Opponents of project labor agreements are no doubt cheering two recent developments concerning wasteful PLA’s. In New York, a state court has ordered the NYDOT to cancel an interchange project because NYDOT violated New York competitive bidding laws by requiring a PLA on the project. According to ENR, at issue was a $72.4 million Orange… Continue Reading
Category Archives: Project Labor Agreements
Subscribe to Project Labor Agreements RSS FeedPhiladelphia PLA’s: Another Setback for the 99%
Posted in Project Labor Agreements, Public BiddingYesterday CBS Philly reported that Mayor Nutter signed Executive Order 15-11 once again making project labor agreements a reality on City owned public works projects in excess of $5 million, which would require all contractors bidding on City projects to hire workers out of a local union hiring hall and abide by onerous, restrictive, and… Continue Reading
City of Allentown’s PLA Ordinance Challenged
Posted in Project Labor AgreementsAs reported by Peter Hall in the Allentown Morning call, the Associated Builders and Contractors of Eastern PA has sued the City of Allentown over the City’s controversial ordinance bidders on City projects in excess of $250,000 to abide by a project labor agreement. The Call reports that F.H. Rohrbach of Allentown, A.J. Trunzo of… Continue Reading
Investing in Unready Projects
Posted in New Projects, Project Labor AgreementsIn an earlier post, I outlined what a common seanse infrastructure bill should look like. As the Wall Street Journal reported yesterday, President Obama is apparently not an avid reader of Supplemental Conditions because he is getting ready to market a new “investment” in infrastructure spending program that misses the mark entirely. I understand that many underemployed… Continue Reading
Update: Cement Workers Ordered Back to Work
Posted in Construction Labor Law, Project Labor AgreementsCrain’s New York Business is reporting that an arbitrator has ordered striking concrete workers back to work on four sites covered by project labor agreements (“PLA’s”). In my previous post, I discussed how these workers were violating the terms of the PLA’s No Strike/Work Stoppages Clause. Despite the Cement Union’s decision to ignore the clear… Continue Reading
PLA Fails to Prevent NYC Strike
Posted in Project Labor Agreements, Secondary Boycott, UnionsThe Concrete Union strike in New York and subsequent walk off on the World Trade Center Memorial and Madison Square Garden projects made minor fanfare this week. What many do not realize is that the Concrete Union was the signatory to a project labor agreement (“PLA”) covering these project which is supposed to prevent… Continue Reading
Wall Street Journal Takes On PLA’s
Posted in Project Labor AgreementsHurrah to the Wall Street Journal Opinion page today for taking on Project Labor Agreements. The Journal’s opinion piece is by far the highest profile criticism of wasteful project labor agreements. As the editors note, the tide of public opinion is turning squarely against project labor agreements even in those areas that are sympathetic to… Continue Reading
Louisiana Bans Project Labor Agreements
Posted in Project Labor Agreements, UncategorizedFormer GOP rising star/policy wonk/excellent Governor, Bobby Jindal of Louisiana, recently signed into a law a bill banning government mandated PLA’s. Louisiana is the fifth State in 2011 and the ninth overall to ban the use of PLA’s on government funded projects. Thanks to aggressive efforts of organizations like the Associated Builders and Contractors and… Continue Reading
Union Labor Loses Grip on NYC Construction
Posted in Project Labor Agreements, UnionsRecently, the Regional Plan Association published a report “Construction Labor Cost in New York City,” which highlighted how union construction firms continue to lose market share to merit based firms. A copy of this report is available for download here. The report comes on the heels of a recent New York Times article regarding the… Continue Reading
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