Orange County Branch Newsletter

November 2015

Community Service

Activities and Opportunities Available to ASCE OC Branch Members to Get Involved and Give Back to the Community

The San Diego Zoo’s Safari Park Bridge Railings retrofit project continues to advance.  Since last month, we have selected the bridge connection devices and the wood post/railing system for our design.  We are now moving forward with the development of the connection construction bid documents, discussing fund raising activities and starting efforts to prepare for a spring, 2016 “construction Day” for ASCE and EWB membership to install the posts/railings and related work.  The Park and Nossaman, LLC have been working to develop a construction contract for placing the connections on the first bridge.

NEEDS: Bridge Design Support (CA P.E.) – Bridges 1-4; Bridge 1 Design QA; Bridge 1 Workday Railing Support – Superintendent & maybe 10-12 support workers (Spring); Fundraising lead and support.

Corazon’s project efforts continue.  EWB-OC and ASCE-OC have agreed to help develop a Sanitation element to the homes (both new and retrofit) and for their developing community centers in Tecate, Mexico.  We are waiting to confirm out current design’s performance through the rainy wither before expanding further.  We are also preparing plans to install one alternative concept for comparison to our current concept.

NEEDS: Design Support (P.E.) - Homes (New, Retrofit) and Community Centers; Assessments & installation support – several teams of two people for two one-day trips for the installation at homes. The Corazon lead has resigned and there is an imediate need for someone to take the lead for this project!

The US National Forest Service has agreed to partner with ASCE-OC and EWB-OC (through the Community Engineering Corps (CEC) partnership program) to engineer the needed improvements for facilities that might otherwise not be improved.  In addition we have agreed to provide Volunteer Groups for day-long trail and facility improvement work, possibly including overseeing disadvantaged youth work teams.  A Master Agreement has been signed by ASCE-OC and EWB-OC and should be fully executed soon.  A Supplemental Project Agreement will then be developed for the first project that is anticipated to be the Wildwood Picnic Area reconstruction (the area was destroyed in a fire).  A CEC Agreement between ASCE and EWB has been developed to move ahead with the Wildwood improvements.  It should be submitted to the CEC in November.  Volunteer Group activities will be developed for 2016.

NEEDS: CEC Application – Kevin; Project Design (CA P.E.) and support; Project Design QA; Project Construction support (2-3 people); Volunteer Group support;

Member volunteers are sought for each of these projects.  Please contact Greg Henk (or 949-292-2505) if you are willing to help out in any capacity.