San Diego Unified School District : This piece recently ran that shows the SDUSD Project Labor Agreement (PLA) fails to meet its local hiring goals set out in their PLA. This is not news to anyone who has been following this debacle from the beginning and knows what happens when you make it harder for the 90% of the local construction workforce who happen to be union-free, from bidding your work. SDUSD receives yet another "F" when it comes to their PLA.

 

Rancho Santiago Community College District : This college belongs in Los Angeles or the Bay Area with the level of corruption it has exhibited over the years with regards to its PLAs. Most recently the board majority finally, after two years of delays, filled the open Bond Oversight Committee (BOC) position reserved for a representative of a taxpayers group with a union member who represents a faux taxpayer group! This shameless move was written about in detail by CFEC and LIS' Kevin Dayton and is a must read.

 

Sweetwater Union High School District : This district was taken over by big labor special interests and that means a PLA ASAP. The SUHSD Board of Trustees has now had to deal with a Bond Oversight Committee that dares to put its kids and taxpayers ahead of union bosses. The BOC had asked the board to hold off on the PLA until the issue could be further studied from their end. As the BOC is the group mandated by state law to see that school bond monies are wisely spent, they were uncomfortable with how the PLA had been rammed through with little to no discussion and certainly no study of the issue. The Trustees of course voted down the request but it was good to see them have to at least shame themselves again. Look for the final vote on the PLA to take place this month. Stay tuned!

 

Long Beach Community College District : After years of bond work going trouble-free the LBCCD Board of Trustees decided to give big labor special interests a present in the form of a PLA last month. CFEC and local contractors spoke out against the PLA but the board represents yet another corrupt urban district that put party politics above what's best for students, workers, and taxpayers. Why did they do this now?  Because they were seeking more than $800 million from taxpayers in the form of a bond and the unions want it all.  

As we have been tracking for years using such tools as our  phonyuniontreehuggers website, among other things, the union abuse of the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) is as shameless as it is profitable for them. Recently this union extortion, which we call "greenmail", was on full display in Bakersfield where the go to union CEQA law firm tried to hold up the Willow Springs Solar Project.

The Project Labor Agreement that the California High Speed Rail Authority placed on this dog of a project is the least of the CHRA Board's problems. Others include  not having any money to build it (oops), a complete lack of transparency, being built on lies, and not having even close the land it needs to have to be built.

 

 CFEC has and will keep you updated on this scam as it moves nowhere.

 

Joined by scores of construction company owners, workers, apprentices, and employees, those assembled laid out exactly why they stood opposed to the San Diego Chargers plans for a new $1.8 billion stadium/convention center. Among those speaking at the event were Ron Smith, owner of Interpipe Contracting who is also a Chargers season ticket holder, Loren Waldapfel of HPS Mechanical,  Rolf Wachter, a fourth year apprentice in the Associated Builders and Contractors Apprenticeship Program, and Hasani Fields, a third year apprentice with the ABC program. All spoke passionately about why the insulting manner in which the Chargers had announced how this project would be built using only union labor was not going to stand.

 

KUSI, FOX, NBC, CBS, CW, Univision and the San Diego Union Tribune all covered the story and CFEC's Eric Christen was featured on the Carl DeMaio show. 

You can watch the intense altercation that took place after the press conference when local union boss Tom Lemmon decided to crash the party  HERE.
View the full Coalition Press Conference re Chargers PLA HERE.