PLA in the works in Anaheim? Say it ain’t so!
Apparently a group that includes a number of labor unions is trying to pressure the Anaheim City Council to include some kind of “community benefit agreement,” which sounds a lot like a project labor agreement, in a NFL stadium construction project, if the NFL grants a team to the ownership group in the OC, according to the L.A. Times.
To make matters worse, a Davis era holdover, Steve Peace, who you might recall was at the helm of the state energy mess, was involved with one of the San Diego developers that signed such a deal when the San Diego Padres Baseball Stadium was built.
Anaheim Council Members Bob Chavez and Lorri Galloway are supporting the union backed proposal. According to the Times, they are on the record as saying that they might vote against the stadium proposal if it does not “address community issues.”
The coalition of community groups and unions is calling itself OCCORD (Orange County Communities for Responsible Development). That’s quite a mouthful. My view of this issue is that if the unions want to weigh in on the stadium deal, they should use their pension money to buy into the ownership group.
I had to laugh when I read that the community/union proposal would ensure that jobs go to local workers. Less than 15% of the workers in the OC belong to unions, so really if you pass something like this, you will almost ensure that big union contractors from outside the area will get the project and will truck in union guys from surrounding counties and states. There just aren’t enough union workers in the OC to give them any preference.
You have to wonder how Anaheim Mayor Curt Pringle will handle this. He squished out on the OC PLA – and was in fact a driving force behind it. My guess is that he will sprain an ankle as he rushes to pander to the unions in return for their “support.” Once a union squish, always a union squish. Forget football – I say let’s support Arte Moreno and his Angels. That should irk Pringle too!
Art, you keep throwing out the misleading 15%. In the large contruction work there are plenty of union carpenters and building trades members in So Cal. And where there is a project agreement, the non-union members also get work…they just pay union dues for the life of the job and then decide whether they want to stay union or not. Of course the non-union company won’t want them to stay with the union, but they have the right to say yes or no.
Unions are good for working Americans.
A registered Republican.
Unions are good for working Americans.
A registered Republican.
I agree, and I wish more Republicans felt the same as you do. The next time your union has some sort of labor dispute, which party(ies) will stand up with you? Not the GOP, that’s for sure. Too bad.
Gila,
You mean like the supermarket strike that actually resulted in a raw deal for the workers? Nice job union bosses. No wonder so many workers are saying “no” to unions. In fact Toyota is now paying its non-union workers more than the union guys make at Ford and Chevrolet…
Art—If you don’t like unions why are you still a union member? And your wife too? Enjoying the benefits? I am not trying to be snide and I respect your right to say whatever you want about unions. But I thought your beef was with union bosses and not unions. Am I wrong?
Garzastrip,
My wife quit her job a couple weeks ago. I still work part-time as an instructor at Cerritos College, but the program I teach for is on summer break.
I joined the teacher’s union at Cerritos primarily so that I could stay informed as to what they are up to, but also so I could take positions on ballot measures and other campaigns and refer to myself as a “union member.”
I doubt I will ever get much out of the teacher pension fund, as it appears to be near bankrupt from what I have been reading in the paper of late.
As for unions in general, I don’t have a beef with their members, but yes I do disagree with their leaders most of the time. They are greedy and they rarely do the right thing for their members. Most of the strikes we have seen in the OC over the last few years have been a disaster for the union members.
I still maintain that unions are a thing of the past. As manufacturing continues to leave our shores, unions will likewise continue to fade away…