4.01.2009

Procurement Bills Receive a hearing in Fiscal Committee

SB 5760 went before the House Capitol Budget Committee on March 31. The AIAWA and a broad coalition of design professionals testified against the bill. The bill is supported by and promoted by the University of Washington and Washington State University.

SB 5760 would pre-empt current law requiring the colleges to get prior approval of projects and would give them blanket authority to use design-build and general contractor/construction manager (GC/CM) procurement methods. This legislation would lower the dollar threshold from $10 million to $1 million and the small works roster limit would be increased from $35K/$55K to $1 million. Thus, SB 5760 would allow every project to be either: small works, design-build or GC/CM. Therefore SB 5760 effectively eliminates the design-bid-build procurement method.

Lastly, the bill would also allow UW/WSU to prequalify bidders and limit the number of bidders on a project-by-project basis.

You can see the AIA/WA testimony in opposition of this legislation below.

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