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Suggested Citation:"1 INTRODUCTION." National Research Council. 1991. Inspection and Other Strategies for Assuring Quality in Government Construction. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/1847.
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Suggested Citation:"1 INTRODUCTION." National Research Council. 1991. Inspection and Other Strategies for Assuring Quality in Government Construction. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. doi: 10.17226/1847.
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Page 2

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INTRODUCTION 1 1 INTRODUCTION Federal agencies typically spend some $4 billion to $5 billion annually for construction of new and substantially renovated buildings, and total spending for construction of all federal facilities in 1989 was roughly $12.7 billion (Department of Commerce, 1990). State and local governments together spend approximately another $25 billion for buildings and $71.6 billion overall each year. The products of this spending are public assets that serve a wide range of private and public purposes and have pervasive influence on the productivity and quality of life of everyone. Assuring that these products meet the highest possible quality standards is a major challenge. Purchasers of construction in the private sector face this challenge as well, and some observers suggest the challenge is being poorly met in both private and public sectors. The Business Roundtable's Construction Industry Cost Effectiveness (CICE) Project noted quality problems influencing the

INTRODUCTION 2 declining productivity of the nation's construction industries.1 That group's 1983 report cited evidence of a rapid growth of ''disputes involving liability, negligence, claims for errors and omissions, and governmental citations,'' and called for better quality control. In 1984, a workshop of nearly 100 representatives of the design and construction industry, convened in Chicago under the auspices of the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE), agreed that "accidents, design flaws, cost overruns, and other similar problems were occurring at a serious rate."2 That group's discussions motivated ASCE to undertake development of a comprehensive guide to quality in design and construction. Regardless of current quality, facilities owners and the construction industry share a common concern for the quality of our buildings and other constructed facilities. The sponsors of the Federal Construction Council (FCC),3 government agencies responsible for managing the public's assets, feel this concern most keenly. Managers of some of these agencies find that budgetary constraints and other technical and administrative forces increasingly threaten the effectiveness of their inspection programs and thereby pose serious impediments to achieving quality. Others have delegated the inspection task to contractors and find themselves accused of abandoning all hope of achieving quality by asking foxes to guard the henhouse. The FCC agencies asked the Building Research Board (BRB) of the National Research Council to undertake a study of inspection as a means to control quality in construction. The BRB selected a committee of professionals with broad expertise 1 The Business Roundtable, 1983. More Construction for the Money, Summary Report of the Construction Industry Cost Effectiveness Project. 2 American Society of Civil Engineers, 1988. Quality in the Constructed Project: A Guideline for Owners, Designers and Constructors, Volume 1, preliminary edition for trial use and comment. 3 Sixteen federal government agencies with major interests in building and facilities research, construction, operation, and maintenance comprise the Federal Construction Council. These agencies had a combined responsibility for facilities-related budgets in FY 1989 exceeding $17 billion.

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This book reports on the costs, effectiveness, and risks associated with agency and private sector inspection practices. It provides advice to senior and mid-level agency managers on the relative merits of alternative strategies in the range of projects typically encountered in federal construction programs.

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