Announcement to all OGC members, and please pass this on...

[Seismic Sam]

The April OGC Member's meeting will occur on April 10th at the Oak Marsh Golf course, which is where the December elections were held. The purpose of booking this larger facility to get as many members as we can to show up and be able to vote on the proposed 2013 construction project, BEFORE we go ahead with the actual project and expenditures. The announcement in the newsletter is here: with the front page being introductory remarks from the Construction Review Committee Chair Al Leirness on the report of the Construction Review Committee itself.

https://www.oakdalegunclub.org/sites/default/files/April%202013%20Newsletter_0.pdf

The actual CRC report is here:

https://www.oakdalegunclub.org/sites/default/files/Final%202012%20Construction%20Review%20Committee%20Report.pdf

At the meeting you will get to see actual drawings of the proposed improvements, as well as final or nearly finalized costs coming back from 3 independent contractors, which is the way all this should have been done to begin with. Unfortunately, the timing is tight, as we have to break ground by May 1st or we will have to go through the Conditional Use Permit process again and nothing will happen until next year. I will be the first to admit that this is not a lot of advance warning, and it would have been MUCH better to have another couple of months talk about this before breaking ground, but the fact is that it's publish or perish time on May 1st. The Construction review Committee had no idea what it was getting into when they volunteered, and it was a huge shock to discover that the true scope of this project had an initial price tag in the February 2012 Board meeting of $4,266.553.00, and was projected to last for a span of perhaps as much 10 years. I literally went home in a state of shock that night. Without going into the details right now, it became clear that if the club membership had not stopped this project in November and ground had been broken on Nov. 19th as planned, OGC would be in a tremendous amount of hurt right now.

And to be quite clear, I was one of those who SHOULD have been going to meetings and paying attention last year like a lot of other people, and that apathy is how things went as wrong as they did. Later, I finally woke up from being inactive member, and I was one of the main instigators who raised one hell of a hue and cry last fall when I heard about 100 yard long 12' concrete walls on the 100 yard range, and started asking some very pointed questions about what the effect of the reflected sound would be, as well as a lot of other things that I didn't think had been considered. As a matter of fact, I was so incensed that I ran for Long Range Planning Director of the Club, and my campaign promise was “do things right, do things throughly, and make sure the membership of the club has its say before major decisions like this are made. Well, I’m here to make good on what I said I was going to do when you voted for me.

Once again, the timing is uncomfortably tight, but it is what it is, and you can’t even begin to imagine all the obstacles we had to overcome to get to this point.

To address the issue of why can’t we wait longer and digest all this, I can assure you this is a valid question to ask, and some people have voiced the opinion that “nothing bad happened with the way the range was in 2012, so why do we HAVE to do something in 2013?” Well, with the range itself, nothing bad did happen, but an accident can happen at any time, and with the 10,000 public shooters we take in every year that possibility is always very real and only one bad shot away. In addition, something very fundamentally bad did happen to the Club and its members in 2012, and that was Dec. 14th. Little did we realize that after shortly thereafter, both Federal and State legislation would be sponsored which would among other things, make most of the club members potential criminals for having the same guns and mags in their safes that had been there for the last 30 - 40 years. In addition, the resulting panic in buying AR style rifles and mags was totally unprecedented, and while that is subsiding the ammo famine continues nearly unabated. In conclusion, things are nowhere NEAR the same as they were last year, and it’s doubtful that much will change until November 2014 at the earliest, and more likely November 2016.

As a result, the club has to make some serious upgrades to its facilities as far as safety and bullet control are concerned, and this simply cannot wait for another year.

To get down to the particulars, the 1st recommendation of the CRC was to upgrade the short pistol range to adequate side walls, overhead baffles which will preclude all bullets getting off the property, plus adding cover for the shooters and increasing the available shooting capacity to 8 - 10 individual stalls. Plus there will be a concrete to pad to stand on, rather than glare ice or melting slop.

The 2nd recommendation had been to block the possibility of a bullet going from the 200 yard range house to the 25 yard range roof, and this was going require a 180' long 12' high precast concrete wall with an estimated cost of $80,000 and some potentially serious concerns about the results of frost heaves on the uphill side of the wall. With some creative drafting and application of simple geometry on my part, this 180' long concrete wall turned into a wood and pea gravel wall about 40' long astride the right berm of the 200, and the cost plummeted to $15,000. Later another wall was seen to be needed to protect the target zone of the 50 from the 200, and again a cheap wood and pea gravel wall was the best answer. Finally, due to the terms of the building permit we had, these walls left the plan altogether are now sitting as a club maintenance project.

