Joan Blackwood
Owner and licensed electrical contractor
Joan served in the U.S. Army before she became an electrician and started the company. She signs every bid and attends the pre-bid walk herself.
About
A small firm that does the paperwork as carefully as the wiring
Blackwood Electrical is a Newark contractor with eighteen people, started by an Army veteran who spent her first years in the trade as a journeyman on public jobs. She saw how many bids stalled on missing documents, and built the company so the documents are ready first.
We are a small-business and veteran-owned firm, and the sheet says which certificates we hold and who issued them. We work for general contractors, school districts, municipalities and developers across northern New Jersey.
Who is on your job
The people who sign, price and build
Eighteen people in all. These five are who a general contractor or an agency deals with.
Rita Vega
Project manager
Runs submittals, schedules and closeout paperwork on public jobs. Speaks English and Spanish.
Amaka Opara
Estimator
Takes off the plans, prices alternates and unit prices, and writes the bid with its exclusions.
Wilson Straker
Field superintendent
Leads the crews on site and keeps the daily log and the three-week look-ahead.
Sal Iannone
Safety and compliance manager
Writes each site's safety plan, runs the toolbox talks and keeps certified payroll and insurance records in order.
How we work
Three habits on every job
A named superintendent
One person on site who knows the drawings and answers the general contractor's questions.
A look-ahead every week
Three weeks of work in writing, so the other trades can plan around ours.
Closeout as we go
As-builts and test records are kept up as the work is done, not rebuilt at the end.