JULY 2022
The Dedication of the Joseph T. Walsh Leadership & Training Center That J. Fletcher Creamer & Son dedicated its training facility in Wall Township to Joseph T. Walsh proved a fitting tribute to the man who was the driving force in making the center a reality. The facility, which opened in October 2017, was officially christened as The Joseph T. Walsh Leadership and Training Center in April in memory of the late J. Fletcher Creamer & Son CEO.
“
Joe was really the brains and inspiration behind this training center. Without his foresight, I don’t think we would have ever gotten there.
Creamer CFO Andrew Wood worked closely with Walsh and was privy to the entire thought process behind the center’s creation. He said that without Walsh (who passed away last August), there likely would not even be a training center. “Joe was really the brains and inspiration behind this training center,” Wood said. “Without his foresight, I don’t think
we would have ever gotten there. It was his vision all along, but it was a stepby-step process. But you couldn’t do it all at once. Initially we started as safety training and then we expanded it under Joe’s leadership.” Roughly 4,500 employees have trained at the facility at various times, with groups of five to eight people there on any given day. New employees are required to spend two days of onboarding/orientation before they can go out and work in the field. While the cost of such a venture would have deterred some, Walsh weighed the benefit versus the cost and decided that spending a little money now will save a great deal of money later in addition to preventing potential injuries. Wood said that he pushed back some early in the process, citing the cost as a factor that needed to strongly be considered. Walsh, however, remained steadfast. “Others and I would challenge him on the cost of doing this and the ability to do it to the extent he wanted to do it with the training,” Wood said. “In our union contracting world, journeymen and tradesmen are supposedly coming to us already fully trained and ready to work. But we were finding that in the real world that is only partially true.” “Companies need to invest in people to provide more training than traditional
union training programs, especially when it comes to leadership and safety, not so much with skills. Mostly they come here skilled and we’re just transforming them from construction workers to construction leaders and Joe really saw that as the purpose (for the facility) That’s why we changed it from training and safety to leadership and development. It’s a much broader approach than just safety and training.” Creamer Director of Risk Management John Papandrea and Technical Training Specialist Mike Liguori also played a role in expanding the facility, working closely with Walsh. Wood said that Walsh kept pushing the project, which included adding onboarding, to the next level. “His point was to look at what it is saving us,” Wood said. “Yes, it costs this much to send someone through onboarding. Most companies have people come from the union hall, they show up at the job site and watch a 10-minute safety video. It was clear that that wasn’t enough. Joe said that wasn’t the right kind of onboarding and that you don’t get the (sense of) the right culture or what we expect of you as a
company. They weren’t getting the training and we weren’t getting the return on our investment.” “Now, all new employees go through the two-day, onboarding process. There is not really anyone else that is doing that in our industry. That came from Joe. He didn’t think of it as an expense but as an investment and that there would be a return on that investment, which I think has been proven true.” J. Fletcher Creamer, Jr. is Creamer’s former CEO and though he is retired, he saw and still sees the benefit of the facility and knows what it has meant to the company in terms of solidifying Creamer’s place as one of the gold standards in the industry. He applauded Walsh’s vision and said the tribute was most deserving. “He said the clients will love it, the insurance company will love it, and the guys will love it,” Creamer said. “We will be a leader. Beforehand, it was just a facility. We didn’t purchase the facility for that, we
Monmouth Bridge Navesink River Road Bridge, Middletown, New Jersey The rebuilding of the Navesink River Road (Monmouth County Route 12A) Bridge seemed to be a straightforward job on the surface. When J. Fletcher Creamer and Son began working on the structure in the spring of 2021, though, it became apparent that what initially seemed uncomplicated was actually a bit more complex. Creamer, in conjunction with Monmouth County and Collier Engineering, worked to resolve the foundational issues that forced construction of the new bridge to be paused last summer. Work resumed
2
just had a facility for our needs. The rest, though, is history.” “I don’t think anyone has copied us, either. I was wondering how our guys would take to it at first. But I had an older foreman who had been with us for years say to me ‘Boss, this is one of the best things you have done’. The guy had been with us and said he thought he knew everything but said that was not the case.” Dale Creamer, J. Fletcher Creamer & Son’s executive vice president, also expressed surprise about other companies not following Creamer’s lead, especially since the program has grown so much and become so successful. “Other companies might have done something similar but not to this magnitude,” Dale Creamer said. “We have created a culture here and we take safety very seriously, so this just becomes another tool in our toolbox and makes us stand out as one of the top contractors in the state.” “It made sense to do it, we got behind
it and away we went. It was Joe’s brainchild. He brought it to my brothers and me and it was very well received. It was something that Joe did that set us apart from the competition.” Creamer president Marty Downs spoke at the facility’s dedication ceremony and was effusive in his praise for Walsh and his ability to lead. That the facility is there and in operation is more than enough of proof of what Walsh brought to the company. “It’s a center that is dear to our hearts and one that we are extremely proud of,” Downs said. “I was fortunate enough to work underneath the leadership and guidance of Joe Walsh and I can attest to Joe’s innate ability to lead along with a relentless work ethic and absolute passion for the leadership and development of our field leaders.”