Last is the 100 yard range, which is the cash engine for this club which can pay for these improvements, and this range HAS to stay open for the club to survive financially and continue to have a good cash flow position. Initially, the original plan called for 10 baffles total to keep all bullets on the range no matter the mistake or shooting position, and the 1st phase only called for 2 or at most 3 baffles to shut off maybe 30% of the blue sky, meaning the club was still painfully exposed on this range despite a six figure expenditure. This was clearly not acceptable from a cost or risk standpoint! I worked over the original blueprints about 10 times experimenting with various things, and finally after weeks of effort managed to get the 100 yard range FULLY enclosed with just 5 baffles and 100' of precast wall, If you are at Oakdale, look down the sides of the 100 yard range and you will see some pink surveyor’s tape tied to the branches at the end of the proposed walls. It makes one hell of a difference in the visual change to the range, as well as cutting the total wall length needed for complete blue sky coverage by 2/3rds.

So, the plan now is to fully prevent any bullets from getting out of the pistol Short Range or the 100 yard range, and rough estimates show the anticipated expenditure not greatly different from what was proposed last year, except that the 100 yard rage is fully protected rather than 30% protected, and that is a HUGE difference! I will not go into more precise numbers here because you will se those on April 10th, and then they will be VERY hard numbers at that point.

It is my personal recommendation to all of you that this is the best and most efficient use of the club’s money to upgrade our safety to be in line with the NRA guidelines and the state law governing the operation of shooting ranges like ours, and that it should be approved by you the membership. There is now a plan in place to deal with all concerns about sound reflection and noise control AND measurement to prove our compliance with State law, so all of my personal concerns about this have been answered, as well as every other aspect of this project. I am 100% convinced in my own mind that this project is the best effort that the Club can put forward at this point both in terms of safety, maximum value for each dollar spent, increased compliance with State and NRA regulations, and that this plan is the absolute best we can do for this price or anything close to it.

One final caveat: For whatever reasons, a lot of side issues have been dragged past the CRC and also the board concerning the final design that accomplished nothing more than to delay the process, and this situation may rear its ugly head at the April 10th meeting, or it may not. I honestly can’t tell at this point, but I would urge all of you to ignore any and all side issues whose solution can be accomplished at a later date, and FOCUS on the task at hand, which is to vote yay or nay on the project presented to you at the meeting. I have spoken my piece, and now you, the membership will make the final decision on this matter as is your right and responsibility.

Good luck, and choose wisely, because if something unexpected happens, which is very possible, we may rue the day we didn’t choose to spend money we could easily afford to pay back on a higher level of safety.

[whiteox]

Thanks for all the work you're putting in on this.

[photogpat]

I'll be there next Wednesday. Thanks for the update Sam!

[rugersol]

to be in line with the NRA guidelines and the state law governing the operation of shooting ranges like ours

Is the range currently in violation of "state law"?!

we may rue the day we didn’t choose to spend money we could easily afford to pay back on a higher level of safety.

... or is it really just this?!

[Mn01r6]

Sam,

I will be a new member on the 14th but just wanted to express my appreciation for you applying some "value engineering" to get a hell of a lot more accomplished for the same cost. I can tell you spent a lot of time and very high-level brainpower applying some common sense to the problems the club is faced with.

[Mn01r6]

to be in line with the NRA guidelines and the state law governing the operation of shooting ranges like ours

Is the range currently in violation of "state law"?!

we may rue the day we didn’t choose to spend money we could easily afford to pay back on a higher level of safety.

... or is it really just this?!

In urban or suburban settings, more people can be affected by an operating shooting range. In these settings, where projectile containment is absolutely necessary, all safeguards necessary must be taken to ensure that all bullets shot on the range stay on the range property. This concept should be also used as the basis for any range that is built, but the number of required safeguards installed will likely be fewer in a more rural setting. Sound containment must also be installed that will make sure the range in compliance with Chapter 87A. These will also vary, based on the level of local population density

[bstrawse]

to be in line with the NRA guidelines and the state law governing the operation of shooting ranges like ours

Is the range currently in violation of "state law"?!

we may rue the day we didn’t choose to spend money we could easily afford to pay back on a higher level of safety.

