Fairfield Connecticut Building Expert Directory

Payne & Fears LLP Recognized by U.S. News & World Report and Best Lawyers in 2023 “Best Law Firms” Rankings

November 28, 2022 — Payne & Fears LLP
Payne & Fears LLP is pleased to announce that the firm has been recognized by U.S. News & World Report and Best Lawyers 2023 “Best Law Firms” list. Firms included in the 2023 edition of U.S. News – Best Lawyers “Best Law Firms” are recognized for professional excellence with consistently impressive ratings from clients and peers. This includes the top 5% of private practicing lawyers in the United States. Payne & Fears LLP has been ranked in the following practice areas:

Commercial Litigation
Employment Law – Management
Insurance Law
Labor Law – Management
Litigation – Labor & Employment
Litigation – Real Estate
Litigation – Intellectual Property

Additionally, on August 15, 2022, 11 of our attorneys were selected for inclusion in The Best Lawyers in America® 2023. Collectively bringing decades of experience and dedication to their practice, Jeffrey K. Brown, Daniel F. Fears, Daniel M. Livingston, Thomas L. Vincent, Benjamin A. Nix, James L. Payne, Scott S. Thomas, and Kelby Van Patten received this respected achievement. Additionally, Leilani E. Jones, Sarah J. Odia, and Matthew C. Lewis were included in Best Lawyers: Ones to Watch 2023. Read the court decision
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Reprinted courtesy of Payne & Fears LLP

Carbon Sequestration Can Combat Global Warming, Sometimes in Unexpected Ways

April 02, 2024 — Michael S. McDonough, Robert A. James & Amanda G. Halter - Gravel2Gavel Construction & Real Estate Law Blog
Whether by land, by sea or through human innovation, carbon sequestration is likely coming to (or already happening in) a destination near you. As our planet, overdosed on greenhouse gases, battles climate disasters, a logical solution is to simply stop pumping carbon dioxide into the air. Legislation worldwide is aimed at that target, but reducing output alone may not be enough. There are still billions of tons of extra CO2 already in the atmosphere—this crossroads is where sequestration comes into play. Carbon sequestration is exactly what it sounds like—the storage of CO2. Once carbon is sucked out of the air, or in some cases pulled directly from industrial smokestacks, sequestration can be undertaken in a lot of different ways. Carbon storage happens naturally, when forests and oceans absorb and convert CO2 into organic matter, but carbon dioxide can also be artificially injected into deep underground rock formations (or wells), or in some cases technological approaches repurpose carbon into a resource like concrete, or as a catalyst in a closed-loop industrial system. However it’s accomplished, the point of sequestration is to stabilize carbon and ensure it doesn’t creep back into our atmosphere. Researchers, like those at the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, now say that CO2 removal is vital to keeping global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius (past that threshold, climate change could reach catastrophic levels). A 2023 University of Oxford study estimated that, currently, about two billion metric tons of carbon dioxide are being removed each year, primarily through land management (i.e., planting trees), and suggested that we need to double that amount to avoid dangerous global warming levels. Reprinted courtesy of Michael S. McDonough, Pillsbury, Robert A. James, Pillsbury and Amanda G. Halter, Pillsbury Mr. McDonough may be contacted at michael.mcdonough@pillsburylaw.com Mr. James may be contacted at rob.james@pillsburylaw.com Ms. Halter may be contacted at amanda.halter@pillsburylaw.com Read the court decision
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Application of Set-Off When Determining Prevailing Party for Purposes of Attorney’s Fees

February 22, 2021 — David Adelstein - Florida Construction Legal Updates
The recent opinion from the Second District Court of Appeal in Hayward Baker, Inc. v. Westfield Ins. Co., 2020 WL 7767859 (2nd DCA 2020) demonstrates that the significant issues test for determining the prevailing party for purposes of attorney’s fees applies to disputes involving payment bonds under Florida’s Lien Law (Florida Statutes Chapter 713). The significant issues test is more or less a subjective test where the party that is deemed to have prevailed on the significant issues in the case is the prevailing party for purposes of attorney’s fees in the case. A trial court has discretion to determine the prevailing party which will not be disturbed absent an appellate court finding the trial court abused that discretion. This significant issues test is an important consideration so that parties understand just because money ends up going their way does not necessarily mean they prevailed on the significant issues in the case. It could mean that. But it may not based on the claims and moneys involved in the dispute. Read the court decision
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Reprinted courtesy of David Adelstein, Kirwin Norris, P.A.
Mr. Adelstein may be contacted at dma@kirwinnorris.com

If You Can’t Dazzle Em’ With Brilliance, Baffle Em’ With BS: Apprentices on Public Works Projects

October 24, 2023 — Garret Murai - California Construction Law Blog
The “Big Four” when it comes to public works contracting on state and local projects in California are:

Registration with the California Department of Industrial Relations (“DIR”);
Payment of prevailing of wages and maintenance and submission of certified payroll;
Compliance with the “skilled and trained workforce” requirements on certain projects; and
Hiring apprentices on state and local public works projects with a value of $30,000 or more.

