Long Beach and its construction trade partners will be in business together for the foreseeable future after the City Council approved a new 10-year project labor agreement Tuesday night.
The vote allows the city manager to execute a new overarching contract with the Los Angeles/Orange County Building and Construction Trades Council, clearing the way for its 48 different unions to work on city construction projects over a certain threshold. The group represents some 100,000 skilled workers in the region.
The agreement will apply through 2031 to all city projects over $750,000 as well as street-related and right-of-way projects over $1 million.
City officials estimate that could be mean the agreement would apply to 40-50 projects worth an estimated $266 million over the first five years. It’s expected to cost the city about one to two percent of the projects’ cost annually to administer the new agreement.
The original project labor agreement adopted by the City Council in 2015 ran for five years and covered projects over $500,000 but did not include street projects.
The new agreement was heralded as a “historic” move and a “monumental achievement” by the city as it locked in labor peace for at least the next decade after it took years to hammer out the previous agreement.
Under the 2015 agreement, the city and its construction partners completed nearly 20 projects, including multiple sports field improvements, wetlands restoration projects as well as the demolition of the old county courthouse and construction of the Seaside pedestrian bridge in downtown.
“It’s been a home run for us,” said Mayor Robert Garcia. “I’m really proud to be here again for this extension.”
While both agreements have local hire-provisions written into them, the city’s previous labor agreement came under fire from community groups who accused the city of not meeting the spirit of “local hire” because many Long Beach workers missed out on Long Beach jobs.
An average of 19% of hours worked on all jobs covered by the previous labor agreement were performed by people who lived in Long Beach. The majority of hours worked often went to the other two tiers of the labor agreement’s hiring pool, which included workers from gateway cities and those living in Los Angeles or Orange Counties.
One of the new provisions written into the agreement approved Tuesday is the requirement that a third-party jobs coordinator work on every project to help ensure that the city’s hiring requirements under the agreement are being met.
A jobs coordinator position was integrated into the old contract toward the end of its life in 2019. A request by Councilman Roberto Uranga for annual updates on who jobs were being assigned to was also approved along with the agreement.
Several members of the public and council spoke to the importance of the agreement and how it could help residents of disadvantaged communities work their way into the middle class.
One new rule written into the agreement is a requirement that unions give those seeking union jobs credit for provable past work on jobs, even if they were non-union.
It also more finely outlined what a disadvantaged worker is by adopting the guidelines from the Los Angeles Metro PLA.
To meet the definition, a person would have to live in an economically disadvantaged area and meet two of nine criteria, which include being a single parent, lacking a high school diploma, having a criminal record, or being a veteran of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
“You can tell that these agreements are really more than just jobs, they’re life for a family,” said Councilwoman Stacy Mungo Flanigan. “They’re breadwinners, community members who are able to have a living wage.”
The new agreement could become effective in the next few weeks as the council voted to extend a negotiating window until March 1, or until the agreement is executed, whichever occurs first.