land of bourbon.. slush and mud works.

Hey, that’s my house!  I wondered where my giant ice cube was…..

To Henry and Thomas’ points, I don’t look around much at ideation.  I do look for textures, materials, details, construction techniques–especially if it is in a heritage that I am rusty at, or unfamiliar with.  I like to kind of flood myself with the vernacular (much as Jon suggested), but I usually do it after the rough space planning/program is…[Read more]