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Medford Wellington apprentice electrician Cheslie Sanon came to the U.S. from Haiti when she was 10 years old. “Since then, I’ve done everything I can to work hard and have a positive attitude.” You don’t need to talk to her for long to realize that those two traits are in her DNA.

“When I got out of high school, college wasn’t an option. I had to work.” And that’s exactly what Cheslie did. She’s been on her own since she was 17, first working as a home health aid.

After six years, she watched her cousin get into HVAC and decided to become an electrician. She found a job and enrolled in school to support herself and begin to accumulate the 8,000 hands-on hours and 600 classroom hours needed to sit for the journeyperson test, which she hopes to do this fall.

Cheslie says “you have to want it, and have patience and dedication.” She’s certainly lived up to that. For years, she went to work in the morning and had class at night. Her Mondays through Thursdays started at 6:15 am and went until 10:55 pm.

Now she’s enjoying her work at Medford Wellington. “It’s the best company I’ve ever worked for,” Cheslie says. “They acknowledge your work and give you the opportunity to grow.

She is certainly taking advantage of that opportunity, and it has built her confidence. “There’s nothing I put my mind to that I can’t learn,” Cheslie says. And she has a track record to prove it.
 

 

By: Joe Camilo, Tocco Building Systems

I’m pleased to say that I’ll be using this month’s message to convey some good news. Last month, I wrote about the Springfield Water and Sewer Commission’s split decision to use a union-only project labor agreement to build the $325 million West Parish Water Treatment Plant. But as of the end of February, I can report that the project has gone out to bid without the PLA.

The Commission wisely insisted that all the unions involved sign on to the PLA, and it set a February 16 deadline for them to do so because of the need to get construction of the treatment plant underway as quickly as possible. When the Regional Council of Carpenters missed the deadline, the Commission announced the project would proceed using free and open competition.

The decision brings a number of benefits. The more than 82 percent of the Massachusetts construction workforce that chooses not to join a union can now take part in the project, as can the many open-shop companies that are pre-qualified. The Commission and its ratepayers will benefit from the lower costs that accompany more competition.

The change of course is also a win for minority-owned contractors, the vast majority of whom are open shop. Earlier in the process, unions balked at a carve out in the PLA to allow non-union minority- and women-owned contractors to bid on contracts of $1 million or less. The unions proposed a $500,000 limit on the exception before agreeing to the $ 1 million.

As the Springfield Republican wrote in an editorial, “Now, bids from all parties will carry the same weight. And minority- and women-owned contractors will not be limited to bids of under $1 million.”

ABC MA actively advocated for the project to go forward under open competition. Chapter President Greg Beeman previously sent a letter calling on commissioners to reverse their decision to build the plant using a union-only project labor agreement. He also had a commentary on the topic published in the Republican.

It's impossible to know the outcome of the political battles in which our chapter sometimes finds itself. But you can be sure that we will always fight for the rights of our members. And when the outcome positive, as with the West Parish Water Treatment Facility, we should all take a moment to enjoy it and appreciate what ABC stands for.
 

 

By Brian A. Lynch, Esq. Rudolph Friedmann LLP

In Massachusetts, the Supplier Diversity Program is a state program that encourages state agencies to award state contracts to certified diverse businesses. To qualify for the program, companies must be certified as a diverse business in any of the following categories:

  • Minority Business Enterprises 
  • Women Business Enterprises 
  • Service-Disabled Veteran Business Enterprises 
  • Veteran Business Enterprises 
  • Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Business Enterprises 
  • Disability-Owned Business Enterprises


The state’s Supplier Diversity Office (the “SDO”) administrates the certification process. The SDO notes on its website, although certification does not guarantee that a business will be successful every time it bids, it may add a competitive edge to firms seeking contracts with the government. In addition to certifying diverse businesses, the SDO also provides certified diverse firms with access to capital, training and development, networking and bidding opportunities.

