Ballot Intiative Points to Next Possible Casualty for Unions: Project Labor Agreements

[Omaha Steve]

http://www.inthesetimes.com/working/entry/6605/ballot_intiative_in_san_diego_today_highlights_attempts_to_bust_constr/

Ballot Intiative Points to Next Possible Casualty for Unions: Project Labor Agreements

Tuesday 2 Nov 10 1:03 pm

By Mike Elk

Perhaps the most important issue for organized labor on the ballot today is an initiative in San Diego County, Calif., which forbids unions from negotiating Project Labor Agreements (PLAs) on construction projects financed by the county government. Union-busting construction groups like Association of Builders & Contractors (ABC), have been blasting San Diego voters with ads against project labor agreements saying "“It’s not fair to force someone to join a union just to work on a taxpayer-funded project.”

Under these project labor agreements, the group running a construction project — whether it be a private corporation or sometimes a government body — negotiates, before construction even begins or bid are placed, an agreement with construction unions an agreement on pay, benefits, and work and safety conditions. As a result, union contractors who typically pay their workers better and demand better working conditions are more completive to get the bid.

PLAs are typically used on government-financed projects. Union contractors are used less and less in the private sector. Union contractors can typically only place competitive bids on government contracts where Davis Bacon laws and Project Labor Agreements apply. As a result, PLAs are the lifeblood of building trade unions as their membership shrinks. In California for instance, only 24 percent of construction workers are union members, but on construction sites using PLAs, 75 percent of the construction workers are unionized.

PLAs have always been controversial. The Bush Administration forbid their on federal financed projects because they favored unions, thus greatly reducing their use nationwide. One of the first actions of the Obama Administration was to sign an executive order allowing the use of PLAs on federally funded projects - leading to a flourishing of project labor agreements. According to the New York Times, AFL-CIO officials estimate that those constructions projects are worth $100 billion nationwide.

In response, a movement against PLAs seems afloat. This last June, in Oceanside and Chula Vista, Calif., ballot measures passed that prohibited local city governments from using PLAs. Now anti-union contractors are hoping to go nationwide in their attacks against them. "If the county ballot initiative passes, nonunion contractors plan to push for similar bans across the state, and eventually the nation," Scott Crosby, president of the San Diego chapter of the union busting Associated Builders and Contractors (ABC) told the New York Times in October.

FULL story at link.