Georgia Southern Cuts Through the Backlog with JOC

Challenge

Georgia Southern University (GSU) is the state’s largest and most comprehensive center of higher education south of Atlanta. A Carnegie Doctoral-Research university, Georgia Southern provides the classic residential experience to the 26,500 students on its immaculate 1,000-acre campus. GSU thinks of itself as a “large-scale, small-feel” research university.

To keep the Statesboro, GA campus up to standard, GSU employs in-house maintenance, trades and custodial staff. For larger renovations, repairs and construction projects, the school turns to contractors. This is where things get difficult for Georgia Southern.

Growth in the areas surrounding GSU has created fierce competition for quality contractors. Subcontractor scarcity drives up prices and creates longer project timeframes—a real problem for a school with short windows of time to complete projects and 100 percent occupancy over the summer thanks to conferences and camps.

These circumstances create a large backlog of deferred maintenance projects and an urgency to get contractors on campus fast.

Solution

The University is more than 100 years old, so the campus buildings vary in age and architecture. The University Housing and Auxiliary Services department alone services more than 2.9M square feet of space – ranging from housing, common spaces and a health center. To address the growing backlog, GSU relies on facility condition assessment reports to prioritize projects.

But that doesn’t help the university find available contractors. So, they use Gordian’s ezIQC® solution to simplify and fast-track construction procurement. ezIQC allows public entities to buy construction services through cooperative purchasing networks—the same way they buy office furniture and supplies. Purchasing through co-ops allows contractors to complete many projects with one competitively-awarded contract. Georgia Southern benefits by getting contractors on campus faster than with traditional procurement, and ezIQC provides more cost control than traditional methods.

Result

“ezIQC can be as complex as you want it to be, it can be very broad, the value can be small or it can be large. We have projects that range from $25K to $3.5M. It’s been really helpful for us.”

Bob Hisey, Assistant Director, University Housing and Auxiliary Services, GSU

Using the ezIQC solution has helped GSU maximize its in-house staff while enjoying a faster, more interactive project planning and approval processes. ezIQC has created a partnership between Georgia Southern University and contractors throughout the state. Completed projects have included:

• Sidewalk, window, roof, exterior trim and siding replacements
• Parking lot and restroom construction
• Staircase and exterior building painting
• Clubhouse, office and franchise renovations
• LED lighting, wireless system, generator and flagpole installations
• Safety and security updates: Fire alarm, CCTV and panic button system installations and security camera upgrades
• Shower replacements
• Steel cleaning and painting
• Generator installation
• HVAC change outs

Discover more about ezIQC and how you can get work started faster.