Yeehaw! United Construction had a blast at this year’s Reno Rodeo. Employees were all smiles in Grandstand 5 on Wednesday, June 23 – Wolf Pack Night. We were thankful for the opportunity to attend as a company, especially after the rodeo was cancelled last year due to the pandemic. What a great time we had!
On International Women in Engineering Day, we are proud to celebrate our very own Project Engineer, Kelsie Hieber. Kelsie is a highly-experienced professional engineer with a diverse set of skills in civil design, construction assistance, geotechnical laboratory management, material testing, and field inspection. She began her career at United Construction as a project estimator and is now happy to be in the field overseeing Project Zephyr, a planned 997,000-square-foot distribution facility in Reno.
From geotechnical to civil construction, Kelsie has overseen engineering site work for a wide variety of clients, including public agencies, environmental projects and distribution facilities. She is immensely committed to delivering high-quality products for every client while maintaining excellent relationships with all partners.
We thank you, Kelsie, for the amazing work you do for United and our community!
United Construction is thrilled to have the opportunity to participate in and sponsor several Northern Nevada nonprofit and professional association golf tournaments this summer. With the pandemic cancelling nearly all events last year, our team is excited to “get back out there” as restrictions continue to lift.
So far, Team United has participated in two golf tournaments:
Kelsie Hieber, Mark Davis, Nick Crawford and Brad Richter golfed for a cause at the NAIOP Golf Tournament, as the event benefitted both the commercial real estate industry and the Give Hope Foundation, which helps families in children in Nevada battling chronic disease and illness.
Mark Davis grabbed his clubs yet again for the AGC Golf Tournament, joined this time by Mike Clements, Mark Byars and Kerry Brock. Team United came in 3rd place at this popular industry tournament! We sponsor this event every year, and this year we sponsored Hole #7. Along with golfing, we also had great fun managing our booth and connecting with all of the teams that stopped by for some drinks, our branded sunscreens and koozies, and much-appreciated shade.
Looking forward to even more golf tournaments this summer to benefit wonderful organizations in our community!
Happy National Children’s Day! On this day, we are proud to celebrate The Children’s Cabinet, a Reno-based nonprofit that provides services that address the unmet needs of children and families in our community. The organization assists more than 11,000 families in Northern Nevada every year with a multitude of no-cost resources, ranging from child care and education to family counseling and crisis intervention.
Co-founded by Dermody Properties Board Chair Michael Dermody, we are honored that our very own CEO Michael Russell has served on the Board of Directors of The Children’s Cabinet for over a decade. As the Past Board Chairman, he strongly believes in the organization’s mission of keeping children safe and families together.
“National Children’s Day is all about honoring children and the importance they bring to our lives, and The Children’s Cabinet delivers critical support and assistance to children in need in our community every day of the year,” said Russell. “I am so proud to have had the opportunity to serve the organization for so many years.”
Additionally, employees at United Construction builds a playhouse and/or doghouse every year to be auctioned off at their Art of Childhood Fundraising Gala. See one of our handcrafted examples above.
We encourage all of our followers to support The Children’s Cabinet on National Children’s Day and beyond. How do you value the children in your life?
Under the leadership of Superintendent Chuck Brown and Project Manager Chris Silsby, United Construction is underway with pre-construction processes along Reactor Way within the Hamilton Company campus. Hamilton hired United and their roadway subcontractor Sierra Nevada Construction to make road and infrastructure improvements at Hamilton Reactor Way, and United is currently working to finish installation of guardrails over University Drain to connect Reactor Way and provide access to Rock Blvd.
United is excavating the surrounding campus trench this week. During this time, heavy equipment will be loaded onsite. Business neighbors should exercise appropriate cautions and stay aware of lane closures and flaggers.
Upon project completion, Waldorf School and High Sierra Industries will enjoy additional parking spaces, while Hamilton Reactor Way will have new sidewalks, parallel parking, crosswalks and landscaping.
As the 2020-2021 school year at Swope Middle School approaches its end, exterior work on the roofing and interior work on school facilities continues full steam ahead.
“This summer will be a busy time for construction at the school,” said Casey Gunther, Operations Manager at United Construction. “With finishes to the new gymnasium and roofs starting to take shape, we are poised to move forward with Phase 3 of the project: demolition, new classroom construction and existing facility remodel. I am honored to work alongside my United colleagues and our Washoe County School District, architectural, safety and engineering partners as we hit major milestones on the schoolgrounds.”