PROJECT TEAM
> Project Manager – Andrew Puk > Project Engineer – Colin Cavanaugh & Jason Grasso > Superintendent – Sean Desmet > Safety Superintendents – Thomas Falletta, Michael Fice & Perry Kasturas > General Superintendent – Michael Pivirotto > Foremen - Renato Meira (LF), Josh VanAuken(DBGF), Jason Miller(DBF), Jason Hill(DBF), Jason Mulch(CF), Acacio Fonseca(LF), Dan Matos(LF), Brian Weiss(CF), Matt Blaine(CF), Phil Zehrer(IWF), Marcos Guzman (IWF) > Estimator – Bob Scheetz on the project shortly after Labor Day 2021 and by Memorial Day of this year, the new span was reopened for traffic on what is a main thoroughfare for those headed to the area’s beaches and marinas. While traffic was able to resume crossing the bridge, which sits on the north shore of the Navesink River and spans McClees Creek in Middletown, N.J., the project won’t be completely finished until sometime this summer. The bridge, which is a two-lane span with a sidewalk that replaced an aging and crumbling bridge,
is 100-feet in length and is about 10-feet above McClees Creek. It was the swampy ground on the creek’s shorelines that created much of the issues and delays. The original design and testing of the soil showed that the ground was stable but when work initially started it became apparent that the outer edges of the sheeting that holds back the shoreline would not remain stable. “We were having issues with the sheeting that holds up the fill for the abutments etc.,” said Andrew Puk, a Senior Project
Manager for Creamer. “Based on the [original] soil borings, the sheeting should have been sufficient. But it turned out that the soil conditions were so bad. When we put the sheets in, it was almost like putting it in a swamp, they would fall out away from the road. We were trying to widen the road and the soil conditions on the edge were much different than the middle. “When we started, we thought we would only be there a short period of time while we did one half of the road. But the other half was in such bad shape that it started to fall apart as we were working on the first half. We shut it [the road] down the week after Labor Day (2021) and it was only supposed to be shut down for a month but we just ended up keeping it shut down. That determination was made by the County. We had to have the road
shut down permanently until the bridge was back up.” The Creamer crew, with the cooperation of Monmouth County, put in extensive hours in order to have the roadway open by Memorial Day in time for holiday/ summer traffic. The roadway is heavily tra-
Canoe Brook Storage Facility Short Hills, New Jersey
Oh, the things you’ll find when you begin digging. The J. Fletcher Creamer & Son team that has been working on the Canoe Brook Storage Facility in Short Hills, N.J. learned what can lurk underneath the surface when they broke ground on the project last November. The Creamer crew was tasked with building the storage facility at New Jersey American Water’s (NJAW) water treatment plant on the Canoe Brook reservoir. The area is in a floodplain and in the past, when the property flooded whatever was stored on it would either become contaminated or float away. Included in the construction of the storage facility was the installation of a precast water retention system called StormTrap. When excavation began, however, on the 120X100 foot hole, the Creamer crew came across something it hadn’t expected – the remains of an old water treatment plant that had supposedly been demolished in the 1990s. A foundation made of reinforced concrete, piping, large tanks, and other debris had simply been buried rather than removed and that proved to be not only a surprise but a bit of a nuisance.
versed because it leads right into many of Monmouth County’s beaches and marinas. Monmouth County was also instrumental in keeping traffic flowing while the bridge was out of service. While Creamer set up a detour that added between 10 and 15 minutes to any trip that would have normally gone over the bridge there was also a nearby dirt road that many residents and marina-bound travelers were using to cut time off the detour. Monmouth County was proactive throughout the whole process by redressing the dirt road while keeping it safe and passable for those travelers who had discovered a way to cut time off their respective trips. “Working with Monmouth County was a pleasure,” Puk said. “Its cooperation and input proved essential to getting this project completed as quickly as possible.”
