March 18, 2010

Niagara Construction Association president worked her way up

PATRICIA WILLIAMS

staff writer

Niagara Construction Association (NCA) president Tara Christensen got her feet wet in the roofing industry working summers at Pec Roof Maintenance, a division of family-owned Ed Christensen Roofing Ltd.

“There had never been a female who had worked in the family business,” says Christensen, who is midway through her term at the NCA helm. “Flat roofing is definitely a man’s world.”

While her father, a second-generation roofer, tried to talk her out of it, Christensen persevered. At 18, before entering Brock University, Christensen landed a job as a labourer, running errands for the flat roofers.

She did that for a couple of summers before becoming a “gofer” in the estimating department.

“I got to measure roofs, drop off quotes and pick up drawings.”

After graduating from Brock with a business degree in 1991, Christensen decided to give estimating a try.

“My dad said, ‘You need to have more credentials behind you’ so he sent me back to school.”

In serving as NCA president, Tara Christensen is following in the footsteps of both her father Peter and grandfather Ed.

After completing the three-year construction engineering technology program at Niagara College, Christensen went to work for the family-owned company as an estimator.

She gradually worked her way up the ladder, to become head estimator.

Four years ago, she joined Roofmart, a distributor of roofing materials. She now is the product manager of the single-ply roofing line. Her responsibilities include inspecting roofs across much of the province. Pec Roof Maintenance is one of Roofmart’s customers.

In serving as NCA president, Christensen is following in the footsteps of both her father Peter and grandfather Ed, who founded St. Catharines-based Ed Christensen Roofing in 1936. As a child, she visited the association’s offices while her father attended meetings.

During her term as president, Christensen has been intent on implementing the association’s new strategic plan.

Priorities include strengthening relationships with key stakeholders and making NCA “more of a voice” in the community for the industry.

“We just want to be more dynamic,” Christensen says.

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