Business Council Breakfast focuses on housing

The monthly Business Council Breakfast for June is Wednesday (June 12) at 6:45 a.m. at Stockman’s Steak House and features Bill Brewer, executive director of the Nevada Rural Housing Authority, and Aaron West, CEO of Nevada Builders Alliance, who will be on hand to present an update on housing.

Brewer has been in a leadership role at NRHA since 2014 and was appointed by the NRHA Board of Commissioners as executive director in August 2018. Over the past four years, NRHA has been awarded the NALHFA Single Family Excellence Award twice and the Dedicated to Mission Award from George K. Baum & Company. The agency has also achieved the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development’s High Performer Status each year.

Additionally, Brewer has helped lead the development or rehabilitation and opening of 14 affordable housing properties throughout the rural areas of the state, serving low-income households including homeless, veterans and seniors.

Brewer began his career in housing at the Farmers Home Administration 30 years ago and subsequently became the first housing program director for the new Nevada State Office of FmHA, which eventually became the state office of the U.S. Department of Agriculture Rural Development. During his tenure as program director at USDA Rural Development, Brewer was responsible for the investment of more than $1 billion in rural Nevada. He also was recently elected to the Board of Directors for the National Association of Housing Finance Agencies.

West, who attended Churchill County schools, has served as CEO of the Nevada Builders Alliance since June 2014. In his role as CEO, West is responsible for all areas of budget development, marketing, membership development and government affairs. Under his leadership, the organization has grown to become the largest statewide construction industry organization in Nevada.

As a lifelong Nevadan, West has had a long and diverse career in residential and commercial development. From leading the planning division of Churchill and Lyon counties, to project manager for the city of Fallon Downtown Redevelopment effort as vice president and board member of Lumos Engineering, Inc., to creating the land division for the NAI Alliance Commercial Real Estate and establishing his own commercial real estate and insurance business, Meritage Brokerage. West was also an adjunct professor in drafting at Western Nevada College from 2002-05.

Under West’s leadership, Nevada Builders has developed positive working relationships with local school districts, economic development entities, State of Nevada Offices (OWINN, GOED, NDE), Nevada community colleges and universities as well workforce development organizations and nonprofits.

West currently serves on the Governor’s Workforce Development Board as well as the Board of Directors for JOIN, Inc. and is a member of the Reno-Tahoe International Airport Authority Community Outreach Committee and was a member of the 2018 Nevada Economic Development Conference planning committee. He has also been a registered lobbyist with the Nevada Legislature since 2007.

RSVP to attend the breakfast to Lisa Gonzales at lisag@cedaattracts.com or 775-423-8587 by June 11.