|
In these parts, cheek-by-jowl with the Canadian border, a few hardy survivalists dig in against an attack of black helicopters manned by foreigners working for the United Nations in cooperation with the sneaky Canadians. Here in sophisticated Bellingham, we call them cranks. But wait, they may be right after all, and they seem to have encouragement from that most revered of institutions, the Department of Homeland Security, not to mention the White House. I speak of the Secure Border Initiative Net (SBInet in gov-speak), which has our major defense contractors drooling at the easy money ahead. A contract for $2.5 billion will be awarded to one of the big defense consortiums later this month — and that will lead to more, and more, and after a while it could turn into real money.
THE dearth of funds has been variously fingered as the major problem besetting the construction industry. The plethora of uncompleted and abandoned projects that dot the nation's landscape has often been traced to this factor. Indigenous construction companies have been worst hit, hence, many of them have folded up, giving way to multinational construction companies who are often backed financially by their home governments. Both the Federal and state governments have often hinged their preference for expatriate construction companies on the fact that their indigenous counterparts lack the equipment to execute complex jobs. But how can they effectively compete with these offshore funded companies when borrowing from commercial banks is usually at cut-throat interest rates. Built environment professionals who have been badly affected by this scenario have not rested on their oars in a bid to float a specialized bank that would be sympathetic to the cause of construction industry operators.
Marco Island's first day of public comment on the final assessments for the 2007 section of the city's septic tank replacement program went by with little more than grumbling from those directly affected at Monday's City Council meeting. Instead, more residents reserved their ire for proposed city-run dog parks. Despite a packed room at Mackle Park, just four residents from the five sewer districts — North Barfield, West Winterberry, North Marco, Old Marco and Port Marco — expressed opinions on resolutions relating to both the creation and financing of the districts with few comments from other citizens. These five districts make up the second year of the seven-year $105.6 million septic tank replacement program that has created years-long acrimony on the island. Immediately before Monday's meeting, the city passed out a spreadsheet detailing cost reductions agreed on by council at a special meeting last week.
Contractor General Greg Christie is to face the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) of Parliament for the second time to give members an opportunity to ask questions in relation to his report on the Sandals White-house project. At its last sitting, Government member and attorney-at-law K.D. Knight sought to ascertain whether the Contractor General had exhausted the available channels to obtain information from the Urban Development Corporation (UDC), one of the entities accused of gross mismanagement of the project, which resulted in cost overruns of more than US$43 million. Incomplete report Mr. Knight and other Government members accused Mr. Christie of submitting an incomplete report to Parliament. There were intense exchanges during the discussion when Mr. Knight took on the role of a defence lawyer posing a number of questions to the Contractor General, who asked whether he was being cross examined.
WASHINGTON, Oct. 16 (UPI) -- After a series of critical reports, the special inspector general for Iraq reconstruction has reviewed a building project that worked: a courthouse in Baghdad. However, the report highlights how dangerous Baghdad has become for Americans and any Iraqis seen to be cooperating with them -- the inspectors could not visit the site personally to review the construction. "The assessment team did not visit the project site because officials at Gulf region division determined it was not safe for the team to travel to the site and because the presence of the assessment team increased the potential danger for the Iraqis working at the site," the report states. In the report, Iraqi workers' faces are blotted out in pictures so they cannot be identified and targeted.
BUCHAREST, Oct. 16 (Xinhua) -- A large part of Romania's budget next year will go to construction, the local Ziarul Financiar daily reported on Monday. The Romanian government has set infrastructure, education and healthcare as priorities of the 2007 budget, the daily said. The government has scheduled to spend some 6.6 percent of GDP, or 7.1 billion euros (8,9 billion U.S. dollars) next year, the daily said. A large part of the budget, or 2.5 billion euros (3.1 billion U.S. dollars), will be poured into the construction market, through infrastructure projects related to road, railroad, school and healthcare. The money is fuelling the already strong demand on the construction market, boosting its growth at a pace of about 15 percent in 2007.
|
