Ontario Construction News staff writer
The first adjudication has been filed under the new Ontario Construction Act, says the Ontario Dispute Adjudication for Construction Contracts (ODACC), which administers the dispute resolution process.
“We have just received our first adjudication, but we don’t anticipate getting many over the next six months or so,” ODACC project manager Carina Reider said in an email to Ontario Construction News on Monday.
Over time, “in terms of the number of adjudications, we really have no idea,” she wrote. “We had to run numerous possible scenarios as part of the application process but we really have no idea how many adjudications there will be.”
The adjudication will be private unless the parties decide to make the case public. “Whether the results of adjudications are public is up to the parties to the adjudication.,” she wrote. If they choose to make the determinations public, they may do so, but ODACC does not publish the results of adjudication.”
““If a party goes to court to enforce a decision, any action taken in court will, of course, be public,” Reider says.
On Monday, ODACC listed 35 adjudicators on its roster, though the several more individuals are going through the training and certification process to be added to the list. Adjudicators have listed hourly rates between $250 and $750 per hour, with the majority setting rates at $400 or $500.
Among occupational classifications, engineers and lawyers dominate, though some list their primary background as project managers and quantity surveyors and one is an architect. Several claim more than one qualification, combining law, arbitration, engineering, project management or other skills.