Fairfield Connecticut Building Expert Directory

Supreme Court Holds Arbitrator can Fully Decide Threshold Arbitrability Issue

March 18, 2019 — David Adelstein - Florida Construction Legal Updates
The United States Supreme Court recently decided parties to a contract can agree, under the Federal Arbitration Act, an arbitrator, rather than a court, can fully resolve the initial arbitrability question. Henry Schein, Inc. v. Archer and White Sales, Inc., 2019 WL 122164 (2019). The arbitrability question is whether the dispute itself is subject to arbitration under an arbitration provision. Parties that do not want to arbitrate try to circumvent this process by filing a lawsuit and asking the court to determine the threshold arbitrability question. In Henry Schein, Inc., the contract at-issue provided: This Agreement shall be governed by the laws of the State of North Carolina. Any dispute arising under or related to this Agreement (except for actions seeking injunctive relief and disputes related to trademarks, trade secrets, or other intellectual property) shall be resolved by binding arbitration in accordance with the arbitration rules of the American Arbitration Association. The place of arbitration shall be in Charlotte, North Carolina. The plaintiff in this case asserted a claim for injunctive relief (among other claims) and argued that, therefore, the dispute is not subject to arbitration based on the exception in the provision. The initial, threshold issue became whether the dispute was subject to arbitration and, importantly, who decides this issue. The Court further looked at whether a trial court can resolve this issue under the “wholly groundless” exception, i.e.,the court can decide the issue if the argument for arbitration is wholly groundless. Read the court decision
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Reprinted courtesy of David Adelstein, Kirwin Norris
Mr. Adelstein may be contacted at dma@kirwinnorris.com

How Machine Learning Can Help with Urban Development

March 27, 2019 — Aarni Heiskanen - AEC Business
An experimentation project has demonstrated the capabilities of machine learning in urban development. It used images as a starting point and came up with interesting and useful applications. “I read data science papers on how machine vision algorithms can be used with satellite imagery. I immediately saw a connection to what we had been doing,” Antti Kauppi, architect at Arkkitehdit Sankari, explains. “Most people associate image recognition with Google’s visual searches. Google can distinguish whether a photo shows a cat or another animal, for example. We went a step further.” An Experiment with Open Urban Imagery Arkkitehdit Sankari Oy, a Finnish architectural design firm began the experimentation project CityCNN in May 2018. It received funding from KIRA-digi, the Finnish government’s digitalization program for the built environment. CityCNN explored the possibilities of using machine learning and open data for urban development. Read the court decision
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Reprinted courtesy of Aarni Heiskanen, AEC Business
Mr. Heiskanen may be contacted at aec-business@aepartners.fi

Failure to Timely File Suit in Federal Court for Flood Loss is Fatal

June 29, 2017 — Tred R. Eyerly - Insurance Law Hawaii
Although the insureds timely filed their suit for denial of flood benefits in state court, the Fourth Circuit found the lawsuit against the Insurer was untimely because it was not filed in federal district court. Woodson v. Allstate Ins. Co., 2017 U. S. App. LEXIS 7862 (4th Cir. May 3 , 2917). Hurricane Irene struck the insureds' house in August 27, 2011. Their property was flooded and for several hours, subjected to wave action, allegedly causing further damage to the home. The insureds contacted Allstate, who retained Rimkus Consulting Group, Inc. to inspect the property. Rimkus found that, other than a substantial loss of soil washed away around the supporting portion of the house, there was no damage to the structure of the house. Rimkus recommended reimbursement of $1200 for the washed out soil. The insureds retained House Engineering, P.C., which submitted a report describing substantial damage caused by the hurricane, including movement to the pilings that caused the house to no longer be level. The insureds claimed $228,822 in damages. Read the court decision
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Reprinted courtesy of Tred R. Eyerly - Insurance Law Hawaii
Mr. Eyerly may be contacted at te@hawaiilawyer.com

Transition Study a Condo Board’s First Defense against Construction Defects

December 04, 2013 — CDJ STAFF
According to the advice provided by T. Allen Mott and Nicholas D. Cowie, condominium boards would be well advised to “hire an engineer or architect to perform a transition study,” since it would be preferable to repair any problems while warranties are still in effect. They also caution that the board must “determine whether the developer-created budget and reserve fund are adequate to cover the cost of maintaining the condominium’s construction over time.” They note that discovered in time, some problems are easy to fix, but left unrepaired, they can result in “extensive, hidden property damage requiring associations to borrow money and assess unit owners to cover the entire cost of repairing the developer’s construction defects and resulting property damage. The goal, as they point out, is “an amicable repair resolution.” Read the court decision
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Road to Record $199 Million Award Began With Hunch on Guardrails