Application Criteria
Under state regulations defined in 425 Code of Massachusetts Regulations Section 2.00, the applicant must prove it is at least 51% owned and dominantly controlled by principals of the same diverse category(ies). In addition to being owned by a majority of qualified individuals, the regulations require the qualified individuals to demonstrate the following core characteristics:

Control. The diverse owner(s) must demonstrate to the SDO that they have legal authority to make, and in fact do make, all major decisions of the applicant business without being subject to any agreement restricting the diverse owner’s control. The approval or veto of any other person, business, or organization cannot supersede the diverse owner’s authority to control the business. Among other criteria, the diverse owner(s) must have control over day-to-day operations, the background and technical competence relating to the business activities of the company, and a thorough knowledge of the financial structure, policies and affairs of the applicant business.

Independent. The applicant cannot be dependent upon, affiliated with, or influenced by, legally or in practice, any other person, business or organization in connection with any of its day-to-day operations or long-term affairs. Additionally, the applicant business cannot rely on or regularly utilize any employee under the direct control of another person, business or organization other than the applicant business. An applicant will not be considered independent if it presents insufficient evidence to the SDO of having the capability or capacity to perform, with its own workforce, equipment, facilities or other functional assets the services it performs.

Ongoing. The applicant must demonstrate it was not formed for the purpose of taking advantage of the certification program. The business must be actively in business with the resources needed to continually perform its services. This does not preclude the applicant from being recently formed and in operation for less than one year. Instead of looking at how long the business has been in operation, the SDO will require the diverse owner(s) to demonstrate they possess the technical experience and expertise to manage the current and future operations of the company.

Conclusion
Becoming a certified diverse business may provide you with new opportunities to contract with the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Rudolph Friedmann LLP can advise you and your business on its potential eligibility and guide diverse business owners through the certification process.
 

Associated Builders and Contractors’ Construction Backlog Indicator declined to 8.4 months in January, according to an ABC member survey conducted from Jan. 22 to Feb. 4. The reading is down 0.6 months from January 2023.

View the full Construction Backlog Indicator and Construction Confidence Index data series.

Backlog increased to 10.9 months in the heavy industrial category, the highest reading on record for that category, and is 2.5 months higher than in January 2023. Backlog is down on a year-over-year basis in the commercial/institutional and infrastructure categories.



ABC’s Construction Confidence Index readings for sales and staffing levels increased in January, while the reading for profit margins declined. All three readings remain above the threshold of 50, indicating expectations for growth over the next six months.


“As predicted, performance in the nonresidential construction sector is becoming more disparate across segments,” said ABC Chief Economist Anirban Basu. “For much of the pandemic recovery period, contractors in virtually all segments were indicating stable to rising backlog. That remains the case for contractors most exposed to the nation’s industrial production. Reshoring and near-shoring continue to drive construction spending.

“In other categories, however, including those most interest rate-sensitive, activity appears to be slowing,” said Basu. “Developer financing has become both more expensive and more difficult to obtain over roughly the past year, in part because of rising office vacancy in many markets. That helps to explain declining backlog in the commercial category. The decline in infrastructure-related backlog may be due only to seasonality, however. There is every reason to believe that contractors specializing in public works will have a very busy year.”


Note: The reference months for the Construction Backlog Indicator and Construction Confidence Index data series were revised on May 12, 2020, to better reflect the survey period. CBI quantifies the previous month's work under contract based on the latest financials available, while CCI measures contractors' outlook for the next six months. View the methodology for both indicators.

On Feb. 9, the U.S. Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration sent its Worker Walkaround Representative Designation Process final rule to the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs at the Office of Management and Budget for final review. The rule would allow employees to choose a third-party representative, such as an outside union representative or community activist, to accompany an OSHA inspector into nonunion facilities. The review at the OIRA is usually the final step in the process before a rule is officially published in the Federal Register. ABC will be meeting with the OIRA to express its serious concerns about the rule.

On Nov. 13, 2023, ABC submitted comments in opposition to the proposed rule and urged OSHA to withdraw it. ABC also signed on to comments submitted by the Coalition for Workplace Safety and Construction Industry Safety Coalition. In a press release about the proposed rule, ABC stated that “the Biden administration is trying to revive a failed Obama-era initiative, which was bad policy then and is bad policy now. This power grab does nothing to promote workplace health and safety, and instead pushes the administration’s ‘all-of-government’ agenda to encourage unions and collective bargaining. OSHA can have a bigger impact on jobsite safety by fostering positive partnerships with employers and promoting safety practices that produce results.”

