BILD – A Thirteen Year Retrospective

On Tuesday evening at the BILD Chairman's Dinner attended by over 500 guests, I was honoured to receive the Chair's Award of Merit from the current Chairman, Paul Golini of Empire Communities.  The award is given to a member who has shown dedication and made significant contributions to the Association over the years.  It was indeed a very special night for me.

It has been my pleasure to serve on the BILD (formerly GTHBA) Executive and Board of Directors since 1999.  BILD is an outstanding association, successfully representing its members with the media, to the public and to the government, both defending their interests whilst ensuring that consumers' rights are enhanced and safeguarded.

Over the past 15 years, I have seen tremendous changes in the industry and our association.  Our membership has grown from 970 members to almost 1,400 members.  BILD is now recognized by all levels of government as a significant force, well beyond its mandate of representing GTA builders.  The GTA represents over 50% of new home sales in Ontario and 25% of new home sales in Canada.  All levels of government respect and give credence to our positions when presented.

We have had an array of outstanding Presidents over my tenure on the Executive, both men and women, who have devoted their time selflessly on behalf of our industry.  There have been many memorable moments over the last 13 years.  In the late 90's, BILD was instrumental in the passing of provincial legislation which prohibits strikes for more than 6 weeks in the residential construction industry, and only once every 3 years.  In 1998, without that legislation, industry strikes wreaked havoc for consumers and builders. 

The growth of consumer protectionism from Tarion has been a significant factor with residential builders over the last 10 years.  I have witnessed Tarion taking on a much more consumer protection agency role, well beyond the original building warranty insurance/surety role it was set up for.  New home consumers have the best warranty and other legal protections in the world.  Ontario has become a leader in addressing residential new home consumer rights and the industry has adapted to the Tarion requirements and worked with Tarion to implement them.

The merger of GTHBA, the builders association, and UDI, the land development association in 2006 was a milestone.  The merger represented the evolution of the building industry whereby most major builders are now integrated and cover both land development and house/condominium building.  It was only natural that there should be one voice for this one land development/building industry, and it is now BILD.  I was proud to assist the Association and Desi Auciello, our President at the time to implement this merger, along with the hard work of our late CEO and President, Stephen Dupuis. 

I have witnessed the crises in the industry involving continuing the government restrictions on land development by way of greenbelt legislation and places to grow legislation.  I have seen the ever increasing amount of taxes including the dreaded HST imposed on new homes to the point where a new home could have in excess of $100,000.00 of built-in taxes.  One of the biggest challenges facing the industry and the government is how do we make homes affordable when there is no land for development, thereby increasing land costs and ever-increasing taxes which impose a huge chunk of cost on the purchase price.  BILD successfully lobbied the province in March 2009 to amend the HST legislation to allow for the eligibility of the $400,000.00 threshold rebate to apply to all homes and not only those sold for $400,000.00 or less.  A huge victory!

The Association has defended the interests of its members in many legislative and legal challenges.  The most recent victory was the OMB Decision of the Orangeville development charges case which upheld the existing, more conservative interpretation of population growth that has served as the accepted basis for the calculation of development charges, and as a result, there have been significant reductions of the increases in development charges that were otherwise going to be imposed pursuant to a new and more liberal interpretation being espoused by certain municipalities. 

The most memorable experience of all has been the fact that for the last 13 years, I had the honour and privilege of working with Stephen Dupuis, our late CEO and President.  I watched him grow in his abilities and stature in representing the industry.  A better representative for BILD, I cannot imagine.  His elevation in 2006 to CEO and President was well deserved.  His foresight, his humor and ability to "herd the cats" and yet retain the respect of both developers and politicians was unparalleled.  I will miss him deeply and only hope that we can find a replacement that can come close to what he brought to the table.

I look forward to continuing my long association with BILD.