PROJECT TEAM
> Project Manager – John Dugan > Project Engineer – Henri DeFrance > Superintendent – Jose Raposo > Safety Superintendent – Thomas Falletta > General Superintendent – Al Oliveira > Foreman – Jose (Carlos) Gouveia > Estimator – Dominick Genario
“Everything from this old treatment plant was just left beneath the ground unbeknownst to them (NJAW) and us,” project manager John Dugan said. “That made it more difficult. We needed more manpower, and it was more time consuming. We brought it (the information) to the water company immediately so they could tell us what to do. We planned to move forward by removing all the piping and the concrete even though they were reinforced foundations.” “Because the area we excavated was used as a landfill with everything that was buried there, we had to stabilize the subsurface with stone in order to allow it to handle the load of the StormTrap system. That was all additional work.” It took nearly four months of digging five days a week for all of the concrete and debris to be removed. The crew had to break up four concrete foundations that were 80-feet in diameter and 10-to-12 inches thick. The circles were thicker in the middle and were reinforced with rebar. The excavation was between eight and nine feet deep in some spots and those holes had to be backfilled in order to create a workable and safe area for the trap to be installed.
3
company. They weren’t getting the training and we weren’t getting the return on our investment.” “Now, all new employees go through the two-day, onboarding process. There is not really anyone else that is doing that in our industry. That came from Joe. He didn’t think of it as an expense but as an investment and that there would be a return on that investment, which I think has been proven true.” J. Fletcher Creamer, Jr. is Creamer’s former CEO and though he is retired, he saw and still sees the benefit of the facility and knows what it has meant to the company in terms of solidifying Creamer’s place as one of the gold standards in the industry. He applauded Walsh’s vision and said the tribute was most deserving. “He said the clients will love it, the insurance company will love it, and the guys will love it,” Creamer said. “We will be a leader. Beforehand, it was just a facility. We didn’t purchase the facility for that, we
Monmouth Bridge Navesink River Road Bridge, Middletown, New Jersey The rebuilding of the Navesink River Road (Monmouth County Route 12A) Bridge seemed to be a straightforward job on the surface. When J. Fletcher Creamer and Son began working on the structure in the spring of 2021, though, it became apparent that what initially seemed uncomplicated was actually a bit more complex. Creamer, in conjunction with Monmouth County and Collier Engineering, worked to resolve the foundational issues that forced construction of the new bridge to be paused last summer. Work resumed
2
just had a facility for our needs. The rest, though, is history.” “I don’t think anyone has copied us, either. I was wondering how our guys would take to it at first. But I had an older foreman who had been with us for years say to me ‘Boss, this is one of the best things you have done’. The guy had been with us and said he thought he knew everything but said that was not the case.” Dale Creamer, J. Fletcher Creamer & Son’s executive vice president, also expressed surprise about other companies not following Creamer’s lead, especially since the program has grown so much and become so successful. “Other companies might have done something similar but not to this magnitude,” Dale Creamer said. “We have created a culture here and we take safety very seriously, so this just becomes another tool in our toolbox and makes us stand out as one of the top contractors in the state.” “It made sense to do it, we got behind
it and away we went. It was Joe’s brainchild. He brought it to my brothers and me and it was very well received. It was something that Joe did that set us apart from the competition.” Creamer president Marty Downs spoke at the facility’s dedication ceremony and was effusive in his praise for Walsh and his ability to lead. That the facility is there and in operation is more than enough of proof of what Walsh brought to the company. “It’s a center that is dear to our hearts and one that we are extremely proud of,” Downs said. “I was fortunate enough to work underneath the leadership and guidance of Joe Walsh and I can attest to Joe’s innate ability to lead along with a relentless work ethic and absolute passion for the leadership and development of our field leaders.”
