Holdfast Training Services Trial Blog

C4ISR

Discussions with schedule specialist show little opportunity for progress without further input from contractor who has now requested another 3 week extension. The Office Engineer is adamant that if they delay any further that he will throw the whole thing out. I am skeptical that he has the authority to do so, however. My understanding is that under the Federal Acquisition Regulations, if the contractor is owed money he has the right to pursue it. I take the OE’s rants with a pinch of salt.

An additional submission from sub contractor for further adjustment has been received and has hit $1.5M – bringing total claim to $3M. This is a Big No No – as essentially it is asking the sub-contractor to do business directly with the Client. I have asked that the Prime certifies the request, but am curious as to whether or not they will – as I believe the sub has been ripping off the Prime. Main contractor must sign off on it before we can do anything with it…..it’s getting bigger!

ECIP Lighting Projects

Sat in on meetings reference energy savings produced from ongoing lighting project. Monitoring shows that project should pay for itself within 5 years…..just in time for the buildings to be de-commissioned!

Ashley Reservist Centre

Joy of joys – this is coming to an amicable solution. The petrographic testing has shown that in essence the concrete on the loading ramps is sound and therefore all of the problems witnessed on site should be able to be resolved using cosmetic upgrades….or so I thought. Subsequent concrete break strength tests (taken from other areas) are now showing that three quarters of the most recent test results are below strength. Why won’t this project die!?!? So we now have the Corps lab saying it’s too weak, the batch plant tests saying it’s fine and the independent lab tests (which have been accused by the corps lab of falsifying results) also saying they are fine. Additional testing from the independent lab is inbound soon and a decision will be made by the Contracting Officer’s Representative as to whether we pursue this further.

EDC Solarwall

I am still rattling the head of security to provide workable policy instead of just putting up barriers and being awkward. I ended up writing a policy which has now been adopted temporarily until they write a more comprehensive one (which I’m told may look very familiar when it comes back) but now we’re having bun fights about how staff are processed for security checking to actually get them on site now. Having upset the head of security a little more publicly this time I don’t think I’ll be taken for a ride-along in a police car any time soon.

Having extrapolated current progress on the wall against the various schedule items I see we are about to start slipping behind on schedule. Ordinarily I would prepare a letter of concern, but seeing as this contractor has been excellent at turning things around (and I see plenty of potential for concurrent activity etc) I saw no reason to escalate so quickly. I wrote a formal letter asking them to simply explain their plans for the COR to reassure him that we have no reason to worry. The COR likes the verbiage and intends to use this approach on other projects before slapping their wrists with the letter of concern. It’s more of a friendly prod while relationships are all still good……and there aren’t many of those around here! I intend to keep it that way as long I we can.

The Department of Labor issues minimum wage rates for various skilled laborers and these get updated quite regularly. It was noticed that the rates that are being used do not match the department of labour rates for the time the contract was signed. This means an administrative modification is required to the contract. Problem 1 is that the mistake was made by another office and must be rectified by the other office. The staff there seem not only unwilling to bring it to the attention of the Contracting Officer but also slightly confused as to why I’m banging a drum about it. (It falls to this office to do the pay interviews etc and we’ll have the fun of fixing it.) Problem 2 is that the rates themselves appear to vary quite badly, meaning there’s a strong chance we will need more federal funding to make sure the workers are paid their dues. More fun to follow.

Having fun with review of wind calcs and seismic loading calcs!

Am reviewing submittal of pay requests and processing them but keep finding that info is missing (but probably sent to the wrong government office). This is bad because the contractor appears to have two masters (a design centre and a construction centre) and neither are on the same page. This whole concept looked great on paper! I also find that we are re-learning the same mistakes over again form the last ‘joint’ venture.

Albright Avenue Closure Repair

This is a new involvement fro me on a levee project where the USACE designed a rolling flood gate…..which appears to float in the event of flooding! All just in time for a TMR. Site visits and historical data collection abounds.

Other News

Was nice to spend some time back in UK with family as my father is not too well. Typically my wife ended up in hospital in the USA while I was in the UK. Impeccable timing you could say. Thankfully all is well. Just as well as owe don’t have any life insurance on her.

The political machines are in full spin cycle in the run up to the elections. I’m pretty sure our voting cards that came through were sent by mistake.

I have developed a habit of seeing things in the shared calendar and inviting myself along…..which then turn out to be the commander’s visits. He doesn’t seem to mind. Most recently was a visit to Poplar Island – a man-made habitat for wildlife made up of dredge material from the Chesapeake bay. I’m keeping my eyes open to see if he’s hosting cocktails – see how far I can push this.

Stay safe y’all