Sec. 201. Standard design in capital construction

327 words·~1 min read·/bill/115/s/1631/is/section-201

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Congress finds that the decision by the Department’s Bureau of Overseas Buildings Operations ( OBO ) to transition from Standard Embassy Design to Design Excellence has in some cases— increased the cost of building new embassies and consulates; delayed the move of thousands of staff from facilities that do not meet current security standards to new, secure facilities; exacerbated certain deficiencies in the quality of the Bureau’s program management; and been a factor in reduced competition for capital construction projects.

It is the sense of Congress that the OBO should give appropriate consideration to Standard Embassy Design, in which each new embassy and consulate starts with a standard design and keeps customization to a minimum. The Secretary shall carry out any new embassy compound or new consulate compound project that is in the design phase or pre-design phase as of the date of the enactment of this Act and that utilizes a non-standard design in consultation with the appropriate congressional committees.

The Department shall provide the appropriate congressional committees, for each such project, the following documentation: A comparison of the estimated full lifecycle costs of the project to the estimated full lifecycle costs of the project if it were to use a standard embassy design. A comparison of the estimated completion date of the project to the estimated completion date of the project if it were to use a standard embassy design. A comparison of the security of the completed project to the security of the completed project if it were to use a standard embassy design.

A justification for the Secretary’s selection of a non-standard design over a standard design for the project. In this section the term non-standard design means a new embassy compound or new consulate compound design that does not utilize a standardized design template for the structural, spatial and security requirements of the compound, or a new embassy compound or new consulate compound project that does not utilize a design-build delivery method.