Home Builders Association of Maryland DEMO - (Page 12) pHoto CredIt stuart zolotorow 2008 HBAM LeAdersHIp ExEcutivE committEE President Lou Baker President-Elect mike owings First Vice President Eliot Powell Associate Vice President Pete Baxter Secretary Jack orrick Treasurer theresa Leatherbury Immediate Past President chris Rachuba publisher’smessage Time for the Winds of Change Virtually everywhere I go, everything I watch and everything I read reinforces the feeling: America is in a funk. There may be debate about whether or not the country or the housing industry is in a recession but there can be little doubt that, as a nation, we are in a collective dour mood. The media certainly continues to do its part with the endless barrage of negativity. Even when the news is modestly positive it usually gets buried in the back of the paper, under a tepid headline, in small type. The statistics confirm it. Consumer confidence hovers at, or near, all time lows. Eleven percent of the country believes we are headed in the right direction. Energy prices soar daily to new record levels, based not on consumption or demand, but on speculative buying. The dollar is getting trounced by foreign currencies, and even the Canadian “loonie” has caught us. Clearly this is not an encouraging climate for consumers, including prospective home buyers. So you ask – When does this change? Why does it change? Never fearful of prognosticating I will give you the precise answer: at 10 p.m. EST on Tuesday, November 4, 2008, when the polls close on the West Coast. At that moment we will have elected a new national leader and, whoever that person is, the nation will breathe a collective sigh of relief that we have turned a page and are at the dawn of a new era. When Ronald Reagan ran successfully for President in 1980, the country was in a mood similar to what we see today, but he assured us that “it was morning in America.” Change was welcomed then and it will be welcomed this November. As Thomas Jefferson put it, “a little rebellion every now and then is a good thing and as necessary in the political world as storms in the physical.” Thankfully, the system he and the other founders created allows for change without necessitating rebellion. Let’s hope that the political winds of change clear the air of the general malaise we feel today and get us back on the track of prosperity. chaPtER PREsidEnts Anne Arundel County Eric devito Baltimore County Evan morville Baltimore City sandy marenberg Carroll County Paul Kotsher Howard County scott armiger Upper Chesapeake Bill Luther counciL PREsidEnts Land Development Council steven Rubin HBAM Remodelers donald Lynch Sales and Marketing Council shawn Fortney Certified Master Builder/Remodeler Jeff Powers Builder Mart Jerry hoover John Kortecamp HBAM Executive Vice President hBam BoaRd oF diREctoRs David Altfeld Steve Bartenfelder Steve Breeden Tim Burkard Chickie Grayson Dover Hankins Joe Hikel Jim Hunter Jim Joyce Chip Lundy Cynthia McAuliffe John Meade David Miller Paul Mueller Tim Naughton Howard Perlow Scott Peterson Jake Ruppert Rich Pezzullo Dale Thompson William Zahler aLtERnatE diREctoRs Pat Costello George Decker Patti Freeman Jay Hergenroeder Martin K.P. Hill Barbara Magill Mary Beth Taylor 12 MID-ATLANTIC BUILDER JULY/AUGUST 2008 www.homebuilders.org http://www.homebuilders.org
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