Bay Bridge Problems Literally Fixed With Duct Tape

Corrosion problems during construction of the $6.4 billion Bay Bridge discovered as early as November, 2004, were "fixed" by a bridge inspector using duct tape to cover leaking vents leading to ungrouted galvanized ducts containing already stressed post tension tendons designed to add strength to the bridge deck carrying traffic, according to CALTRANS inspection records uncovered recently. California Governor Jerry Brown announced yesterday that this, and other corrosion related problems arising during bridge construction, has initiated a review of bridge construction documents dating back to 2003 or earlier, and will likely delay the scheduled Labor Day opening of the iconic bridge.

"I take it very seriously, and that thing's not going to open unless it's ready," Brown said. Besides defective girder welds, fracturing seismic equipment bolts, and questions about the strength of the bridge's concrete foundations, inspection records released recently reflect that hundreds of steel tendon inserted into bridge deck segments and stretched, to add strength to the traffic carrying bridge deck, could have been seriously damaged by corrosion during early phases of the construction project. At one point, the situation brought one of the bridge's engineering managers to tears, as he observed workers pumping gallon after gallon of rusty water from ungrouted tendon ducts.

Post tension bridge construction involves using precast concrete panels for segments of the bridge decking. The panels are manufactured with galvanized ducts inside them. Once the precast panels are in place on the bridge, steel cables are inserted into the ducts, and stretched under tension to compress the precast panel, adding significantly to its load bearing strength. Commonly used engineering standards, included in the Bay Bridge contract, require the ducts to be filled with protective grout within ten days after the tendons are put under tension, to avoid corrosion and early failure of the steel cables. Failure to timely grout the ducts exposes the stressed cables to moist air and other elements that can corrode the steel.

During a November 2004 routine inspection of the under construction bridge deck, CALTRANS inspector Laura Rubalcaba found water inside ungrouted ducts containing cables which had been under tension for two months or more. That day, Rubalcaba wrote in her construction diary, "The top of the grout injection/vent hoses were not sealed against the rain. I ... found many instances where it was obvious that rain water was already in the ducts with the stressed tendons." Rather than stopping work on the deck section involved, Rubalcaba had a solution that should send chills up and down the spine of every bridge engineer around the world - "I duct taped over the tops of the tubes myself."

After Rubalcaba's report, and numerous other, similar observations of potentially destructive corrosion of post tensioned cables in wet ducts, CALTRANS undertook some inspection and testing efforts to evaluate the problem, finding it not a significant risk to the bridge. However, even after that report was issued, bridge builders left cables under stress within wet ducts for many months, and failed to use a special grout formula designed for wet ducts once the ducts were finally grouted, despite five to nine inches of rainfall during the six months it took to get around to grouting the wet cables.

The bridge is already billions over budget and years behind schedule. Any elected official who is in any part responsible for a premature decision to open this bridge to traffic, or releasing taxpayer dollars in final payment to the contractors involved in these failures, should be held fully accountable to the public for any future disasters which might befall this bridge.

ASA Documents Updated To Fight Bid Shopping

The American Subcontractors Association this month released a new version of its Subcontractor Bid Proposal form, incorporating Consensus Docs 750 Standard Form of Agreement Between Constructor and Subcontractor, in ASA's continuing effort to thwart general contractor shopping of subcontractor and supplier bids on construction projects. ASA's new bid submission form has added the following language to the subcontractor proposal:

"Subcontractor has devoted time, money and resources toward preparing this bid in exchange for Customer's express agreement that the parties shall have a binding contract consistent with the terms of this bid proposal and Customer unconditionally and irrevocably accepts this bid proposal if it 

(A) in any way uses or relies on the bid proposal or information therein to prepare "Customer's bid" for the project at issue and Customer is awarded a contract for the work; or

(B) divulges the bid or any information therein to others competing with Subcontractor for the work."

This language is designed to deter general contractors and construction managers from shopping subcontractor bids to competitors after a contract has been awarded to the general on the general's bid  which includes the subcontractor's pricing. Bid shopping is sometimes used by unscrupulous builders to increase their profits by squeezing subcontractor pricing after award of a contract based on subcontractor bids which are then undercut by competitors who never bid on the project, or who were outbid but are willing to cut their prices once the results of the bidding are known.

Determined Chicago Window Builders Defy All Odds

Seventeen employees of a Chicago window manufacturing facility forced out of work not once, but twice, by plant closures are defying the odds and forming a not for profit co-operative to keep their equipment humming and preserve their jobs. The 17 were employed at what was, in 2008, Republic Windows and Doors. Republic abruptly shut down the factory in December, 2008, laying off 270 workers. After a union organized six day sit in protesting the plant closure, the workers settled with the bankruptcy creditors committee for checks amounting to between $2,000 and $8,000. A few months later, California based Serious Energy purchased the factory from the bankruptcy estate, and promised to hire back Republic's laid off work force.

Serious managed to bring back as many as 70 of the former Republic workers, but by May, 2012, Serious shuttered the plant for a second time. Now, with 70 employee-owners who each invested $1,000.00, New Era Windows Cooperative has leased factory space in a different building, moved Republic's machinery and tools into the new space, and set up a $665,000.00 line of credit from New York based non-profit foundation The Working World, is back in operation. 

The Working World co-founder Brendan Martin says of New Era Windows, "If this is successful, it could suggest a new path forward for our post-industrial economy, and certainly as a non-profit, we'll be trying to replicate this model." Initially, New Era does not expect to compete with giant, high volume producers of low cost windows for new construction. Rather it expects to participate significantly in the larger market segment for remodeling and replacement windows. Only time will tell if the ingenuity and courage of these 70 tough, persistent window makers can compete successfully where big corporations could not.