Interior framing in the new gymnasium has begun, and drywall will be installed in the coming weeks along with finishes to the basketball hoops, bleachers, wood flooring, paint and lockers. Consequently, demolition of the existing gym will take place in mid-to-late June. Site workers are also preparing to demolish the library to make room for the new kitchen as well as demolish and remodel the band/choir rooms. Outside, neighborhood residents can enjoy the metal canopy close to completion.
Completion of the PVC Membrane Roofing system over the gym marks a significant project landmark. The roof supports four HVAC units (two in the locker rooms and two in the fitness room) that will heat and cool the building. Skylights will also be installed that will amplify natural light into the entire area, which is “a welcomed addition to the typical industrious gym environment,” said Gunther.
In the meantime, residents can expect an increase in traffic through both the west side of the property (Sherwood Drive and Balsam Street) and the east side (Keele Drive).
Photo Credits: Ryland Sweigard
The week of May 16th officially marks National Public Works Week in the United States. During this week, we celebrate public works employees and construction partners – like the superintendents and engineers on our UCC team and our subcontractors who physically build our state-of-the-art public projects in the field. In terms of public works, these incredibly hard workers serve our community by building and renovating our schools, health centers, roads, airports and aircraft facilities, public spaces and more.
The American Public Works Association (APWA) announced the theme for this year’s National Public Works Week: “Stronger Together.” According to APWA, the idea for this theme is to challenge their membership and the larger public works and associated communities “to think about the role public works plays in creating a great place to live. By working together, the impact citizens and public works professionals can have on their communities is magnified and results in the ability to accomplish goals once thought unattainable.”
Give your fellow public works employees and construction partners some extra love this week!
Featured in the photo above are site workers doing great work on the job at Swope Middle School in August 2020.
Community Health Alliance (CHA) is a network of high-quality community medical centers across Northern Nevada providing comprehensive health services to a wide variety of populations, especially those who are underserved. United Construction is honored to be the construction partner for CHA on the renovation of their Oddie Boulevard clinic in Sparks.
The clinic remodel includes expanding into the adjoining tenant space to build more exam rooms, a brand new nurses station, and an expanded waiting room. Nurses have officially moved into their newly constructed station, and patients are enjoying the improved, welcoming waiting areas. Assistant Superintendent Justin Brunner is overseeing the progress of the project on-site, and his team members are excited to be in the field constructing the new-and-improved facilities to help CHA serve even more Nevadans with affordable and quality healthcare.
Featured above you will see an example of part of a new exam room at the clinic. See below for a before-and-after photo array of one of the exam room hallways inside the clinic on Oddie Blvd. For more information on Community Health Alliance, visit their website at www.chanevada.org.
Swift progress is afoot at the Dassault Falcon jobsite on the Reno Tahoe International Airport grounds. The 10,978 sf, two-story addition – designed by Dave Eckes and overseen on-site by Pete Brunner – will feature parts storage, locker rooms, records storage and a second-floor training/event room, avionics work room, engineering, conference room and quality assurance department.
Site workers have poured the concrete for the stairs, installed girders, closed all big footings and are getting closer to finishing the siding of the expansion. Elite Safety is doing regular safety inspections, and the site continually gets a clean bill of health.
Dassault Falcon employees expressed much excitement to the United Construction team over the progress of the addition. Dassault looks forward to having extra space for comfortable storage, changing areas and meeting rooms.
Project completion is currently scheduled for the end of June.
About Dassault and UCC’s Relationship
Dassault is a French based aircraft manufacturer of business and corporate jets. The United Construction design-build team also delivered the existing building used by Dassault. United delivered it in 1996 as an aircraft maintenance hangar for Reno Air.
The first full week in May of each year marks North American Occupational Safety and Health (NAOSH) Week, which launched in 1997 from an agreement between the USA, Canada and Mexico. According to naosh.org, the goal of this commemorative event “is to focus employers, employees, partners and the public on the importance of preventing injury and illness in the workplace, at home, and in the community.”
United Construction has a safety-focused culture and sets a precedence for safety in the workplace, with a commitment to zero accidents and zero injuries. From on-site logistics and training to expert advisement from our partner Elite Safety, we take this seriously, and that includes protecting the health of our team. We are especially proud – not just this special week but every week – to have the support of our safety partner to help us excel in our high safety standards for our projects.
If we could pin one incident as a major test of our immense dedication to preventing injury and illness at work, it would be the COVID-19 pandemic. With strict precautions to keep everyone healthy – including mask mandates, social distancing, high cleanliness standards and fostering a culture of care where our staff members are encouraged to take sick time to care for ourselves – we will always keep the health and safety of our United team and partners at the forefront of what we do day in and day out.