Helping To Protect Connecticut Taxpayers And Create Jobs
The University of Connecticut Construction Debacle Situation
"My concern from the start has been the safety of the students at the University of Connecticut. After safety, my top priorities are accountability, oversight, the integrity of the process and the cost-effectiveness of the work that's being done on the campus."
Connecticut Governor M. Jodi Rell
"You can't have people watching over themselves. The Connecticut Department of Public Works ought to have a role in the oversight here. We're just asking for trouble."
Connecticut State Representative William Dyson
The two long-term construction projects, UConn 2000 and UConn 2005, have been managed and led by out-of-state companies and management team executives. Why? Millions and millions of our hard-earn tax dollars have been wasted! In both of these major construction "campaigns", billions of dollars of our tax money have been used and billions of dollars have flown right out of our state. Why can't UConn officials adopt simple in-state preference guidelines so Connecticut companies that hire Connecticut workers are supported?
Why?
Throughout the whole building process, the construction management companies for the UConn projects have mismanaged the work and been fined thousands of dollars by state labor officials. When will this stop? Because of these poor management construction practices, students' lives have been put at risk.
Why?
Because the out-of-state management company hired questionable contractors, illegal and undocumented workers were found to be on the job site. Incorrect social security numbers and prevailing wage laws were violated.
Why?
As more and more safety code violations are found in campus dormatories and surrounding buildings, costs to repair and fix these constructions problems skyrocket! Millions of our tax dollars are being wasted to correct these problems as well as parents and students as their tuition fees are raised.
Why?
After a state legislative review of the mismanagement of the construction process, certain recommendations were made by the state legislature and Governor Rell's office. The primary recommendation included the creation of an oversight committee that included appointed representatives from UConn and the legislature. However, there are no construction industry representatives or public works members that are on the committee -- just UConn insiders.
Why?
Governor Rell, In Ceremony, Signs UConn Oversight Bill
8/7/06
Governor M. Jodi Rell, in a ceremony at the University of Connecticut in Storrs, signed a bill strengthening oversight of the ongoing reconstruction of the UConn campus. The legislation reflects several recommendations from the study panel Governor Rell appointed last summer to investigate mounting revelations of fire and building code violations at student housing complexes at the university.
“When I asked for a thorough examination of the way the UConn awards contracts and manages construction projects, my message was blunt:Cost overruns and lax oversight are absolutely, positively unacceptable,” Governor Rell said.“My goal all along has been equally clear: I want to make certain that taxpayer money at the university is being spent wisely, efficiently and effectively. The taxpayers deserve nothing less than that.
“UConn is a cornerstone in the foundation of Connecticut’s educational, economic and cultural future.Connecticut’s future and UConn’s future are inextricably linked, and that future must be grounded in three things: Efficiency, accountability and integrity."
The new law requires the creation of a seven-member committee to provide independent oversight of projects tied to UConn 2000, the 21-year, $2.3 billion capital program.
“The new UConn building oversight committee will be an independent entity committed to the highest standards of integrity, fairness, and openness,” Governor Rell said.“This committee will go about its work with the best interests of UConn students, parents, faculty, administrators, and Connecticut taxpayers in mind.”
The new committee will not oversee day-to-day construction, but will be responsible for ensuring the university follows proper procedures and policies.
In addition, the new law:
Requires public bidding on UConn 2000 projects costing over $500,000
Revises the process for UConn to prequalify contractors to bid on UConn 2000 projects
Subjects UConn 2000 projects to Department of Public Works and Administrative Services building construction and contractor prequalification statutes
Requires UConn and the Department of Public Safety to arrange for UConn staff to ensure code compliance on UConn 2000 projects
Requires UConn to spend all deferred maintenance allocations for that purpose and identify future deferred maintenance needs and costs.
Requires substantial subcontractors to prequalify with DAS before they perform work on a state or municipal construction contract.
The bill took effect July 1, except for the provisions concerning reports on deferred maintenance spending and code violations, which were effective on passage; the provisions subjecting UConn to DAS prequalification requirements, which are effective January 1; and the changes concerning subcontractor prequalification, which are effective October 1.
