After more than two years of headlines reporting on a supply side challenge that was crippling construction projects, a new industry survey is indicating that things have substantially improved. According to the ConstructConnect findings, contractors in general are reporting far fewer supply chain issues than they did between 2020 and 2022. The improved environment comes as authorities in the Panama Canal have been limiting traffic in an effort to conserve water due to ongoing drought conditions. That decision, notes the publication Truck News, “threatens to impact the ability of retailers to stock inventories ahead of the holiday season.” The Panama Canal’s low water levels have led to a backup of at least 200 ships. Those ships are primarily gas carriers and bulk cargo. The ConstructConnect survey revealed that among the items still difficult to obtain because of supply chain issues are transformers, meter bases, lighting, and switchgear. Survey respondents also reporting delays in receiving air handlers, chillers, HVAC equipment, roofing materials, and both doors and door hardware. Meanwhile a new report released during the annual conference of the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City last week indicated that China remained as thoroughly embedded in the supply chain to the U.S. as ever, despite moves to lessen its role. “The U.S. indirect supply chain links to China remain intact,” said the report, written by two scholars from the Harvard Business School and Dartmouth’s Tuck School of Business. And even though efforts have been made in recent months to increase the supply line coming out of Mexico and Vietnam, the China connection appears to be as strong as ever. In remarks delivered to the Advisory Committee on Supply Chain Competitiveness, Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo remarked that the “last two years of supply chain crises have revealed that the U.S. government needs to invest more in supply chain resilience.” Raimondo said she is particularly interested in the U.S. pursuing “supply chain resiliency” with partners in the Indo-Pacific region via the established Indo-Pacific Economic Framework. The Supply Chain Center, set up by the Commerce Department, is specifically designed to leverage quantitative date and advanced analytics, noted Raimondo, as a means of formulating more effective supply chain strategies at the federal level. By Garry Boulard
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Longtime Abandoned Downtown Las Cruces Building Seeing Demolition, Future Plans for Site Not Clear8/28/2023
Nearly 50 new affordable housing units will see construction in the months ahead in Longmont, Colorado with the help of a significant grant from the state's Department of Local Affairs. That agency has announced that it is awarding a grant with a dollar value of just under $1.9 million to purchase some 7.2 acres located at 905 Harvest Moon Drive roughly 2 miles to the south of downtown Longmont. Those 7.2 acres will be combined with an adjacent 9 acres that the city purchased three years ago from the Costco Wholesale Corporation. With the acquisition of that land, the City of Longmont, which has been planning the project for more than two years, will be able to build an overall total of 47 single-family homes and 140 townhomes. The support from the Local Affairs Department is officially called an Innovative Housing Incentive grant and is designed to help local governments throughout the state build affordable housing properties. Additional support for the Longmont effort is coming out of the American Rescue Plan, which was passed in 2021 as a measure to combat the economic the ravages wrought by the Covid 19 pandemic. Last summer, it was announced that the City of Longmont had received just under $6 million in tax credits through the Colorado Housing and Finance Authority to build 55 affordable housing units. By Garry Boulard A landmark tax bill passed during the presidency of Donald Trump should be discarded rather than renewed as it nears its expiration date, says a fiscal study. Published by the Washington-based Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, the study contends that renewing Trump's 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act could cost the country $3.3 trillion over the course of the next decade. That act, largely regarded as a signal legislative victory for the Trump administration, reduced tax rates for businesses and individuals and increased the standard deduction and family tax credits. The bill has been regarded by many policy analysts as the most significant tax legislation since passage of the Tax Reform Act, which was signed into law by President Reagan in 1986. But the Responsible Federal Budget study contends that if Congress is considering an extension of the Trump legislation, whose shelf life ends on the last day of 2025, it should carefully weigh what provisions of the bill will be extended, modified, or allowed to simply expire and become history. The committee study says the most burdensome part of the Trump legislation comes with the reduced income rates, which could result in a loss of $2.6 trillion