The Washington Building Industry Association or BIAW is part of Washington State 501 (c) a non-profit organization established in 1966 to represent the housing industry in Washington state of interest governments to regulate trade they. BIAW membership consists of approximately 7,735 member companies, home builders, trade contractors, suppliers and industry professionals.
Video Building Industry Association of Washington
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BIAW is the third largest state association affiliated with the National Association of Home Builders. BIAW wants lower taxes and fewer regulations, especially those that are environmentally friendly. The Association wants to be a counterweight to unions and their allies who have helped keep the governor's office in the hands of Democrats since the 1984 election.
Maps Building Industry Association of Washington
Leadership
- Bob Johnson, President
- Monty Smith, First Vice President
- Kevin Kartak, Second Vice President
- Dave Main, Treasurer
- Patrick Hayes, Secretary
- Palace of Art, Executive Vice President
Funding
The main source of BIAW's political money is the Retrospective Program of the Ministry of Labor and Industry, known as Return on Industrial Insurance Program or Retro. Through Retro, participating companies can recover some of their workers' compensation compensation if they are able to reduce the level of injury and lower related claims costs. Of the 40's Retro programs in the state, BIAW has the largest. Retro Group BIAW has about 1,600 member companies. BIAW collects 20 percent of the state-provided compensation benefits, of which ten percent goes to BIAW and ten percent goes to local associations. This means about $ 3-4 million of refunds in each of the last few years. In 2009, computer programming errors revealed that resulted in the Department of L & amp; I returned $ 10 million to $ 15 million more per year than they should have done in the past fifteen years.
BIAW-MSC was established to manage Retro programs. BIAW Member Services Corporation (BIAW-MSC) is a wholly owned subsidiary of BIAW profits established in 1993. BIAW-MSC also sells insurance and runs educational programs.
Campaign Financing
In 2008, BIAW contributed to Dino Rossi for the governor. Over $ 7 million provided by BIAW is spent on advertising. Rossi's main contributor is BIAW.
The group also spent considerable time in 2006 in an effort to overthrow Supreme Court Justice Gerry Alexander. BIAW spent almost $ 1 million on the main campaign. The ads say John Groen will do a better job of protecting "our constitutional rights to a limited, open and accountable government." TV commercials depicting Judge Alexander as a judge too old for the job were bought out by the group. In 2004, over $ 500,000 was spent on independent advertising by BIAW to assist Dino Rossi. Rob McKenna, now Attorney General, receives over $ 415,000 from "It's Time for Change", one of the PAC BIAW. BIAW gave $ 150,000 for the campaign of their former lawyer, Jim Johnson, run for State Supreme Court. District Court Judge Richard Sanders received $ 35,000 from BIAW.
While BIAW has contributed to Republican candidates, Democratic candidates have also received BIAW contributions, including the Governor of Lt. Brad Owen, state auditor Brian Sonntag, Rep. Deb Wallace, Rep. Marko Liias, Rep. Christine Rolfes, Rep., Al O 'Brien, Rep. Pat Sullivan, Rep. Fred Jarrett, Rep. Judy Clibborn, Rep. Deb Eddy, Rep. Ross Hunter, Rep. Liz Loomis, Rep. Larry Springer, Senator Mary Margaret Haugen, Senator James Hargrove, and Rep. Dave Quall.
BIAW uses PAC to fund various campaigns. BIAW has several PACs. Washington's Affordable Housing Council, "Time to Change" and "Walking for Washington". The same legal contact information appears for all PAC BIAW.
BIAW also provides funds to local affiliates such as the Association of King's Builders and County Snohomish, and the Home Builders Association in County Kitsap.
Legal challenge
In 2008 a letter to Attorney General Rob McKenna and three county prosecutors accused BIAW of collecting $ 3.5 million in illegal secret funds for a campaign to defeat Democratic Gov. Christine Gregoire. He also claimed that the builders' associations failed to register properly as "political committees" or report where the money came from. The allegations come from a group led by two former Irish Supreme Court judges and Robert Utter. The group said it would sue if government lawyers do not take action against the BIAW and two local builders associations. PDC researchers dismissed claims that BIAW acts as a PAC. PDC found evidence that BIAW-MSC incorrectly concealed its role in bundling around $ 585,000 in compensation workers' compensation for donations to the BIAW's political arm. McKenna filed a lawsuit against the King's Expert Builders Association and County Snohomish and a second lawsuit against BIAW-MSC, a subsidiary of BIAW. High Court Judge King County Paris Kallas asked Rossi to testify about his personal involvement in the house-building fundraising campaign a few days before the 2008 election. Rossi did not remember details about his relationship with BIAW and declared the suit a "false complaint by political actors".