On Sept. 26, ABC joined 40 other CWS members in sending a letter to the U.S. House Education and the Workforce Committee’s Subcommittee on Workforce Protections calling out OSHA for its proposed rule and the politicization of the agency that the rulemaking exemplifies. Read CWS’s press release.

On Feb. 21, 2013, OSHA issued a letter of interpretation endorsing union representatives and other nonemployee third parties accompanying OSHA inspectors on walkaround inspections at nonunion workplaces, which ABC adamantly opposed, expressing serious concerns. OSHA eventually rescinded the letter of interpretation on April 25, 2017.

ABC will continue to monitor this issue and provide updates as they become available.
 

 

The construction industry added 11,000 jobs on net in January, according to an Associated Builders and Contractors analysis of data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. On a year-over-year basis, industry employment has expanded by 216,000 jobs, an increase of 2.7%.

Nonresidential construction employment increased by 7,600 positions on net, with growth in 2 of the 3 subcategories. Nonresidential specialty trade added 13,700 positions, while nonresidential building added 1,600 jobs on net. Heavy and civil engineering lost 7,700 jobs.

The construction unemployment rate rose to 6.9% in January. Unemployment across all industries remained unchanged at 3.7% last month.

“The construction industry added jobs for the 10th straight month in January,” said ABC Chief Economist Anirban Basu. “That was hardly the biggest story from today’s release, however, with total U.S. payroll employment increasing by a staggering 353,000 positions. That’s nearly twice the consensus forecast and represents yet another economic indicator that has surprised to the upside.

“The construction unemployment rate stood at 6.9% for the month, which is tied for the third-lowest January rate on record,” said Basu. “As a result of labor scarcity, construction wages surged in January, increasing at the fastest rate since July 2023. With both the construction industry and the broader economy continuing to grow at a rapid pace, contractors will struggle to remain adequately staffed over the coming quarters, especially with a majority of contractors intending to increase their staffing levels over the next six months, according to ABC’s Construction Confidence Index.”
 

By: Joe Camilo, Tocco Building Systems

New data show that nearly 90 percent of U.S. construction workers choose not to join a union. In Massachusetts, it’s more than 82 percent, according to federal Bureau of Labor Statistics data analyzed by unionstats.com. The open shop numbers are even higher among African-American construction workers. Yet once again we find ourselves fighting a union-only project labor agreement (PLA).

This time it’s the Springfield Water and Sewer Commission, which voted to use a PLA to build the West Parish Water Treatment Plant. The 2-1 vote came after unions made a full presentation to the Commission. Those opposed to the PLA, including ABC MA President Greg Beeman, got three minutes to make their cases during the public comment section of one of the Commission’s meetings.

The Commission’s own lawyer urged commissioners not to approve the PLA. So egregious are these policies that exclude the vast majority of the commonwealth’s construction workforce that the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court has ruled that they violate state bidding laws unless very specific conditions exist. Commission Attorney Norm Guz told commissioners that he did not believe the PLA met these conditions.

A couple of basic concepts are in play when PLAs are used. First, excluding open-shop contractors means fewer bidders, and fewer bidders result in higher costs. Second, with the construction industry is in the midst of a labor shortage, it doesn’t make sense to build a project on which a diverse, local workforce is a priority by excluding over 80 percent of workers, and an even higher percentage of workers of color.

ABC MA is the organization that fights on behalf of fundamental fairness when our members’ rights are being violated. Our employees routinely work side-by-side with union members on projects bid without a project labor agreement, but we don’t have that opportunity under a PLA.

Our chapter has already sent a letter calling on the Commission to reverse its PLA decision and begun making our case in Western Massachusetts media. It will always be ABC’s mission to seek a level playing field. Healthy competition is one of the things that makes this county great.
 

