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The state of California is undertaking an expansive project to improve and expand its prison medical and mental health facilities, and it’s enlisted the help of the Bovis Lend Lease West Region to get the job done. The $6 billion California Prison Health Care Receivership Program spans multiple facilities across the state, Executive Vice President Todd Pennington says.

The company has formed a joint-venture partnership with URS Corp. to serve as the overall program manager.

Pennington says lean principles and a design/build approach will allow rapid delivery of the projects. The company expects to complete its request for proposal this summer and break ground on the first projects in early 2009.

“One of the core goals of the project is creating innovative health care facilities of a type that does not currently exist in the United States,” he says.

Project Executive Bill Proctor brings more than 35 years of correctional facility experience to the project. “The core goals of the program is creating innovative [and] secure mental health and sub-acute medical care facilities of a type that do not currently exist in the United States,” Proctor says.

The program currently anticipates seven facilities of approximately 1 million square feet each, for a total program budget of $6 billion.  

The facilities will house sub-acute medical patients and a full range of mental health patients in campus-type facilities, which share centralized support services.  “The projects are being planned for very fast design and construction to comply with federal court orders imposed on the state of California,” Proctor adds.

Perfect Storm
The company’s West Region includes locations in Dallas, Houston, San Francisco, Sacramento and Los Angeles. Pennington says there are multiple projects underway in each of those markets, but the company is definitely feeling the hit of the slowed economy.

“It is fortunate that we are diversified into the public sector and institutional markets to sustain a positive outlook in our multiple business units,” Proctor says.

“I think of it as the perfect storm, given the current impacts of the wars, gas prices, surety challenges,  valuation of the dollar, lender liquidity due to the sub-prime market and overall reduction in consumer confidence and leadership uncertainty,” he adds.

“Entrepreneurial private developers are struggling to finance projects right now and this segment of the market has seen a dramatic impact on construction starts, but there is nowhere else I would rather be at this time.     

“Therefore, multiple private sectors projects not yet started are on hold seeking ways and means to conclude their common challenges. The western market historically is less impacted and rebounds sooner than the rest of the country,” he adds.

And it’s not only residential projects that are affected.

“We’re involved in many mixed-use projects, often with residential components, that were the first to be hit in this phase,” he explains.

“But it’s also affecting some of our institutional clients, who have slowed down, as well, due to their market valuations and growing other priorities. We remain positive that the timing and duration of this recession will be short and we’ll be active in these existing and new markets across the region.”

The company is focusing primarily on public, institutional and end-user clients, as well as  hospitality and healthcare projects, with a strong emphasis on the overall western states inclusive of Texas, which remains a strong market, Pennington says. “California remains a robust economy yet varies in the various geographies across the vast state,” he notes.

“We hope to grow a more diverse business in the multiple markets and services we serve and deliver.

“Our existing work in California has been on very long-term projects, which we hope will ride through this period. “We have further seen less impact in Texas which have a very diverse portfolio of work across the state.”

He says the company’s ability to network knowledge throughout its divisions worldwide set it apart from competitors. “We have an internal search engine called iKonnect, which allows seekers and sharers to network knowledge seamlessly and a quick moment,” he explains. “Our further uses of technology includes multiple common platforms of applications across the globe inclusive of BIM (AutoCAD/Revit) and many others.

“Pertaining to service delivery success, implementation of strategic project success planning is also a key differentiator,” Pennington continues. “In this process, we bring the key stakeholders together and facilitate the development of a project mission statement followed by group definitions of success, roles, needs and indicators as well as key process development.

“We review our collective commitments and score quarterly.”

The company is also a leader in safety and believes that every incident can be avoided, he adds.

“Our behavioral approach to improving safety results  is the most effective way our entire industry can ban together to see in our generation a better future for our work force than the one that proceeded our generation,” he says.
    “We must seek ways to attract people to our industry in our war for talent and  of creating a industry wide common culture of safety improvement is the best place to start today.

“We’re a people business and we truly have a people-first culture.”     

The company was named a best place to work by the L.A. Business Journal.

In 2007, Bovis Lend Lease’s California office reported $251.6 million in revenues.

