State Housing Chief Takes Post With Builders Group

Christine Diemer Reed, California’s top government housing official, will take over as executive director of an Orange County builders trade group on July 1.

Reed, 36, will succeed John Erskine as head of the Orange County region of the Building Industry Assn. of Southern California. Erskine announced earlier this year that he was joining a local law firm.

Reed was appointed head of the state Department of Housing and Community Development by Gov. George Deukmejian in 1986. She had previously served as a deputy attorney general and as deputy secretary for housing in the California business, transportation and housing agency.

Reed is married to Dana Reed, a partner in the prominent Costa Mesa-based law firm of Reed & Davidson.

More than 1,000 builders, developers and other businesses belong to the BIA’s Orange County region, according to an official with the trade group. It has played a key role in shaping the course of development in several Southland areas, but perhaps is best known for being a linchpin in the business community’s successful efforts to beat back the slow-growth Measure A on last year’s Orange County ballots.