New York’s Governor squashes interior design title act

I could write alot about this issue but it would be similar to what the Interior Design Protection Council had to say, so why bother?

Click on link above or  below, no matter, it takes you to the same IDPC newsletter on the veto of an interior design title act for New York state.

http://archive.constantcontact.com/fs060/1102107213116/archive/1102183032390.html

Hey, ASID,  our nation’s economy is in the toilet.  Why not use your members money wisely and forget about trying to pass legislation that nobody wants, and nobody needs.

Florida cracks down on Hirsch Bedner & Associates!?!?!??

[read comments below]

I recently learned the Florida Board of Architecture and Interior Design contracts with the law firm of Smith, Thompson, Shaw & Manausa, P.A., to provide investigative and prosecutorial services to the Board.

The law firm provides these services for both licensed and unlicensed interior designers (and architects). So who have they “caught” practicing interior design lately? None other than Hirsch Bedner & Associates the internationally famous hotel design firm.

Yep, the Florida Board has caught themselves a pretty big fish…..Florida’s practice act is nasty…business owners and large corporations apparently are now being forced to hire only licensed Florida interior designers to design their hotels (or those designers will be breaking the law.) Someone needs to challenge this stupid law. This is America … anyone should be able to hire any interior designer they want to.

Hirsch Bedner & Associates

Howard Pharr

Case No. 2007-068978

Probable cause was found that Hirsch Bedner & Associates of Atlanta, Georgia, is not licensed to practice interior design in Florida and contracted to provide interior design services on a commercial project. Further, Hirsch Bedner & Associates is offering these services without a certificate of authorization. An Administrative Complaint seeking fines will be filed and a Notice and Order to Cease and Desist will be issued.

Scroll down this page to find the Hirsch Bedner entry

More disciplinary cases here

ASID’s Licensing Spin is Dizzying

[read comments below]

There’s an article written by Rita Carson Guest, FASID called “A Goal of Licensure, not Limitation” in Interiors and Sources Magazine. It is a masterpiece of smoothly written nonsense masked to take in and win over unwitting practitioners.

For example – - -read it slowly . . .

“We are asking that those practitioners who can provide evidence that they meet the necessary requirements ­similar requirements demanded of other professionals ­be permitted to provide certain services, which they are trained and qualified to perform.”

I say: WHAT SERVICES are interior designers currently denied from providing? The answer is NONE. As long as they are actually providing interior design services and not architecture, engineering or building contracting, interior designers are free as birds to provide interior design services, no license needed.

Rita also wrote:

“To those who say to us, “Why do you need a law for interior designers?” we say, interior design is already regulated de facto. The law is there to protect the health, safety and welfare of the public, and we support that. But those laws are preventing interior designers from fully practicing their profession. We simply want states to grant interior design professionals who meet the necessary qualifications to be permitted to offer their services. We want to loosen the restriction on interior design professionals, not add a new one.”

I say: WHAT LAWS say that interior designers cannot fully practice? WHAT RESTRICTIONS need loosening? Again, the answer is NONE. Unless Rita is referring to those restrictive interior designer laws that ASID has already supported that currently shuts out other designers !

Rita, you do not need a heavy handed state license scheme to make interior designers accountable and responsible. California interior designer law already proves this. If your argument was a canoe, it would be at the bottom of the lake, it’s so full of holes.

as always, COMMENTS WELCOME!

Why do you belong to ASID, IIDA, NKBA, IDS, IFDA, etc..etc..?

[read comments below]

I’m an independent interior designer. I could get qualified to belong to ASID and IIDA as I know I could pass the NCIDQ, I have the experience and education. But I choose to not belong, just as many thousands of doctors choose to not belong to the AMA, as many thousands of architects choose to not belong to the AIA.
Lets just say that I embrace my inner misfit. Its what I like best about myself and historically misfits have changed the course of the world.

I once asked a good friend who is Allied ASID: Why do you belong? She said for ASID’s insurance and the initials. I asked her why she never took the NCIDQ. She said “I’m successful already and clients have never asked me if I took an exam”.

This is a legitimate inquiry: why do you belong to a design organization?

“Designing Freedom”, tea parties, strategies, the beat goes on. . .

[read comments below]

Good reading from the IDPC (Interior Design Protection Council) , July 1, 2008 Newsletter
“PROJECT: DESIGNING FREEDOM as we defend our rights to occupational freedom and free speech!”

(Brent comment: ASID and IIDA may think this is bunk, that you better get in line to take their exam and become licensed or just prepare to fold up your tent, but as long as America is still a democracy, and citizens have rights, interior designers should not stand down and get trampled on. This is not to say that I am against design education, experience and being tested, if need be, but using the state to stomp out competition is DEAD WRONG and there are other ways to be MORE PROFESSIONAL without putting thousands of perfectly fine designers or decorators out of business. )

Cote de Texas: “ASID: An Agency Out of Control”

[be sure to read comments to this post]

Here’s proof that Practice Acts hurt interior designers and I’m not just talkin’ ’bout them housewife dekoraters with a reesale number.

Many designers are hired to work out of state. The Cote de Texas blog reveals how some very famous interior designers have been snared by The Florida Board of Architecture and Interior Design.

With designers such as Juan Montoya (N.Y.) and Kelly Wearstler (L.A.) having cases filed against them, Florida is now THE STATE to watch regarding ASID: An Agency Out of Control

Be sure to check out the 83+ comments after you read the article.