A Great Park
Bovis is program manager on the Orange County Great Park project in Irvine, Calif. The project will convert the El Toro Marine Base into a 1,000-acre park, larger than New York’s Central Park.

“There is nothing like it of its scale in the U.S. today,” Pennington says. “It will be a sustainable-driven park with numerous amenities, including sports fields, museums, lakes and multiple activity locations throughout.”

The $1 billion-plus project is in the design phase.

It will move into the construction phase in the next several years and is expected to cost more than $1 billion.

The Great Park Balloon is the park’s first attraction.

As the largest tethered helium balloon in the country, the park says, it is “environmentally safe, non-polluting and totally silent.”

Tethered to the ground with a steel cable, the balloon is available for visitors to ride for free.

“Balloon riders will soar between 250-400 feet above the surrounding landscape, enjoying a bird's eye view of the transformation of the retired air station into the first great metropolitan park of the 21st Century,” the park says.

The helium balloon measures 118 feet high and can hold up to 30 passengers. The balloon’s gondola can rise to up to 400 feet – in accordance with FAA regulations, the park notes – offering a viewing distance of up to 25 miles.

Solair Wilshire
Bovis Lend Lease has been selected by KOAR Institutional Advisors LLC, to provide General Contracting services for the Solair Wilshire, a $109 million, 186-unit condominium high-rise.

Located in the Koreatown section of Los Angeles – directly across from the historic Wiltern Theater – the 22-story, 780,000-square-foot Solair Wilshire project features one level of subterranean retail parking, 50,000 square feet of restaurant/retail space at the first two levels, four levels of above-grade resident parking, and a condominium amenities deck.

“Adorned in modern architecture with concrete and steel construction and featuring a glass wall exterior, the building’s interiors include luxurious finishes and high-end appliances, floor-to-ceiling windows with impressive views of the city and skyline,” the company says. “Residents will have the option of two- and three-bedroom residences with a diversity of floor plans, including penthouses,” it adds. “In addition, the development will include a 40,000-square-foot retail center, and 10,000 square feet of restaurant space.”

Project Features
On the seventh floor, there will be a 30,000-square-foot amenity deck with a pool and spa, cabanas, outdoor fireplace and barbecues, Zen garden, indoor/outdoor lounge, yoga room and resident’s club with kitchen and dining area.

The project involves a creative arrangement with the Mass Transit Authority who owns part of the property to integrate the project with an existing subway station to enable a true entertainment center.

The Solair Wilshire project is expected to be completed later this year.

One Rincon Hill
Bovis Lend Lease is involved in seven mixed-use residential towers throughout the state of California.

One of these is Rincon Hill, a $178 million upscale residential project located in the up-and-coming Rincon Hill neighborhood of San Francisco.

When completed later this year, the company says, it will be “the most significant addition to the San Francisco skyline in over 30 years and the tallest all-residential tower west of the Mississippi River,” the company says.

One Rincon Hill is a complex project, both structurally and geographically, according to the company.

The 1.3-acre site is immediately adjacent to the San Francisco/Oakland Bay Bridge and surrounding buildings.

The One Rincon Hill project included demolishing the site’s existing office building, the famed Bank of America clock tower and parking garage.

The One Rincon Hill project also included excavation to 55 feet, requiring considerable coordination with California Department of Transportation (Caltrans) and the city of San Francisco.  
Specific challenges to the project site regarding the excavation included shoring, monitoring movement of the Bay Bridge and custom designs of the soil retaining system.

Additionally, coordination of the adjacent utilities and neighbors requires special care, the company says.

Once completed, the two-phase development will include two cast-in-place concrete towers, 64-stories and 52-stories, above a full-site podium structure.

The podium structure will house approximately five levels of below-grade parking, amenity functions, and a 5-story town house structure.

Phase I, construction of the 762,000 square foot, 64-story tower, garage and townhouse structures, began in September 2005. The first phase will house 390 residential units and 513 spaces of underground parking.  

Phase II will include the second and smaller tower.

The two towers and the podium will be cast-in-place concrete.

“One Rincon is the first high-rise project in San Francisco to achieve a three-day pour cycle,” the company says.