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On January 10th fifteen interior designers from all over the state met in Columbus with the purpose of forming a coalition to pass a title act in the State of Ohio.
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Having incorporated, the Coalition of Interior Designers for Legislation in Ohio and polling the membership which was affirmative, a lobbyist was hired.
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The first bill introduced late in 1989 never had hearings.
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The bill was re-introduced in 1990 as Senate Bill #376 was referred to committee and hearings were held. Meetings were held to inform the architects about our bill and they did not oppose. The Ohio Board of Examiners of Architects was opposed to the sealing of drawings and though they did not want to include Interior Designers on their board they objected to the placement of our board under the Board of Building Standards. The second bill died at the end of the legislative session. George Voinovich was elected Governor.
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With the governmental change from Democrat to Republican, S.B. 75 was introduced by Robert Cupp, a Republican from Lima and referred to the Commerce and Labor Committee. A Capitol Awards Program was held in the capitol rotunda to exhibit interior design projects noted for their solutions relevant to health, safety, and welfare.
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Opposition to the bill came in hearings from IDS (Interior Design Society) and one of their members who ran a proprietary school of Interior Design. A last minute amendment gave Ohio retail merchants an opportunity to work with CIDLO to be established to address their issues. In March S.B. 75 passed the house and in June it passed the senate, both by a 2/3 majority. In July it was vetoed by the Governor who was in total opposition to the creation of any new boards. The sponsors declined to go against the Governor to initiate an over-ride.
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CIDLO tried to keep open communications with the Governor's office to make him understand what Interior Designers actually do in practice as well as how to address "the board issue." The Home Builders Association introduced a bill in 1994 to protect their rights to construct without the architects' interference. CIDLO tried to initiate a coalition with the Home Builders. The Ohio Board of Examiners of Architects started sending "cease and desist" letters to Interior Designers for filing plans dealing with non-structural work. Governor Voinovich was re-elected.
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With debts finally retired and with renewed enthusiasm, CIDLO hired a new lobbyist with more direct Republican connections. We worked with the Department of Commerce to simplify the administration of a new bill addressing all the concerns of the Governor's office - "no new boards, a clerk typist can do it."
It was learned that the architects, the home builders, and engineers had formed a coalition and had introduced H.B. 231, which became known as the "Seal Law." We tried to amend the bill to include Interior Designers and achieve the definition we had long sought, but were told that this was such a tenuous coalition that if we left it alone the architects would support our bill. We could not be totally silent. We testified before the Senate hearings as interested parties. Having been assured that all concerned parties had been involved in the negotiations, the senators were surprised to learn that the CIDLO Interior Designers had not been consulted and seemed to express concern about our situation on the design team. H.B. 231 passed and was signed into law, effective November 24, 1995. Ohio Building Departments promptly posted signs stating that all plans submitted for approval must carry a stamp by a state registered architect or engineer.
The Interior Design registration bill was readied for submission. The sponsoring Senator set a meeting on December 31st with the Governor to emphasize compelling reasons Interior Designers should be registered with the state and the fact that there was to be no board involved. The Governor said, "NO WAY". Happy New Year!
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A change in personnel in the Governor's office gave CIDLO renewed hope for communication. The Governor's aides and the Department of Commerce however seemed to take turns playing "good boy bad boy". The more we comprised them, the more they wanted. The Governor's hot button was economic development and CIDLO hoped that the figures of a Design Principals Roundtable Task Force in Cleveland would show the economic loss to the OH firms due to the fact that Interior Designers were not a registered member of the design team.
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CIDLO rewrote a bill to re-address the architects' and engineers' issues and developed a strong list of bipartisan supporters. It was introduced in September by Representative Pat Tiberi as H.B. 593 and was sent to the Economic and Small Business Committee.
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Hearings on H.B. 593 were held in January. Proponent testimony was well received. At the next hearing the opposition was architects, who raised issues over what they considered "practice act " not "title act", and the Department of Commerce, who seemed to be having second thoughts over the administration of a title act.
Robert Taft was elected governor and had indicated to our lobbyist during his campaign that if the legislature saw fit to pass our legislation that he would sign it into law.
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A new two-year legislative session began and our old bill was introduced by Senator Robert Cupp in March as S.B. 138 and assigned to the Senate's Insurance, Commerce, and Labor Committee. Proponent testimony was held in May and before the opposition hearing was held. CIDLO learned of a new coalition of architects, engineers, and retailers. Each group had their own, sometimes-conflicting demands, but their approach was that all the demands of all three had to be met or they would oppose our bill. Many meetings were held to negotiate throughout the year.
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It became obvious that if we were to meet all of the demands that had been made over the last year, our bill would be worth nothing to the Interior Design profession. In July we terminated our relationship with our lobbyist. A new Strategic Plan was adopted to strengthen the grassroots effort and to prepare for a stronger lobbying effort.
The International Building Code (IBC) was developed nationally to reduce the differences in building codes from the many jurisdictions that manage building permits with language that required the qualified design team to be defined by each adopting jurisdiction.
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Ohio adopted the IBC and the Interior Designer is not defined in Ohio as a design professional.
CIDLO reorganized to strengthen its grassroots. A CEU course, "What is Grassroots Legislative Action" was held in Columbus.
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The grassroots effort continued with emphasis on area meetings to disseminate legislative information. Cincinnati hosted the first Annual Grassroots Benefit Bash. CIDLO began the development of a website and web-based database with activity log to track legislative activity from any location in the State.
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