Spreading the word

Design-Build Institute of America recruiting Wisconsin members

By Sean Ryan
Daily Reporter Staff

Even though the Design-Build Institute of America has more than 900 national members, it's still an infant in Wisconsin, where agents have yet to launch a state chapter.

"Wisconsin right now only has 26 members," said Jack Michler, Wisconsin representative on the DBIA Great Lakes Chapter Board and manager of Waupun-based Westra Construction Inc.'s Design/Build Division. "There are a lot of contractors that don't even know what DBIA is. My ultimate goal would be to get any contractor and subcontractor entity involved in design/build to get involved with the institution."

Michler said DBIA's Great Lakes Chapter, which is based in Chicago and includes Illinois, Indiana, Michigan and Wisconsin, added him to its board Aug. 1 to recruit contractors and encourage them to fund and operate a Wisconsin chapter. He said he's testing the waters and trying to build interest in the Great Lakes Chapter's membership services and its Oct. 4 conference in Chicago.

"As we move forward, I'm hopeful, being fairly new with this, that in 2003 we'll have a lot more to offer," Michler said.

"Eventually, the long-term plan is for the Great Lakes Chapter to take some programs on the road to states that are partners."

Steve Stein, Great Lakes Chapter president, said DBIA's success at the state level hinges on the state Legislature's stance on design/build as well as prominent design/build companies' marketing efforts. He said the chapter isn't even 2 years old, so it will take time to build momentum.

"What drives a lot of our success in the design/build field is the legislative environment and how accepting the Legislature and public agents are to design/build," he said. "Also, how aggressive the companies are. If they're good and they do a good job, then they'll attract more customers."

Helping hand

Hill Burgess, legislative champion for the DBIA Great Lakes Chapter, said he's boning up on Wisconsin's history of design/build legislation so he can help associations or contractors develop new state laws. He said he hasn't started work on Wisconsin legislation yet, but he's been working in Illinois, where most Great Lakes members are based, since the chapter's creation in 1999.

"We're trying to add support to groups that are actually initializing design/build legislation and to add support to groups that are resisting anti-design/build legislation," Burgess said. "What we're doing now is we're not trying to purchase or peddle influence.

We're trying to support the other people who do that."

Burgess said he's helping the Illinois Commission on Intergovernmental Cooperation, a trade industry lobbyist organization based in Springfield, Ill., develop legislation that would allow cities to use design/build on projects. He said he's available to help groups in Illinois and Wisconsin by finding attorneys to draft legislation, providing testimony at committee hearings and advising groups on current laws.

"I talk to them about the existing public procurement legislation in Illinois," Burgess said. "I've been advising them on how to combine those two pieces of legislation and combine them with other states' legislation for a really good piece of public procurement legislation."

Stein said he doubted DBIA would do any lobbying work of its own because most other construction associations already play prominent roles in state government. However, he said he would try to forge partnerships between his chapter and the Wisconsin branches of other builder associations with political influence.

"I think that if they're farsighted, they'll be supportive," Stein said. "We want to be part of the legislative process. I doubt we'll be lobbyists because there's already so many construction-related agencies that have lobbyists."

On the ground floor

Stein said his chapter is working at Purdue University in Indiana to create educational programs to attract college-level students to design/build. He said after making a trial run in Purdue, he would come to Wisconsin and try to give DBIA a place in state universities.

"We have a very nice infrastructure presence with Purdue, so that's our pilot program since we have such good access there," Stein said. "I went to (the University of Wisconsin-Madison), but I was a history major. So what they've got in engineering and construction I don't have a clue anymore, plus that was a long time ago. We've got to figure out how this works."

Michler said that although the national DBIA has a history of legislative and recruitment success, its influence hasn't trickled down into the state arena. He said Wisconsin is one of many states, including Michigan, beginning to foster a DBIA chapter, and there's a long road ahead.

"The long-term intent as the membership grows is for each state to have its own chapter, but our membership is fairly low," Michler said. "But I think at the national standpoint, they are really setting a precedent for the delivery system."

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