June 17, 2015 — Patrick G. Lee – Bloomberg
It started with a hunch about malfunctioning highway guardrails. It led to the biggest known whistle-blower award in U.S. history. Joshua Harman, a Virginian with two small highway safety companies, made a discovery in late 2011 that perhaps only a guardrail maker could: A big competitor had changed the dimensions of its roadside safety device by as much as an inch here and there, he said, without telling federal regulators. As designed, Trinity Industries Inc.’s ET-Plus system was meant to turn the end of a guardrail into a de facto shock absorber. The altered units, as Harman saw it, were locking up when hit, spearing cars and their occupants. Read the court decision
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Reprinted courtesy of Patrick G. Lee, Bloomberg

Balcony Collapses Killing Six People

June 17, 2015 — Beverley BevenFlorez-CDJ STAFF
Six college students died from injuries that occurred when a balcony collapsed at a downtown apartment complex in Berkeley, California, according to Berkeleyside. The city of Berkeley ordered a structural inspection of the remaining balconies at Library Gardens, and to immediately remove the failed balcony. The following day Berkeleyside reported that the city ordered the Library Gardens’ owners to remove another balcony after “[i]nspectors determined that the third-floor balcony ‘was structurally unsafe and presented a collapse hazard endangering public safety.’” Berkeley’s mayor, Tom Bates, stated that “investigators believe the wood wasn’t sealed properly at the time of construction and was damaged by moisture as a result,” the Wall Street Journal reported. Read the full story, 6/16/15 Berkeleyside article... Read the full story, 6/17/15 Berkeleyside article... Read the full story, Wall Street Journal... Read the court decision
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Massachusetts Clarifies When the Statute of Repose is Triggered For a Multi-Phase or Multi-Building Project

December 07, 2020 — Jeffrey J. Vita & Anna M. Perry - Saxe Doernberger & Vita, P.C.
Lennar Hingham Holdings, LLC (“Lennar”) built a twenty-eight-building, 150-unit condominium project containing twenty-four discrete phases over a seven-year span. The condominium association subsequently brought an action against Lennar and others alleging design and construction defects to four main components of the common elements: “decks and columns,” “roofing/flashing,” “exterior walls/flashing/building envelope,” and “irrigation system.” In response, the defendants argued that the plaintiff’s claims with respect to six of the twenty- eight buildings were barred by Massachusetts’s six-year statute of repose, G. L. c. 206 § 2B. The United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts previously held that all twenty-eight of the condominium’s buildings should be treated as a single improvement for purposes of application of the statute of repose. Subsequently, the court certified the following question to the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court: Where the factual record supports the conclusion that a builder or developer was engaged in the continuous construction of a single condominium development comprising multiple buildings or phases, when does the six-year period for an action of tort relating to the construction of the condominium’s common or limited common elements start running? Reprinted courtesy of Jeffrey J. Vita, Saxe Doernberger & Vita, P.C. and Anna M. Perry, Saxe Doernberger & Vita, P.C. Mr. Vita may be contacted at JVita@sdvlaw.com Ms. Perry may be contacted at APerry@sdvlaw.com Read the court decision
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The Three L’s of Real Estate Have New, Urgent Meaning

April 15, 2024 — Mark Gongloff - Bloomberg
What will it take to make Americans stop rushing headlong into climate peril? Cheaper housing in safer places, for one thing. But maybe big red flags on property listings will help, too. Redfin Corp., the digital real estate company, last week added air-quality data to its listings as part of its “climate risks” feature, which aims to warn homebuyers of the chances their dream home could succumb to a global-warming nightmare. Using data from the climate research firm First Street Foundation, Redfin estimates a property’s current and predicted risk levels for flooding, wildfires, extreme heat, high winds — and now days when the Environmental Protection Agency’s Air Quality Index tops 100, a category known as “unhealthy for sensitive groups.” Read the court decision
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Reprinted courtesy of Mark Gongloff, Bloomberg

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