Urgent President’s Message

August 2026

Fellow AIA Inland California Members,

As I write this message, wildfires continue to burn across our neighboring states. Oregon and Washington are experiencing one of the most severe fire seasons in recent memory, with entire communities near Spokane evacuated and hundreds of homes and businesses reduced to ash. Firefighting crews from California, including many of our own state's resources, have been deployed north to assist. Closer to home, fire activity continues to test our own region as the season deepens.

I share this not simply as news, but as a reminder that hits close to home for every member of this chapter. As architects, we are in the business of permanence. We design buildings meant to stand for generations, to shelter families, to house businesses, to anchor communities. But recent events are a sobering reminder that permanence is never guaranteed. Fire, earthquake, flood, and wind do not respect construction drawings or property lines. The built environment we create is resilient, but it is not indestructible. Nature will always have the final word.

This is precisely why our work matters so much, and why the codes we design within are not bureaucratic obstacles, but life-saving tools. Building codes exist because we have learned, often at great cost, what happens when structures fail to account for the forces around them. Every requirement for defensible space, fire-rated assemblies, egress width, or structural bracing represents a lesson paid for in real loss. When we push back against a code requirement or treat it as a checkbox to clear rather than a principle to honor, we risk forgetting exactly why it exists in the first place.

That is also the heart of the California Architects Practice Act. Its primary objective is not aesthetics, and it is not efficiency. It is the health, safety, and welfare of the people who will occupy the spaces we design. Everything else we do as architects, every creative decision, every material choice, every negotiation with a client or a contractor, sits downstream of that obligation. When wildfires like these sweep through a region, we are reminded in the starkest possible terms what that obligation actually means. It means the difference between a family making it out safely and a tragedy. It means the difference between a community that can be rebuilt and one that cannot.

Rebuilding is exactly what many of our neighbors to the north will now have to do. Behind every acre burned and every structure lost is a family, a business owner, a community facing months or years of recovery. That road is long, and it is not one anyone should walk alone.

I want our chapter to be part of the answer. I am reaching out directly to AIA Washington to learn which local firms in the affected communities could use technical support in the months ahead, and to offer our chapter's assistance, whether that means extra hands on a project, code and permitting expertise, or simply a colleague to call when the workload of rebuilding becomes overwhelming. I am also reaching out to AIA National in Washington, D.C., to learn how our chapter can plug into broader disaster response and rebuilding efforts already underway. I am asking our membership to consider the same. Whether that means volunteering technical expertise to a firm in an affected area, participating in a disaster assistance program, or simply making yourself available to colleagues who may need guidance navigating code compliance, permitting, or design in a post-disaster context, your knowledge is a resource that communities in crisis genuinely need. If you are interested in contributing your time or expertise, please reach out to the chapter office so we can connect you with the right effort.

We do not design buildings because we believe they will last forever. We design them because, for as long as they stand, they protect the people inside. That is our responsibility, and it does not end when the fire is contained. It continues through every year of recovery that follows.

Stay safe, look out for one another, and let's put our skills to work where they are needed most.

David Higginson, AIA
President
AIA Inland California Chapter