Facilities Quality Service
PLAN FOR UPDATING STANDARDS
TOPIC: VA MASTER CONSTRUCTION SPECIFICAT IONS
ISSUE:
Status of Master Construction Specifications
BACKGROUND:
In response to the need to increase staff efficiencies in the Office of Facilities
Management (FM), a new standards planning and development process has been
established. It involves a combination of in-house staff and private consultants
who will accomplish the work setforth. Our goal continues to be to ensure VA
standards are the best value for the VA and reflect the best practices of
professional, private, and government organizations.
DISCUSSION:
VA master construction specification program is used extensively by the field and
headquarters facility staff. Our Internet web pages are extremely popular with both
the VA and private sector organizations. Our standards are used extensively by
the VA staff for both major and minor construction programs. It is vital to maintain
the quality, availability, and value of VA's facilities standards program. In
response to recent organizational change and VA reinvention initiatives, FM has
identified a number of standards to be updated by consultants with program
oversight by FM staff. We have identified funding and implemented a contractual
process that will expedite the standards updates. We will also benchmark our
standards with other federal organizations and private sector health care providers
such as Kaiser Permanente with assistance from consultants.
VA maintains a total of three hundred and twenty eight (328) specification sections
on FM's Internet based Technical Information Library (TIL). FM's goal is to ensure
that no section is more than three-year-old, and priority is given to rapidly changing
areas with significant impact on facilities design and construction. The plan
includes priorities for updating various sections and names of FM staff who are
responsible for their respective professional specialty. We will also be asking for
review and comments from the field through a variety of resources including the
monthly engineering conference call. Our goal is to ensure that our standards
reflect our customer needs, and a level of quality that ensures the best value for the
VA.
23 September 1999
FM-181A-DA-100
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