Government agencies limitation of scope 2

[jhnblgr]

Many government agencies tend to influence design by their processes of approval of design documents. While their purpose is to review to ensure that designs meet certain standards or requirements they often go beyond that. Often times they force engineers to change designs based on personal opinions and not sound engineering principles. It would seem that this is beyond their scope and unethical that a person is forcing the engineer in charge who is responsible for the project to make a change that is often not needed or produces a flawed end product. Should the state board of engineers hold these government engineers accountable to the code of ethics? Also the cost impact they have that cost taxpayers money.

 

[SWComposites]

So who is going to referee the design decisions?? The state board? Courts? Sounds like a good way to slow down projects and drive up costs.

 

[JStephen]

I don't really see that you're getting into an ethical issue there.
I suspect you mean "flawed end product" in a different sense than it might be understood elsewhere. "Less than optimum" or "different than how I think it should be done" are not the same as "flawed".
Example: Here in the Dallas area, the land is fairly flat, the rivers are shallow, it's simple enough to support any bridge with piers every 10' if that's what's required. However, they have built a number of "signature" bridges with big arches, etc. Those are obviously more expensive than what could have been built, and what existed before. Are they "flawed" because of that? I think not.
Similarly, if you're having a custom home built, it's your option to have it built in stupidly expensive ways if you have the funds, but that doesn't imply a flaw in the construction, either.

 

[BrianPetersen]

In my neck of the woods, government employees are largely immune from prosecution. In my career, I've run across a few situations that were created by a government engineer making what was in my opinion an unreasonable judgment, and these situations cost some varying degree of time and money to resolve, but it would have been tough to claim negligence.

The toughest situations that I've run across, are the ones in which the government engineer is technically correct, but the way the underlying laws, regulations, or standards are written is not fully practical (or possible) to be in compliance with (other than kicking all employees out, shuttering the facility, and locking the door). There are accepted practices in industry ... but, to give an example, good luck with keeping a woodworking shop "safe" to the extent that the regulations imply that one should. Any machine that can cut a piece of wood, can cut off a finger or hand. (I dealt with those by refusing to get involved.) I have a bandsaw in my own shop ...

There have been cases where a government engineer recommended to do something stupid, but the ones I've seen were fairly easy to push back against.

Pick your battles.

 

[jhnblgr]

The issue is that these government engineers lack knowledge or experience in the area they are reviewing. The design should be left to the professional that is signing and sealing the documents not a government engineer that takes zero liability for the work. When the government engineer requires a design change that goes against accepted design standards it is an ethical concern since they are forcing a design professional to make a change that the design professional does not agree. For example the government agency telling you not to design for earthquake forces because they don’t believe it required, or designing a pump station without taking into account minimum submergence or volume to meet max number of hourly cycles on the pumps.

The review should focus on if the plans meet the project requirements and the methodology follows industry standards.

 

[CWB1]

No, state licensing boards have no legal authority over other agencies. Every agency has a formal complaint and review process subject to the Freedom of Information Act and the courts. If you're concerned about a regulator's actions then file a complaint or sue the agency.

 

[jhnblgr]

The board might not have authority ov the agencies but they do have authority over the licensed individuals of that agency. For an engineer to perform their job they need to be competent in that area or they are in violation with the state laws. If government agencies are not following the state laws then they should be held responsible. There is nothing more dangerous than when an engineer is practicing in an area they are not competent and at such a high level as government agencies. There is no action that can be taken since fear of retaliation or loss of work.

 

[SWComposites]

Do govt building officials have to be licensed? Don’t think so. If not the state eng board has no oversight of them.

 

[jhnblgr]

These are civil engineering projects which are reviewed by licensed professionals. In civil engineering you must be licensed to be considered an engineer. Other engineering branches operate without need of licensure but not civil engineering where it is highly regulated. Ironically the government engineers are exempt from continuing education which is a whole separate issue. The other issue this brings up is liability of a change forced on the EOR by an outside agency, the EOR is still liable even if the change was done in protest. Engineering should be regulated but the regulations should not be directed changes but rather references to follow industry standards.

 

[Sparweb]

Hi Jhnblgr,
I feel your pain. I regularly have to contend with this in my work, and no, I don't think there's much anyone can do about it. I come to Eng-Tips to complain about it, like you, with a knowing and sympathetic audience.

You know the old saying: "If you can, do, if you can't, teach..." ...and "if you can't teach, regulate!"

Another old saying: "Hello, I'm from the FAA, and I'm here to help!"

I have had regulators make arbitrary decisions that turned a project's economics upside down.
I have had regulators make arbitrary decisions that made customer cancel the project.
I have had regulators initiate compliance investigations against my customers after they came to us for the very approval needed to be in compliance.
The regulators refer to policy and guidance documents, some written by bureaucrats who have never turned a wrench or crimped a wire, and therefore cannot by applied in practice. In these situations my regulators will interpret the vague inconsistencies one way, when I would prefer them to use a different interpretation.

"C'est la vie"

 

[Smoulder]

"Often times they force engineers to change designs based on personal opinions and not sound engineering principles. It would seem that this is beyond their scope"

Is it? Check your contract and scope. Completely normal around here for consultant's scope to include responding and incorporating comments. Remember though you're still their advisor so your have to explain in writing why you disagree.


"unethical that a person is forcing the engineer in charge who is responsible for the project to make a change that is often not needed or produces a flawed end product."

They can't force the engineer in charge. Something is wrong with your assessment of the situation. If you're in charge then tell them so. Nicely to start then firmly if needed. If they don't back down ask them flat out if they're taking control and responsibility for the design. Only had to do that twice and they backed down both times.


