As a former president of the local building trades council, and current business manager and financial secretary of the Plumbers & Pipefitters Union, Local #104 in western Massachusetts, I can tell you that projects done under a Project Labor Agreement do not cost the taxpayers any more money, as the state and federal projects are done at the prevailing wage set by the state.
The labor rates on these projects are nearly identical whether they are done union or non-union. Therefore, the only way a project like the Springfield Water and Sewer Commission project could save $15.5 million on labor costs without a PLA, as the commission’s consultant said in November, would be by cheating contractors.
The PLA language in the pending economic development bill simply gives individual municipalities, owners or end users the option to utilize a PLA on their project. It does not force anything or mandate anyone to use a labor agreement or use 100% union labor.
