Fort Lauderdale airport overhauls construction oversight

Nov. 6--URS Corp.'s longstanding control over managing construction work at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport came to an end Tuesday.

The airport's new director, Kent George, won approval from county commissioners to have his top deputies oversee construction with assistance of outside consultants hired for each project.

The county had stalled on extending URS's contract as debate raged over whether to seek new bids to select one firm to oversee billions in work, divide up the business or bring management in-house. George, who comes to Fort Lauderdale after a lengthy tenure at the airport in Pittsburgh, suggested a mix of multiple consultants and internal oversight.

URS will remain on board through May, managing a handful projects that include roadway landscaping and taxiway improvements. The firm would be able to bid on future oversight contracts.

URS has been paid up to $14 million a year for its work. But it has faced repeated criticism both about its long-term grip on construction management and whether it was safeguarding the spending of public dollars well enough.

The questions came to a head as the airport moves ahead with plans to build a second major runway to handle commercial airliners and potentially expand terminal space. The runway alone is expected to cost at least $694.8 million to build.

Four times in the span of two years, county auditors uncovered potential misdeeds by contractors that they said should have been caught by the people who oversee construction.

Commissioners argued after the last such audit in mid-2006 that they ordered airport staff to make reforms and assumed that happened because managers said they had followed through. They were livid over the string of audits and threatened to dump URS.

To see more of The South Florida Sun-Sentinel or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.sun-sentinel.com/. Copyright (c) 2007, South Florida Sun-Sentinel Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services. For reprints, email tmsreprints@permissionsgroup.com, call 800-374-7985 or 847-635-6550, send a fax to 847-635-6968, or write to The Permissions Group Inc., 1247 Milwaukee Ave., Suite 303, Glenview, IL 60025, USA.