... or is it really just this?!

The ranges and their operation are currently non-compliant in a number of areas against current standards as referenced in the Minnesota Range Protection Act. Specifics will be covered during the member meeting on April 10th.

[bstrawse]

Sam,

I will be a new member on the 14th but just wanted to express my appreciation for you applying some "value engineering" to get a hell of a lot more accomplished for the same cost. I can tell you spent a lot of time and very high-level brainpower applying some common sense to the problems the club is faced with.

Sam and Al have done a very nice job leading this effort and ensuring that things are being done in a transparent and fully aboveboard way...
B

[Seismic Sam]

Oh, as one particularly memorable example of the stuff that was discovered in the original plan which has enable us to GREATLY compress the cost of the project, the CRC was told that for the baffles on the 100, the cost was $85,000 per row, and the cost of the AR500 steel was $85 per square foot. Seemed expensive, but for steel that would defeat a 50 BMG bullet with no damage to the plate itself (when installed at a 20 degree angle), you'd expect it to cost more than mild steel by a noticeable margin. One of the recommendations of the CRC was to select a Construction Industry Professional who could understand all the details to act on the Club's behalf, and be answerable ONLY to the club, which was a huge change from the muddy situation we had been mired in before then. The OGC Board unanimously selected Petar Poucki, who owns his own construction business (Meritus Construction) that he started himself a long time ago, and is a new OGC member who joined on in early 2012, so Petar has been in the trade a LOOONNNG time.

Shortly after that, Petar starts looking at the costs for the project, and in particular the AR500 steel which is THE key element as far as costs are concerned, and discovers that he's getting back costs from his steel vendors on the order of $20 per square foot or less!! This is earth shaking news, and casts the cost of the project in a whole new light as far as I was concerned. Petar then proceeded to try and get the costs down further, and called up 6 steel companies for prices on the raw 8' x 24' x 3/8" AR500 plates, and let all the companies know they were bidding against each other, and got the price down to $12 a square foot the next day.

At some later point, the CRC discovered that with the original Black-Dew cost estimate of $85 per square foot, an Indemnification had been added by the supplier Megget, who makes shooting range backstops, to provide an insurance policy with the steel to pay for damages from an accident occurring due to any fault in the steel itself to the club. !??! So that $85 per square foot steel cost was actually 1/4 steel price, and a 3/4 up front insurance policy price??? And if you think about this for just a minute, if there were some accident in the future resulting in legal action, OGC would STILL get dragged into court for months or years, and this Indemnification policy would ONLY pay off if there was some defect in the steel itself.

This was another in a long series of OMG moments for the CRC, which was totally indicative of how little the club had known about the reality of the 1st construction agreement, and I'm not sure that even the Board had fully realized the implications of this steel price, much less having gotten an independent price from a steel vendor themselves. Turns out you can surf the web to get AR500 prices just as easily as you can prices on guns and ammo these days, except the steel is in stock, available, and competitive priced.

In conclusion, between my remorseless reworking the original design for weeks on end until it finally rolled over and cried "Uncle", and having Petar find out the REAL price of AR500 steel by squeezing 6 companies at once to get the lowest price, the cost assumptions have literally gone through the floor, which is the fundamental reason that while the current plan has the same magnitude price tag as the original plan, the club is getting a WHOLE lot more upgraded safety value per dollar. So that's the hat that the current rabbit came out of, and which you will be voting on to purchase or not purchase said rabbit.

[OldmanFCSA]

Has anyone tested the path of a 800 grain projectile at 2700 fps after it hits a AR500 steel plate at a 20 degree angle?

Damm expensive rabbit, but far cheaper than any lawsuit from a projectile leaving the range with a 5 mile max travel.

Good work Sam and Brian !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Seismic Sam]

Has anyone tested the path of a 800 grain projectile at 2700 fps after it hits a AR500 steel plate at a 20 degree angle?

Damm expensive rabbit, but far cheaper than any lawsuit from a projectile leaving the range with a 5 mile max travel.

Good work Sam and Brian !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The answer is YES. And the AR500 comes with the manufacturer's documents of authenticity, and seeing as this is the real deal as far as bulletproof steel is concerned, the Government tracks this stuff and makes sure it's going to places like OGC rather than some body shop trying to armor plate a truck to try for an an Oklahoma City attack. Not a huge deal for OGC as the final delivery point, and it's not like having to get a Class III license, but if you tried to buy that steel yourself you would draw a lot of attention VERY fast...

