Echoes of Shutdown in Delay of Key Building Metric
November 27, 2013 —
CDJ STAFFAmong the important measures of the U.S. economy are housing starts and completions. The data on these are collected by the U.S. Census Bureau, which is itself part of the Commerce Department. Due to the October government shutdown, the Census Bureau was unable to complete timely collection of housing starts, among other data collected by the bureau.
Estimates of housing permits issued during September and October will be released on November 26. However, the data on housing starts and completions will be delayed until December 18. This report will include September through November.
Read the court decisionRead the full story...Reprinted courtesy of
Counterpoint: Washington Supreme Court to Rule on Resulting Losses in Insurance Disputes
September 01, 2011 —
Douglas Reiser, Builders Council BlogThis is the fourth installment of posts on Vision One v. Philadelphia Indemnity, a Washington Supreme Court case touching on Washington construction and insurance law. After Williams v. Athletic Field got so much coverage, I wished that I had provided a forum for argument on Builders Counsel. While we await that opinion from the Supreme Court, I decided to let a few good writers have at Vision One here on the blog. Last week, attorney Chris Carr weighed in. Today, insurance expert David Thayer returns to give his final impression. David provided an initial peak at the case earlier this year. Thanks to both Chris and David for contributing to the debate.
In August 2011 the Washington Supreme Court will rule on a pair of joined cases that involve critical insurance coverage issues. The outcome of the ruling will impact a large swath of policyholders in Washington State including builders, developers, and homeowners to name a few.
The cases are Vision One vs. Philadelphia Indemnity Insurance and Sprague vs. Safeco. The Vision one case comes from Division Two of the Appellate Court which overturned a lower court decision in favor the plaintiff, Vision One. Division Two decided that the collapse of a concrete pour during the course of construction did not constitute a resulting loss due to faulty workmanship. They further went on to redefine efficient proximate cause in a way that is harmful to policyholders by broadening rather than narrowing the meaning of exclusionary language in Philadelphia’s Builders Risk Policy.
Read the full story…
Reprinted courtesy of Douglas Reiser of Reiser Legal LLC. Mr. Reiser can be contacted at info@reiserlegal.com
Read the court decisionRead the full story...Reprinted courtesy of
Pennsylvania Supreme Court Dismisses Appeal of Attorney Fee Award Under the Contractor and Subcontractor Payment Act
February 16, 2016 —
William J. Taylor – White and Williams LLPIn late December, the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania dismissed, as improvidently granted, the appeal in Waller Corporation v. Warren Plaza, Inc., No. 6 WAP 2015 (December 21, 2015). As a result, the Superior Court’s holding in that case that there is no good faith exception to the attorney fee provision of the Pennsylvania Contractor and Subcontractor Payment Act (CASPA), 73 P.S. §§ 501-516, remains intact.
In its decision in Waller, 95 A.3d 313 (Pa. Super. 2014), the Superior Court considered if there was a “good faith” exception to the interest and penalties provision of CASPA, 73 P.S. § 512(a), and whether there was a similar good faith exception to the attorney fee provision of the statute, 73 P.S. § 512(b). The court held that while an award of interest and penalties under § 512(a) could be denied if a party had a good faith basis for withholding payments due under a construction contract, no such exception exists for an award of attorney fees under § 512(b). Rather, an award of attorney fees is appropriate for the “substantially prevailing party” under a CASPA claim, and a claimant can be the substantially prevailing party even if the other party withheld payments in good faith.
Read the court decisionRead the full story...Reprinted courtesy of
William J. Taylor, White and Williams LLPMr. Taylor may be contacted at
taylorw@whiteandwilliams.com
Corporate Transparency Act’s Impact on Real Estate: Reporting Companies, Exemptions and Beneficial Ownership Reporting (webinar)
December 04, 2023 —
Pillsbury's Construction & Real Estate Law Team - Gravel2Gavel Construction & Real Estate Law BlogOn October 23, 2023, colleague
Andrew Weiner and Kevin Gaunt, counsel at Hunton Andrews Kurth, examined the Corporate Transparency Act (CTA), effective Jan. 1, 2024, and its impact on real estate entities and transactions, including who is considered a reporting company subject to new beneficial ownership information (BOI) reporting requirements and whether an exemption applies. The panel also discussed certain state laws that impose similar reporting requirements as the CTA and described best practices for real estate counsel to assist their clients with preparing for the CTA’s implementation and ongoing compliance.
The panel also reviewed other important considerations, including:
- Which real estate entities will likely be most affected by the CTA’s implementation and why?
- What exemptions may apply?
- How will the CTA’s reporting requirements affect real estate transactions for lenders and investors/buyers?
Read the court decision
Read the full story...
Reprinted courtesy of Pillsbury's Construction & Real Estate Law Team
Righting Past Wrongs Through Equitable Development
January 17, 2022 — Bruce Buckley & Pam Radtke Russell - Engineering News-Record
Standing on a dead-end street in Spartanburg, S.C., Harold Mitchell can plainly see the history of injustice in his community. On one side lies the remains of his childhood home. On the other, a shuttered fertilizer plant that was operational when Mitchell was growing up. He distinctly recalls smells of ammonia and sulfur emanating through the neighborhood that “were so pervasive, you didn’t even think about it.” He remembers his father regularly cleaning white dust off their cars, and workers emerging from the plant gates “looking like the Pillsbury Doughboy” covered in fertilizer dust from head to toe. Sometimes, he’d walk with the plant’s night watchman, strolling alongside neon green sewage lagoons located not far from his bedroom window.
