Author name: niallogara

ALBANY—This year’s grinding state budget battle was near-historic in the making, requiring extensions for 38 days past the April 1 new fiscal year—the latest it has been in 15 years. But what this new budget clearly wasn’t—at $254 billion—was a dollar short in most major categories like education, safety, cost of living adjustments and transportation.

HARRISON, NY—The final resolution of water quality issues and litigation surrounding a variety of remedial proposals that have dogged Westchester Joint Water Works and its customers for nearly three decades is at hand.

WHITE PLAINS—City and county officials joined White Plains Hospital and Montefiore executives to take part in a groundbreaking ceremony on May 5 for the hospital’s latest 500,000-square-foot expansion project that when completed will nearly double the size of the existing facility on East Post Road here.

ALBANY—With the New York State budget now approved, the focus has turned to the mechanisms to advance the Metropolitan Transportation Authority’s $68.4 billion 2025-2029 Capital Plan.

A downstream contractor has no contractual relationship with a project owner; that relationship is between the general contractor (or, here, the construction manager, Hill) and the owner. Accordingly, parties downstream from the construction manager cannot sue the owner if they sustain money damages caused by the owner. In response to this lack of contractual privity, the downstream contractor and construction manager may enter into a liquidating agreement, or pass-through agreement, where the downstream contractor assigns its claim to the upstream contractor. Such a provision may also already be in place in the downstream contractor’s boilerplate contract.

CHESTER, NY—The New York State Department of Transportation held a well-attended public open house on May 6 here at the Chester Senior Center to discuss proposed changes to area interchanges (exits 126, 127 and 128) on Route 17 as part of the $1-billion “NYS Route 17 Mobility & Access Improvements Project,” popularly called the Route 17 expansion project.

WASHINGTON—The highway and bridge sector is making measured progress in reducing worker deaths and injuries compared to the broader construction industry, according to an analysis of U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data released April 23 that coincided with National Work Zone Awareness Week.

Construction companies are now contending with new disruptive forces of shifting trade policies, price volatility and other risks that are the result of new and increased tariffs on imported construction materials. Though no one can predict the next round of tariffs or when they’ll hit, contractors can take strategic steps now to mitigate their impact.

NEW YORK—New York Attorney General Letitia James and a coalition of 16 other attorneys general filed a lawsuit on May 5 against the United States Department of Transportation and DOT Secretary Sean Duffy for illegally cutting off critical funding to support states’ plans to build a nationwide electric vehicle charging network.

NEW YORK—New York City is entering a new era of office-to-residential conversions, according to a new report by commercial brokerage firm CBRE. Conversions in Midtown Manhattan are taking place at an unprecedented rate as developers acquire underperforming assets in the primary business district as well as in peripheral areas.