A new permit by rule recently approved by the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality could lead more commercial and industrial facilities to use combined heat and power technologies for their power needs.

The U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration is investigating the cause of a fatal tower crane collapse at the University of Texas at Dallas campus in Richardson on July 7, but experts familiar with the accident are already pointing to problems with the dismantling process.

The Dallas library of George W. Bush, former president and oil man, strives to be one of a few state projects with Platinum LEED certification.

State officials hope to boost shrinking water supplies with potential construction of a new brackish groundwater desalination facility in central Texas.

The Regional Transportation District Board of Directors has formally approved a proposal by Kiewit Infrastructure Co. to complete the I-225 Light Rail Line to Peoria by November 2015.

Construction employment declined in 162 out of 337 metropolitan areas between June 2011 and June 2012, increased in 127 and stayed stagnant in 48.

One invaluable way to track what clients truly value and what their hot-button issues really are is client research.

Heat stress and heat-related illnesses can occur when the human body is exposed to hot temperatures for prolonged periods of time.

Don’t be surprised if the first response you get from your insurance company is a denial when you file a claim or ask it to defend a claim against you or your company.

New construction starts in June slipped 1% to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $446.1 billion.

The Denver Housing Authority has launched a landmark public-private partnership to bring renewable energy to 387 affordable housing buildings throughout the city.

Construction spending in June rose to a 2-1/2 year high as double-digit percentage increases in private residential and nonresidential construction more than offset an ongoing downturn in public construction.

Whether an employee is driving a company car or being reimbursed for driving their own vehicle on company business, the employer can be accused of negligent entrustment following a collision.

Overall confidence in the equipment finance market is at 51.5, up from the June index of 48.5, but reflects continuing concern over external economic factors and regulatory and political uncertainty.

One of Israel’s worst pollution sites is set for what officials say is a first-of-its-kind cleanup in the country.

General contractor Stalco Construction, Islandia, N.Y., is aiming for the Queens Library in Elmhurst to achieve LEED Silver certification through use of green roofs and energy-efficient materials

A proposed standard that would provide a common basis for consumers to describe, manage and communicate electrical energy consumption and forecasting is open for an advisory public review until Sept. 3.

For years, BIM has been long on promise and short on delivery for years due to software incompatibility and deeply ingrained culture and workflow issues. But there’s increasing evidence that this is finally changing.

In constructing multifamily housing on the 2,000-plus-population island, Lopez Community Land Trust focuses on whole neighborhoods and retains ownership of its land holdings, so that site acquisition does not impact pricing for residents.

Robert Hull has designed a medical clinic outside of Herat in Afghanistan .

With a little more than a month before the opening of the 13th Venice Architecture Biennale, firms around the world are finalizing contributions to the massive show.

Members of the buildings sector are applauding the U.S. Green Building Council’s decision to delay the release of the next version of its popular green-building rating system, called LEED. In the meantime, debate rages on over the content of the draft revision.

The federal government’s much-anticipated new contractor registration system, “SAM” was launched on July 30, 2012. SAM (short for System for Award Management) replaces the former Central Contractor Registration (CCR) system, and will ultimately integrate eight federal procurement systems (CCR, FedReg, ORCA, EPLS, CFDA, eSRS, FBO, FPDS-NG, FSRS, PPIRS, WDOL), along with the Catalog of Federal Domestic Assistance, into a new, streamlined system.

Eventually, contractors will be able to use one set of log in information to access everything that was once spread out over eight sites. Once SAM reaches that stage, there should be more consistency in the information found on-line, as contractors will no longer have to keep track of, or update, information on several different websites – one update on SAM, and you are set. Contractors will be able to register, file certifications, and search for contracting opportunities, in one place.

Steps for registering your business on SAM can be found in the User Guide posted on the SAM website. A quick start guide is also available. If you have further questions, or experience any difficulties, you can contact the Federal Service Desk’s Answer Center. We do understand that contractors have been having difficulty accessing the system, which is not entirely surprising at this point. If we receive any information addressing these accessibility problems, or any other issues of import regarding SAM, we will pass along that information to you.  By: Edward T. DeLisle & Maria L. Panichelli

A report released last month by the R Street Institute ranking state insurance departments on their regulatory systems claims that credit scoring has been “the biggest factor” in getting drivers out of state-run high-risk pools and back into the open coverage market, where prices are much more affordable.