[bstrawse]

Has anyone tested the path of a 800 grain projectile at 2700 fps after it hits a AR500 steel plate at a 20 degree angle?

Damm expensive rabbit, but far cheaper than any lawsuit from a projectile leaving the range with a 5 mile max travel.

Good work Sam and Brian !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The credit belongs to Sam - he and Al have done the heavy lifting on this (Along with Petar) - I've only provided advice and insight on the NRA Range Standards as a NRA Chief Range Safety Officer...

b

[froggpond1]

Hello I would like to introduce myself to all of you. My name Petar Poucki ( Pouch-key) or you can say Smith I don’t sweat the small stuff.
http://www.linkedin.com/in/petarpoucki/
http://www.meritus.me
http://www.meritus.me/category/testimonials/
My Company is Meritus Construction. I live in Woodbury MN
Here is the reader’s digest version of the past few months. (pardon the length)
I am member of Oakdale Gun Club and the fellow who stood up in the November 2012 member meeting and challenged Stan and the Board on whether this construction project should go forward or be suspended, or otherwise reviewed for it’s merit or lack of. As some of you may know many people in the room agreed with my line of questioning, and a motion was made to suspend the project. Objections were made about stop costs which turned out to be without substance. Since that time I have been battling the 2012 board in trying to obtain pertinent information about the project and was stonewalled until earlier this year. About the Time the new board members arrived.
Important to note is the recommendation of the CRC to appoint a Construction Industry Professional as Owners Rep or Club Liaison for construction. The matter was presented at a board meeting and the board unanimously voted Petar (me ) in as that person.
I immediately went to work on obtaining current pricing, and ferreting out details. Details which were not developed on the old plans. Budgets were coming in much lower than the previously stated amounts for each range. In part due to a reduced scope of work and to how the products were being purchased. Competitive antagonism was used to drive prices down. In unison I Arranged for OGC to hire the Architect and Engineer directly, obviously with board approval and facilitated 2 site visits with the Architect and engineer, which had previously never seen the site. I instructed the new team to make changes to the plans to accurately reflect site conditions, and changes per the CRC committee recommendations, some Range Best Practices rules and further to retest all contemplated geometry and recommendations to ensure their accuracy. 2 heads are better than 1

Upon reduction of the scope of work on each range, we were able to reduce the costs. Today we have a project which prices up at less than ½ of the original budget. Given a large part of that difference is in scope reduction. The balance of savings comes from detailing, purchasing, and instruction. Notably the contribution of the CRC led by Al Lierness and namely Sam Netherly made this current plan possible.

At this time we are scheduled to meet April 10th at the Oak Marsh Golf Club. This meeting is critical for a large member turn out and participation. We have a Conditional Use Permit and a CUP Amendment which is tied to the original plans submitted. We can use this submission for the permit re-application for a same or smaller project but we cannot add anything to it. So the smaller more manageable project fits. This CUP amendment expires May 1st 2013, after which time we would need to reapply against a whole new line up of Lake Elmo Board members and in the shadow of a failed start, we are cutting this down to the wire and time to act is now!
The questions for this meeting will come down to reviewing the whole project, and voting on the parts we start on. That is all that has to be decided right now. I do not see a cheaper alternative that meets all of the same criteria and safety elements this design defeats, and this design is also expandable. We have a large facility, solutions are large. Future range work can be reviewed in the future and I will make sure these meetings are published and time given for alternative ideas. Our club has been on notice of defects for over 12 months and has done nothing to defeat those shortcomings.

Please keep in mind I have only been on the job here since the end of Feb 27th
Things accomplished.
• Contract reviewed, presented, cancelled.
• Architect and engineer hired.
• Architectural visit to site for as built measurements, grade to be shot once snow is gone.
• CRC committee findings input to architect.
• Drawings amended and scope or work reduced.
• Short Range, 100yard Range, 50 yard Range, 200yard range, Comp range repriced- real subcontractor pricing.
• Steel sourced and price reduced by 65%
• Revised plans presented to the city, received approval upon submittal of special inspections report.
• Soil engineer proposal for special inspections initiated.
• Artful renderings created.
• Qualifying bidders in process.
• More to come!
I promise any future posts will be shorter!

[bstrawse]

Welcome Petar
B

[Snowgun]

With all this cost savings and brainpower can we dig some pistol bays?