 

The construction industry will need to attract an estimated 501,000 additional workers on top of the normal pace of hiring in 2024 to meet the demand for labor, according to a proprietary model developed by Associated Builders and Contractors. In 2025, the industry will need to bring in nearly 454,000 new workers on top of normal hiring to meet industry demand, and that’s presuming that construction spending growth slows significantly next year.

 

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“ABC estimates that the U.S. construction industry needs to attract about a half million new workers in 2024 to balance supply and demand,” said Michael Bellaman, ABC president and CEO. “Not addressing the shortage through an all-of-the-above approach to workforce development will slow improvements to our shared built environment, worker productivity, living standards and the places where we heal, learn, play, work and gather.”

ABC’s model uses the historical relationship between inflation-adjusted construction spending growth, sourced from the U.S. Census Bureau’s Value of Construction Put in Place Survey, and payroll construction employment, sourced from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, to convert anticipated increases in construction outlays into demand for construction labor at a rate of approximately 3,550 jobs per billion dollars of additional spending. This increased demand is added to the current level of above-average job openings. Projected industry retirements, shifts to other industries and other forms of anticipated separation are also embodied within the computations.

Based on historical Census Bureau Job-to-Job Flows data, an estimated 1.9 million construction workers will leave their jobs to work in other industries in 2024. This should be offset by an anticipated 2.1 million workers who will leave other industries to work in construction. These frictional interindustry transfers are estimated exogenously and serve as inputs to the model.

The U.S. construction industry unemployment rate averaged 4.6% for the second straight year, matching the second lowest level on record, while job openings remained historically elevated at an average of 377,000 per month through the first 11 months of 2023. As a result of labor shortages, contractors laid off workers at a slower rate than in any year between the start of the data series in 2000 and 2020.

“Broadly, there are two factors shaping the interaction between construction worker supply and demand,” said ABC Chief Economist Anirban Basu. “There are structural factors, including outsized retirement levels, megaprojects in several private and public construction segments and cultural factors that encourage too few young people to enter the skilled construction trades. There are also structural factors, including those related to interest rates, consumer sentiment and general economic performance.

“Over the past two years, cyclical influences have helped diminish the gap between construction worker supply and demand,” said Basu. “Though nonresidential construction spending has continued to surge, homebuilding segments have felt the impact of higher borrowing costs more intensely. With interest rates set to decline in 2024 and 2025, the expectation is that construction worker shortfalls will remain elevated. Among other things, that would delay the rebuilding of American infrastructure and the creation of new domestic supply chains. It would also tend to drive up the cost of construction service delivery, impacting American enterprise and taxpayers alike.

“Meanwhile, structural influences persist,” said Basu. “More than 1 in 5 construction workers are 55 or older, meaning that retirement will continue to contract the industry’s workforce. These are the most experienced workers, and their departures are especially concerning.”

“While construction employment is growing, it is not growing fast enough to meet the demand to complete the work on the books for 2024,” said Bellaman. “To address this shortage and grow the construction talent pool, ABC has a network of more than 800 apprenticeship, craft, health and safety and management education programs—including more than 450 government-registered apprenticeship programs across 20 different occupations. ABC chapters also have 323 entry point programs in place nationally to welcome all to begin a career in construction. To address workforce demand that drives the U.S. economy, Congress must also look toward much-needed reforms to our legal immigration system and provide high-demand industries, like construction, with access to new or expanded visa programs.”

“Exclusionary policies and programs that do not welcome all to compete to build our public works projects, such as project labor agreement mandates, will further exacerbate this shortage and undermine significant investments made by taxpayers in infrastructure, clean energy and manufacturing projects,” said Bellaman. “Taxpayers and workers are best served by inclusive, win-win policies that create a level playing field for all contractors to compete to build public works projects.”

View the methodology of ABC’s 2024 construction workforce shortage model.

An Associated Builders and Contractors analysis of 2023 state union membership data published by UnionStats.com found at least 90% of workers in the private construction industry do not belong to a union in 29 states. That’s up from 26 states in 2022 and 24 states in 2021. Nationally, an all-time high 89.3% of construction workers are not part of a union, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, up from 88.3% in 2022.

