February 15, 2008
  LAPD’s Valley Bomb Squad and Training Facility Opens
WWCOT Architects designed a new $7 million Valley Bomb Squad and Training Facility for the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) campus in Granada Hills, Calif. The 9,200-square-foot facility, located north of downtown Los Angeles in the San Fernando Valley, officially opened in January. LAPD officers will use the facility to train on domestic terrorism response and the handling of explosives and hazardous materials. The facility, funded through a $600 million bond approved by voters in 2002 to renovate and construct public safety facilities, allows for future growth and technologies in LAPD emergency response. It recently garnered a design award for WWCOT from AIA San Fernando Valley.

Arizona Homebuilder and Operation Homefront Partner to Give Injured Veterans Housing Discounts
Biltmore Homes is offering to take up to $50,000 off the price of new houses
Biltmore Homes of Arizona is the first homebuilder to join with Operation Homefront and offer large discounts to injured veterans and their families in a new subdivision it’s developing. The price of the houses is reduced for these families by $30,000 to $50,000. The softening real estate market has benefited the program, as homebuilders say they are anxious to unload standing housing stock that hasn’t sold.

Builder Concentrates on Green Homes and Communities
Austin builder Clark Wilson took a five-year hiatus from the industry after he resigned as president of the homebuilding company he founded in 1992. During the period of his non-compete clause, the veteran builder studied the market and considered what would be the next up-and-coming trend on which he and a new business could capitalize. The answer, Wilson reports, was a “no-brainer”: green building. He founded Green Builders Inc., a large-scale community developer of green, sustainable homes. The company has received the Energy Star® certification from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) on all of its first completed green built homes.

 

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This is the home of the weekly Best Practices column, news of tips and tools that you can use in your day-to-day practice and case studies illustrating “how-tos” and “lessons learned” for all stages of practice. The Practice Zone also features reports of research in architecture and related fields.