Put Freedom to Work in Syracuse

The Syracuse City School District is preparing to spend more than $225 million in the first phase of a major school renovation project.  The entire project – to be completed over a 10-year period – includes nearly three dozen schools and will total approximately $925 million.  These renovations are greatly needed to provide students with an improved, modern learning environment.  As such, this project will undoubtedly be beneficial to the entire community.

Regrettably, the state-approved funding for this project, which took more than two years to secure through legislative action, includes a provision that requires a local construction board comprised of city and school district officials to decide whether to implement a project labor agreement or PLA. 

Such agreements typically encourage, or even require, that all work is done by union workers.  PLAs which mandate all work to be done by union members do not allow for competitive bidding by qualified contractors in our local community.

Union-only PLAs have been proven to significantly drive up the costs of school construction projects in other communities. In April 2006, the Beacon Hill Institute at Suffolk University released a report entitled, “Project Labor Agreements and Public Construction Costs in New York State.”  The study found that union-only PLAs raise the base construction bids for building schools by 20 percent.  In Syracuse, that would mean that up to $45 million of the $225 million would be wasted.

Union-only PLAs also discriminate against more than 75 percent of the New York state workforce that chooses not to belong to a construction union.  Minorities and women are especially discriminated against under union-only PLAs as both groups are significantly underrepresented in union shops.

We believe that all local workers, whether union or non-union, should have an equal opportunity to work on this project.

We are not anti-union.  We believe a competitively bid project open to both union and non-union contractors and their workforce will create more opportunities for a greater number of people and significantly reduce discrimination against women and minorities.  Open and competitive bidding also allows taxpayers to receive quality construction at a much lower price.

We encourage the Syracuse Joint School Construction Board to vote to allow a truly competitive bid process to ensure that all local working families have an opportunity to benefit from this project. 

Keep Syracuse competitive.  Put freedom to work.