PROJECT TEAM
> Project Manager – Andrew Puk > Project Engineer – Colin Cavanaugh & Jason Grasso > Superintendent – Sean Desmet > Safety Superintendents – Thomas Falletta, Michael Fice & Perry Kasturas > General Superintendent – Michael Pivirotto > Foremen - Renato Meira (LF), Josh VanAuken(DBGF), Jason Miller(DBF), Jason Hill(DBF), Jason Mulch(CF), Acacio Fonseca(LF), Dan Matos(LF), Brian Weiss(CF), Matt Blaine(CF), Phil Zehrer(IWF), Marcos Guzman (IWF) > Estimator – Bob Scheetz on the project shortly after Labor Day 2021 and by Memorial Day of this year, the new span was reopened for traffic on what is a main thoroughfare for those headed to the area’s beaches and marinas. While traffic was able to resume crossing the bridge, which sits on the north shore of the Navesink River and spans McClees Creek in Middletown, N.J., the project won’t be completely finished until sometime this summer. The bridge, which is a two-lane span with a sidewalk that replaced an aging and crumbling bridge,
is 100-feet in length and is about 10-feet above McClees Creek. It was the swampy ground on the creek’s shorelines that created much of the issues and delays. The original design and testing of the soil showed that the ground was stable but when work initially started it became apparent that the outer edges of the sheeting that holds back the shoreline would not remain stable. “We were having issues with the sheeting that holds up the fill for the abutments etc.,” said Andrew Puk, a Senior Project
Manager for Creamer. “Based on the [original] soil borings, the sheeting should have been sufficient. But it turned out that the soil conditions were so bad. When we put the sheets in, it was almost like putting it in a swamp, they would fall out away from the road. We were trying to widen the road and the soil conditions on the edge were much different than the middle. “When we started, we thought we would only be there a short period of time while we did one half of the road. But the other half was in such bad shape that it started to fall apart as we were working on the first half. We shut it [the road] down the week after Labor Day (2021) and it was only supposed to be shut down for a month but we just ended up keeping it shut down. That determination was made by the County. We had to have the road
shut down permanently until the bridge was back up.” The Creamer crew, with the cooperation of Monmouth County, put in extensive hours in order to have the roadway open by Memorial Day in time for holiday/ summer traffic. The roadway is heavily tra-
Canoe Brook Storage Facility Short Hills, New Jersey
Oh, the things you’ll find when you begin digging. The J. Fletcher Creamer & Son team that has been working on the Canoe Brook Storage Facility in Short Hills, N.J. learned what can lurk underneath the surface when they broke ground on the project last November. The Creamer crew was tasked with building the storage facility at New Jersey American Water’s (NJAW) water treatment plant on the Canoe Brook reservoir. The area is in a floodplain and in the past, when the property flooded whatever was stored on it would either become contaminated or float away. Included in the construction of the storage facility was the installation of a precast water retention system called StormTrap. When excavation began, however, on the 120X100 foot hole, the Creamer crew came across something it hadn’t expected – the remains of an old water treatment plant that had supposedly been demolished in the 1990s. A foundation made of reinforced concrete, piping, large tanks, and other debris had simply been buried rather than removed and that proved to be not only a surprise but a bit of a nuisance.
versed because it leads right into many of Monmouth County’s beaches and marinas. Monmouth County was also instrumental in keeping traffic flowing while the bridge was out of service. While Creamer set up a detour that added between 10 and 15 minutes to any trip that would have normally gone over the bridge there was also a nearby dirt road that many residents and marina-bound travelers were using to cut time off the detour. Monmouth County was proactive throughout the whole process by redressing the dirt road while keeping it safe and passable for those travelers who had discovered a way to cut time off their respective trips. “Working with Monmouth County was a pleasure,” Puk said. “Its cooperation and input proved essential to getting this project completed as quickly as possible.”
PROJECT TEAM
> Project Manager – John Dugan > Project Engineer – Henri DeFrance > Superintendent – Jose Raposo > Safety Superintendent – Thomas Falletta > General Superintendent – Al Oliveira > Foreman – Jose (Carlos) Gouveia > Estimator – Dominick Genario
“Everything from this old treatment plant was just left beneath the ground unbeknownst to them (NJAW) and us,” project manager John Dugan said. “That made it more difficult. We needed more manpower, and it was more time consuming. We brought it (the information) to the water company immediately so they could tell us what to do. We planned to move forward by removing all the piping and the concrete even though they were reinforced foundations.” “Because the area we excavated was used as a landfill with everything that was buried there, we had to stabilize the subsurface with stone in order to allow it to handle the load of the StormTrap system. That was all additional work.” It took nearly four months of digging five days a week for all of the concrete and debris to be removed. The crew had to break up four concrete foundations that were 80-feet in diameter and 10-to-12 inches thick. The circles were thicker in the middle and were reinforced with rebar. The excavation was between eight and nine feet deep in some spots and those holes had to be backfilled in order to create a workable and safe area for the trap to be installed.
