Professional Services

Professional Services The term professional services refers to engineering, legal, administrative, and similar services. 1. Allowable costs include the costs of/for: A. Planning, application, and design. These costs include all engineering and other costs that are incurred in planning and designing the project, as well as applying for the Grant. These costs include but are not necessarily limited to the following services, as determined allowable in Subchapter 5 of these regulations. Contracts for planning, application and design costs need not be submitted to the Department. (i) Preparing the plans, specifications, and contract documents. (ii) Preparing interlocal agreements necessary for the project. (iii) Surveys and all other work needed to obtain clearance or permits from all intergovernmental review agencies. (iv) Preparing the Grant application, preparing applications for permits required by federal, state or local regulations or procedures. B. Construction Phase Professional Services (i) Services incurred during the advertisement, award and construction of a project to ensure compliance with state purchasing laws and to ensure that the project is built in conformance with the design plans and specifications. These services are primarily engineering, and construction management services provided during the advertisement, award and building of the project, including observation services, materials testing (e.g., concrete strength, soil compaction, etc.) required by the specifications, inspecting and expediting the delivery of equipment and material purchased directly by the Grant recipient, reviewing shop drawings and full-scale record drawings, preparing change orders, payment processing, etc. (ii) Legal, engineering, and other services incurred by the Grant recipient in deciding procurement protests and defending their decisions in protest appeals under Subchapter 9 are allowable regardless of the outcome of the protest, provided there was not an attempt by the Grant recipient to violate or circumvent state purchase laws. (iii) Development of an operation and maintenance manual. (iv) Start-up services for onsite training of operating personnel in operation and control of specific treatment processes, laboratory procedures, and maintenance and records management, provided these costs are incurred prior to the end of the 60-day period established in Rule 5.3.19.11 of these regulations. (v) Professional liability or other insurance premiums for a provider of professional services only for insurance which the provider maintains in connection with the general conduct of its business. The types and extent of coverage shall be in accordance with sound business practice, and the rates and premiums shall be reasonable under the circumstances but only as part of an indirect cost agreement. (vi) Administrative services associated with the construction project and administering the ARPA RWAIG. (vii) Services, other than engineering services during construction/repairs, such as railway or highway flagmen or utility or highway inspectors, required during the building of the project, provided that a. The entity responsible for the affected railway, highway, or utility requires such services for all parties conducting similar types of work, regardless of the source of construction funding for the project, or the services are required by law. b. The cost of such services has not been included in the construction contractor's bid price. (viii) Engineering or other services necessary to correct defects in the grant applications plan, design drawings and specifications or other documents to the extent that such costs would have been allowable for preparing defect free documents. 2. Unallowable costs include the costs of: A. Public liaison services. B. Local travel (i.e., commuting expenses) between living quarters and the construction site for persons working at the site.