"For example the government agency telling you not to design for earthquake forces because they don’t believe it required, or designing a pump station without taking into account minimum submergence or volume to meet max number of hourly cycles on the pumps."

If it's a review for regulatory approval then tell them your design exceeds minimum requirements and you're not going to change it. If they're in a client role then follow the procedure outlined above.


"The other issue this brings up is liability of a change forced on the EOR by an outside agency, the EOR is still liable even if the change was done in protest."

Suggest avoiding being in that situation. If regulatory reviewer then escalate appropriately. In your example of not designing for earthquake you tell them they're endangering the public and you want the manager or whoever. Elected representative if needed. If client role then ask for contract variation including being indemnified. All these are tactics to force them to back down or protect you. But you can never endanger anyone just because someone else told you to.

 

[CWB1]

State licensing boards have no authority to investigate a regulator acting on behalf of their agency. The most they could do is refer your complaint to the agency who, from a practical standpoint is the most qualified to review complaints of a technical nature.

There will always be need for regulators to interpret/clarify legal requirements and add necessary detail due to the complexity of what we do, ever-changing laws, and the misnomers called "standards." Industry is inconsistent at best and your view of it tiny compared to regulators'.

 

[LOTE]

I run into this all the time working on the supplier/contractor side of things. I find the actual DOT is more reasonable than the consultants they hire. Usually it's that the consultant reviewer wants something arbitrarily more conservative than the specs (my favorite is "that CDR is too close to 1.0, please increase". To what??? And where is this requirement???). If it's a material difference for my client, I'll respond back with a "please spell out the revised requirement beyond the project spec's and we will quantify these increases for a change order." That usually helps them change coarse quickly.

I have run into a couple issues where we'll request information on additional loading from a structure near ours. When the owner replies with a "oh it won't add any load, all loading is stated in the plans", we'll do something similar to Smoulder and state the owner, and specifically the engineer relying to the RFI, certify that there is no additional loading due to that structure and we accept no liability for any affects from additional loading have on our structure. We'll also put that in a cover letter to ensure it doesn't get missed. I have not run into a case where the owner accepted that and didn't get the loading we were requesting.

 

[TLHS]

I totally understand griping about unreasonable comments from stakeholders, but the way you're presenting this is weird and makes me picture stubborn engineers I've worked with more than it makes me picture unreasonable stakeholders. Like, what's been going on that makes you jump to reporting people for ethical violations?

This isn't just a government thing. This is a client thing. Clients are free to ask for whatever they'd like, that's what they're paying for. They're not paying to necessarily get it, but they're paying you to be able to know better than they do and help them implement what they want to implement. If you're letting them push you into something ethically questionable, then that's your issue to deal with. Comments are not unethical, and even when written as directives these things are generally comments. If you're the engineer signing off, then you need to be comfortable that your work meets a minimum standard. If you think requested modifications are not within that comfortable minimum standard, then you disagree with the comments and have the discussion about it. If they're asking for more conservatism you thank them for their comment and talk to the project manager about change notices and see if they're willing to pay for it. If they're asking for something non-conservative you justify what you've done and why you aren't doing it their way. If they're asking for something that's basically a difference in preference, you generally should just suck it up and do it unless it's a real pain.

The only point where this would become unethical is if they somehow start to say that you're practicing improperly. Until that point, it's just you doing your job as a consultant to educate stakeholders.

Different stakeholders have different points of view. You're going to get comments that you don't agree with because you have different information, different experiences and different goals than other stakeholders do. Sometimes the comments will be bad engineering, sometimes you'll be the one that missed something, but a lot of times it's either a lack of meeting of the minds that can be reasonably easily fixed, or they have other experiences that prioritize things differently that may need discussion.

 

[Gr8blu]

Most design standards are "consensus" standards. What this means is that a bunch of people get together and write down what they believe to be the MINIMUM requirement to enforce safety and reliability. Who gets involved? If the group selection is done correctly there are representatives from each of the following: industry (the experienced/practical experts), academia (the theory experts), government (the regulatory experts), and general public (essentially, all other interested or affected parties). After the standard is written, the final draft goes out for public balloting - which entails an even larger selection of those same groups.

During the ballot process, there are a number of comments engendered. If the comment does not have a proposed alternative wording or solution - and the comment resolution group (CRG) is against the comment - then it is rejected. If there is an alternative proposed, the CRG must consider it and either accept as is, modify to where it meets intent, or reject (with professional technical explanation of why). Once all comments have been addressed, the document goes out for ballot again. The process repeats until the required consensus (in the form of an approved ballot) is obtained.

Only after all the comments (on the draft) get resolved, does it actually become a working document.

There is no reason why an end user (in the OP's hypothetical case, a regulator) demanding more than the standard - nor is there a reason why the engineer of record can't have a design which exceeds the standard. In both cases, it's (usually) a good thing. How to resolve conflict - either professional or personal - is another thing entirely. Try a few methods until you find one that works for you (and the other party).

Converting energy to motion for more than half a century

 

[djs]

In my area there was a reservoir built to hold water for the local municipalities during our dry season. The banks of the reservoir were initially designed to use rip rap to protect the banks. During the permitting process, the state DEP rejected the rip rap and specifies a soil cement covering. This was implemented, but after the reservoir was placed into operation for several years, it was found the the raise and fall of the water in the reservoir was causing the soil cement covering to crack. The contractor was forced to to provide corrective action at their cost.