Labor agreement changes nixed

After six months of talking about the city's project labor agreement, the Cloquet City Council voted Tuesday to change absolutely nothing.

The decision was not unanimous by any means. The council voted on two resolutions related to the PLA: the first, a motion to increase the city funding level that triggers the PLA from $175,000 to $250,000, which failed to get the required supermajority of five when councilors Bun Carlson and Lyz Jaakola voted no. The second failed motion was to add language to the PLA agreement which would require non-union contractors to pay prevailing wage to employees rather than abiding by the PLA.

Generally, under the terms of a PLA, construction unions have bargaining rights to determine the wage rates and benefits of all employees working on a project. The terms of the agreement apply to all contractors and subcontractors working on the project, although they do not have to be union companies themselves. Benefit pay goes to the union, and if the employee is not a union member, he or she may never qualify for those benefit funds, which are retained by the union in that case. PLAs also typically require that employees hired for the project are referred through union hiring halls - in this case, the Duluth Building and Construction Trades Council.

Although the PLA remains unchanged, this time the council did due diligence before voting, unlike most past PLA actions. Tuesday's vote came after extensive discussion over six months, since the council overturned the PLA by a 4-3 vote in May and then overturned that decision at the very next meeting by the same vote, after Ward 2 councilor Sheila Lamb asked for a new vote and changed her vote to one in support of the PLA.

Tuesday's vote for adding the prevailing wage requirement to the city's PLA actually tied, with councilors Lamb, Lyz Jaakola and Chris Swanson voting against the proposed change, and councilors Kerry Kolodge and Bun Carlson, along with mayor Roger Maki, voting in favor of the change. At-large councilor Lara Wilkinson was absent, and the tie vote meant the motion failed.

While the majority of input over the past six months has come from union leaders and members who have attended council meetings regularly and pushed to be heard, this week's meeting had an unexpected guest.

Local businessman Adam Kiminski addressed the council during the public comment portion at the start of the meeting, whiteboard in hand, saying he wanted to explain how the PLA works as someone whose business was previously not union, but which changed to all-union about five years ago. He didn't have a dog in this fight, but realized a lot of elected officials - including past councilors - don't truly understand how PLAs impact a non-union contractor or employee, he said.

"It's important to me to at least say I wouldn't be here now if every job I did for the government required a PLA," he said. "In favor or not in favor, I just don't think that non-union guys have a fair chance at some of those issues," he added.

The city can correct unfair bid advantages by non-union contractors by requiring prevailing wage, he said. If prevailing wage is $30, then both union and non-union workers get the same wage: union employees' benefit pay goes to the union and non-union employees get the additional hourly rate (which he estimated at $20), which would go toward benefits, directly in their paychecks.

Regarding claims of PLAs preventing work stoppages or resulting in better work, Kiminski said with equal pay there are rarely stoppages and suggested payment performance bonds and inspections ensure quality of work.

"I owned a non-union company for 15 years before we became union and we have the same standard of work and quality then as we do now," he said.

"I'm a proud union contractor and part of what makes me proud is we made that decision without being forced to."

Later in the meeting, during the actual PLA discussion by the council, mayor Roger Maki did not allow any union officials or other audience members to speak, which frustrated Dan Olson, secretary of the Duluth Building and Construction Trades Council, who said he might challenge the city's "Robert's Rules of Order" because he was not allowed to speak or sign up to speak on Tuesday.

"You've had the opportunity to speak many times," Maki said.

Lamb asked city administrator Tim Peterson to explain why the city wouldn't just stick with the recently discovered action by a long-ago council to require prevailing wage instead of introducing it into the PLA. Peterson, who has advocated for the council to eliminate the PLA, said he would be happy to have the city follow the previous prevailing wage vote, but said the PLA "would be breaking our own resolution and ordinance as well."

"I would say that the project labor agreement has since taken over for that," he said. This would make it so we handle union and non-union contractors as they are. They're different; they're separate."

Councilor Jaakola asked mayor Maki if it was the city's legal opinion that the PLA takes the place of the prior ordinance, "or is that Tim Peterson's opinion?"

Councilor Kolodge said the issue of the prevailing wage was not raised when the first PLA vote was taken in 2017. Peterson said the two documents could not coexist.

Jaakola said she would vote to support the PLA as it was already written and have a separate discussion on prevailing wage.

Kolodge voted to add prevailing wage, he said, because he thought the city's PLA helps some workers but it doesn't help all the workers in the city. "I was elected by all the workers in my ward," he said. "I'm not here to take any benefits away from the union workers. But I'm here to even the playing field and to get benefits for everybody."

When the vote tied, Maki attempted to break the tie with a second vote, but that was not allowed because he's already voted, thus the motion just died.

Earlier this year, the council - with Duluth Building Trades' blessing - removed requirements that employees join the union this spring, after a lawsuit was filed targeting the cities of Cloquet, Two Harbors and Duluth for their PLAs. The lawsuit has not been resolved yet.

In other matters, Phase 1 of the 14th Street project has been completed and the street is open to traffic again. The city also welcomed new finance director, Katie Bloom, to the meeting Tuesday.