North Carolina State Building Commission: "Design Build is not Allowed; Please Ask us to Do Design Build"

North Carolina General Statutes Section 143-128 sets forth the general methods of contracting allowed to public agencies in North Carolina.  Broadly speaking the statute allows:  

1. Multiple-prime contracting
2. Single-prime contracting
3. Dual prime contracting (combination of multi-prime and single prime)
4. CM at risk
5. Or any other method allowed by the Building Commission

Although the authenticity of this is not self-evident, I got it from the Design Build Institute and have no reason to doubt it, the North Carolina Building Commission adopted a resolution on August 28, 2012 encouraging local entitites to apply to the Building Commision  for design-build approval. 

Here's the Building Commission: 

WHEREAS, the State Building Commission acknowledges the merit of the Design/Build delivery method for certain projects and has authorized the use of Design/Build in the past, with apparent success, now therefore,

BE IT RESOLVED, that the State Building Commissions encourages State agencies and institutions, local government units or any other entity subject to the provisions of G.S. 143 to utilize the procedures adopted by the State Building Commission when seeking authorize to use Design/Build as a construction contracting method and to consider the following:

1.   The public owner has the responsibility to secure construction services with method that will provide a fair and full opportunity for open competition and ensure that the public project is built at a competitive price to the taxpayer without favoritism.

2.   Licensed design professionals have responsibilities to public health, safety and welfare that cannot be lessened or delegated in any way because of the involvement as part design/build team. This suggests that appropriate design fees must always be part any Design/Build proposal.

3.   Although G.S. 143-135.8 allows bidders to be prequalified for any public construction project, the law does not allow a shortlisting process to restrict the number of potential bidders. Also, the final selection of the Design/Build team must be based on the low qualified bid pursuant to G.S. 143-129.

4.   The cost incurred by design and construction professionals, when responding to a Design/Build Request for Proposal, can be significant (a cost that can run well into fi figures) and could prove to be a deterrent to competition. Therefore, the State Building Commission believes it is essential that “bridging documents” be prepared by the o (or his independent design professional,) to be used as an objective basis for competitive responses to any Design/Build RFP.

5.   The cost to smaller design and construction firms to prepare a design build proposal may hamper their ability to compete with large firms, thus limiting the number of competitive proposals that the Owner receives.

6.   The Construction Manager at Risk construction delivery method authorized by G.S 1128 is a construction method which allows qualification based selection of the contractor and offers many of the advantages of the Design/Build method and, in addition, allows the Owner to have an independent assessment of the construction quality by licensed design professionals. Therefore, the Construction Manager at Risk delivery method should be considered prior to seeking authority for Design/Build.