GSA Stiffs 1,334 Small Businesses

A Congressional investigation report released today by the House Small Business Committee demonstrates that Government Services Administration small business contractors in the Multiple Awards Schedules program were underpaid more than $3 million because the agency failed to honor the minimum payments provisions of GSA's own contracts with these vendors.  GSA's MAS program encourages small businesses to offer products and services to locally based federal agencies at fixed prices for relatively small quantities. In order to qualify for the program, each small business most endure an expensive and arduous vetting process, and promise to sell $25,000.00 in products or services to federal purchasers during the first two years of participation, and a minimum of $25,000.00 each year after that. 

Those businesses which qualify, but fail to meet the sales quotas, are eliminated from the program. GSA's own contract form imposes on itself an obligation to make a minimum payment of $2,500.00 to eliminated sellers who failed to get awards of that amount before they are dumped. House Small Business Committee Chairman Sam Graves (R-Mo.) acknowledged that the MAS program is supposed to promote government efficiency and encourage small business participation. "But when federal agencies don't live up to their end of the bargain, small businesses are discouraged from competing, and taxpayers lose the benefits of government efficiency," Graves said in announcing the findings of his investigation.

Apparently, for the last ten years, no one at GSA was responsible for making the minimum payments to terminated MAS contractors, though GSA wrote the form of contract each small business was required to sign to get in on the program. 

Skilled Trades Shortage Stymies Housing Recovery

Now that new homes are beginning to sell again, recovery in the housing market has met a new foe - shortages of skilled construction tradespeople willing to give up the alternative jobs they struggled to find during the hard times of double digit unemployment in our industry, and return to construction work. Some trade contractors report they are only able to fill 75% to 80% of the journeyman trade jobs needed to take on all the work offered to them.

The National Association of Home Builders reports that the five states experiencing the strongest recovery in housing starts are also finding severe shortages of framers, roofers, carpenters, and plumbers, a labor market problem which curtails even faster growth in new housing construction. Though construction industry unemployment still far exceeds the national overall unemployment rate of 7.5%, and employment in home building has increased only 5% from its 2011 all time low of 2 million workers, tradespeople who found other work during the five year industry slump are understandably reluctant to come back to the seasonal and cyclical construction workforce. Housing starts increased 47% in the last 12 months, but construction employment over the same year long period rose only 3.7%.

Half of the NAHB members surveyed report they have had projects delayed because of shortages of journeyman tradespeople, and 15% say they have refused to bid on some projects offered to them because they could not staff the jobs. Furthermore, new home price increases increased 12% from a year earlier, to an average of $247,000.00 driven by higher wages needed to attract skilled trades people back into the construction job market. NAHB estimates there are as many as 116,000 unfilled skilled construction jobs, and also that 22% of the home construction workforce is made up of foreign born workers.

NAHB chief Economist David Crowe predicts that increasing prices for construction materials, along with the skilled labor shortage, will prevent a return to the peak home construction rates of 2002-2006 until at least 2016. "We need to rebuild the infrastructure of the industry," Crowe concludes.

Seattle Recovers Embezzled Million

Just over a year after discovery that a Seattle city engineer had embezzled a little more than a million dollars from municipal sewer extension projects, the Seattle City Pete Holmes reports that taxpayers have recovered all but $30,000.00 of the stolen funds.  Seattle utility engineer Joseph Phan still faces criminal charges numbering 70 counts of first and second degree theft in connection with the diverted funds. Holmes' diligent and persistent civil court efforts to get back the stolen million have made city taxpayers almost entirely whole. "We shower we will come after you with everything we have to make taxpayers and ratepayers whole," Holmes said in announcing completion of the restitution effort.

Phan was responsible for estimating the costs of hooking up sewer and water lines to new construction for developers anew home owners, drafting the city construction agreements, and collecting payment for the work from those owing the city for the construction. Allegedly Phan opened a bank in his own name into which he deposited the checks from property owners payable to the City, then using the money in the account to buy rental properties and vehicles in his own name, and to make cash gifts to relatives and to his church. He was arrested in March, 2012.

Seattle seized $96,000 from Phan's city pension account, $20,000 from his life insurance, and $43,000 from a college savings account he set up. Phan's scheme was uncovered after he was fired for hacking into his own city utility account to post payments he never actually made. After Phan was terminates, a developer asked the city to transfer funds it had paid to Phan from one property development which never materialized to the account of a different project, and sent in a copy of the check in payment. Seattle could find no record of any deposit of the payment into City accounts, and the following investigation turned up the million dollar embezzlement.

Criminal Charges Threaten Belize Contractor Bulldozing Mayan Ruins For Rip Rap

A highway contractor in northern Belize who chose to destroy a 2,300 year old Mayan ceremonial pyramid located in a privately owned sugar cane field, and use the decimated stone for rip rap on the highway project could face criminal prosecution under the laws of Belize protecting pre-Hispanic cultural ruins. The hundred foot tall pyramid complex at Nohmul, in northern Belize, is a well known archaeological site, and according to Jamie Awe, head of the Belize Institute of Archaeology, could not possibly have been mistaken by the contractor as a naturally occurring gravel mound. "These guys knew this was an ancient structure. It's just bloody laziness," Awe said of the desecration. "It's a feeling of incredible disbelief because of the ignorance and the insensitivity ... Why can't these people just go and quarry somewhere that has no cultural significance? It's mind-boggling."

Tulane University Anthropology professor Francisco Estrada-Belli, complains that the desecration of Mayan religious sites for construction material is a daily occurrence in Belize. "The only way to stop it is by showing that it is a major crime and people can and will go to jail for it," according to Estrada-Belli. Tension between the infrastructure construction needs of emerging modern societies and respect for ancient cultural heritage requires government vigilance which often is not supported by the requisite level of resources devoted to enforcement of historical preservation efforts.