City hires UEP project manager
The city of Cape Coral has hired a project manager to oversee the next phase of its billion dollar utility expansion project.
City Manager John Szerlag has hired Paul Clinghan, who will oversee the UEP Southwest 6/7 area.
He was hired Dec. 17.
Work on the remaining infill area is set to begin sometime in 2013.
Clinghan said he is working hard to come up to speed on the project. He will soon be talking with Tetra-Tech, the engineers and designers for the Southwest 6&7 phase, and with city UEP team.
So far, Clinghan said he likes what he’s seen.
“It’s an interesting project. It’s definitely needed,” Clinghan said. “The size of the Southwest 6&7 is a big project. The job is pretty straightforward, there’s just a lot of it.”
Clinghan is a registered professional engineer in six states and in the Virgin Islands, and has nearly 30 years of experience of engineering, managing, design, bidding and construction of wastewater, water, reuse and stormwater projects throughout New England, the Mid-Atlantic states and Florida, according to a prepared statement announcing his coming on board.
Clinghan was a senior vice president, board member and partner at Hoyle, Tanner and Associates, based in Manchester, N.H.
But with all his children grown and one of his daughters working as a nurse in Tampa, Clinghan said moving south was a natural.
“My wife and I always wanted to move here, so we started looking at online government sites and applied and went through the process here,” Clinghan said.
And Clinghan expects to be here for a while, especially for a project that will take decades, not years, before the entire thing wraps up in the north Cape.
While Clinghan said he’s done larger projects, this one ranks up there as one of the biggest.
“Things I’ve done in the past have been different. This is seven contracts and will cost $100 million when finished,” Clinghan said. “I’ve managed those kinds of numbers, but in different municipalities.”
The bidding process is expected to begin in June or July, with the first digging set for late summer or early fall, Clinghan said. Southwest 6&7 is expected to take two years to complete before the city starts on North 2 in 2015.