The new Massachusetts data show that 82.2% of construction workers were not unionized in 2023, with 17.8% choosing to join a union.
 

 

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“Approximately 7.9 million construction industry professionals did not belong to a union in 2023, and the number of merit shop construction professionals continues to grow year after year,” said Ben Brubeck, ABC vice president of regulatory, labor and state affairs. “President Joe Biden’s exclusionary policies may secure him endorsements from special interest donors and organized labor, but the overwhelming majority of this industry is operating in a nonunion environment. Biden administration policies threaten to inflate construction costs, steer public works contracts to donors with little competition and exacerbate the construction industry’s skilled labor shortage, all of which stand to undermine taxpayer investments in America’s infrastructure, clean energy and manufacturing projects. All qualified contractors and their employees should be encouraged to bid on and build taxpayer-funded construction projects, so they can be awarded based on cost, quality and safety, not union affiliation.”

The states in which at least 90% of the construction workforce does not belong to a union, ranked by the highest percentage of nonunion workers, are: North Carolina, Mississippi, Maine, South Carolina, Texas, Colorado, South Dakota, Vermont, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, New Mexico, Arizona, Wyoming, Utah, Tennessee, Virginia, Idaho, Arkansas, Alabama, Alaska, Delaware, Oklahoma, Kansas, North Dakota, Iowa, New Hampshire, Kentucky and Montana. .

“The Biden administration continues to push unproductive, anti-competitive regulations, like government-mandated project labor agreements on federal and federally assisted construction projects, sweeping overhauls to the government-registered apprenticeship system, the controversial Davis-Bacon final rule, the redefinition of independent contractor status and the unprecedented expansion of labor policies onto private construction projects through federal tax code via the Inflation Reduction Act,” said Brubeck. “Construction industry freedom and choice to affiliate with unions independent of government interference creates immense value for taxpayers and the construction industry, which is why ABC will continue to challenge exclusionary policies and advocate for all construction workers to be welcome to build taxpayer-funded construction projects.” 

 

 

By: Joe Camilo, Tocco Building Systems  

Our Chapter’s mission statement reads:

ABC believes that the common good is best served by an open and competitive marketplace; that every company, regardless of its affiliations, has the right to compete free of coercion by any group or organization; and that every person must have the opportunity and right to work. Toward this end, ABC's mission is to foster an environment that ensures our members and their employees the ability to grow and prosper.

Amid all the things that pull us in countless directions every day, there is value in periodically refocusing on core principles. As I return to serve a second term as ABC MA chair, I believe this is one of those times. I’m proud of what our organization stands for; ours are the principles that built this great nation.

We will surely face no shortage of challenges in the coming year. We already know that finding enough qualified workers to meet demand is a long-term problem in our industry. In Washington, many of the current administration’s policies are at odds with our view of free and open competition.

Thankfully, the picture is somewhat different in Massachusetts. A year into her term, Gov. Maura Healey has welcomed our input and understands that if the commonwealth is to prosper, we don’t have the luxury of excluding any portion of the construction industry. We hope she appreciates the need to revisit restrictive hiring ratios that limit our ability to hire apprentices. Diversity is a strength. Expanding our talent pool in construction will not only help meet demand, it will provide opportunities for more of our citizens to have a meaningful, well-paying career.

Thanks to the good work done under the leadership of Vera Vadeboncoeur in 2023, our organization is stronger than it was a year ago. We have been awarded several competitive grants that fund the pre-apprenticeship programs that help to build a talent pipeline for member companies. That workforce development goal is also being served by the success of the Gould Construction Institute’s daytime electrical program. These are just a couple of the reasons why ABC MA prospered on Vera’s watch.

One thing we know about 2024 is that we will undoubtedly find ourselves grappling with issues we couldn’t possibly foresee today. As we confront them, let’s remember our core values of open competition that is free of coercion, and each individual’s right to have the opportunity to work.

Thank you for again putting your faith in me. It’s my honor to serve as ABC MA chair for 2024.