Arizona Chapter
	Seattle Chapter

Director of Defense Systems in the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition Technology and Logistics. James (Jim) Vickers of Raytheon Corporation in Tucson has played a significant role in providing contractor insights that were useful in developing the plan.

The VE plan is part of the Office of Secretary of Defense (OSD) efforts to Reduce Total Ownership Costs (RTOC) of defense systems. The plan calls for achieving an annual 1.5% cost savings or avoidance in total obligation authority by FY06. It also calls for processing 90% of all VECPs within 180 days of submittal by FY06 and training 500 DOD personnel through the Defense Acquisition University (DAU) continued education program by FY06. Also to be completed by FY06 is a community of practice in DOD involving at least 250 people who are actively practicing VE.

Jim also spoke on some new VE-related initiatives in Government such as Share In Savings and Efficiency Savings and some older ones like the Title III programs.

Jim Vickers is currently Senior Manager of Contract Support for Raytheon Missile Systems. As such he is responsible for the company's contract compliance and leads its Value Engineering efforts. His efforts have resulted in more than $75 million in Value Engineering Incentives being paid to Raytheon. With more than 25 years experience in procurement beginning as a Naval Material Command Intern in Long Beach, California, Jim has worked as an international contract negotiator for Harris Corporation in Melbourne, Florida negotiating contracts for the sale of computer multiplexing systems and was also head of Contracts for Hughes NASA Systems Division where he negotiated the contract for the Galileo Jupiter Probe. Jim also is a retired Naval Reserve Commander. He holds an MBA from California State University, a J.D. from LaVerne University and is a member of the California State Bar. He also has completed thecourse requirements for a Doctorate in Management Science at the Florida Institute of Technology. He is a National Contract Management Association (NCMA) Fellow and a Certified Professional Contract Manager (CPCM).

• Meetings and Schedules: Gene reviewed the 2004 meeting schedule and topics.
  
  • April 14 meeting topic: TBA
    
  • May 12 meeting topic: Peg Drummond returns with more insights about preventing meeting madness.
    
  • June: No meeting
    
  • July 12-15: SAVE International Conference in Montreal, Canada
    
    
• VE Promotion to Legislature Initiative: Gene summarized progress on a new Board of Directors initiative to increase VE opportunities at the State level. The Board has just begun to explore how to best promote VE services to the Legislature. Our first step will be to compile available study data about VE effectiveness at the TIB, GA, OSPI, DOT and Corps to show demonstrated advantages of using VE. Our concept is to develop some printed material that summarizes and promotes VE in an effective manner to the relevant decision makers. Our goal is to increase opportunities for VE statewide.
  
  
• Presentations: Presentations are summarized in the January 2004 newsletter posted on the Seattle Chapter website.
  
  

General Membership Meeting, February 11, 2004

Summary: Discussion of Chapter business was brief and focused on the Board's initiative to promote VE services to the State Legislature. The meeting's main event preceded dinner: a tour of the new Federal Courthouse by the prime contractor, Absher Construction. Major discussion items are summarized below.

• Tour of New Federal Courthouse in Downtown Seattle: Jim Creek, Absher's Project Manager for the Courthouse, began with an informal presentation of the project scope and background. NBBJ is the prime architect for the General Services Administration, owner. After the introduction, he focused on the considerable and successful effort by the owner, designer and contractor to bring the project cost under the $150 million budget in 2001. Jim passed out detailed summaries of the VE proposals that were generated by the project team and answered questions from attendees. We all were struck by how comprehensively the team had examined every opportunity for increasing project value through redesign/substitution. Savings totaled approximately $12 million from an original $162 million construction bid with a large proportion of items ranging from $ 5,000 to $30,000. Following the presentation, we toured representative elements of the beautiful building with on-going discussion from Jim Creek and Brad Sayre in response to questions by attendees. Thank you Jim and Brad!
  
  
• VE Promotion to Legislature Initiative: Gene handed out the current WAC 180-29-085 (governs VE services in Washington) to attendees to review and discuss. The Board is actively exploring how to best promote VE services to the Legislature with a primary goal of increasing opportunities for VE statewide. Gene encouraged members to look for potential updates in the WAC language that SAVE could propose to the State. He suggested focusing on specific items such as the distinction between a VE study and a constructability study and their respective requirements for deliverables. Some individuals discussed this issue informally during dinner. The Board encourages each member to review WAC requirements and suggest improvements. Feel free to contact Gene Haba or Joel Davis with your suggestions and/or for more information.
  

* Editor's Note - The Seattle and Portland Chapters recently combined to form the Cascadia Chapter to increase SAVE International representation in the Northwest United States.