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| Corridor Inc. Assistant Editor
Originally published May 2008
BREAK GROUND, BRING ON THE OFFICE CHAIRS
 Rendering of the new DISA facility at Fort Meade. Courtesy of Army Corps
“This is going to be a fast track operation,” said Scott Drumheller, project manager with the Army Corps of Engineers, Baltimore District.
The Corps awarded the contract to Virginia-based Hensel-Phelps Construction Co. in February. The company formally accepted the job in early March, and the clock began ticking.
The Corps and Hensel-Phelps have just 1,065 days, which began March 8, to design, build, furnish and turn over a 1 million square foot facility to the Department of Defense’s primary communications agency.
“Time is not our friend,” Drumheller said.
Design work is expected to extend through most of the first year of the contract. Meanwhile, the project’s to-do list for the first 90 days of the contract spanned 30 pages and included roughly 10,000 items, he said.
So the Corps and Hensel-Phelps have adopted systems that will enable them to work on different phases of design and construction simultaneously. They’ve also agreed to tackle many facets of the project good and early, which brings us back to the looming issue of furniture.
Acquiring enough desks and chairs and other equipment to serve nearly 4,300 DISA employees will add up to a furniture lease of more than $30 million, Drumheller said. But to complicate matters further, DISA needs “cutting edge” furniture to facilitate the agency’s expert and collaborative communications missions.
“DISA is a tough customer, make no mistake,” Drumheller said. “They have a unique, critical mission and they are providing significant challenges to the Army.”
The Corps, he added, will rely heavily on private sector expertise to complete DISA’s headquarters, a
project mandated by Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC) laws.
“We need to pull in their expertise because obviously the government isn’t the only one that builds high-tech facilities,” Drumheller said. “Getting a $400 million job off the ground takes a lot of horsepower.”
Officials from the Corps, DISA and Fort Meade held the ceremonial groundbreaking for the DISA building April 16. The Corps and Hensel-Phelps are slated to turn over the building — completed, wired and fully furnished — by March 2011. NEW PITCH FOR FEDERAL FUNDS
Maryland is getting a new opportunity to persuade federal officials that Washington should fund some BRAC-related transportation projects.
The Office of Economic Adjustment, a Department of the Defense (DOD) agency that compensates communities affected by defense activities, has scheduled meetings with state and county officials in mid-May. The topic is the state’s claim that it must complete 70 transportation projects costing roughly $3 billion to accommodate growth at Fort Meade, Andrews Air Force Base, the National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda and other BRAC sites.
Economic Adjustment officials previously resisted claims that they should aid communities that were gaining jobs through BRAC.
“Initially the attitude in DOD was you’re gaining jobs, that’s positive, be grateful,” said Kent Menser, BRAC coordinator for Howard County and chair of the transportation committee of Maryland’s BRAC Subcabinet.
That attitude, however, seemed to change during a December meeting in St. Louis, Menser said. During that gathering, communities from across the country detailed the expenses they expected to incur due to military growth.
The office has contributed funds toward transportation studies, but none yet for construction, so May’s “fact-finding mission” is encouraging, said Andy Scott, a special assistant on economic development for Maryland’s secretary of transportation.
Scott, however, said securing federal dollars might be difficult in the middle of such a tight budget year.
“Overall, national transportation funding is approaching a crisis level,” Scott said. “There is not a pot of money lying around.” BUILDING A WIRED WORKFORCE
Anne Arundel Community College is securing new funds to address the growing demand for medical and technology workers.
This spring, Rep. Dutch Ruppers-berger announced a $121,000 grant to the college as part of a $5.7 million package for BRAC-related education and transportation projects in Maryland.
The funds are being channeled to the college’s Center for Health, Science and Homeland Security to purchase state-of-the-art equipment to digitize x-rays.
The purchase will help students learn current technology, said Linda Schulte, a college spokeswoman.
The college, however, is also searching for ways to fit more students into its health programs, she said.
Demand for nurses, medical technologists and physical therapists is growing as the population ages, military expansion increases the county’s population and the wars funnel more wounded soldiers to the region.
“Yet we turn away qualified applicants every year, hundreds of them” due to lack of space, laboratories and instructors, Schulte said.
Meanwhile, the college is planning a Science Technology Engineering and Math (STEM) initiative at its Arundel Mills campus to help more middle- and high school students prepare for careers in technology and medicine.
The county’s 2009 budget will include funds to start the program, said Bob Leib, the county’s BRAC coordinator. However, county officials are asking Sen. Barbara Mikulski to secure $425,000 to create two information technology laboratories for the STEM students, Leib said.
As Maryland’s senior senator and a member of the Senate Appropriations Committee, Mikulski has secured funds for numerous other education and BRAC initiatives. |
