Right to Work Blog

California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger used his power as governor to veto a proposed $6 million in state funding to a Big Labor institute that trains political operatives.

Kevin Korenthal, the Executive Director of the Associated Builders and Contractors of California, commented:

For the last 2 years, Governor Schwarzenegger has allowed the taxpayers to shoulder the cost for the operation of a special interest group training program that has long been used to train operatives on the finer points of defeating Republicans and conservative initiatives at the ballot box. The 6 million taxpayer dollars that the Miguel Contreras UC Labor Institute was handed each of the last 2 years is also responsible for the composition of a bogus “study” supporting a union Project Labor Agreement (PLA) for the Los Angeles Community Redevelopment Agency immediately before the agency’s commissioners voted on it. This was done with YOUR money - misusing the name and academic reputation of the University of California to advance the union political agenda.

So it was to our pleasant surprise to learn today that the long sought 2008/09 budget did not include this special interest payment. In this era of budget deficits and decreased tax revenues, Schwarzenegger’s line-item veto of this giveaway denies its beneficiaries much needed public funding. Yes, the unions will somehow come up with the money to keep the Big Labor training program in operation, but denying the program public money sends the right message and the Governor should be applauded for killing the funding.

Like a diamond in the rough, the Waterbury Republican American newspaper in the heart of Big Labor Connecticut is willing to stand up for taxpayers against the political power of union bosses even when the politicians won’t. Their latest editorial about the construction of a local elementary school is a perfect example.

Confronted last week with a choice between giving taxpayers less and adopting a risk-free strategy with high potential to give taxpayers more, Waterbury’s Board of Education gave taxpayers less, possibly at a higher price.

Members were shocked when bids for Gilmartin Elementary School renovations came in $7.5 million over the expected $26.2 million budget. The proposal called for a Project Labor Agreement (PLA) that effectively excluded nonunion contractors from bidding. Independent and Republican board members, joined by an unaffiliated member and a lonely Democrat, Coleen Flaherty-Merritt, wanted to drop the PLA for the Gilmartin project. The board owes it to taxpayers “to look at every factor we can to bring (the project) in on time and on budget,” unaffiliated board member Ann M. Sweeney said at the Sept. 2 meeting.

Nobody knows whether the union-only provision inflated the price. But the answer is simple enough to find: let union and nonunion contractors compete as equals. The numbers will tell the tale.

Unfortunately for the taxpayers of Connecticut, the Board of Education knows that competition will bring lower costs to most any project including the construction of local schools. But with the power of local union bosses, most politicians refuse to cross them:

The five Democrats who remained in lockstep after Ms. Flaherty-Merritt broke ranks produced a 5-5 tie vote Sept. 2, leaving the PLA intact. As an ex officio member of the board, Mayor Michael J. Jarjura could have broken the tie, but he did not attend. Having settled the PLA issue, the board approved, 7-3, a plan to bring forward a cheaper design.

Politicians beholden to Big Labor will stop at nothing to prevent workers from exercising their free choice as to whether to join a union. You can add Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa to that list.

The mayor has decreed that any city project that receives funds from the Community Redevelopment Agency must agree to use union workers.

Rather than ensuring the best quality work at the lowest cost, this special-interest earmark to Big Labor prevents workers who chose not the join a union from getting work from a fund they subsidize with their taxes.

In San Diego, California, Big Labor construction unions are demanding that Gaylord Entertainment, a hotel operator, sign a Project Labor Agreement (PLA) that prohibits non-union construction companies from working on the building of a new 1,500 room hotel.

Gaylord Entertainment is rightfully refusing.

The Constitution protects your right to associate and, by logic then, your right to disassociate. But Broome County, New York has decided to punish and discriminate against those exercising this basic right.

The Birmingham, New York Press & Sun Bulletin reports that:

Broome County’s non-union contractors are up in arms over the county’s decision to set aside 90 percent of the work on the $16.9 million George Harvey Justice Building renovation to union members as part of a new labor agreement.

They say it will shut out local workers in favor of out-of-county and even out-of-state workers.

County leaders who are obviously in the back pockets of Big Labor bosses claim the policy will “save money.”

What nonsense.

But non-union contractors say the agreement — a first for Broome County — will jack up costs by attracting fewer bidders and awarding jobs to union members from outside Broome County.

There is a more fundamental issue at stake than dollars and cents.

Using taxpayer dollars to discriminate against Broome County residents who exercise their constitutional rights is an outrage that must be overturned.

“Organized Labor has a long history with extortion and the mob. Federal prosecutors have put most of those mob bosses behind bars, but unions haven’t renounced using blackmail to get what they want. They simply use more sophisticated methods to do the same thing,” writes James Sherk at the Heritage Foundation.

The new tactic can be called “greenmail,” blackmail with an environmental hue.

Sherk continues: “Take the way unions exploit environmental concerns through Project Labor Agreements [PLAs]. Under PLAs, businesses promise to hire only union members — or else. Why would businesses sign such agreements? Because unions threaten to use environmental regulations to shut them down unless they sign the PLA.”