Nossaman Infrastructure Partner Ann-Therese Schmid Discusses Green Line Extension Project In Commonwealth Article

Nossaman Infrastructure Partner Ann-Therese Schmid was quoted in the Commonwealth article, Consultant: T got snookered on Green Line. The article reported on a look-back consultant’s finding that Massachusetts enabled a contracting group to take advantage of it, leading to ballooning Green Line Extension costs.  The article noted that Schmid, who was brought in for perspective on construction-manager-general-contractor contracting - the delivery method used for the project - described a cost reconciliation process in which the independent cost-estimator on the project was blinded from the other parties, and said the contractors used lump sum pricing instead of a guaranteed maximum price and returned risk on the project to the state.  She added that on construction-manager-general-contractor procurements a better practice would be one or two contracts for the full project to provide cost certainty.  Schmid also said she heard anecdotally that the contractors did not always receive three bids from subcontractors as required by the MBTA’s policy.