Legislative and political agenda
Household protection law
The BIAW said it was against the rules that add additional costs to the home. Damon Doyle, former president of the Washington Building Industry Association, said: "Builders are not against collateral, builders are against vast, vague and unintentional mandatory warranties." "We have to be careful of consumers who are obliged to get a 30-year mortgage," said Rep. Brendan Williams, D-Olympia.
The industry association opposes HB 1391. The law will mandate a guarantee for all new residences. BIAW says there is no insurance product available to cover the builders and that the bill prohibits anyone choosing to ignore the implied warranty of eligibility, providing only a new and easier way to sue builders.
Washington is the sixth country to refuse the mandatory use of fire sprayers in all new home construction, which has been proposed by the ICC. SBBC (State Building Code Council) found that the cost of fire sprinklers in new homes will be from $ 1.50 to $ 8.50 per sq ft.
Land use rules
BIAW opposes linking Climate Change with growth legislation. BIAW opposes the critical area (CAO). In Thurston County BIAW et al. v. WWGMHB (West Washington Management Development Board) et al., Court agrees with BIAW.
Environmental rules
According to an article in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, BIAW is Washington's largest lobby of climate change and open space law. After the bombing of the Washington University Urban Horticultural Center by the Earth Liberation Front, was classified as the top domestic "terror threat" in the United States by the Federal Bureau of Investigation in March 2001, the BIAW bulletin said: The older people in the main enviro groups are silent -suddenly praised this new and new approach: If you build it, we'll burn it. This is the next natural step in the environmental movement.
Worker protection
In 2003, BIAW runs a signature drive for I-841 to revoke the state's ergonomic regulations and examines the Director of the Department of Labor and Industry to make further ergonomic rules. The initiative also promised voters that the lifting of ergonomic regulations would "help create jobs and hire Washington people." According to the Kitsap Peninsula Business Journal, experts predict compliance with ergonomics rules will cost the business $ 725 million for the first year alone. At that time, Washington was the only state with ergonomic rules. In an opposing opinion article, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer argues that "Initiative 841 overrides the public's right to safety, the normal process of government and state power.Rather than adjusting the ergonomic rules adopted by the State Department of Labor and Industries, voters to bulldoze additional protections against repeated injuries. "BIAW and its members spend more than $ 1 million on this initiative. They outperformed the union opposed to two on one. Yakima Herald-Republic supports this initiative.
Right to work
In 2005, BIAW considered sponsoring the "right to work" initiative. Unions look at "rights-to-work" initiatives as a barrier to unions and deport the Democratic Party. BIAW VP VP McCabe said the group wanted to do something dramatic to counter recent attempts at the Democratic-controlled Legislature that would take millions of dollars bribes from the association and wipe out much of its political influence. According to the AFL-CIO, the BIAW has "repeatedly threatened to file a work-rights initiative and freely acknowledges their efforts will be retaliation for workers' advocacy on unrelated employee compensation issues." Labor Council president Rick Bender said if the rights-to-work act (from BIAW) makes it to the ballot, union members will "apply" to defeat him. Bender sees such actions as businesses that declare war on their workers.
New home impact cost
In 2005, BIAW lobbied for excise taxes to replace the so-called "impact costs" that local governments assessed in new construction.
Retro Reform
BIAW lobbied against SB 6035. The bill requires groups participating in the Retro program to report how they spend the money paid by employers. It passes the Senate with a narrow margin of 25-24. Republicans say the bill is an attack on freedom of speech and that Retro groups should be able to use the money back as intended. Democrats say that the bill is intended to bring transparency to the system in the light of computer coding errors that harm countless countries millions in the overly large refunds to Retro ponds.
Workman Computing
In 2010, after the Democrat-led legislature refused to reform a single state-run payer compensation system in Washington, BIAW launched the I-1082 voting initiative to allow private insurance companies to compete with the state monopoly system.
References
Source of the article : Wikipedia
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