Members of the new committee are UConn Board of Trustees Chairman John W. Rowe, Thomas D. Ritter and Wayne Shepperd, all appointed by UConn; and Richard Shoenhardt, Pamela Delphenich, John Barrasso and Charles Urso, all jointly appointed by Governor Rell and the legislative leadership.
Safety Issues Persist At UConn: Fire Risks Among Concerns Listed By Workers Inspecting New Buildings
May 14 2006
STORRS -- Inspectors checking new buildings at the University of Connecticut have raised questions about the fire safety of water heaters in a student housing complex and discovered that carbon monoxide fumes plagued a second dormitory until last summer.
The fire and building inspectors uncovered the problems, among numerous others, while carrying out the governor's orders to check buildings constructed through the $2.3 billion UConn 2000 program.
Inspectors have checked 37 buildings so far, with nine more to go, and have found multiple code violations in every one. Conducting the inspections and following up on corrective work has become so time-consuming that UConn plans to further increase the staff of code-compliance inspectors, which already has grown from one to seven, State Building Inspector Christopher Laux said.
A Courant review reveals that inspectors found:
Water heaters in every unit of the Charter Oak Apartments may not have been installed properly and may pose a fire hazard; one sparked a blaze in September.
Carbon monoxide fumes had been present in the basement of at least one building in Husky Village, the second new dorm complex where the poisonous gas was found.
Fire sprinklers were inadequate in sections of the oceanology building on the Avery Point campus in Groton.
UConn officials say they are making good progress on correcting the violations.
"We are doing well. The drawings have to be pulled out for each building and the inspections are being made, but it's moving along. We are taking a very professional approach," said James Bradley, interim executive director of UConn's architecture and engineering services. "The architects and contractors have come back to do the repairs and so far everybody's been responding well."
Gov. M. Jodi Rell in August ordered inspections of every dorm and classroom building erected under UConn 2000 in response to news stories revealing scores of problems, including missing fire walls and fire sprinklers.
Some were so serious that Laux ordered fire watches at two dorm complexes, which were lifted during the winter.
The UConn inspectors, who are supervised by Laux, have been steadily working their way through the buildings.
But the job has become so overwhelming that Laux twice has extended the deadline for finishing the job.
That deadline is now Oct. 1, and the inspections are far from over. The legislature recently authorized the state building inspector to direct inspections of all new university construction until 2015, when the 20-year, $2.3 billion construction program ends.
The UConn 2000 scandal came to light in August 2004 when the university found carbon monoxide fumes in the Hilltop Apartments.
Since then, the university has discovered scores of other code violations new buildings, and a criminal probe was launched by the chief state's attorney.
Three UConn employees involved in the building program, including the vice president of operations, were put on administrative leave. Two of them later resigned.
Charter Oak Apartments
The Courant's review of recent inspection reports found numerous new problems, including concerns about the potential fire hazard posed by water heaters in the living room closets in the Charter Oak Apartments.
Inspectors are worried that the enclosures around the water heaters are too tight and that there is not adequate ventilation.
"When you close the door of the closet, the door almost touches the water heater," Laux said.
One of the heaters ignited a fire Sept. 8 when the control wiring overheated and the insulation caught fire, Laux said. The inspectors brought in the manufacturer, who said the installation was acceptable, but the inspectors do not feel comfortable with the situation, Laux said.
"The issue is the potential overheating of the unit," he said.
At Laux's request, the university has hired an independent engineer to evaluate the water heaters.
"It's my understanding that they were installed correctly," Bradley said. "We have agreed to have a third-party review to make sure."
More Carbon Monoxide
The state reports also revealed the presence of carbon monoxide fumes in the basement of the Husky Village dorms, the second complex where the poisonous gas has been found.
Laux said the university fixed the problem last summer at the complex when it corrected many of the fire and building code deficiencies found by engineering consultants.
Laux said the carbon monoxide problems arose from common water heaters in the basement and the ventilation system designed to pipe the fumes outside.
