Angelo Tasca — Stories from a Practical Joker & Construction Cost Estimator

By: Darra Kubera, Director of Communications

November 1, 2022

Angelo Tasca is a talker. He nonchalantly says, “what you see is what you get,” but after spending time with him there’s no denying his large personality and genuine sense of optimism. He’s the type of person who will play a practical joke that lasts a year while simultaneously working to develop budgets and technology to help our firm and industry grow.

Driven by his family, Angelo has been immersed in the construction industry for practically his entire life. “I’m the youngest of four; my oldest sister’s husband had a construction-based company and I spent a lot of time there when I was younger. When I was about 12, they hired me to pass out fliers for five bucks an hour until I graduated up to ground crew. Eventually, I went to architecture school mostly because I wanted to build my own house.”

“Architecture school was fun and I learned a lot, but it wasn’t for me,” — having a construction background made it hard for Angelo to mentally separate what happens in the field with his technical knowledge. “I quickly realized that was not what I wanted to do. I even had a professor throw me under the bus! She told me to throw away all my technical knowledge and be creative, so I did, and then she called me out during my final crit when I had a roof design that wasn’t structurally going to work. I KNEW it wasn’t going to work!”

I gently chuckle as Angelo is clearly still bothered by what happened in the classroom that day, asking if that’s when he decided to become an estimator. He says, “I still wanted to be in the realm of architecture. I loved it, but I wanted to mesh that with construction, so I ended up becoming an estimator since working and bidding on jobs seemed like a natural starting fit. Originally, I thought I would become an architect or a technology high school teacher. I eliminated being a teacher because I didn’t want to deal with students. Now it’s been over sixteen years as an estimator and I’m so happy I was able to blend everything together.”

Having been with CannonDesign since the start of his career, I was eager to hear Angelo’s opinion on this choice. “I’ve been working with FOS since its inception in 2009, back when it was just a part of an ‘idea challenge.’ That was back when the type of work FOS does was used primarily as a prepositioning tool with school districts since building condition surveys are mandatory for them. After we worked at Yonkers, a major school district, we built the original version of FOScore® as a database to create records for deficiencies. Joe [FOS President] truly found a way to be more efficient as he recognized there was a market for this type of work.”   

Move the years forward, FOS took off and achieved exponential growth eventually becoming their own LLC in 2020. As a part of that growth, especially in the job order contracting market, they needed their own estimating group so in early 2021, the cost estimating group from CannonDesign merged into FOS. “It ended up being a really natural fit for the CD estimators to merge with the FOS group instead of competing with them or trying to find another outside resource.  As an estimating group, we’re really our own niche; you don’t really go to school for it in the traditional sense.”

There are technical details with cost estimating that I won’t pretend to understand. But a part of Angelo’s success comes from his ability to merge that technical knowledge of complicated database systems and takeoff bridging software with his previous field survey experience. “I used to do facility condition assessments too, when it used to be a requirement to have estimators go into the field for government work. Now, it’s nice to know what our assessors are looking for from that aspect. I understand from the literal ground-floor level how to price things back in the office that I know the assessors are going to encounter.”

Angelo & FOS teammates, Community Service Day 2021

My next question throws Angelo off guard momentarily — what’s the best mistake you’ve ever made? “It was kindof a work-related mistake, and I thought I was going to get into serious trouble but thank goodness everyone was a good player.” Consider my interest piqued. “Carolyn from our legal department was a new hire, and her husband mentioned on the radio that she liked mozzarella sticks. So, I took it upon myself to leave her an order of them in her office. After folks found it a little weird, I agreed with them, so I didn’t want to fess up to it. It was YEARS later at a holiday party I confessed and apologized and, in the end, everyone laughed at the joke.” I confess to Angelo I would’ve personally loved this surprise; so Carolyn, if you’re reading this, I’d be happy to share mozz stix with you anytime!

Sincerely tickled with Angelo’s stories, I ask what drives him. “I’m a family guy. I’ve been with my high school sweetheart for over 23 years now, married for 14, and have three girls. They’re a lot of fun, each with their own personalities, that’s why I live in the basement. But really, I try to tell my daughters to be true to their word, to live by that. What you say and what you do carry a lot of weight, so be a person of your word and speak the truth. Even when you screw up, take ownership and it’ll be easier to get through.”

Do your daughters listen to that sage advice? “I tell myself all the time to listen. I like to talk a lot.” I hadn’t noticed I say with a grin. “So I had to teach myself to listen. I tell my girls we have two ears one mouth, try to listen.”

Between teaching his daughters these important life lessons, crushing it at work, loud traditional Italian-family Sunday dinners, and a hobby of BBQ smoking (complete with branded swag), it amazes me to hear Angelo also had the most impressive Halloween costume prepared for this year. His entire family was in on it— gearing up to go dressed as the three Sanderson Sisters, Billy the zombie, and Binx the cat from the cult classic Hocus Pocus. As our discussion comes to a close, my face hurts from smiling so much. I hope everyone is lucky enough to have a colleague like Angelo.