The federal government is once again trying to interfere with your opportunity to bid on federal construction projects, and we need your help to stop them. The United States Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) released a bid solicitation for the new construction of the Research Office Building (ROB) at the VA Pittsburgh Healthcare System in Pittsburgh (SOL: VA10110RP0130) with a project labor agreement (PLA) attached to it. We’re hearing that various special interest groups used political pressure to attach the PLA mandate to ensure unionized contractors and their all-union workforces have a huge advantage over their nonunion counterparts for this much-needed work.
As you know, four out of every five construction workers in Pennsylvania have chosen not to join a labor union, yet the government is willing to increase costs for all taxpayers and discriminate against 80 percent of the industry just to reward Washington, D.C., special interest groups.
We need you to help us stop federal agencies like the Department of Veterans Affairs from making federal PLA mandates the norm for our construction market. It is time to put an end to Big Labor’s wasteful and discriminatory anti-competitive schemes.
It is vital for the construction industry and American taxpayers that projects be awarded to contractors that can deliver the best product, for the best price. Always.
There is still an opportunity to tell the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs NO to this proposed PLA. You can generate an email to contracting officer Frank A. Clemons and project manager Robert Bliss by clicking .
I am a construction contractor in Pennsylvania, and my firm is interested in the opportunity to build the Research Office Building (ROB) for the VA Pittsburgh Healthcare System in Pittsburgh (SOL: VA10110RP0130). Unfortunately, the bid specifications require this project to be built using a wasteful and discriminatory project labor agreement (PLA). This requirement will keep my company – and the 80 percent of Pennsylvania’s construction workforce that chooses not to join a union – from being able to compete for this project.
Attaching a PLA to this project will decrease competition, increase costs to taxpayers and limit the available pool of qualified contractors, which employ skilled and local construction professionals who could work on this job. Additionally, attempts to mandate PLAs on federal projects have led to costly delays and slowed the ability of agencies to get shovels into the ground.
The construction industry is facing record unemployment and unprecedented economic uncertainty. Work is scarce in our local construction market. The federal government needs to ensure that every qualified Pennsylvania business has a fair opportunity to compete for federal construction contracts. It is time to put the well-being of all taxpayers ahead of politically well-connected special interest groups – like Big Labor.
Please remove the anti-competitive and discriminatory PLA and let me help you deliver to taxpayers and the Department of Veterans Affairs the best possible construction project at the best possible price.
To learn more about PLAs, please visit us on www.thetruthaboutplas.com or Facebook.