The venting system was poorly designed, he said, and created some negative pressure in the pipe, which pushed some of the odorless, colorless poison fumes back into the basement.
"It was pretty serious," Laux said, adding that UConn was lucky that no one was killed.
"It's probably not as serious as when the carbon monoxide was going directly into the apartment units, but it's not something you want in a building," he said.
Students living in Husky Village before the repairs were made told The Courant last May that people had been getting sick there and that carbon monoxide detectors frequently went off.
Students said the fire department always responded to the detectors and tested the air.
Students at one of the sororities in Husky Village, Delta Zeta House, were concerned that the air quality was so poor that they pressed for more air tests.
One student moved out on doctor's orders because her allergies acted up in the building.
Regional health officials and UConn officials at the time said they had gotten some sporadic complaints from students.
"We have not noticed a pattern of illness in that facility. I think I could probably find anywhere you went that people had some sickness," Linda Flaherty-Goldsmith, UConn's former vice president and chief operating officer, said at the time.
She added that the university was constantly monitoring carbon monoxide levels in dorms.
"Sometimes they go off," she said, adding that the detectors were highly sensitive and some were found to be faulty.
Bradley, who was hired after the Husky Village repairs were completed, said he had not heard anything about the carbon monoxide problem there.
More Inspectors
More recently, building officials found 28 code violations in the 8-year-old oceanology building, which contains classrooms, labs and dorm rooms, on the university's Avery Point campus.
Inspections revealed that fire sprinkler protection was missing in attic areas and the second-floor ceiling in the building, which is part of the Marine Sciences and Technology Center.
Earlier this spring, inspectors found 38 fire and safety code violations in the university's agricultural biotechnology building on the main campus, including some that are substantial and will be costly to fix.
The inspections have overwhelmed the team of seven UConn fire and building inspectors and put a strain on the state building inspector's office.
As a result, UConn plans to hire a few more inspectors, bringing the staff up to about 10 inspectors. That's a far cry from the single building inspector UConn had - until the first safety problems emerged - to handle all inspections under the massive construction program.
In two weeks, the university will begin fireproofing stairwells in Hilltop Apartments, Charter Oak Suites and Charter Oak Apartments.
Connecticut Governor Rell Seeks Answers on UCONN Repairs
March 13, 2007 -- Connecticut Governor M. Jodi Rell has written to the Attorney General and the President of the University of Connecticut asking for answers to questions about how the University is paying for repairs to correct code violations in buildings funded under the UCONN 2000 Infrastructure Improvement Program.
“I continue to receive complaints that student fees are being used to pay for the code violation repairs,” Governor Rell said. “I share the concerns about how these repairs are being funded. Funds that have been allocated for a specific purpose should only be used for that purpose. The responses to these questions will help to ensure that funds are properly used for the purposes for which they were intended.”
In a March 12 letter to Attorney General Richard Blumenthal, Governor Rell posed a series of questions in an effort to clear up any confusion about which funds may be used to correct the building code violations.
UConn Spends $650,000 On Apartment Gas Leaks --------------------
By GRACE E. MERRITT Courant Staff Writer
November 12, 2004
STORRS -- The University of Connecticut has spent $650,000 to correct carbon monoxide leaks in the 3-year-old Hilltop Apartments, officials said Thursday.
Those costs are expected to grow with this week's news of more fire- and building-code violations at Hilltop and two other student housing projects.
UConn has sued the contractor to recover the $650,000 and is working on a plan to fix the violations, Linda Flaherty-Goldsmith, vice president and chief operating officer, said Thurdsay.
The university is also looking into the problem of revising the way it monitors its many construction projects as it finishes its $1 billion, 10-year building blitz and prepares to launch a $1.3 billion extension of the program.
"We are looking at several possibilities. Any one of them will require additional staffing," Flaherty-Goldsmith said.
Meanwhile, a state building inspector said this week that the violations never would have happened if his office had been involved in the projects.
