Jim Kollaer's blog

Everyone knows Ground Zero.  Everyone remembers the horror of 911.  Construction teams and first responders arrived before the smoke had cleared.  Construction workers searched the site after the collapse.  Construction workers cleared the site and then combed through the debris looking for the remains of the thousands of people who died that day.  Construction workers helped strategize with the planners and the Silverstein Properties who have worked for the last 9 years on a plan to rebuild the site in an appropriate way that respects the people who lost friends and families that day.  Now the six new buildings are being erected at the site by an amazing team of construction professionals.

Fox News is reporting on the progress all this week and you can see some of the designs, the 7 levels below grade, the park where the first of 400 trees were placed over Labor Day and the progress on the new buildings that are rising from the site.   [node:read-more:link]

Will the new 2500 page healthcare bill “level the playing field” for contractors and specialty contractors who bid projects every day in this country?  Yes, and this is how.

The new healthcare bill has a major impact on the construction industry, particularly on those contractors and subcontractors who today do not provide any coverage at all.  The bill requires that you provide medical benefits for your workforce or incur penalties of up to $2,000 per employee for not doing so.

We have previously talked about the complexity of the new healthcare bill and we thought that you should have a timeline of the implementation of the major parts of the bill so that you will know what is coming, when it is coming and how it will impact your construction business and your bidding over the next decade.  We found this timeline on the Visual Economics website that shows the 10 year implementation plan to help you start making your own long range

Congressman Kevin Brady (R-Texas) was in Houston last week to participate in a national program to end the Energy moratorium, or as he said “To put a face on the impact that the moratorium has had.”  Before that meeting, he took time to meet with a group of lawyers, healthcare specialists and business folks to talk about healthcare and what it means to us. 

The construction industry is sometimes able to weather the economic turmoil because the projects take several years to plan, design and build. The issue for us is that when the project pipeline dries up, it takes some time for the activity to regain its former velocity. The question is how long before we have a full recovery of two quarters of job growth? The latest rise in unemployment is an indicator.

Richard Fisher, the president and CEO of the Dallas Branch of the Federal Reserve, the banker’s bank, spoke about the current economic conditions and possible solutions at a luncheon last week

There is a list of criteria called the IRS 20 Questions used to determine whether someone is an independent contractor or an employee.  This is the Ohio State University interpretation of the list with a couple of comments from us to clarify them.  The answer of yes to any one of the questions (except #16) may mean the worker is an employee. 

A recent posting in Ezra Klein’s column in the Washington Post asked the question about the validity of forcing companies to use the E-Verify system.  The author, Suzy Khimm, asks the question of whether companies should be forced to use E-Verify, or Instant Verification of Work Authorization, as their primary verification system. 

According to an article in Arabianbusiness.com, a number of Saudi construction companies have been hiring illegal workers in order to finish projects on time.  The article says that workers become illegals when they leave their sponsoring companies to go to work on other projects in order to get an increase in pay.  The illegal workers are receiving SR200 per day, the US equivalent of $53.33 per day.  That, according to Saudi sources, is up to 4 times what the legal workers are being paid.  The latest census in the kingdom indicates that there are 8.4 million foreign workers in the country. 

There are two or three areas that the new wage theft laws and their amendments address that will be welcome news to those who have been victims of wage theft or misclassification.

In the past, the laws that were in place in states like Illinois only imposed a Class C misdemeanor for violations and had no real penalties for employers who penalized or fired employees who complained about wage theft.  The court cases indicated that the misdemeanor charges were only there to deter other offenders and few cases ended in penalties for retribution.

The recent amendments however, include a stronger role for the Illinois Department of Labor, prosecution in civil and criminal court for full payment and the possibility of Class 4 Felony charges for repeat offenders. 

Wondering this morning what it will be this time.  We have heard phrases like, “It ain’t goin’ to be the same this time around.”  “I sure hope that it picks up soon.”  “Change is a comin!”  “It’s a new world this time around.”

Twenty years later and we are still hearing the same phrases thrown around.  I am still waiting to hear “Look to Heaven in '11!”

Jim Parsons, who blogs for ENR.com, wrote in an entry entitled Rebar Madness: Preparing for the New Normal, that those who are expecting the construction business to return to the levels of 2007 any time soon will likely be in for a rude awakening.

Parsons quotes Laura D’Ardenne, Manager of Sustainable Construction for PCL Constructors, who says that some changes are already in place.  According to D’Ardenne, 

“Owners are looking for knowledgeable contractors who can be part of process, and help them evaluate strategies.  Firms are also being called on to demonstrate their knowledge.  You can’t just say you know BIM or sustainability.  You need to show just how well you understand it, including how you’ve used it to improve your own operations.”   [node:read-more:link]

The tallest building on the planet today is the Burj Khalifa rising 2,717 feet into the desert sky over Dubai.  It is a building full of hyperbole built to illustrate some of the limits of today’s construction.  At 160 floors, it is higher than two Empire State Buildings and the tower that sits on its top is over 700 feet tall.  The designers said that the tower was that tall so that the overall tower would not look too stubby.  The designers were members of the Skidmore, Owings and Merrill (SOM) offices.  The firm has had a number of tall buildings, but this is the tallest.

We could ask and answer lots of esoteric questions about its cost and design, but that is not the purpose of my inquiry.  You can read a great review of the building, its lighting and some of the intricacies in this latest issue of Architecture Record.

My question is two-fold.  First, Who is the contractor?  I will leave that one to the reader to tell me.  [node:read-more:link]