3
“We encounter obstacles on almost every [excavation] job but not to this magnitude,” Dugan said. “Once NJAW was made aware of the sub-surface conditions, they found some old records of the foundation and the piping being there. We found piping and water mains that people didn’t know existed. We found old electrical. They just buried everything in there.” Once the excavation and backfilling were completed, Creamer was able to set
about installing the StormTrap, which is a series of channels made out of precast concrete, on top of a poured slab of concrete. The system, which is wrapped in a liner, provides storage for the groundwater and surface water until it exits through the storm drains into the nearby stream.” The storage facility sits atop the drainage system. “This piece of ground was pretty much unusable until New Jersey American Water
Haworth Chemical Storage Building Haworth, New Jersey When J. Fletcher Creamer and Son completed construction of a chemical storage building in May at Suez Water’s water treatment plant in Haworth, N.J., it marked the end of what proved to be a unique project. The building’s construction marked the first time that Creamer had completed such a project on a completely in-house basis, according to project manager Velid Suljic. “This was all kinds of tough,” Suljic said. “Erecting the building was the most challenging part I would say. It was the first time we had done something like that in-house where we self-performed all the work. This was just another avenue for us to explore to help further diversify our business. But we felt we could tackle the challenge of building the building rather than sub it out.” “I definitely enjoyed this, coordinating all the work ourselves. It was easier than relying on someone else. We were definitely trying to do something new and widen our horizons.”
4
came up with this solution,” Dugan said. “The ground is now stabilized, and the water is under control. At the start of the project, we moved containers from one side of the property to the other and the third day after we moved them it rained, and they all floated away. Now, the area in which we did our work is completely dry.”
PROJECT TEAM
> Project Manager – Velid Suljic > Project Engineer – Patrick Ferrera & Chris Werrell > Superintendents – Sean Desmet & Dan Mattos > Safety Superintendent – Perry Kasturas > General Superintendent – Michael Pivirotto > Foreman – Altin Meka, Qamil Meka, Stephen Underwood & Phil Zehrer > Estimator – Mike Rose
The building itself features a containment system that sits four feet below the ground. Suljic likened it to a basement and said that it had to be built that way so that the entire structure would meet the Town of Haworth’s height requirement code. General superintendent Michael Pivirotto and his crew did a “great job”, according to Suljic, to get the building erected. “The containment system is there should there be a (chemical) spill,” said Suljic, who added that the containment system was designed to have a 100-year lifespan. “We built the foundation for the six tanks that were placed inside the building then erected a pre-engineered metal building. The containment system is a regular concrete slab but it needed to be done in one continuous shot to prevent joints in the concrete, so it was a bit of an effort.” “Think about any house that has a basement. This is somewhat below ground. Because the tanks are 16-feet tall we had to lower the floor. We poured the slab for the floor and then have concrete walls that proj-
ect out of the ground that should be able to hold all the volume should all the tanks fail at once. Essentially, we built a bath tub out of concrete.” Constructing the building itself was only part of the challenge, though. Creamer also installed all the chemical process piping. “The building was one thing, but we also had the chemical process piping that carried the chemicals from the storage tanks to an existing building where they have other chemical storage equipment,” Suljic said. “We did the connection into the existing system as well. It is a dual containment system pipe and we had to be trained by the manufacturer on how to install it. It was a one-day training procedure. We were left to our own devices, but we did have an on-site inspector overseeing it (the pipe installation).”
Meet Our 2022 Summer Interns The J. Fletcher Creamer and Son. internship program is certainly what it says it is – a program in which college students from up and down the East Coast work to gain valuable experience in what may turn out to be their desired career field. Chris Schubert, Creamer’s Manager of Talent and Retention, is in his ninth year of running the program and is firm in his belief that the term intern, however, is more than just a moniker for the two dozen or so students that have been selected to participate in the program each year.