The violations, which officials said are not life-threatening, surfaced while UConn was correcting ventilation problems with water heaters that led to elevated levels of carbon monoxide in some Hilltop apartments.
UConn asked the state building inspector and the state fire marshal to investigate. They found other problems from exposed electrical wire boxes to holes in firewalls. The problems not only plagued Hilltop, but the Charter Oak Apartment complex and Husky Village, where most of the university's fraternities and sororities reside.
Collectively, the three complexes house more than 2,000 students and cost about $101 million to build. They were built during the past three years to help house UConn's expanding enrollment.
The $650,000 was used to correct carbon monoxide and ventilation problems, and install detectors, Flaherty-Goldsmith said. The university is seeking to recover the costs from Capstone Development Corp. of Birmingham, Ala., which built Hilltop.
UConn also plans to try to recover the costs from the construction companies that will be associated with correcting the recently discovered fire- and building-code violations. Capstone built Hilltop and Husky Village and JPI Inc., of Irving, Texas, built the $46.5 million Charter Oak complex. Neither Capstone nor JPI returned phone calls Thursday.
Flaherty-Goldsmith recently put Larry Schilling, UConn's top construction manager, on paid administrative leave. She has declined to comment on the reason for the leave, or whether it was related to the latest problems with student housing.
Government leaders said they are pleased that UConn has responded quickly to the problems, and said that generally the university has done a good job with the 53 projects it has completed in the past nine years.
Lawmakers, however, are closely monitoring the situation. The legislature and the governor's office have asked UConn to prepare a full report on the fire- and building-code violations and how they occurred, Lt. Gov. Kevin B. Sullivan said Wednesday.
State Rep. Pamela Z. Sawyer, R-Bolton, whose district encompasses the Storrs campus, said she planned to tour the problem buildings.
"Basically, it sounds like shoddy workmanship," she said. "I don't know if it's related with Capstone, or whether it was a question about the quality of labor they were using."
During Hilltop Apartments' construction, the state labor department found that Capstone had underpaid workers nearly $1 million and that one of the subcontractors had hired illegal Mexican immigrants and had failed to pay them for nearly a month.
Some watchdog groups also have been monitoring the latest developments and reacted with dismay, but not surprise.
"I think it's just such a shame that we've spent all this money and now there are all these problems," said Helen Koehn, who leads Citizens for Responsible Growth in Mansfield.
"It's not surprising. The university has known about the problems and the bad workmanship. We've had meetings with them," said James E. Duffy, director of the Labor Management Foundation for Fair Contracting of Connecticut in Newington.
Daniel Tierney, deputy state building inspector, who was called in to inspect the problems, said that if he had been involved in the projects, he would have caught them before construction started.
"These problems wouldn't have existed because we would have caught them in the plan review phase of construction," Tierney said. "We would have taken immediate steps to bring this to their attention."
Until the collapse of the L'Ambiance Plaza Hotel in Bridgeport in 1987, which killed 28 men, the state building inspectors were not required to inspect any state buildings.
A Blue Ribbon Committee formed to examine the issue recommended that the state inspectors check every public building. But the problem was that the state did not have the staff to handle the job at the time. So the committee set a threshold to limit the scope of their work until the department could hire more staff. As a result, the state would inspect only large buildings, generally more than four stories, or 150,000 square feet. The state never hired more inspectors so the threshold still stands today.
In UConn's case, all three housing projects fall under the threshold. That means they were inspected by UConn's standards, which means inspections by the builder and the engineer, as well as a UConn project manager and code compliance employee.
The UConn fire marshal, however, is not part of the process. When asked whether he thought the fire department should be routinely involved in the inspection process, UConn Deputy Fire Chief Francis Williams said, "I'd rather not comment on that."
Currently UConn has only one code inspector, who is stretched thin trying to keep track of numerous projects in the UConn 2000 program, Flaherty-Goldsmith said.
She said the university would likely hire two other code inspectors. She said she is also considering asking the state building inspector to take over the role, but is concerned that he may not have enough staffing. Copyright 2004, Hartford Courant
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