US

How Union Deals Have Derailed The California High-Speed Railway

REUTERS/Jason Lee

Daily Caller News Foundation logo
Font Size:

California’s attempt to connect the state with a high-speed railway system has faced major setbacks thanks in part to union deals.

The California High Speed Rail Authority (HSR) began construction in 2014 with the hopes of connecting close to a dozens cities. The project has faced major delays and financial difficulties. The Coalition for Fair Employment in Construction (CFEC) notes the railway is plagued with problems — including union influence.

“The approval was made in 2008 and since then they have basically been struggling to get anything beyond an initial amount that was approved,” CFEC Executive Director Eric Christen told The Daily Caller News Foundation. “The problem is that there’s no source of funding. The money that was approved with the vote isn’t even twenty percent of what they need to supposedly finish.”

Christen notes project organizers have been forced to find an additional $128 million in funding. The main issue is the project organizers at the beginning weren’t honest about the commitment the project would entail. Labor unions furthered the delays and costs for the little that has been done with the use of a project labor agreement (PLA).

“For the overpasses and for some of the initial groundwork that has been done,” Christen continued. “If you put this out to bid in a free, and open and competitive marketplace, free of the PLA, you would have had different results on those portions of it that have already been awarded, you would have different results than what you currently have.”

PLAs work like normal union contracts, but governor temporary projects in a given region. PLAs often prevent non-union companies from competing at a competitive rate by dictating wages and benefits. HSR spokeswoman Adeline Yee admits the project was delayed, but argues the problems that have been reported have been overblown.

“Construction did get off a bit slower than expected,” Yee told TheDCNF. “We had a lot of lawsuits that we had to handle, a lot of it had to do with getting the right of way to acquire the necessary permits for the gate construction. I think initially we were off to a slow start in actually getting some of the structures built, but since then we’ve made up a lot of time.”

State Building and Construction Trades Council of California (SBCTC) is the main labor group involved in the project. It is overseeing the labor agreements governing project workers and the local unions involved. Christen notes the full impact of its PLA has not even been fully realized and might never be because of how little progress has been made.

“I don’t think they’ll ever really get past phase one, which regards to actually breaking ground,” Christen continued. “What the PLA is emblematic of a lot of the deception that goes along with this. You’re limiting the ability of the people to work on this project to a very small group of unionized workers.”

The Associated Builders and Contractors (ABC) has done extensive research on what impact PLAs have on construction projects. ABC found the agreements in general tend to drive up costs for public projects and create delays. The agreements put additional burdens on taxpayers.

“The board of the California High-Speed Rail Authority gave Big Labor a huge favor in 2013, but it’s now blowing up in their face,” Center for Union Facts Executive Director Richard Berman told TheDCNF. “The project faces a multibillion-dollar shortfall and has been plagued by waste and inefficiency—which have been synonymous with Big Labor for too many years.”

Yee contends the union agreement is likely not a contributing factor to how much the project costs. She notes union and non-union companies alike could bid on the contracts. The bidding process was specifically designed to foster the best results and the best price for taxpayers.

“It’s a very competitive bidding process. The winning firm has to go through interviews, give a presentation and a plan of how we can meet expectations,” Yee continued. “We always try to take the best of the best, but also something that is economical as well. In doing so we are able to keep costs down.”

Nevertheless, PLAs have often been cited as giving unionized businesses an unfair advantage over non-union companies. Opponents note the agreements prevent non-union companies from competing for contracts at a competitive rate. The agreements essentially dictate the costs a company must operate by setting wage and benefit requirements.

“So-called Project Labor Agreements are an outrageous giveaway to union bosses at the expense of the taxpayers and workers who choose not to join a union,” National Right to Work Foundation said in a statement provided to TheDCNF. “Cost overruns and construction delays should be expected when contracts are given based on union status and ability to funnel forced union dues to favored politicians, instead of solely on merit.”