“About 20 percent of our internships have led to full-time job opportunities so not only is that a good return on our investment but also the student’s. We’re not looking for quantity, though, we are looking for quality. With the wide variety of schools, we are looking to build a diverse network as well by increasing the diversification of races and genders between the interns and co-ops.” “Summer 2022 is our largest group to date, but I don’t want to say keep growing it and have 26 or 27 or more interns in the years to come to simply say look at us. Then it (the program) becomes unmanageable and doesn’t become a productive learning experience. We have 20 working in construction management, with the balance supporting estimating, information technology and our field technology departments. In recent summers, we also had interns in our talent/retention and marketing areas. We will continue to evaluate the needs of our back offices and other areas of the business.” Schubert said that his department is annually part of as many as two dozen career fairs, either in person or virtually, and those take place throughout the course of the entire calendar year. Additionally, other interns are recruited through jobs sites such as LinkedIn, Handshake, Indeed or by word-of-mouth referrals from past interns. “Having a past intern refer a friend or classmate to the program speaks volumes to their experience at Creamer,” Schubert said. Regardless of how the interns arrive at Creamer, one thing is certain – many of them stay after their internship is completed to
“They are an intern or co-op by title, but they are truly an integral part of a project team in the day-to-day operations,” Schubert said. “I am very proud of this program, but we can’t do it without the support of all the executives and project or department managers who are involved. Additionally, all the various other people and departments that involved in this program also deserve a big shout out.” This year’s intern class features 25 students from 16 different schools. Most students come from various New Jersey-based schools, though Ohio, the Carolinas and schools throughout New England are also well represented. While most of the interns began their Creamer journey in May and June, in a true summer internship capacity, others have been working since January in a Co-Op placement. “We have cast a wider net to get a quite diverse talent pool from different schools, thoughts and backgrounds,” said Schubert. work part-time during the semester, all while being evaluated for full-time placements once they have graduated. One other aspect of the program that may set Creamer apart from many other companies is how the interns close out the program. They are required to make a roughly 15-minute presentation in front of the other interns, project managers and company executives to discuss their engagement with the company and what they have learned during their time with Creamer. Additionally, the interns will also field questions during the presentation process. “It [the presentation] is not a graded process but it is a good, fun experience,” Schubert said. “It’s a good business life skill to learn about public speaking, but also a great way for us to collect feedback on how we can make the experience even better for future interns.”
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“We encounter obstacles on almost every [excavation] job but not to this magnitude,” Dugan said. “Once NJAW was made aware of the sub-surface conditions, they found some old records of the foundation and the piping being there. We found piping and water mains that people didn’t know existed. We found old electrical. They just buried everything in there.” Once the excavation and backfilling were completed, Creamer was able to set
about installing the StormTrap, which is a series of channels made out of precast concrete, on top of a poured slab of concrete. The system, which is wrapped in a liner, provides storage for the groundwater and surface water until it exits through the storm drains into the nearby stream.” The storage facility sits atop the drainage system. “This piece of ground was pretty much unusable until New Jersey American Water
Haworth Chemical Storage Building Haworth, New Jersey When J. Fletcher Creamer and Son completed construction of a chemical storage building in May at Suez Water’s water treatment plant in Haworth, N.J., it marked the end of what proved to be a unique project. The building’s construction marked the first time that Creamer had completed such a project on a completely in-house basis, according to project manager Velid Suljic. “This was all kinds of tough,” Suljic said. “Erecting the building was the most challenging part I would say. It was the first time we had done something like that in-house where we self-performed all the work. This was just another avenue for us to explore to help further diversify our business. But we felt we could tackle the challenge of building the building rather than sub it out.” “I definitely enjoyed this, coordinating all the work ourselves. It was easier than relying on someone else. We were definitely trying to do something new and widen our horizons.”
4
came up with this solution,” Dugan said. “The ground is now stabilized, and the water is under control. At the start of the project, we moved containers from one side of the property to the other and the third day after we moved them it rained, and they all floated away. Now, the area in which we did our work is completely dry.”
