Opinions

Subscribe

Is Home Star in HVAC contractors’ best interest? Another says the Home Star bill is worth supporting.

We here in the Midwest are just finishing up one of the hottest summers we can remember. If you are like many of us, you have reduced your staff to help you through the economic downturn. That means your staff has had to work exceptionally hard to take care of your customers. Have you been properly appreciative?

In some ways, the end of summer feels like the end of the year. Many of us can start to feel the seasons changing; kids are going back to school; etc. It almost feels like a good time of year to make resolutions - better than New Years, in fact. Most of those resolutions are made at the spur of the moment, and often under the influence of alcohol.

Recently, I read an article about a company named OPower that is attempting to motivate people to reduce energy consumption with reports that compare their average energy use to their neighbors. When utility customers get their reports from OPower, they see a smiley face if their energy use is lower than their average neighbor’s use.

Every time major international environmental conferences take place, I have a tendency to wait with baited breath to see how the outcome could negatively affect the way HVACR business is done and the associated cost. Two fairly recent examples are the Kyoto Protocol and the Copenhagen Accord.

I confess … before working for The NEWS I would never have suggested that someone enter the trades as a profession. My job as a former high school teacher was to prepare a white collar workforce and trade schools and community colleges weren’t where we were aiming students. In retrospect, I was ignorant.

Ccontractors should seize the day and reposition their companies to recruit young people, and to appeal to highly skilled workers. We need to tell the working world (and school counselors) that we are a stable, recession-proof industry with lots of new technology products and lots of opportunity.

Pluses and minuses of the one-man shop. What’s going on in the classroom.

The Air Conditioning Contractors of America (ACCA) and several other contracting organizations have raised concerns with some aspects of the Home Star program. We don’t disagree with its stated goals. But just because legislation has lofty goals doesn’t mean it’s headed in the right direction.

The most important thing to know about the Home Star legislation now pending in Congress is that the bill is first and foremost an emergency job creation package developed to address the persistent crisis in America’s construction sector.