Gary E. Bird Horizon Award

2000 Winner—Paul Day (Innovative Safety Process Used for Large Road Construction Project)

Mr. Paul Day of Cianbro Corporation was honored at the 20th IRMI Construction Risk Conference with the second IRMI Construction Risk Management Best Practices Award for the identification, design, and implementation of a behavior-based, continuous improvement safety process at a large, complex, and challenging bridge rehabilitation project. Paul led the project team in moving beyond traditional methods of safety management through this new safety process.

The project, the 11th Street Interchange on the Anacostia Freeway in Washington, D.C., served as a pilot project for Cianbro's rollout of its new accident prevention process. The project was finished 6 months early, logging a total of 144,300 safe hours over a 30-month period with zero recordable incidents. The process has now been implemented throughout the organization on all types of construction projects.

This award was created by International Risk Management Institute, Inc. (IRMI), to recognize individuals and companies who have demonstrated a commitment to improving construction risk management through the implementation of innovative, cost-effective, and efficient risk management techniques. In addition to recognition, winners receive complimentary registration, travel, and lodging for the next IRMI Construction Risk Conference. A panel of industry experts, selected by IRMI, judged the award submissions.

Judges' comments about the winning submission included the following.

• "This behavior-based program focuses on what is observed and not who is observed. CAPP's goal is to eliminate accidents by reducing at-risk behaviors and replacing them with safe behaviors. This process makes the program non-threatening and helps the company leap over traditional hurdles to make their safety program effective."
• "This contractor has demonstrated an understanding of more than just the economic benefits of safety in construction. The commitment to 'send each employee home in the same condition they came to work' is commendable. The contractor also reports intangible benefits in the form of helping identify new leaders within the ranks, as well as improved business relationships with project owners."
• "The program was well researched and makes very good use of some industry standards with regard to safety and management and was an outstanding combination of ideas."
• "The program is very adaptable, especially for larger contractors, but is portable to any construction environment for those willing to commit to the program and processes."
• "This program has a timeliness that should be shared with others. I'm sure many firms are struggling to find new ways to reduce injuries."

The other two finalists for the award were Jim Boone, risk manager of J.S. Alberici Construction, for developing and implementing the "Safecap" process for identifying and correcting unsafe behaviors on job sites, and the risk management team of Kent Underwood, Marleen Judge, Terry Swanson, Jeff Peterson, Jon Alexander, and Sharla Reynaga from Solutia, Inc., for the development of an interdisciplinary process to define safety requirements to be followed by all employees, contractors, and guests.