Companies flock to get in on work

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Utah contractors and suppliers line up to board one of 11 buses at the Hilton Salt Lake City Airport Hotel for a tour of a planned $1 billion, 1 million-square-foot data center at Camp Williams.

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Want a role in constructing a $1 billion facility at Camp Williams for the country's spy agencies to collect data in the fight against cyberterror?

Among those who do are upward of 500 contractors, subcontractors, parts and service suppliers, union representatives and private consultants. They filled a large hotel ballroom Thursday morning to hear officials from the National Security Agency and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers describe the "Utah Data Center" and the process they will follow in selecting a contractor for the massive design-build project.

Many -- no more than two per company -- then boarded 11 buses that ferried them to the 200-acre site, southwest of Camp Williams' garrison area, where the high-tech data

"This is huge, huge," said John Marchand, a senior vice president with Dynamic Systems Inc., a mechanical-contracting firm from Austin, Texas. "It's 1½ to two times bigger than the one we're doing for the NSA in San Antonio. Projects like this tend to create [business] opportunities that are unique."

And extensive.

"We just want a piece of the pie," said Rick Garcia, a project manager for Mechanical Service & Systems Inc., a plumbing and mechanical business based in Midvale.

The federal agencies set up Thursday's "Industry Day" -- another one is planned for Nov. 13 -- to help companies as large as Marchand's and even smaller than Garcia's to learn more about the plan and to start talking to one another. Their goal is to create teams to bid for the right to design and build the facility -- an accelerated process similar to the $1.59 billion design-build approach used to reconstruct Interstate 15 before the 2002 Winter Olympics. Design-build refers to starting construction as the design process continues.

Big players in the construction industry were everywhere.

After NSA and Corps of Engineers officials made their presentations, they asked the big contractors to stand up and identify themselves so they could be approached during a networking session by potential subcontractors and other partners. Those who stood included Jacobsen, Kiewit, Okland, Layton, Zwick, Bechtel.

The mingling that took place in the halls of the Airport Hilton exposed those industry heavyweights to a variety of Utah small businesses.

Rod Kaye was there from Layton to pitch his Navajo-named company, NeZhoni Construction, an electrical and general contractor which has worked on sensitive buildings at Dugway Proving Ground.

"Hopefully, we can get a little of this," he said.

Jayson Nosack was fairly confident his firm, a Salt Lake division of IES Commercial Inc., will get a share of the contract for voice and data wiring, card access and video-surveillance systems.

"We specialize in data centers," he said, optimistic the project will help carry Utah's economy forward. "This should help a lot of general contractors and small businesses here locally ... We have about 25 to 30 people. We'd probably hire more if we were awarded part of the contract."

The contract will not go to the low bidder but to the consortium that offers the best value to the government, said Carlen Capenos of the Army Corps of Engineers.

Every company involved in a bid team will be asked to provide proof they can do the type of work they say they can do -- and fast.

"Did I say how important the schedule is?," she asked, not once but several times. In addition, every employee of the selected team -- only American companies need apply --- also will be "vetted" for security reasons.

Capenos and NSA spokesman George Ruo emphasized that the winning team must include plenty of small businesses and produce an environmentally advanced facility that will meet LEED silver-certification standards.

"We want to be good stewards of the environment ... understanding we're power pigs," said Ruo, referring to the likelihood that the facility's annual electrical use will match that of Salt Lake City's nearly 182,000 residents.

mikeg@sltrib.com