PROJECT TEAM
> Project Manager – Velid Suljic > Project Engineer – Patrick Ferrera & Chris Werrell > Superintendents – Sean Desmet & Dan Mattos > Safety Superintendent – Perry Kasturas > General Superintendent – Michael Pivirotto > Foreman – Altin Meka, Qamil Meka, Stephen Underwood & Phil Zehrer > Estimator – Mike Rose
The building itself features a containment system that sits four feet below the ground. Suljic likened it to a basement and said that it had to be built that way so that the entire structure would meet the Town of Haworth’s height requirement code. General superintendent Michael Pivirotto and his crew did a “great job”, according to Suljic, to get the building erected. “The containment system is there should there be a (chemical) spill,” said Suljic, who added that the containment system was designed to have a 100-year lifespan. “We built the foundation for the six tanks that were placed inside the building then erected a pre-engineered metal building. The containment system is a regular concrete slab but it needed to be done in one continuous shot to prevent joints in the concrete, so it was a bit of an effort.” “Think about any house that has a basement. This is somewhat below ground. Because the tanks are 16-feet tall we had to lower the floor. We poured the slab for the floor and then have concrete walls that proj-
ect out of the ground that should be able to hold all the volume should all the tanks fail at once. Essentially, we built a bath tub out of concrete.” Constructing the building itself was only part of the challenge, though. Creamer also installed all the chemical process piping. “The building was one thing, but we also had the chemical process piping that carried the chemicals from the storage tanks to an existing building where they have other chemical storage equipment,” Suljic said. “We did the connection into the existing system as well. It is a dual containment system pipe and we had to be trained by the manufacturer on how to install it. It was a one-day training procedure. We were left to our own devices, but we did have an on-site inspector overseeing it (the pipe installation).”
Meet Our 2022 Summer Interns The J. Fletcher Creamer and Son. internship program is certainly what it says it is – a program in which college students from up and down the East Coast work to gain valuable experience in what may turn out to be their desired career field. Chris Schubert, Creamer’s Manager of Talent and Retention, is in his ninth year of running the program and is firm in his belief that the term intern, however, is more than just a moniker for the two dozen or so students that have been selected to participate in the program each year.
“About 20 percent of our internships have led to full-time job opportunities so not only is that a good return on our investment but also the student’s. We’re not looking for quantity, though, we are looking for quality. With the wide variety of schools, we are looking to build a diverse network as well by increasing the diversification of races and genders between the interns and co-ops.” “Summer 2022 is our largest group to date, but I don’t want to say keep growing it and have 26 or 27 or more interns in the years to come to simply say look at us. Then it (the program) becomes unmanageable and doesn’t become a productive learning experience. We have 20 working in construction management, with the balance supporting estimating, information technology and our field technology departments. In recent summers, we also had interns in our talent/retention and marketing areas. We will continue to evaluate the needs of our back offices and other areas of the business.” Schubert said that his department is annually part of as many as two dozen career fairs, either in person or virtually, and those take place throughout the course of the entire calendar year. Additionally, other interns are recruited through jobs sites such as LinkedIn, Handshake, Indeed or by word-of-mouth referrals from past interns. “Having a past intern refer a friend or classmate to the program speaks volumes to their experience at Creamer,” Schubert said. Regardless of how the interns arrive at Creamer, one thing is certain – many of them stay after their internship is completed to
“They are an intern or co-op by title, but they are truly an integral part of a project team in the day-to-day operations,” Schubert said. “I am very proud of this program, but we can’t do it without the support of all the executives and project or department managers who are involved. Additionally, all the various other people and departments that involved in this program also deserve a big shout out.” This year’s intern class features 25 students from 16 different schools. Most students come from various New Jersey-based schools, though Ohio, the Carolinas and schools throughout New England are also well represented. While most of the interns began their Creamer journey in May and June, in a true summer internship capacity, others have been working since January in a Co-Op placement. “We have cast a wider net to get a quite diverse talent pool from different schools, thoughts and backgrounds,” said Schubert. work part-time during the semester, all while being evaluated for full-time placements once they have graduated. One other aspect of the program that may set Creamer apart from many other companies is how the interns close out the program. They are required to make a roughly 15-minute presentation in front of the other interns, project managers and company executives to discuss their engagement with the company and what they have learned during their time with Creamer. Additionally, the interns will also field questions during the presentation process. “It [the presentation] is not a graded process but it is a good, fun experience,” Schubert said. “It’s a good business life skill to learn about public speaking, but also a great way for us to collect feedback on how we can make the experience even better for future interns.”
