“It will enable DOT to produce better projects quicker and less expensive,” said Sen. Steve Gooch, R-Dahlonega, chairman of the Senate Transportation Committee and the bill’s chief sponsor.The legislation also would provide more flexibility in contracting by doing away with a requirement that contracts go to the low bidder. Instead, the agency could award design-build contracts based on “best value.”Is anyone monitoring this bill in Georgia? Tracy Vann, I'm looking at you.
Gooch said the best value approach considers factors besides price. For example, he said the DOT might approve a bid calling for more expensive but longer-lasting building materials.
“Sometimes, the low bid does not result in the lowest price because of the number of change orders,” added Sen. Judson Hill, R-Marietta.
The measure also would add technology systems to the types of projects that could be developed using design-build. Electronic message boards using fiber optics have been cropping up along interstate highways with growing frequency.
The bill, part of the DOT’s agenda for this year’s legislative session, now moves to the state House of Representatives.
Thursday, February 28, 2013
Georgia Moving Towards D/B for Road Projects
The Atlanta Business Chronicle has an article this week alerting us that the Georgia Senate unanimously passed a bill that would pemit the Georgia DOT to proceed with best value design build projects for road, rail, bridge, and building projects. The bill is off to the House.
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By all means. :)
ReplyDeleteI don't practice in GA so I'm not 100% up to speed on this bill; however,I have been somewhat tracking it.
The bill was adopted by the Senate on 2/25/13 and has since gone through its first and second read on the House level, with a favorably house committee report on March 12th. The third reading has not yet been scheduled; however, from all appearances, the bill will pass the House.
The bill amends Article 4 of the GA Code relating to DOT's power to contract generally, so as to change the type of projects eligible for design-build contracts and to alleviate some of the burden from the procurment process related to those types of contracts. Namely, the statute is geared towards allowing GA DOT to use its best judgment in awarding a design-build project, if it determines the design-build is ultimately the lowest bid, even though there may be a fixed-price bid that is technically lower (e.g. by the time you tack on all the change orders, etc. the cost is higher than the design build fee). Previously, GA DOT had authority to award design-build contracts but only in extraordinary circumstances. The extraordinary circumstances langugage has now been deleted.
Additionally, even if GA DOT previously had authority to issue a design-build project, they typically couldn't because design-build was not authorized for utility and technology issues. The bill redefinies the permissible uses for design-build to specifically authorize those items.
Still, while the bill goes a long way towards allowing the GA DOT greater control over the type of project delivery method they wish to award, it still significantly limits the right to issue design build contracts by retaining Paragraph (f) of the bill, which limits DOT's use of design-build projects to 50% of the total amount of construction projects awarded in the previous fiscal year. Thus, it appears the State is somewhat hedging its bet on this delivery method.
For those interested in reading the specifics of the statute, you can go to http://www.legis.ga.gov/en-US/default.aspx, and type in SB70, for a full copy of the revised bill.