An Administrator's Guide to California Private School Law

Chapter 17 – Construction

preparation, consult with appropriate consultants, and utilize the assistance of legal counsel for construction contracts and projects.

B UILDING A T EAM F OR S UCCESSFUL A ND T IMELY C OMPLETION O F A P ROJECT

Section 2

A school should undertake a construction project, whatever its size and cost, only after careful evaluation, planning, and consultation with appropriate professionals. By selecting the right architect and construction manager for a project, the school will be well on its way to completing a timely and successful project. A. A RCHITECTS Architects play a crucial role in the planning, development, design, and construction of a project. An architect designs the project, prepares the plans and specifications, prepares technical portions of bid documents, ensures compliance with applicable codes and regulations, and may serve as an administrator and coordinator of the construction project. 2261 Architects should have proper design professional licenses. In California, architects must be licensed with the California Architects Board. A school that needs to secure pre-construction permits will find that cities and counties will require the architect who prepared the plans and specifications to sign a statement that he or she is licensed prior to issuance of any permits. 2262 Schools may select the architect that best fits their needs and are under no obligation to request multiple architects to submit proposals. A school’s best practice, however, is to consider several proposals and then select an architect based on experience and qualifications to design and construct the type of building or project the school is renovating or constructing. Additionally, architects must demonstrate a basic level of competence in their professional services. 2263 LCW Practice Advisor A school may want to consider sending out a request

for qualifications to architects to ascertain the architect’s demonstrated competence and professional qualifications, and to select the best architect given the school’s project and budget. A qualifications-based selection process can encourage merit-based competition, promote innovation, including emerging social and efficiency issues such as sustainability, and result in a better project.

B. C ONSTRUCTION M ANAGEMENT Schools may consider hiring a project or construction manager to supervise construction, and prepare and oversee the project schedule. Schools may need a construction manager if the project architect or engineer is not willing or able to supervise and coordinate the construction

An Administrator’s Guide to California Private School Law ©2019 Liebert Cassidy Whitmore 547