DBIA Announces 2014 Design-Build in Transportation Leadership Award Recipients

Washington, D.C., Feb. 26, 2014

DBIA honors the Ohio Department of Transportation, Steven Hansen, Edward Pensock and Brian Papernik for leadership in advancing design-build project delivery.

DBIA has announced the recipients of its 2014 Design-Build in Transportation Leadership Awards. The awards serve to honor the agencies and individuals from across the country that have made critical strides to advance and expand design-build project delivery within the transportation sector.

DBIA’s 2014 winners include:

The Ohio Department of Transportation, Owner of the Year
Steven Hansen, City of Liberty, Mo., Owner Category
Edward Pensock, Jr., Texas Department of Transportation, Owner Category
Brian Papernik, Industry Professional/Practitioner Category

“We applaud the winners of DBIA’s Design-Build in Transportation Leadership Awards for their tireless work to advance our industry for the benefit of communities across the country,” says Lisa Washington, CAE, Executive Director/CEO, DBIA. “Transportation is the fastest growing design-build sector in the United States, with transportation design-build projects doubling in the past five years, both in quantity and value of projects. State and local governments recognize that transportation is critical to the nation’s economic growth and development.”

Owner of the Year: The Ohio Department of Transportation (ODOT)
In 2009, ODOT received pilot authority to deliver up to $1 billion biennially using a two-step, value-based design-build procurement. This allowed selection of a design-build team based on a combination of qualifications, technical ability and price. Based on the positive results of these first value-based design-build procurements, the State General Assembly granted ODOT greater authority to deliver projects using value-based design-build and made it a permanent part of their authority. Partly based on the success of ODOT’s design-build program, the Ohio General Assembly overhauled the construction contracting procedures for other departments through legislation called “Ohio Construction Reform” passed in 2011. This gave other departments in Ohio the authority to use value-based design-build as well. The State of Ohio was able to achieve $113 million in savings on the WB Cleveland Innerbelt project and $41 million in savings on the I-71/I-670 Columbus Interchange projects through the use of design-build. Today, ODOT has authority to use design-build for up to $1 billion per fiscal year. Based in part on the successes achieved, several other very large transportation projects, which are part of ODOT’s short-term program, are currently under serious consideration for design-build procurement.

Steven Hansen, P.E., Director of Public Works, City of Liberty, Mo.
Steven Hansen has more than 36 years of experience working in municipal government organizations and has served as the Director of Public Works for the City of Liberty for 25 years. As a result of Mr. Hansen’s active leadership and participation in DBIA and mastery of design-build project delivery, the City of Liberty embraced DBIA Best Practices in ways no other public organization in the Kansas City metropolitan area had done before, creating a bellwether project. The City of Liberty was the first to use 100 percent qualifications-based selection for a public project in the Metro area, achieving time savings, innovative ideas and increased scope for the benefit of taxpayers. Because of Mr. Hansen’s leadership and proven success, another city in the metro area has replicated the legal enabling efforts, the procurement documentation and the use of DBIA contracts used by the City of Liberty to secure a design-builder for its first design-build infrastructure project.

Edward Pensock, Jr., Director of Strategic Projects, Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT)
Edward Pensock has embraced design-build, utilizing the delivery method on large and small projects throughout Texas that include managed lanes, toll projects, rehabilitation and major highways. In 1999, Mr. Pensock managed and sponsored the state of Texas’ initial efforts in highway design-build using DBIA resources as a basis for starting a program. In the spirit of Design-Build Done Right, Mr. Pensock has worked to make design-build more efficient through measurable requirements without compromising safety or accountability, as reflected in the recent and highly successful procurement of the Energy Sector Roadway Repair project. This $150-million design-build project exceeded all standards with a four-month procurement time from RFQ issuance to the conditional award in December 2013. Working in collaboration with state legislators, contractors and designers, Mr. Pensock has successfully delivered more than 12 design-build projects totaling $14 billion.

Brian Papernik, Esq., Partner, Nossaman LLP
For more than 15 years, Brian Papernik has been a key player in the design-build industry, helping public agencies use innovative contracts for transportation projects. The design-build contracts he developed for the $1.3-billion T-REX project in Denver, as well as contracts for the Minnesota and Utah DOTs, have been used as models by many other agencies. His work also includes major P3 contracts for the Texas, Oregon and Georgia DOTs, as well as the Utah DOT’s award-winning $1.1-billion I-15 CORE design-build project. During the past two years, Mr. Papernik has been the lead attorney for the California High-Speed Rail Authority’s multi-billion-dollar design-build program. He has also been instrumental in developing best practices for design-build projects, including publishing several articles on alternative technical concepts and contributing to DBIA’s resource materials.