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Architects urge hiring a construction manager early to control costs on Brewster County projects
Summary
Presenters recommended a construction-manager-as-agent delivery method to keep the bunkhouse and visitor-center budgets under control, explaining tradeoffs with bonding, subcontracting and local contractor capacity and estimating construction manager fees at roughly 5–10% of the project.
Architects and the county's project presenter recommended bringing a construction manager on early in the design process to help control costs and provide early pricing information. Presenter (S3) described the construction manager agent approach as allowing the county to hire and manage individual subcontractors while the construction manager provides cost oversight and schedule coordination.
Presenter (S3) said the method avoids bonding costs on every trade and gives the county more control over subcontractor selection; he estimated typical construction-manager fees on a project of this size at about 5–10%—"anywhere from 25,000 to 50,000"—and noted that breaking the work into trade packages can keep individual contracts under the county's $100,000 bidding/bonding threshold. Commissioners debated whether the county could act as its own construction manager or should solicit an outside firm through qualifications-based selection (RFQ). The court directed staff to include a construction-manager solicitation as part of next procurement steps for the bunkhouse and visitor-center packages.