The R Street Institute—a spin-off of the Heartland Institute that supports “free markets” and “limited effective government”—docked points from states that limit or completely prohibit insurers from basing rates partially on a driver’s financial history. R Street says insurance companies should have extremely wide latitude to set rates in order for the free market to regulate competitiveness.

Why Credit?

Credit scoring, also known as insurance scoring, is when insurers look at an applicant’s financial history in order to see what it might tell them about how good of a driver that applicant is. Why do insurers believe that things like bankruptcies, credit history, and debt ratios would be able to tell them how good of a driver an applicant is? Claims statistics and independent studies have shown that the worse of a financial history you have, the worse of a driver you’re likely to be.

An 82-page report issued by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) in 2007 on the use of consumers’ financial information in auto and home coverage markets concluded that credit-based insurance scores “are predictive of the number of claims consumers file and the total cost of those claims.” In the FTC report, an analysis of data for claims in which policyholders damaged another person’s property showed that insurers paid out nearly twice as much for the group with the lowest scores when compared with the group with the highest scores.

“The use of scores is therefore likely to make the price of insurance better match the risk of loss posed by the consumer,” the FTC wrote. “Thus, on average, higher-risk consumers will pay higher premiums and lower-risk consumers will pay lower premiums.”

And according to the R Street Institute, that’s exactly what has happened

Credit Scores and Residual Markets

Specifically, they say that financial scoring has been the driving factor in depopulating states’ residual markets, which are state-run markets of last resort for high-risk drivers. These pools consist of drivers that appear too risky to insure profitably. When drivers enroll in these pools, they are assigned to a carrier. The policies cost more this way, but, for hundreds of thousands of people, it’s the only option.

But by allowing credit scoring, the R Street Institute argues, insurers are much better able to accurately price policies. So people who looked to be too risky to insure on paper may not look so bad once you get a peek at their financial history, and they have better access to affordable car insurance as a result.

And R Street is correct about the fact that residual markets are shrinking. Data from AIPSO, the organization that helps states run their residual markets, backs up their conclusion. The number of policies issued through state residual markets in the U.S. annually fell by about 27 percent between 2005 and 2009, falling from about 2.37 million to about 1.73 million.

However, it’s not clear how much of that trend could be attributed to the use of credit scores. Consider the fact that California and Massachusetts both saw huge drops in residual-market enrollment between 2005 and 2009, yet these are two of the only three states (the other is Hawaii) that ban the use of credit scoring. California cut its residual-market enrollment by a whopping 90 percent during that period, and Massachusetts cut its enrollment by 56 percent. Credit scoring had nothing to do with those gains.

In the end, R Street gave everyone neutral scores on credit scoring except for the states that have an outright ban on the practice. Hawaii, Massachusetts, and California all got docked points for their regulations.

By: Edward T. DeLisle & Maria L. Panichelli –  Yesterday, the U.S. Small Business Administration (“SBA”) proposed certain size standard changes, which could expand the number of contractors eligible for “small” business status in relation to construction contracts under NAICS Code 23.

Specifically, the SBA issued a proposed rule that would increase the size standard associated with NAICS Code 237210 (which relates to contracts dealing with Land Subdivision) from seven million dollars in average annual receipts over three years to twenty-five million dollars. Similarly, the SBA proposed an increase in the size standard for NAICS Code 237990, relating to contracts involving Dredging and Surface Cleanup Activities, from twenty million dollars to thirty million dollars.

The SBA explained that, if adopted, these size standard increases will expand the small business share of total receipts in all industries within NAICS Sector 23, dealing with the construction industry, from about 49.7 percent to 50 percent. The SBA further estimated that these changes would result in an additional 400 contractors being deemed eligible for “small” business set aside contacts under NAIC Codes 237210 and 237990. The SBA stated that these changes would benefit three primary groups: (1) Businesses that are above the current size standards, who may gain small business status under the proposed rule, enabling them to participate in federal small business assistance programs; (2) Growing small businesses that are close to exceeding the current size standards, who will be able to retain their small business status under the proposed higher size standards, thereby enabling them to continue their participation in the programs; and (3) Federal agencies will have a larger pool of small businesses from which to draw for their small business procurement programs.

Under the proposed rule, the remaining NAICS codes relating to the construction industry would retain their current size standards.

The SBA is accepting comments on the proposed rule through September 17, 2012.