in revenue to the nation's coffers in coming years. That provision, along with several others in the original Trump bill, continues the study, would contribute to a significant worsening of the national debt. For that reason, lawmakers "should view 2025 as an opportunity to re-evaluate what worked and what did not," with the Trump bill. In so doing, contends the study, members of Congress should not extend any part of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act "without enough offsets to ensure they reduce, or at least don't add to, the national debt." Moves to extend the Trump legislation are regarded as certain during the next two years, but will almost be significantly impacted by which party takes control of Congress after the 2024 election. By Garry Boulard Voters in Growing Phoenix School District Looking at Comprehensive November Facilities Bond Proposal8/25/2023 A big bond is being proposed in a big school district in Phoenix to pay for everything from building and renovating several school facilities and improving athletic grounds, to purchasing land for future school construction. Encompassing a span of 220 square miles, the Phoenix Union High School District is one of the oldest in the state and includes 24 individual schools. It is a high school-only district. In May, members of the district Governing Board voted to put on this November’s ballot a $475 million bond that will primarily go for installing new heating and cooling systems in each of the district’s school facilities, while also installing new roofing and flooring. Specific school building projects include the renovations to the Metro Tech High School, which is located at 1900 W. Thomas Road and houses the district’s career and technical education classes. A remodeling of the Phoenix Digital Academy building at 4520 N. Central Avenue is also in store; as is an upgrading of a structure at 3701 W. Tomas Road, which is slated to house the district’s Phoenix Educator Preparatory school. Serving more than 28,000 students, most of whom are of Hispanic origin, the Phoenix Union High School District has seen an enrollment growth of more than 1,000 students in the last decade. The growth has been particularly noted in the former predominantly rural Laveen community, which has seen its population jump from just under 48,000 two years ago to more than 50,200 today. Responding to that growth, Phoenix Union High School District officials have promised to build a small school just for that community. That school will be only the latest of some half a dozen smaller facilities the district has built in the last decade. By Garry Boulard Giving evidence that business is booming, a long-time Budweiser distribution company in El Paso is making plans to build a new $31.million distribution center. L&F Distributors want to build what will be a 225,000-square-foot facility on the east side of the city near the intersection of Interstate 10 and Loop 375. That facility will replace the company's current center, located at 6949 Market Avenue, which measures around 75,000 square feet. L&F Distributors, which has other facility locations in Roswell, New Mexico, as well as the Texas cities of Alice, Corpus Christi, Harlingen, and Laredo, was launched in 1978 with a single location in McAllen. The company today serves some 35 counties in both southern New Mexico and Texas. First introduced in 1876 in St. Louis, Missouri, Budweiser is the product of the Anheuser-Busch company, which last year realized revenue in excess of $59 billion. According to the data firm Neilsen IQ, Budweiser remains on the top ten nationally in beer sales, somewhat behind Bud Lite, another Anheuser-Busch brand. Bud Lite is also distributed by L&F Distributors, as well as the increasingly popular White Claw Hard Seltzer, produced by the Mark Anthony Group. By Garry Boulard For the second year in a row, a Calabasas, California tool supply store has made the National Retail Federation’s list of the nation’s top 25 fastest-growing retail companies. Harbor Freight Tools, founded in 1977, specializes in a wide variety of tools, including power drills and drivers, ratchets, sockets, grinders, and power saws. With annual revenue in excess of $5 billion, up from $4.7 billion in 2021, the company has in excess of 1,400 stores, and, according to reports, opened more than 100 new locations last year. The company currently has 25 stores in Arizona, 21 in Colorado; 17 in New Mexico; and 119 in Texas. The state with the most Harbor Freight Tools locations is the state of the company’s origins, California, with 136 stores. In just the last two months Harbor Freight Tools has opened stores in Alliance, Ohio; Phenix City, Alabama; Amite, Louisiana; and Elko, Nevada. The average Harbor Freight Tools store measures anywhere from 15,000 square feet to 16,500 square feet, and includes two offices, a break room, at least two restrooms, and a loading dock. The National Retail Federation’s top 25 growth list this year is heavy with grocery and convenience stores. Stores catering to contractors included Costco Wholesale, with $23.7 billion in sales, and Sherman-Williams, with $1.2 billion. By Garry