Your Union Project Labor Agreement Has Failed Again: Comment on Stockton City Council 2/5/19 Agenda Item #11.13 - Approve Resolution to Authorize the Della Street Sanitary Sewer Rehabilitation Project

Dear Stockton City Council:

At your meeting tonight (February 5, 2019), you are scheduled to award a public works contract for the Della Street Sanitary Sewer Rehabilitation Project. Prospective bidders for this project were informed by the City that all construction companies will be required to sign a “Community Workforce Training Agreement (CWTA) adopted by the City Council on July 26, 2016.

Staff is asking you to award the contract to SAK Construction, LLC, a Missouri Corporation, with a business address at 864 Hoff Road, O’Fallon, Missouri 63366. The only other bidder was Insitufoirm Technologies, LLC, a Missouri Corporation, with a business address at 17988 Edison Avenue, Chesterfield, Missouri 63005.

We note that on August 8, 2017, the Stockton City Council voted to award a contract for the Black Oak Public Utility Easement (PUE) Sanitary Sewer Rehabilitation Project to Insituform Technologies, LLC because the low bidder - SAK Construction, LLC - was non-responsive. There were no other bidders.

Notice how the same two companies from MISSOURI were again the only bidders on these two projects. Not one company based anywhere else (including San Joaquin County) chose to bid on these relatively small projects.

The Coalition for Fair Employment in Construction has been tracking your bid results for construction projects since the city council voted in 2016 to require your construction contractors to sign a Community Workforce Agreement (aka Project Labor Agreement) with unions. The public would not be impressed.

We seem to recall that in 2016 representatives of local San Joaquin County construction companies alleged that the Community Workforce Training Agreement (aka Project Labor Agreement)  was meant to discourage them from bidding on projects, thus leaving unionized contractors with an effective monopoly on City of Stockton contracts.

We also recall that union officials and city council members asserted that the Community Workforce Training Agreement (aka Project Labor Agreement) would do the opposite: encourage local contractors to bid because undesirable out-of-area non-union contractors would go elsewhere for contracts.

The local non-union contractors were correct. The union officials apparently think Missouri is local.

There’s nothing wrong with Missouri, but you may want to investigate how these two Missouri companies have managed to get exclusive bidding for projects in the City of Stockton that require contractors to sign a Project Labor Agreement with unions.

Sincerely,

Eric Christen
Executive Director
Coalition for Fair Employment in Construction
www.opencompca.com