Fresno Mayor Dyer vetoes union construction jobs deal. He says it’s ‘discriminatory’
Mayor Jerry Dyer on Monday vetoed an agreement recently passed by the Fresno City Council that gave city construction projects to union workers and apprentices, saying the agreement as written does not prioritize local hiring as intended.
“As a dues-paying member of public sector unions for the past 41 years, I do recognize that a project labor agreement, if done correctly, can be beneficial,” Dyer said in a news release. “I would support the PLA if it could be modified to prioritize local hiring and local businesses.”
The Fresno City Council approved the agreement earlier this month on a 6-1 vote, with Councilmember Garry Bredefeld casting the lone “no” vote, after six months of negotiations. The agreement with the Fresno, Madera, Kings and Tulare Building and Construction Trades Council was for projects with a price tag over $1 million and would prioritize workers who are women, veterans and those from disadvantaged communities. The agreement outlined requirements for work to be done by apprentices from the local unions.
Councilmembers and union workers touted the agreement as a way to rebuild the city’s middle class by giving workers good-paying jobs with good benefits and creating apprentice programs. A UC Merced policy brief published earlier this year concluded that the city missed opportunities to support jobs in the last several years by not pursuing project labor agreements. The brief cited research that showed union jobs put more money in workers’ projects, and project labor agreements delivered projects for cheaper.
The Fresno City Council needs five affirmative votes to override the mayor’s veto. Council President Luis Chavez said he will put the item on Thursday’s meeting agenda.
Union chief surprised by veto
Chuck Riojas, the executive director for the local Building Trades Council, said he was surprised by the veto but felt comfortable that the city council will maintain its support for the agreement.
Dyer in his veto news release repeated criticisms of the agreement raised by City Manager Thomas Esqueda. Dyer also agreed with talking points used by the Associated Builders and Contractors of Northern California, saying that union members make up less than 13% of the U.S. construction workforce.
Riojas said those percentages fit a certain narrative. In reality, union workers make up 25% of the market share and 75% of costs for construction work, he said.
“Everybody has a right to their opinion, but categorically, they’re wrong,” Riojas said. “I wouldn’t bring a piece of legislation or a policy that wasn’t good for the city, that didn’t help local hire and that didn’t help the local or expand the local workforce.…(The city manager) was in negotiations throughout the whole six months. He knew what the document entailed. So, yeah, I disagree with all of it.”
Rather than focusing on union workers, Dyer said he would rather see an agreement with the following requirements: hire contractors headquartered in the city; use employees who live within the city; provide health care and 401k or other retirement benefits to employees on the project; use at least 20% apprentices living in the city.
Dyer said non-union contractors would be at a disadvantage under the project labor agreement because they would end up paying double for benefits.
“This two-tiered system is discriminatory toward a large majority of Fresno’s construction workers and does not fit Mayor Dyer’s One Fresno vision of inclusivity,” the news release said.
Support from trade group
The Associated Builders and Contractors had urged Dyer to veto the agreement and were happy to see he did.
“We applaud Mayor Dyer for his veto of the project labor agreement that excludes nearly 82% of Fresno construction professionals from working on projects in their own communities,” said Nicole Goehring, vice president of government and community affairs for the ABC of Northern California. “Every Fresno worker deserves the opportunity to earn competitive wages and better their own community one project at a time.”
Chavez said he respectfully disagreed with Dyer’s veto.
“As elected officials, we often have disagreements on policy decisions,” he said. “Out of more than 30-plus deal points, there was agreement on 95% of them. The outstanding deal points were not deal breakers for me.
“This agreement will put people from the city of Fresno and the Valley back to work and provide them with a career in the construction trades of welding, carpentry, sheet metal and plumbing,” Chavez said. “The investments we make today will pay off dividends for our city in the next five years tenfold. There’s nothing more empowering than helping someone provide for themselves, and this PLA does that.”
This story was originally published September 13, 2021 at 5:40 PM.