{"id":33261,"date":"2023-02-03T08:58:27","date_gmt":"2023-02-03T14:58:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/?p=33261"},"modified":"2023-02-03T08:58:27","modified_gmt":"2023-02-03T14:58:27","slug":"flexibility-sought-for-water-related-projects","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/?p=33261","title":{"rendered":"Flexibility sought for water-related projects"},"content":{"rendered":"

Nebraska could use a variety of alternate contract methods for state-sponsored water-related infrastructure projects under a bill considered Feb. 2 by the Natural Resources Committee.<\/p>\n

\"Sen.
Sen. Bruce Bostelman<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

LB723, introduced by Brainard Sen. Bruce Bostelman at the request of Gov. Jim Pillen, would allow the state Department of Natural Resources to use public-private partnerships, construction manager-general contractor, design-build and progressive design-build project methods when contracting for public water and natural resource projects.<\/p>\n

Under the bill, the department would develop guidelines by July 1, 2024, for entering into such contracts, including requests for proposals and evaluation criteria for ranking them. The department also would be required to pay a stipend in an amount determined at its discretion to qualified design builders that submit proposals but are not selected \u2014 giving the department ownership of the intellectual property contained in those proposals.<\/p>\n

Bostelman said the Legislature has granted the state Department of Transportation, Nebraska Game and Parks Commission and several other political subdivisions the ability to use these innovative contract delivery methods \u2014 enabling greater efficiencies and best practices by engaging contractors earlier in the process \u2014 and LB723 simply would allow the Department of Natural Resources to do the same.<\/p>\n

\u201cAll three [options] are intended to reduce a project\u2019s overall costs and construction time,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Department of Natural Resources director Tom Riley testified in support of the bill, which he said would help the department facilitate large natural resources projects such as the Perkins County Canal Project approved by the Legislature last session. The bill doesn\u2019t provide any funding or conflict with any current competitive bidding requirements, he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe bill\u2019s purpose is simple \u2014 provide the department flexibility in project delivery methods in order to provide the best value for the state,\u201d Riley said.<\/p>\n

Alex Linden, government and public relations manager for the Central Nebraska Public Power and Irrigation District, also testified in favor of LB723.<\/p>\n

The district already has the option to engage in the alternative contracting methods outlined in the bill, he said, and providing the same options to the Department of Natural Resources would allow them to complete major projects in a timely, well-designed and cost-effective manner.<\/p>\n

No one testified in opposition to the proposal and the committee took no immediate action on it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Nebraska could use a variety of alternate contract methods for state-sponsored water-related infrastructure projects under a bill considered Feb. 2 by the Natural Resources Committee.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":33237,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"colormag_page_container_layout":"default_layout","colormag_page_sidebar_layout":"default_layout","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[15],"tags":[183],"class_list":["post-33261","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-natural-resources","tag-sen-bruce-bostelman"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/02\/LB723Bostelman2-2-23a.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33261","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=33261"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33261\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":33263,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33261\/revisions\/33263"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/33237"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=33261"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=33261"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=33261"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}