Boulard In a move to see the building of more houses in Colorado and at a quicker pace, Governor Jared Polis has signed an executive order that, as the official document says, is designed to “support strategic growth.” Noting that the Centennial State has become the eighth most unaffordable state in the country, Polis maintained that as things stand today, “many Coloradoans are not able to live close to where they work or close to transit, which leads to more congestion on our roads, more money spent on commuting, more pollution, and more inequitable outcomes.” Matters are only made more challenging by forecasts that Colorado, which already has a population of around 5.8 million—up from 4.3 million two decades ago—is expected to add another 1.7 million in the next generation. Although the state has invested more than $2.5 billion in new housing in just the last four years, Polis said more is needed, and as part of his executive order is directing the Colorado Department of Local Affairs to turn grants around for residential projects much more expeditiously. Polis said the goal is to reduce a current 240-day average turnaround to 90 days. Polis additionally is pushing for a variety of state agencies, including the departments of economic development, transportation, natural resources, and public health, to evaluate “everything they do that touches on housing: grants, policies, plans, procedures, rules, including utilization of state land.” “Neither the state nor local governments should be a barrier to housing development,” continued Polis, “and state programs must support and align with the state’s strategic growth goals.” The Governor’s order comes weeks after members of the Colorado State Legislature failed to agree on a measure requiring cities and towns in the state to zone for greater housing density. In a statement, Brian Rossbert, executive director of the nonprofit Housing Colorado, remarked: “We are confident that the governor and the legislature will continue to keep the issue of housing top of mind as we move toward 2024." Although Polis’ executive order does not allocate any new funding for housing construction, notes the Denver Post, “it will boost housing development,” while also increasing housing density. By Garry Boulard A plan to build a new fire resource building is one of three bond proposals to be decided upon in November by voters in Goodyear, Arizona. In different ways, all of the proposals reflect the infrastructure needs of a southern Arizona city, some 20 miles to the west of Phoenix, that has in recent decades experienced explosive growth, jumping from around 10,000 residents when Bill Clinton was president to more than 101,000 people today. Question 1 on the ballot is calling for an investment of $135 million to design, plan, and build streets, avenues, and alleyways throughout the city. The $135 million, if approved, will also go for new traffic control systems, street lighting, and underground utility lines. The second ballot question proposes $80 million to build what is officially being called a "fire resources management facility" and public safety training facility, among other things. Question 3 is the smallest proposal at $17 million and it will fund the design and building of new parks, bike, and pedestrian paths, and recreational facilities. The proposed funded projects were selected as part of a months-long process by members of the Goodyear Citizen Bond Exploratory Committee. Goodyear has several times been listed as one of the fastest-growing cities in Arizona, a growth largely attributed to migration out of Phoenix. According to city sources, its population is expected to exceed 350,000 in the next decade. By Garry Boulard Builders and developers have enjoyed a strong the multifamily housing market for most of this year but securing to an equally strong 2024 may prove somewhat more problematic. According to a new survey released by the National Association of Home Builders, a majority of builders classified current conditions as good, reflecting an improvement in general attitudes over last year. Using what the NAHB calls a Multifamily Production Index with any reading above 50 indicating conditions are better than worse, the latest measurement came in at a healthy 56. An ongoing increase in demand for multi-housing, observed NAHB economist Robert Dietz in a statement, "is being supported by the low availability and high cost of single-family homes on the market." But Dietz added that multi-family development appears to be challenged by many of the same supply side dynamics that are currently impacting the nation's single-family sector. Indeed, home builders responding to the NAHB survey pointed to the reduced availability of credit for new construction, problems getting individual projects approved, and insurance issues impacting new multi-family development. Factoring in all of the pros and cons of the coming market, Dietz remarked: "On balance, we forecast that multi-family starts will decline during the second half of 2023 due to tight financing conditions and local concerns over supply." By Garry Boulard |
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