SAID Conference Speech at the SACAP Bosperaard
Present – SAIA , SAIAT, SAIBD, SACAP
Quinton J Damstra
My name is Quinton J Damstra and I have been an Executive member of the South African Institute of Draughting since 2001 – S.A.I.D. I am here with Maureen Gerrens our secretary and Megan Reneke, we are the 3 executive members representing Architectural Draughting on the S.A.I.D. executive.
A bit about SAID and how we fit into the architectural food chain. We have been in operation since 1953 and it’s not only a great honour but also historic for us to be at the same table with other Institutions and other ‘V.A.’s today and we thank S.A.C.A.P. for this opportunity and priviledge to be present today.
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I’m going to give a very brief overview of how the profession of draughting has evolved in SA through the years. As draughting is a very broad based discipline, of which Architectural Draughting is a small part it is important to mention the other disciplines associated with the draughting profession. We are not only a VA under SACAP however we are also a VA under the engineering council of SA – ECSA. A draughtsperson used to start their professional journey as a tracer or on the workshop floor. they would then be invited into the drawing office if showing the correct aptitude. In the case of architectural draughting they would trace existing Architectural plans. At first your basic homes are the easiest to trace. They would then trace examples of all the disciplines electrical, civil, mechanical, structural steel details and piping. This experiential progress should take years! As I maintain to my students – one can only get 20 years experience in any field by working 20 years – no shortcuts to experience. After being exposed to the various draughting disciplines the draughtsperson can now choose which discipline best suites their passion. – The matrix is very broad – some choose to become Architectural draughtspersons and slowly climb the now SACAP ladder.
Most large industrial companies have a draughting office or at the very least an in house draughtsperson. The Steel and mining sectors have very qualified draughtspersons – who are called Multi Disciplinary Draughtspersons.
One of SAID’s many challenges is most of these other draughting professionals feel architectural draughting is an easy discipline – and they all dabble in it. – Part time! SAID’s architectural draughting representatives job is to educate these draughting individuals that we should all stick to our professional draughting portfolio – S.A.C.A.P has helped immensely with preventing this across the board draughting by preventing these individuals from submitting plans to councils without a SACAP number. which has been a great start to this problem. As S.A.I.D. we want to give credibility to our brand – when industry see the SAID logo advertising an individual or product we want that to be the mark of approval and we also want to be able to validate the placing of that logo.
Our architectural Industry has its very strange anomalies – when you speak to an architect about draughts people or technicians they are very vocal and passionate about the fact Draught Persons and Technicians don’t know how to design and they shouldn’t etc, etc, …
When you speak to draughtsmen & technicians they say certain Architects don’t know how to draught and their sketches and certain of their designs are illegible etc, etc, …
So there is a lot of eyeballing. All of us in our own compounds; a kind of professional xenophobia.
What can the S.A.I.D. do to better equip our draughtspersons to aid in our offices. We are contacted by companies from Holland – where everyone is an architect or Engineer – they contact us for our draughts people – you see in Holland there are no draughtspersons to do the bulk work in the drawing office. Site surveys, tracing and all the tedious work – the truth is as much as draughtspersons get eyeballed, a professional draughtsperson adds a huge ammount of value to your practice. Every one knows the adage regarding too many cooks/ too many chiefs. We need workers! We want to provide professionals from our ranks for the work place. Skilled draughtspersons within our ranks to bolster industry. So that’s us in a nutshell.
Our Aim is not to have our draughtpersons be Engineers without the qualifications or Architects / Architectural Technologists without the necessary experience.
Our Aim is to promote the advancement of the skill of draughting. The skill or communicative language we all use in our Architectural profession.
S.A.I.D. wants to change the perception that draughts persons are under qualified. The perception that we are not the brightest of the bright. To be brutaly honest there are some even within your professional ranks that are no Einstein’s!
We do have a concern:
Municipal Councils – What dialogue does S.A.C.A.P. have with municipalities? What is S.A.C.A.P. doing to expedite the plans approval process in council? And give much needed expertise to a very inadequately run process.
I have clients who have money and invest now in our economy – through job creation, buying and building. I design a home that doesn’t require departures, neighbours, consents, and motivation. I have presented my proposals to several Aesthetics’ Committees and Homeowners’ Associations – all have screened my designs with a fine toothcomb. These committees approve them. Most of the work has already been done before reaching the municipality. I walk into council to have the plans sit on a desk for 8 months, 1 year before approval. In this time my client is losing his money; inflation, interest rate hikes – the usual! The public is not being protected – my client suffers from the inadequacies of the Municipal Councils. When you go to Council – it’s like running into flypaper – they are short staffed and in some cases woefully under qualified and basically they are preventing growth. Can’t S.A.C.A.P. do something about this, maybe by putting up scrutiny fees, attract more qualified staff into municipalities and some how unblock this log jam?
Is it not possible to forward the best-run Municipality in the land and create a model for other municipalities to look at? This is a crisis and is costing Homebuilders millions.
We as an Institute want to thank S.A.C.A.P. for facilitating the bosberaad and I’m sure it’s going to pave the way for a professional future for all of us.
