U.S. EPA orders City of Holbrook to comply with Clean Water Act to protect Arizona water

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has ordered the City of Holbrook to comply with its wastewater permit after the city failed to respond to a State-issued Notice of Violation.

The order follows nearly two years of attempts by State and federal regulators to bring the city into compliance. Holbrook failed to submit monthly discharge reports for 23 consecutive months and failed to submit monitoring reports characterizing the quality of its treated wastewater, both violations of mandatory terms in the city’s permit.

“Holbrook must comply with all conditions of its wastewater permit, including the required monitoring and reporting,” said Alexis Strauss, the EPA’s Water Division Director for the Pacific Southwest region. “Dischargers are responsible for water quality monitoring to show us, and the public, they’re complying with their permit and protecting Arizona’s waters.”

The order requires the city to submit all missing records and reports within 30 days and come into compliance with their wastewater permit. In addition, within 60 days, the city of Holbrook must submit a report detailing all costs associated with complying with the order.

The City of Holbrook holds a permit for the Painted Mesa Water Reclamation Facility which covers discharge of treated wastewater to the Leroux Wash, a tributary to the Little Colorado River. The Little Colorado River is used for swimming, boating and is a drinking water source for some communities.

Water pollution degrades surface waters making them unsafe for drinking, fishing, swimming, and other activities. As authorized by the Clean Water Act, the National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System permits are used to regulate the discharge of pollutants into waters of the United States.

For a copy of the order, visit www.epa.gov/region/water/npdes/compliance.html.

For more information on the NPDES permit program, visit www.epa.gov/region09/water/npdes/index.html.

Hunter Douglas and BCC Blinds join Builder Partnerships

Builder Partnerships said they are pleased to announce the addition of Hunter Douglas Window Fashions and Blind Corners & Curves Window Coverings as manufacturer associates in their program. These companies have worked together within the building community for more than a decade, Building Partnerships said, and offer a very competitive incentive program for builder members.

Hunter Douglas offers the industry's largest collection of energy-efficient, custom-made window fashions. Designed and assembled in the U.S., and backed by a Lifetime Guarantee, their sheers, shades, honeycombs, blinds and shutters can be customized with a variety of lifting systems for added safety and convenience.

Blind Corners & Curves Window Coverings (BCC Blinds) is committed to quality service and fair prices which has allowed them to become one of the largest distributors of blinds, plantation shutters and draperies. BCC Blinds successfully manages all aspects of a builder program from measurement to installation.

BuildTopia releases next generation CPM scheduling system for single and multi-family builders and developers

BuildTopia, Inc., provider of the industry’s most widely used Web-based residential construction management software, announces a major release of new functionality in BTBuilder, their premier total construction management system. This next generation scheduling is a milestone for web based scheduling applications for the entire residential construction industry.

Bob Mitchell, President of Mitchell & Best Home Builders and former President of NAHB, offered; “Now I feel both my project managers and purchasing manager can coordinate our cycle time so as to improve customer satisfaction and company profitability. My entire team is now following the same schedule that provides seamless interaction between purchasing, subcontractors, the sales staff, and the customer.”

BTBuilder’s scheduling allows both single family and multi-family builders to dramatically improve their construction operations with a web based scheduling system that enables collaboration of the entire construction process.
“By combining interactive multithreaded web-based cpm scheduling with sales, trade partner collaboration, document management, purchasing; and a very slick and interactive user interface, the construction community is getting a tool never before seen in the industry”, states Beau Engman, CEO of BuildTopia. “We began the process of designing this scheduling module 4 years ago. Over the years we took incremental steps to establish the foundation so we could ultimately deliver this new next generation scheduling module.”

Enhanced functionality includes:
-CPM scheduling that notifies the user how much a task can slip before construction date is altered.
-Multithreaded schedules for multi-family builders to manage schedules of buildings, floors, and units.
-Checklists so builders can incorporate information about how to inspect work for quality workmanship.
-Collaboration with trade partners where your subcontractors can view their schedules and get automatically notified of schedule changes.
Stunning calendar views including Gantt charts views with the ability to identify critical tasks and perform resource loading by vendor.
-Importing functionality allowing users to convert their Microsoft Excel or Project schedules directly into BuildTopia.
-Publishing of schedules directly into MS Project.
-Integration of job schedule with Purchasing to support such things as generation of PO’s by phase and field approval of PO’s when schedule tasks are marked complete.
-Option Lockouts to prevent the sale of options based on progress of the schedule.

“Now that builders can choose to use either a critical path, or a schedule that can easily be bumped, the BTBuilder system can appeal to every type of builder”, said Erik Cofield, VP of Sales and Marketing. He stated, “The extraordinary custom lot configuration, along with integration with MS Project is a huge enhancement for every type of builder”. The new release potentially affects over 4000 residential construction companies in the United States and Canada, putting even more capability in builder’s hands to streamline their business and speed up interaction with trade partners.

“All I can say is this new CPM scheduling system BuildTopia developed absolutely blows me away”, says Marc Martin, President of Marcus Martin Builders and long time customer of BuildTopia.

Az Contractors Association seeking contractors interested in large-scale solar project presentation

David Jones, president and CEO of the Arizona Contractors Association, put out a call for contractors interested in working on a large solar facility near Phoenix.

“I recently spoke with a representative of an owner engineering firm who is performing a labor and contractor study of the greater Phoenix, Arizona area to determine the availability of labor and contractors to construct a 290 MW Solar facility approximately 65 miles west of Phoenix,” Jones said in a press release. “This project consists of erection of approximately three (3) square miles of solar assemblies, a 290 MW power plant, a thermal storage facility, and all the necessary balance of plant (BOP) systems.”

Jones said it is the intent of the Arizona Contractors Association to assure that all of this work is performed by Arizona contractors.

“In order to do this I have invited representatives of the owner engineering firm to present the requirements and qualifications necessary to perform work at this facility,” Jones said. “I have been assured that the majority of the construction and erection efforts are no different than the typical work performed by the Arizona Contractors on a daily basis.”

Jones said a date has not yet been set for the presentation, however, he is asking for feedback to determine the level of interest in attending such a presentation.

Jones asked that those interested respond by June 26 by e-mailing him at bjones@azca.com with the company name, personnel names who want to attend and e-mail addresses. Those names will be added to an invite list and attendees will receive their invites through e-mail.

Find Paint Color Matches Instantly With New ColorSnap Apple iPhone Application From Sherwin-Williams

Whenever color inspiration strikes, builders, contractors and industry professionals can now visualize colors remotely for their residential or commercial spaces with the new ColorSnap Apple iPhone application from Sherwin-Williams, available for download at swcolorsnap.com.

ColorSnap is a free color-matching app that allows users to quickly capture hues from their surroundings and match them to more than 1,500 Sherwin-Williams colors. Match shades to existing décor such as painted walls, artwork or furniture pieces, or to any color you see in nature or walking the city streets.

The application is quick and easy. Upload a photo from an existing photo library or snap a new photo in the moment of colorful inspiration. Then, use a finger to scroll around the image to locate the exact hue to be matched and ColorSnap will immediately offer the closest matching Sherwin-Williams color, RGB value and a coordinating palette. Save the palette into “My Saved Colors” for future reference and even locate the nearest Sherwin-Williams store.

“With ColorSnap, you can discover how coordinating colors and bringing ideas to life is easier than ever imagined,” said Jackie Jordan, director of color marketing at Sherwin-Williams. “Nothing is more beautiful than potential.”

ColorSnap is the latest in advanced color matching technology and digital color visualization from Sherwin-Williams. Visit www.swcolor.com for more interactive tools and color resources.