Project Labor Agreements Work for Workers and Communities
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For more than 70 years, project labor agreements (PLAs) benefited communities, employers and workers by ensuring fair wages and benefits and on-time completion of local, state and federal construction projects. PLAs, also known as Community Workforce Agreements, generally set wages and establish work rules and methods of settling grievances on large multi-contractor construction projects
But in one of his first acts as president, George W. Bush issued an executive order in 2001 banning the use of PLAs on federal projects.
This past February, President Barack Obama reversed the Bush order and restored the use of PLAs. His action sent anti-worker construction groups and companies into a tizzy, with the latest battle centering on a $30 million Job Corps Center in Manchester, N.H.
Obama Overturns Bush Exec. Order on Project Labor Agreements
The men and women in the nation’s building and construction trades won a major victory today when President Obama signed an executive order overturning the Bush administration’s ban on project labor agreements (PLAs) on federal and federally funded construction.
The ban was one of the first orders signed by former President George W. Bush when he took office in 2001. Mark H. Ayers, president of the AFL-CIO Building and Construction Trades Department (BCTD), praised Obama’s action, saying:
The Bush anti-PLA executive order was exactly the type of special interest-driven politics and policy that American voters rejected overwhelmingly last November.
We acknowledge and praise this executive order as being one of the first steps in ushering in a new, more pragmatic and value-conscious approach to governing.
