Today, CAA Chair Linus Murphy and CAA Executive Director Jayne Jeneroux met with Consulting Engineers of Alberta (CEA) Executive Director Ken Pilip to discuss four key issues that impact CAA and CEA members:

1.   Government change

As everyone knows, Alberta’s 2015 provincial election resulted in a significant change in many ways – a new party to govern the province, new ministers appointed and new MLAs for most ridings.

These changes provide new opportunities for the CAA.

We have already sent letters of congratulations to Premier Rachel Notley and to the new Minister of Infrastructure and Transportation, the Honourable Brian Mason and we plan on meeting with them in the coming months. Our immediate goal is to introduce our association to the Premier and the Minister as a helpful and wise business voice of the industry and to indicate our support for continued infrastructure spending to the benefit of all Albertans. Each of you can play your part in educating new government officials about our profession and the value it provides to the province as most of you now have a new Member of the Legislative Assembly (MLA) with whom you can speak. If you don’t yet know who your new MLA is or where their office is located, you can find the details atwww.assembly.ab.ca (click on Members of the Legislative Assembly at the top right of the page). By taking the time to make an appointment and drop by your MLA’s constituency office to introduce yourself, you have the opportunity to speak about our profession and its value for Albertans.

2.    Survey

As you know, the CAA sent out a survey to its members recently about Alberta Infrastructure’s procurement and contract formats. The CEA sent out a similar one. The CAA is focusing our survey distribution on the senior managers in our member firms so that the responses are answered from very informed individuals. It is important that members take opportunities, such as the survey, to provide feedback to government and to include issues that are important. Thank you to everyone who has responded. If you haven’t yet responded, please take a few minutes to do so.

3.  Quality Based Selection (QBS)

Another key issue discussed was QBS. CEA indicated their belief that it is being used more and more in jurisdictions across Canada and the United States and cited a number of engineering associations that are focusing on QBS initiatives with their differing levels of government.  We discussed the value as well as the concerns that arise with QBS, especially for smaller firms wanting to break into a market. Discussions will continue on this topic and we will be asking our members for critical input.

4.    Alberta Infrastructure Contract discussions

We also talked about the variety of discussions that have taken place and will continue to take place between Alberta Infrastructure (AI), the CAA and the CEA regarding AI contracts and procurement processes.   Both CAA and CEA are at the front line for these discussions and it is important that we move Alberta infrastructure toward fair contracts and procurement processes.

Posted June 25, 2015