End of An Era

OHBA's CEO Moving On

All good things must come to an end. The man who has become synonymous with leadership in the Ontario residential construction industry and who has stood at the helm of the Ontario Home Builders’ Association for the past 10 years is stepping down.

Beginning next month, Chief Executive Officer Joe Vaccaro will assume a founding leadership role in the private sector, leaving giant-sized shoes to fill, observes OHBA President Bob Schickedanz.

“This is a tremendous loss, not only to the OHBA and our HBA family but the residential construction and renovation industry and essentially #homebelievers right across Ontario and beyond,” wrote Schickedanz to OHBA board members. “While Joe’s significant contributions and leadership will be properly honoured and recognized at a future date, I want to offer our heartfelt thanks and deepest appreciation for his tireless efforts, passion, commitment, knowledge, wisdom and leadership for these many years.”

While he is understandably excited about the next chapter in his career, Vaccaro acknowledges the depth of the roots he has grown with the Association.

“It has been an incredible 15-year journey with OHBA, from that first lunch meeting (with the late former CEO) David Horton in 2004, to starting as Manager, Government Relations in 2005, then moving across the hall to serve as the V.P. at BILD with Stephen Dupuis, and eventually returning to OHBA in 2010 and being named CEO in 2011,” says Vaccaro. “As David Horton would often say, ‘No job is too big and no job is too small for OHBA.’ I’ve proudly had a lot of those jobs in my time here.

“My admiration and my respect for all of the presidents, chairs, board members and volunteers cannot be fully expressed,” Vaccaro added. “I thank you all for your industry leadership and volunteerism. When asked to serve, you provided the Association—CHBA, OHBA and your local HBA—with the resources and the industry integrity to support our advocacy work. And obviously the association work gets carried forward by a committed group of executive officers and HBA staff. And thank you to my colleagues for the creativity and energy you bring to the important work of the Association. I have been very fortunate to work with some incredible people.

Vaccaro leaves OHBA “to become a co-founder in a new technology venture that will create solutions specifically for our building and development industry challenges,” he notes. “In this new role, I will continue to be a problem-solver for our industry, with some new tools, approaches and resources to continue to make great things happen.”

In order to aid with the transition period, Vaccaro will continue to serve as OHBA’s CEO through its Annual Meeting of Members on October 4.

“Going forward, our immediate challenge will be to hire a new CEO, which will be big shoes to fill,” says Schickedanz, as OHBA prepares to continue its ongoing advocacy work to support the home building industry.