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Creamer Happenings
Creamer CFO Andrew Wood and Joe Walsh’s son Andrew Wood, accept the 2022 NJ Utilities Association Distinguished Service Award on behalf of the late Joe Walsh.
NEW HIRES
PROMOTIONS
Matthew Almeida Estimating Engineer
Michelle Carusio Project Administrator
Alicia Descaro Installation Coordinator
Andres Frias Project Engineer
Tyler Oliveira Installation Coordinator
Isabella Tarantino Project Engineer
Jeffrey Topps Surveyor
Scott Vande Vrede Kamran Din Project Engineer Project Engineer
Kylie Lawson Paralegal/ Administrative Assistant
Lorenzo Nacci Construction Services Analyst
Giovanni Oliveira Installation Coordinator
Alexander Terenik Project Manager
Anthony Iacovelli Installation Coordinator Supervisor
In May, Creamer’s resident duck nested and incubated her eggs in the Hackensack office atrium for the 12th straight year.
Monthly summer employee lunches began in May.
Jignesh Patel Kevin Pisacane Paul Pullia Robert Gaffney Project Engineer Project Manager Project Engineer Project Engineer
RETIREMENTS
Erin Smith Talent & Retention Associate
Congratulations on your retirement!
The Creamer Engagement Team kicked off a summer of event for the whole family at the Somerset Patriots game in May.
The Creamer team hosted 2 successful job fairs in our Beltsville, Maryland office in May & June.
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Creamer employees and their families took in a NJ Jackals game in June.
Maureen Spina Payroll Associate
Ernie Zappitelli & Rick Guerra Teamsters
Bob Scheetz Chief Estimator
7
Creamer Happenings
Creamer CFO Andrew Wood and Joe Walsh’s son Andrew Wood, accept the 2022 NJ Utilities Association Distinguished Service Award on behalf of the late Joe Walsh.
NEW HIRES
PROMOTIONS
Matthew Almeida Estimating Engineer
Michelle Carusio Project Administrator
Alicia Descaro Installation Coordinator
Andres Frias Project Engineer
Tyler Oliveira Installation Coordinator
Isabella Tarantino Project Engineer
Jeffrey Topps Surveyor
Scott Vande Vrede Kamran Din Project Engineer Project Engineer
Kylie Lawson Paralegal/ Administrative Assistant
Lorenzo Nacci Construction Services Analyst
Giovanni Oliveira Installation Coordinator
Alexander Terenik Project Manager
Anthony Iacovelli Installation Coordinator Supervisor
In May, Creamer’s resident duck nested and incubated her eggs in the Hackensack office atrium for the 12th straight year.
Monthly summer employee lunches began in May.
Jignesh Patel Kevin Pisacane Paul Pullia Robert Gaffney Project Engineer Project Manager Project Engineer Project Engineer
RETIREMENTS
Erin Smith Talent & Retention Associate
Congratulations on your retirement!
The Creamer Engagement Team kicked off a summer of event for the whole family at the Somerset Patriots game in May.
The Creamer team hosted 2 successful job fairs in our Beltsville, Maryland office in May & June.
6
Creamer employees and their families took in a NJ Jackals game in June.
Maureen Spina Payroll Associate
Ernie Zappitelli & Rick Guerra Teamsters
Bob Scheetz Chief Estimator
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101 East Broadway Hackensack, NJ 07601
APi Logo Change APi Group, J. Fletcher Creamer & Son’s parent company, is undergoing a rebrand and as part of that process updated its logo. The new logo was unveiled in April. “Our [APi Group’s] CEO Russ Becker took an opportunity to refresh our logo while in the middle of a larger rebranding project,” APi’s Director of Marketing and Creative Services Caralie Roisum said. “He was inspired by one of our other companies’ rebrand. We have gone through a lot of changes in the last couple of years, a major one being publicly traded on the NYSE (APG). It was the right time, with the right partner to rejuvenate our logo and marketing materials.” Roisum added that the process of developing and finalizing the new logo took several months. The overall rebranding project, which included refreshing marketing materials and APi’s website, began early in 2021. “Many people worked together to ensure that the logo symbolizes our contemporary nature while honoring our history and all that we’ve built together as a company,” Roisum concluded.