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New Jersey’s public contracts laws date back to 1917 at the time when Ty Cobb was the highest paid major league baseball player with an annual salary of $20,000.   While there has certainly been revisions to the law, as to how public projects are procured, the underlying basis over the last 100 years has remained the same, that being a low bid, competitive process.

As densely populated as New Jersey is and as much development as we have seen over the last decade, there remain many once thriving communities struggling to regain relevance. Like many of these proud communities, Hackensack’s fate was sealed back in the 1970’s.

I’ve been with DMR Architects for 23 years, recently becoming a partner in the now 25-year-old firm. This milestone inspired reflection about the architecture industry. For the most part, how buildings are being built is the same. Design-build projects and some new equipment provide a means to go a little faster, perhaps, but building is still all about the steel, sheetrock, concrete, wood and bricks.

Architecture is a continually stimulating profession, especially for the firm’s owner who addresses complexities in various industries in delivering the service.

The firm I founded in 1991, DMR Architects, belongs to six of us a result of naming the first of what I expect will be many partners. The profession of architecture has spawned many compensation structures and equity arrangements, but it is probably fair to say that if a firm is going to invite partnership, it does so sooner than 25 years. So why now?