The next case, GRFCO, Inc. v. Superior Court, 89 Cal.App.5th 1295 (2023), discusses the last of these requirements. The case also reminded me of W.C. Field’s old saying – “If you can’t dazzle em’ with brilliance, baffle em’ with bullshit” – and which ended with expected results. Read the court decision
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Reprinted courtesy of Garret Murai, Nomos LLP
Mr. Murai may be contacted at gmurai@nomosllp.com

Landowners Try to Choke Off Casino's Water With 19th-Century Lawsuit

December 17, 2015 — Edvard Pettersson – Bloomberg
California’s latest water war is being waged at the edge of wine country against an Indian tribe planning a massive casino expansion as a group of landowners tries to stop them with a lawsuit from 1897. The Santa Ynez Band of Chumash Indians is spending $170 million to build out its resort, featuring a 12-story tower on a bucolic landscape where only the mountains are higher. The tribe has also snapped up 1,400 more acres to house cramped residents of its reservation. Read the court decision
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Reprinted courtesy of Edvard Pettersson, Bloomberg

A Year Later, Homeowners Still Repairing Damage from Sandy

October 01, 2013 — CDJ STAFF
The New York and New Jersey coastal communities are still in the thick of rebuilding and repairing after hurricane Sandy struck almost a year ago. Newsday reports that in the eight months following the October 2012 storm, more than 23,000 building permits were issued in Long Island communities, an 11 percent rise over the previous year. The town of Long Beach, New York has waived fees and hired more staff in order to encourage people to rebuild, in order to rebuild the town’s tax base. Homeowners aren’t going it alone, New York expects to fund more than $1 billion of rebuilding for homeowners who are unable to afford repairing their homes. At this point, the state is still processing more than five thousand requests for grants. The money is still in the state’s coffers. Other homeowners are still filing insurance claims. While towns are busy issuing building permits, contractors are busy too. Bill Sims of Sims Steel said that his business has changed from commercial construction to raising homes higher to put them above future floods. “There’s probably been more homes raised this last year than in the previous 20 years,” he told Newsday. Another contractor, Pat Gordon said that he is “only taking what we can handle.” He described Long Beach as “a traffic jam of construction trucks that has never been seen before.” Read the court decision
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Statutes of Limitations May be the Colorado Contractors’ Friend

April 18, 2011 — Beverley BevenFlorez CDJ STAFF

Albert Wolf, a principal in Wolf Slatkin & Madison P. C., has written an interesting article on statutes of limitations in construction defect claims in Colorado. While Wolf states that in most cases, “construction defect claims against construction industry participants (contractors, subcontractors, architects, engineers, etc.) requires that suits be started within two years after construction defects have been or should have been—in the exercise of reasonable diligence (care)—discovered,” if a project used the AIA General Conditions (AIA Document A2010) before the 2007 edition, the “statutes of limitations begin to run (accrue) at either substantial completion or breach by the contractor (installation of defective work), depending on the circumstances.”

“That’s a huge difference,” Wolf writes in his article. “For example, if the structural defect caused by faulty foundation work is not discovered or discoverable until walls begin to exhibit cracking more than two years after the building is completed, the owner’s claim against the contractor may be barred if the AIA provision is applied.”

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Approaches in the Absence of a Differing Site Conditions Clause

April 10, 2019 — Parker A. Lewton - Smith Currie
A contractor who has encountered unforeseen conditions will typically rely on the contract’s differing site conditions clause as a means to recovery. Most construction contracts address those issues directly. In ConsensusDocs Standard Agreement and General Conditions between Owner and Constructor, the starting point is § 3.16.2. But what if the contract does not contain a differing site conditions clause? Or, what if the contract does contain such a clause, but the contractor failed to provide adequate notice or satisfy other conditions or requirements of the contract? When reliance on a differing site conditions clause is impractical, a contractor still may seek recovery in certain instances under one or more of the following legal theories: misrepresentation; fraud; duty to disclose; breach of implied warranty; and mutual mistake. Misrepresentation Misrepresentation occurs when an owner “misleads a contractor by a negligently untrue representation of fact[.]” John Massman Contracting Co. v. United States, 23 Cl. Ct. 24, 31 (1991) (citing Morrison–Knudsen Co. v. United States, 170 Ct. Cl. 712, 718–19, 345 F.2d 535, 539 (1965)). A contractor may be able to recover extra costs incurred, under a theory of misrepresentation, if it can show that (1) the owner made an erroneous representation, (2) the erroneous representation went to a material fact, (3) the contractor honestly and reasonably relied on that representation, and (4) the contractor’s reliance on the erroneous representation was to the contractor’s detriment. See T. Brown Constructors, Inc. v. Pena, 132 F.3d 724, 728–29 (Fed. Cir. 1997). These four requirements can be satisfied, for example, through the use of deposition testimony detailing the owner’s representations and the contractor’s reliance thereon. See, e.g., C & H Commercial Contractors, Inc. v. United States, 35 Fed. Cl. 246, 256–57 (1996). Read the court decision
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Reprinted courtesy of Parker A. Lewton, Smith Currie
Mr. Parker may be contacted at palewton@smithcurrie.com

FAIRFIELD CONNECTICUT BUILDING EXPERT DIRECTORY AND CAPABILITIES