SBCTC did not respond to a request for comment by TheDCNF.

Follow Connor on Twitter

All content created by the Daily Caller News Foundation, an independent and nonpartisan newswire service, is available without charge to any legitimate news publisher that can provide a large audience. All republished articles must include our logo, our reporter’s byline and their DCNF affiliation. For any questions about our guidelines or partnering with us, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.

PREMIUM ARTICLE: Subscribe To Keep Reading

Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!

Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!
Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!

Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!
Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!

Sign Up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!
Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!
Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!
BENEFITS READERS PASS PATRIOTS FOUNDERS
Daily and Breaking Newsletters
Daily Caller Shows
Ad Free Experience
Exclusive Articles
Custom Newsletters
Editor Daily Rundown
Behind The Scenes Coverage
Award Winning Documentaries
Patriot War Room
Patriot Live Chat
Exclusive Events
Gold Membership Card
Tucker Mug

What does Founders Club include?

Tucker Mug and Membership Card
Founders

Readers,

Instead of sucking up to the political and corporate powers that dominate America, The Daily Caller is fighting for you — our readers. We humbly ask you to consider joining us in this fight.

Now that millions of readers are rejecting the increasingly biased and even corrupt corporate media and joining us daily, there are powerful forces lined up to stop us: the old guard of the news media hopes to marginalize us; the big corporate ad agencies want to deprive us of revenue and put us out of business; senators threaten to have our reporters arrested for asking simple questions; the big tech platforms want to limit our ability to communicate with you; and the political party establishments feel threatened by our independence.

We don't complain -- we can't stand complainers -- but we do call it how we see it. We have a fight on our hands, and it's intense. We need your help to smash through the big tech, big media and big government blockade.

We're the insurgent outsiders for a reason: our deep-dive investigations hold the powerful to account. Our original videos undermine their narratives on a daily basis. Even our insistence on having fun infuriates them -- because we won’t bend the knee to political correctness.

One reason we stand apart is because we are not afraid to say we love America. We love her with every fiber of our being, and we think she's worth saving from today’s craziness.

Help us save her.

A second reason we stand out is the sheer number of honest responsible reporters we have helped train. We have trained so many solid reporters that they now hold prominent positions at publications across the political spectrum. Hear a rare reasonable voice at a place like CNN? There’s a good chance they were trained at Daily Caller. Same goes for the numerous Daily Caller alumni dominating the news coverage at outlets such as Fox News, Newsmax, Daily Wire and many others.

Simply put, America needs solid reporters fighting to tell the truth or we will never have honest elections or a fair system. We are working tirelessly to make that happen and we are making a difference.

Since 2010, The Daily Caller has grown immensely. We're in the halls of Congress. We're in the Oval Office. And we're in up to 20 million homes every single month. That's 20 million Americans like you who are impossible to ignore.

We can overcome the forces lined up against all of us. This is an important mission but we can’t do it unless you — the everyday Americans forgotten by the establishment — have our back.

Please consider becoming a Daily Caller Patriot today, and help us keep doing work that holds politicians, corporations and other leaders accountable. Help us thumb our noses at political correctness. Help us train a new generation of news reporters who will actually tell the truth. And help us remind Americans everywhere that there are millions of us who remain clear-eyed about our country's greatness.

In return for membership, Daily Caller Patriots will be able to read The Daily Caller without any of the ads that we have long used to support our mission. We know the ads drive you crazy. They drive us crazy too. But we need revenue to keep the fight going. If you join us, we will cut out the ads for you and put every Lincoln-headed cent we earn into amplifying our voice, training even more solid reporters, and giving you the ad-free experience and lightning fast website you deserve.

Patriots will also be eligible for Patriots Only content, newsletters, chats and live events with our reporters and editors. It's simple: welcome us into your lives, and we'll welcome you into ours.

We can save America together.

Become a Daily Caller Patriot today.

Signature

Neil Patel