The last six months have been a whirlwind, especially for this single dad of six school children (who are no longer in school) while I work from home/office/car/jobsite/court. During the first week of the pandemic, I wrote an ebook for contractors on how to deal with COVID-19. Over the next month, I answered countless phone call and emails, asking about safety and employment issues in the construction industry.  Weeks four through six had me…

I have been thinking of launching a leadership mastermind for construction professionals.  And this idea came to me over the past month as the world basically came to a complete halt—except for the construction industry, which has instead been on a roller coaster ride. You see, most of the states and cities have enacted various “stay at home” orders with various exceptions for construction work, depending on the locality, the type of construction work, or…

Many jurisdictions have allowed construction activities to continue through the COVID-19 pandemic. But the “stay at home” restrictions have varied from a state to state. Restrictions vary depending on whether the project is public infrastructure, to commercial, to health care, to multifamily and residential. (Make sure that you confirm your particular jurisdiction’s orders to see what restrictions are in place.) When the Center for Disease Control (“CDC”) initially released its guidelines on social distancing in…

I am not going to even attempt to describe what has occurred over the past week.  You’ve read it online. You’ve watched the daily news reports. You’ve listened to the radio. And you’ve even had to adjust your own schedule to accommodate school closings. While working remotely myself, my mobile phone has been constantly pinging me with calls, emails and texts—all asking substantially the same question: How do we response to this mess? After four…

Contractor licensing violations raise serious concerns for all parties. For an owner, an unlicensed contractor may affect financing options on one end and the contractor’s entitlement to recover profits on the other end. For contractors, a licensing violation can have a crippling effect on all projects, the ability to perform, and the ultimate ability to recover amounts owed under a contract. For subcontractors and suppliers, an alleged licensing violation can be used as leverage to…

They say that hindsight is 20/20.  Who is they, anyway?  The old proverb means that it is easy to understand something after it has already happened. In the world of construction contracts, preservation of claims made in hindsight does not always get you what you want. In Appeal of Matcon Diamond, Inc., ASBCA No. 59637 (Feb. 20, 2020), the Armed Services Board of Contract Appeals recently denied a claim for Eichleay home office overhead delay damages …

I missed it by less than an hour. I was working late last week and left my office right before midnight … which happened to be right before a Category 5 tornado ripped through the outskirts of downtown Nashville and then proceeded to East Nashville and Putnam County.  The next morning, the skies were clear as the sounds of sirens and wreckage hummed throughout the city. It has not been a week since the catastrophic…