OAC | Who We Are

A look at OAC over the years:

1980s

The 1980s brought a massive decline in the nuclear industry, which resulted in a similar reduction in OAC workload. OAC struggled and made difficult decisions to lay off over two thirds of its staff, eventually leading to the closures of the Anchorage, Portland, and Richland offices. OAC regrouped, developed new clients, and evolved its services to meet a changing economy. Value analysis quickly became one of OAC's market niches and led to strong revenue production through much of the 1980s. In 1982, Randy Hart, AIA, joined the firm and secured a large architecture and engineering contract with Grant County PUD. In 1985, Randy Hart became a principal of OAC. As a result of the Grant County PUD project, Larry Cross, AIA, was hired and three years later, also became a principal of OAC.

By the late 1980s, OAC's architecture and engineering work was focused primarily in retail, commercial office, and industrial design. Value analysis, cost estimating, and scheduling were going strong, due in large part to repeat work with multiple branches of the DoD, the FHWA, and Washington state school districts. In 1989, a tragic but important event marked the birth of a new business line at OAC - a restaurant in Wenatchee, WA, burnt down, an unfortunate result of a "Molotov cocktail." OAC was hired to investigate and repair the building. This project was the "seed" from which OAC's property casualty, construction defect, and building envelope services evolved.

Services provided: Architecture; Mechanical, Electrical, Civil, and Structural Engineering; Value Analysis; CPM Scheduling; Project Management; Property Casualty Consulting

Approximate staff: 20-45

Clients included: DoD; Washington School Districts; Grant County PUD; Metro; Muckleshoot Indian Tribe; U.S. Postal Service; U.S. Coast Guard; U.S. Forest Service; GSA; University of California, Berkeley; Alaska Copper Works; HNTB; Betts, Patterson & Mines; Allstate Insurance; Magnolia Hi-Fi

Interesting note: OAC purchased its first computers in the early 1980s. These computers included the Apple IIe for cost estimating and a Lanier for word processing (Microsoft was as yet unknown). OAC's first Microsoft program was DOS-based Excel, purchased in the late 1980s and used for cost estimating.