Reprinted courtesy of Bruce Buckley, Engineering News-Record and Pam Radtke Russell, Engineering News-Record
ENR may be contacted at enr@enr.com
Read the full story... Read the court decision
Read the full story...
Reprinted courtesy of
How To Lock Disputes Out Of Your Project In Construction
July 22, 2019 — Anastasios Koutsogiannis – LetsBuild
Disputes are seen as one of the main threats for the successful completion of a project in construction. There is a plethora of factors which could lead to a construction dispute (e.g. contracts, behavior, environment) but, strangely enough, the industry seems to invest more attention on the resolution of a conflict instead of its prevention.
Thanks to the progress that digital technologies have witnessed during the last few years, there is a good chance that things in construction will change for the better soon. The ability to exchange crucial updates in real time, while keeping a detailed record of everything that happens on the field adds an extra level of protection to your project and ensures that all agents are on the same page.
In an effort to shed some light on the issue of construction disputes, we present below four tips that could help your team to lock conflicts out of your project:
1. Standardize your processes
Before you kickstart your project, it is of paramount importance that you standardize all your systems and processes. In that way, you will be able to add extra clarity to your workflow and eliminate misunderstandings.
Once you have achieved that, you can replicate the same process to your future projects. The more you manage to repeat the same project structure the better your team will become in completing their tasks without ending up in any kind of conflict.
In that sense, standardization could be a long-term investment for your organization.
2. Go digital
As soon as your processes are defined, it is time for the digital journey to begin. Finding the right tool for your project will result in a streamlined construction process where all the members of the team are on the same page without any room for costly mistakes or disagreements.
Furthermore, with the help of digital solutions it becomes easier for project managers to measure the performance on site and monitor the completion of the set benchmarks. Like that, all payments will be on time and the program of the project will reflect reality.
3. Be extra careful with the contracts
A poorly-written contract can have a big impact on the effort to lock disputes out of your construction project. While putting together a new contract, you should always make sure that you have taken into account all the different scenarios for your project.
Either that is a delay due to weather conditions or an accident on site everything should be described in detail in the contracts and be well understood by those in charge.
In any other case, things can get a bit risky and a costly dispute might wait to happen.
4. Hold regular meetings with all stakeholders
Last but certainly not least, meet regularly with all project stakeholders. The frequent contact with the different members of your team will allow you to discuss and resolve any problematic situations before they grow out of proportion.
What is more, regular meetings will help both your field teams and the people in the office to remain aligned and will eliminate the possibility of having people working on outdated versions of the program.
Of course, these meetings don’t need to be time-consuming or even in person. With the help of technology, you can keep these meetings short and to the point. In that manner, everybody involved will be able to get the most out of them.
Final word
All in all, it becomes clear that locking disputes out of your project in construction requires continuous work and a carefully-elaborated plan. Thankfully, the emergence and progress of digital solutions have made this process much easier contributing significantly to the development of the industry far from disputes and project misunderstandings.
About the author: Anastasios Koutsogiannis is Content Marketing Manager at LetsBuild.
Read the court decision
Read the full story...
Reprinted courtesy of Anastasios Koutsogiannis, LetsBuild
Eleventh Circuit Holds that EPA Superfund Remedial Actions are Usually Entitled to the FTCA “Discretionary Function” Exemption
February 18, 2019 — Anthony B. Cavender - Gravel2Gavel
An unusual Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA, known also as Superfund) remedial action has resulted in a broad ruling that Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) remedial actions and their implementation by EPA contractors may be entitled to broad protection from liability insofar as the Federal Tort Claims Act (FTCA) is involved. The case is Gadsden Industrial Park LLC v. United States of America, CMC Inc., and Harsco Corporation, an unpublished opinion released by the court on November 30, 2018.
After the Gulf States Steel Corporation, the owner and operator of a former steel manufacturing facility located in Gadsden, AL, declared bankruptcy, in 2002, Gadsden Industrial Park LLC (Gadsden) purchased 434 acres of the 761 acre site, as well as assets located in what is described as the “Excluded Real Property”—recyclable materials generated in the steel making process known as “kish” and “slag,” and a track of a railroad line located in this area. However, in the 2007 or 2008, the Eleventh Circuit observes, EPA began a CERCLA remedial cleanup action on the Excluded Real Property and barred Gadsden from entering the Excluded Real Property to make use of its new assets. Read the court decision
Read the full story...
Reprinted courtesy of Anthony B. Cavender, Pillsbury
Mr. Cavender may be contacted at anthony.cavender@pillsburylaw.com
‘Hallelujah,’ House Finally Approves $1T Infrastructure Funding Package
November 15, 2021 — Tom Ichniowski - Engineering News-Record
After nearly three months in a holding pattern and a long day of back-and-forth negotiations among House Democrats, the chamber approved a sweeping, multi-year infrastructure funding package late on Nov. 5 that will provide an estimated $1 trillion for a wide range of infrastructure categories, including highways, transit, rail, water, power and broadband.
Reprinted courtesy of Tom Ichniowski, Engineering News-Record
Mr. Ichniowski may be contacted at ichniowskit@enr.com
Read the full story... Read the court decision
Read the full story...
Reprinted courtesy of
