According to a statement critical of the Albany Times Union article, Stanley Gee, Acting Commissioner, NYSDOT, says there is actually no final decision on the PLA.

“The fact is that the decision on whether or not a project labor agreement (PLA) will be utilized for construction of the Lake Champlain Bridge has not yet been made. Indeed the decision was made this week to advertise for bids for the construction project consistent with the Department’s efforts to replace the Lake Champlain Bridge as quickly as possible. The advertisement did not include a provision for a PLA. This action does not preclude the use of a PLA. A decision about the use of a mandatory PLA has not been made.

In reference to another project cited in the article that had a PLA mandated late in the bidding process, Gee defended the use of a PLA.

“Separately, the New York State Department of Transportation has included a PLA on an I-287 project advertisement where we have used PLAs previously on projects in the I-287 corridor in Rockland and Westchester Counties. This PLA has been submitted to the Federal Highway Administration for approval since it is a federally funded project.”

A Big Labor boss in the Post-Starmakes the same stale and misleading argument that PLAs guarantee local workers are hired (“No PLA yet, but NYSDOT is accepting bids for the bridge,”).

Larry Bulman, the business manager for Plumbers and Steam Fitters and also the secretary treasurer and political director for the NYS Pipe Trade Association, said he hopes the NYSDOT will reconsider a Project Labor Agreement.

“We’re happy they’ve attached New York State’s prevailing wages to the project, which are higher than Vermont’s, but we want to make sure we are getting jobs for New York and Vermont workers.

Bulman said a PLA guarantees workers from New York and Vermont are hired for the job.

“PLAs ensure people from local hiring halls are put to work on this project,” he said.

Without a PLA, Bulman said anyone can bid and the lowest bidding construction company is awarded the project.

“They could be from Maine of South Carolina. If they get the job they are free to bring workers from their home state. With a PLA if that same company gets the project they will come do the work, but they will do it with local people,” he said.

Of course, the truth is that PLAs guarantee that most or all workers on a PLA project are union workers. The unions argue a PLA will create jobs for local union members, but there is nothing in a PLA that stops out-of-area union members from working on a PLA project ahead of local and qualified nonunion craft professionals.

Even if this standard Big Labor argument were 100 percent true, PLAs prohibit qualified local nonunion employees from building PLA projects.  Some PLAs allow nonunion employers to use a very small number of their existing skilled and local nonunion workforce (typically less than a maximum of 12 percent of a PLA project’s specific trade can come from a contractor’s “core workforce”). And local nonunion employees must get hired through the union hiring hall (where they are often harrassed or pressured into joining a union), follow unfamiliar and inefficient union work rules and their employers are required to pay benefits into union trust and benefit funds that nonunion employees will never benefit from unless they join a union. 

A recent study found PLAs reduce the take home pay of nonunion employees by almost 20 percent. It’s why nonunion contractors and their employees are discouraged from competiting for contracts on PLA projects.

PLAs are a raw deal for nonunion employees and they are especially unfair for skilled and local nonunion employees hoping to build a project in their backyard with their tax dollars.

Jeffrey J. Zogg, CEO of Associated General Contractors of NYS makes some compelling arguments against Jones:

Of course there is a swift need for construction of this bridge. Nobody wants progress on this project more than we do. Contractors and their employees need the work.

A government-mandated project labor agreement was proposed by the building trades unions. PLAs are a highly controversial subject in the construction industry. Did they expect that wouldn’t be the case here?

Yes, prevailing wages will be paid on this work. They are required on all public work in New York and by law they are the union wage rates. Why then do we need a PLA?…

…Yes, all capable contractors can bid on PLA projects, but those who do not employ union labor usually don’t. The PLA precludes them from using most of their own long-standing employees. The unions argue that all can bid, when they know that most open shop bidders will not, which is really their goal.

Yes, this project should be built by skilled tradespeople from upstate New York and Vermont. But the PLA will deny those very local workers who are not unionized the opportunity. In the project region, there are more open shop workers than union workers. Which public official is going to tell them they can’t work on this project?

The best solution to ensure that all interested contractors can compete for the project, all available local workers can have the opportunity to work on it and the taxpayer can achieve the best price is to bid the project both ways. If the PLA is truly more economical, we will find out.

TheTruthAboutPLAs urges the NYSDOT to reject the special interest PLA on this project. Free and open competition will deliver the best construction product at the best price and create jobs for all construction employees, regardless of labor affiliation.

Richard Piasecki, President of the Castelton, NY Piasecki Steel Construction Corp. says “a PLA would be business suicide” and explains what a PLA would mean to his business and his employees.

“Robert J. Jones’ March 6 letter about the Associated General Contractors’ position on a project labor deal for the Crown Point Bridge is a self-serving half-truth.

My firm is one of many upstate open shop bridge construction companies. All our employees are New York residents. Jones is technically correct that a nonunion firm like ours could bid under a PLA. It is also technically correct that we could shoot ourselves in the foot.

A project labor agreement forbids us from using our own personnel and forces us to hire exclusively union labor, from whom we can expect little loyalty and more than a little militant animosity.

For firms like us to bid on a PLA would be business suicide. My employees as taxpaying state residents deeply resent being precluded from any public work employment opportunity based on union membership.

If this PLA is such an economic benefit, let’s have it as a bidding option. Let’s all see these supposed benefits in black and white when the bids are opened.”

Mr. Piasecki touches on one of the key issues at the heart of the PLA debate. PLA proponents like Big Labor representative Mr. Jones are afraid to compete in the free market, so they invent subjective reasons why a PLA will benefit the community and construction owners in their effort to obtain a virtual monopoly on a PLA construction project’s workforce.  Mr. Piasecki argues that if PLAs are so great and offer cost savings, why not prove it through competitive bidding?

When governments mandate a PLA, discriminatory and costly PLA provisions apply to all contractors, so those contractors that can offer the best possible product at the best possible price without a PLA never have the opportunity to prove it.  There is nothing wrong with contractors voluntarily entering into a PLA, but the government shouldn’t be tinkering with the competitive bidding process to reward special interests.

It’s good government suicide, too.