Lawsuit Flushes Project Labor Agreement Scheme on Massachusetts Wastewater Facility
ABC’s Massachusetts chapter and a coalition of local merit shop contractors successfully blocked the Springfield Water and Sewer Commission’s scheme for a project labor agreement mandate on a $325 million water filtration plant. “Notwithstanding the lip service the PLA pays to being open to all bidders, it most assuredly is not,” wrote Hampden Superior Court […]
USACE Louisville District PLA Survey for Westover AFB, MA Due July 12
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) has issued a survey soliciting comments from the construction industry about the potential use of a government-mandated project labor agreement (PLA) for a the repair repair by replacement of Runway 05/23 and overruns at Westover Air Reserve Base. ABC National, encourages the merit shop contracting community to respond to this PLA survey. […]
USACE Mobile District Project Labor Agreement Survey Due May 9
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) has issued a survey soliciting comments from the construction industry about the potential use of a government-mandated project labor agreements (PLA) on projects associated with U.S. Army Medical Command facilities in Maryland, Delaware, Texas, Massachusetts, and Alabama. TheTruthAboutPLAs.com encourages the merit shop contracting community to respond to this […]
USACE Project Labor Agreement Survey For Hanscom AFB School Due Jan. 5
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) has issued a survey soliciting comments from the construction industry about the potential use of a government-mandated project labor agreement (PLA) on a contract to demolish the existing Hanscom primary school and construct a new primary school at Hanscom Air Force Base in Bedford, MA. TheTruthAboutPLAs.com encourages the merit shop […]
USACE Project Labor Agreement Survey for New England MATOC Jobs Due June 2
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) New England District is requesting comments from the construction community addressing a potential government-mandated project labor agreement (PLA) for federal Multiple Award Task Order Contracts (MATOC) to build, renovate and repair military and other federal facilities throughout six New England states. Those states include Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode […]
Project Labor Agreement Fails at Local Hire on New Bedford Dredging Project
Big Labor bosses and government-mandated project labor agreement (PLA) advocates frequently claim that PLAs are the only way to guarantee local hire on construction projects. Of course, this is another myth promoted by special interests to convince lawmakers and taxpayers that there is a public benefit to anti-competitive and costly PLA schemes, which funnel lucrative […]
Great Scott: Projects Bid With and Without PLA Mandates Show PLAs Increase Costs and Reduce Competition
While researching the use of government-mandated project labor agreements (PLAs) in West Virginia in advance of Wednesday’s deadline for a U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) survey about a potential PLA mandate on a large-scale federal project in Harpers Ferry, W.Va., TheTruthAboutPLAs.com went back in time to revisit another real-world example of how discriminatory PLA […]
USACE PLA Survey for New Bedford Harbor Project Due April 23
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) New England District issued a survey requesting feedback from the construction industry about a government-mandated project labor agreement (PLA) on a contract to dig a Confined Aquatic Disposal (CAD) cell as part of a project to dredge the Acushnet River and New Bedford, Mass., harbor. To review and respond to the […]
Op-Ed: Gov’s Insistence on PLAs Excludes Majority of State’s Skilled Labor
The controversy over Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick’s (D) decision to require contractors to sign a wasteful and discriminatory project labor agreement (PLA) as a condition of performing work on the $285 million reconstruction of I-95’s Whittier Bridge continued to attract attention and remind Bostonians of past PLA failures in their community this week. Greg Beeman, president of […]
Boston Globe Editorial Blasts Government-Mandated Project Labor Agreements and Patrick Administration
An editorial in today’s Boston Globe decimates flimsy arguments in favor of government-mandated project labor agreements (PLAs) and skewers Mass. Gov. Deval Patrick (D) for requiring PLAs on major state projects, including the Whittier Memorial Bridge, which TheTruthAboutPLAs.com covered last week (“Project labor agreements: Mass. taxpayers lose again,” 7/24/12): Although it lacks any compelling reasons for doing so, […]