Public Project Staking

They may have pulled their pricing out of their rear end.  Or they may have got it out of a "Means" book that estimators rely on.  Probably the former.  

2026 Construction Cost Books with RSMeans data

@norman-oklahoma Interesting, first I've heard of this book.  I'd be curious to see what it says about surveying.

The more I think about this the more it doesn't really make sense.  I listed a detailed scope  which wasn't even based on anything the city provided-- it was just me picking commonly staked things off the plans-- and then the price was to stake all of that.  If they don't need everything I listed then obviously the staking might end up costing 10k or maybe even less.

Is this not obvious to these people?  Or do they just assume you're going to make the work cost the same as the estimate no matter how much of it is actually done?

I have been on the other end of construction several times over my years as a school board member and as a board member of two rural water districts and a public wholesale water supply district.  Sometimes, the need is real but the resources to do it NOW just aren't available.  Shave 20 percent off the total expenditure and it will happen NOW.  Where can dollars be cut and still have basically the same thing.  Either that, or it will be two to ten years before we try again.

These non-paying titles are where I've received over ninety percent of my experience with courtrooms.  

When I've looked at public bid tab results, I've come to the conclusion that the estimator just puts numbers in the survey column to get the bid out the door. Teh big firms are trying to get multiple out a day. Too many "even ten thousand" prices to be coming from legitimate surveyor proposals.

The thing to keep in mind on construction project is that, in many cases, the team that solicits pricing and puts their overall proposal together is not the team that hires the subcontractors and executes the project. One the job is one, the estimators pass the project over to a project manage who finalizes all the subcontractor contacts and is under no obligation to use the price that was used at the time the bid went in. 

If you can build relationships with the contractors PM's this can actually work in your favor. IF XYZ Surveys priced it at $20K and you were at $22K the estimators are going to put the low number in the bud, Bur when the PM is buying out the subcontracts, if they would rather work with you, they will find $2k somewhere else.       

Public projects often mean prevailing wages, certified payrolls, audits, and the worst of all hold-backs.

14k seems very tight for a fire station and presumably parking areas, sidewalks, and all the other lil honey-dos that get tossed into a staking job. 

Posted by: @mightymoe

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14k seems very tight for a fire station and presumably parking areas, sidewalks, and all the other lil honey-dos that get tossed into a staking job.

It's not a very large station, I think maybe about the size of a dollar store with 2 floors and a 2 bay garage and a smallish parking lot.

But yeah I think I'll call these guys back or stop in their office since it's about a quarter of a mile from my place.

Got the rejection letter today, was interesting seeing one of these.

My first question was WTF does a fire chief and board of commissioners know about construction staking?  Or anything to do with building a commercial or industrial thing.  Just total nonsense, imo.

And then later it says they can get a better deal "on the open market".  The initial bidding was open to anyone, how is that not "the open market"?

Anyway, gonna get in people's faces about this for a little bit because this seems like some shady BS or government incompetence or maybe both.

Again, speaking from the side of the ultimate client, this is not uncommon for a variety of possible reasons.  They aren't wanting to insult any one part of the overall bids received.  They are saying they will chose a different route before moving forward.  They are being cautious representatives of public funds.

While not being the same thing, the following example came up at our most recent school board meeting.  In order to offer a new extracurricular activity, think E-sports, we had gone out for bids for a long list of hardware, software and shipping expenses, expecting to save money.  The lowest bid was over $28,000.  Our tech whiz who assembled the list had also put together the expense if we simply ordered all of these items ourselves.  That total was just over $20,000.  We voted to reject all bids.

Nearly 40 years ago, serving on that same school board, we had a specific fund set up to spend right at $200,000 per year over a five year span for new construction.  Each year involved a differnet building.  What we had put into our annual budget for budget authority was $200,000.  We absolutley could not overspend that budget authority.  One year I sat in on the bid opening.  We had approximately $210,000 in that account but could spend no more than $200,000.  Six bids came in slightly above or below that $200,000 and one came in at #150,000.  That bidder was an alumnus nearing retirement age who chose to subtract nearly all of the money that would have ended up in his own pocket,  Sometimes you get lucky.  We were able to take that extra money and spend it in Year 6.

Another fun part of spending public funds is attempting to guess how many deadbeats would not pay their taxes in a given year.  Let's say Mountaintop County sent out property taxes totaling $42 Million.  The prior year, they only received 77 percent of that year's total, so they only distributed 77 percent to each of the entities that were funded via the County.  Therefore, you must increase your tax rate to make up for what probably won't be received.

The fire station should be good to go, there's no need of drywall, ceilings, insulation, doors, frames, roof, elevator, cabinets or flooring. After all they are manly firemen. 😉 

@holy-cow I wouldn't mind so much if they had some actual data to back up their reasoning, but since there's no detailed explanation for rejecting so many bid packages it gives me the impression they weren't operating in good faith in the first place.

It looks to me like they had no intention of accepting any of these bids and were simply looking for a cheap way to price their project.

And now all of the companies who submitted bids on this project are at a competitive disadvantage since our estimates were read at a public meeting...

There is a reason. Just not one as linear as you would like it to be. You want to know who is going to end up doing this staking?  The same guy who staked their last job. And the one before that. The guy they always use. And, by the time all the restaking and change orders are done, he will probably end up billing a good deal more than $10k or even $14k.  This is why relying on cold bidding to get staking jobs is a really hard way to make money. You have to build up a book of clients that call you when the bidders numbers are rejected. And to get there you will have to pay a pennance of providing bids and overperforming on the few that you do get.    

@norman-oklahoma I can see that being the case with a random GC but with government stuff the playing field seems to be a bit more even.

I actually find the staking to be easier to get than random boundary surveys.

At that level of detail it makes no difference.  

Over my career I've done most kinds of surveying there are to do. Urban, rural, forestry, geodetic control, engineering topos, construction staking of all kinds. Heavy construction is probably the best way to make money of all of them, IMO. But it is a very cutthroat business.

There is another form of attempting to obtain work from public entities.  Request for Qualifications.  The entity purs out a RFQ.  The end result is that every packet they receive proves that firm has the qualifications to take on such a project.  The Board/Commission discusses what they have received and pick the same firm they have used for the past 50+ years.  Then they talk dollars and sense with that same firm.

Unfortunately construction staking is not a professional service so the the agency/GC treats you as a providing a service for a fee.   Fee, being the most important component for them. They aren't tied to qualification based rfp type proposals, they are simply looking at $.   

@wa-id-surveyor 

That is an issue for those of you who are younger and willing to stake a claim in the name of professionalism should address with the political world you work in.  I came from the other side of the tracks.  An engineer first who converted to having a separate license as a land surveyor.  The construcion staking element was for engineers to control and for surveying technicians to perform.

On the one hand land surveyors wish to be thought of as professionals, but, on the other hand are unwilling to pick up this torch and run with it.

I have never seen a bid document (specs and maps) that fully covered what most projects will ultimately require. I believe that most money is made in extras and call backs. Oh...and restakes!

@wa-id-surveyor I didn't realize this, are you saying that only services covered under 'professional service' are subject to qualification-based evaluations? How does the effect of bid $ change in that case?

On the rare occasion when we can't stake our own projects.  The spec i create basically says, contractor is responsible for all construction staking. Short and sweet.  Most in this area on our projects have their own staking crew.