Related Links: Blue Ribbon Commission on America's Nuclear Future final report (January 2012) Nuke Waste Panel Says New Sites Needed (ENR 7/29/11) No solution appears in sight to the nation’s growing problem of how to dispose of nuclear waste. A bipartisan group in the Senate is drafting a bill to address a blue ribbon panel’s recommendations for nuclear waste disposal, but with little time left in the current congressional session, no major nuclear waste bill is expected to go anywhere this year.Moreover, with the Obama administration sticking to its 2009 decision to nix the repository site beneath Nevada’s Yucca Mountain,

Image courtesy Fla. Dept. of Transportation Odebrecht Construction states that the new law would prevent the firm from further pursuing the $2.1-billion Interstate 4 reconstruction project planned for Orlando. Photo courtesy Odebrecht USA Odebrecht says the final completion for its $1.1-billion North Terminal contract at Miami International Airport is set for February 2013. Related Links: Florida's Anti-Cuba Law Could Be Trouble for Odebrecht Gov. Scott's Signing of Anti-Cuba Legislation Ends With Curious Twists Odebrecht Construction on June 5 filed a federal lawsuit against the state of Florida over its new law that bars the awarding of public contracts to firms

Photo Courtesy of American Road & Transportation Builders Association Industry representatives are briefed on highway-transit bill negotiations before heading to Capitol Hill to lobby for a deal by June 30. Related Links: A Quick Deal on Transport Bill? Don't Bet On It House, Senate Nearly Set for Talks on Highway-Transit Bill Seeking to jump-start slow-moving House-Senate negotiations on a new surface transportation bill, Senate leaders have delivered a compromise proposal to their House counterparts. The plan—which Senate Environment and Public Works Committee Chairman Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) and that committee's top Republican, James Inhofe (Okla.), personally took to the House on

Related Links: Civilian BRAC Bill Faces Challenges in Senate Office of Management and Budget Memo The Obama administration has put a freeze on the acquisition of new federal, non-defense real estate. Under the policy, spelled out in a May 11 Office of Management and Budget memo, federal agencies must offset any planned new space by consolidating or disposing of old space. The American Institute of Architects says the policy could create opportunities for building renovations and is less worrisome than current federal budgetary concerns.

Related Links: Fiscal Year 2013 Looks Rough for Construction Spending Appropriations bills are about money, but sometimes those measures have policy provisions that spark fierce fights. The fiscal 2013 appropriations round, now under way, offers several examples.On May 31, the House voted 218-198 to delete language in the FY13 military-construction/veterans-affairs spending bill that would have barred agencies from adopting union-only project labor agreements (PLAs). Nearly all House Democrats and 34 Republicans voted for an amendment offered by Rep. Michael Grimm (R-N.Y.) to strike anti-PLA language from the bill. The House passed the underlying spending measure.Labor unions hailed the vote as

Construction union leaders released a 165-page report on May 31 aimed at discrediting market penetration claims of their longtime open-shop nemesis, the Associated Builders and Contractors. The report, produced in four months by the AFL-CIO-funded National Labor College, comes in an election year amid growing ABC activism against mandated project labor agreements."ABC is particularly aggressive in [its] attempts to block familysupporting PLAs," said Laborers' union General President Terry O'Sullivan. It intends "to drive down wages, undermine training and skirt safety standards, while contractor profits increase at the expense of taxpayers and workers." The report claims, among other things, that ABC's

Source: House, Senate Appropriations Committees FY13 Federal Construction Appropriations Bills funding federal construction programs for fiscal year 2013 are moving through congressional appropriations committees, and so far, the best that construction companies can hope for are small increases.As of May 29, the Senate Appropriations Committee had cleared seven of the 12 annual spending bills; the House committee had approved six. One of the six, the bill funding the Commerce and Justice departments, was approved by the full House. In general, Senate appropriators have approved freezes or small hikes in construction accounts; their House counterparts have recommended cuts. Military construction programs

National Labor Relations Board member Terence F. Flynn, a Republican, resigned on May 26 amid fallout from a May 2 Inspector General report alleging he improperly shared data on pending NLRB cases with former Chairman Peter Schaumber and others. Flynn has denied the allegations. He recused himself from future board cases. His July 24 departure will leave the five-person NLRB with three Democrats and one Republican.

If the Senate confirms President Obama's choice to be the next chair of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission—George Mason University professor Allison M. Macfarlane—she would join the panel as it faces a host of challenges.The NRC has 10 license applications pending for 16 new nuclear reactors and is determining what new requirements it may set for U.S. nuclear powerplants in the wake of last year's Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster in Japan.If approved, Macfarlane, nominated on May 24, would replace Gregory B. Jaczko, NRC chairman since 2009, who announced on May 21 he planned to resign when a successor is confirmed. Jaczko,

Related Links: Senate labor committee chairman Harkin calls for Flynn's resignation NLRB members' joint statement to the staff National Labor Relations Board member Terence F. Flynn, a Republican, has resigned amid fallout from a May 2 Inspector General (IG) report alleging he improperly shared data on pending NLRB cases with former Chairman Peter Schaumber and others. The controversy dates back to March, when NLRB IG David P. Berry released a preliminary report that drew similar conclusions. But Flynn repeatedly has denied any wrongdoing, and in his resignation letter to President Barack Obama and Board Chairman Mark Gaston Pearce, dated May