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Your apprentices are barred from work under the Project Labor Agreement
by National Black Contractors Association
What is a ‘Project Labor Agreement’ (PLA)
San Diego and California state politicians raised Juneteenth flags to mark the end of enslavement for Black Americans and spoke at Black Juneteenth events telling us that Blacks have the right to be free and that slavery was wrong. They define emancipation as liberation, freedom from legal, social or political restriction. And that’s supposed to mean something now that Juneteenth is a federal holiday.
At the same time, they are approving a Project Labor Agreement (PLA) that sets political restrictions – outlaws – the Black Contractors Association Apprenticeship Program, which hires and trains Black apprentices, and also stops other non-union apprentices, all state and federally approved, from working on projects for the City of San Diego, County of San Diego, SANDAG (San Diego Association of Governments), MTS (Metropolitan Transit System) and San Diego City Schools – virtually all the public works jobs in San Diego.
What cities in California will be targeted next?
Blacks in San Diego make up 6% percent of the population and 25% of the homeless. This job lockout will put more Black families on the street. Some unions are open and fair to Black workers, but according to the LISC report, trade union-sponsored apprenticeship programs don’t hire and train Blacks in a meaningful way. So for politicians to outlaw the BCA’s apprenticeship program is a crime against Black Americans and humanity.
Some Black workers don’t understand this and are getting caught up in the hype of “better jobs, and better pay” as trade union workers. The fact of the matter is that 80% of the liberated construction industry works without PLA exclusions and are the ones building America. Workers are free to work union or non-union as an option and still be paid prevailing wages and have a chance to move up to better jobs. Yet those are the jobs that trade unions are trying to take away from non-union apprentices in trying to make public works projects union only.
According to the LISC report, trade union-sponsored apprenticeship programs don’t hire and train Blacks in a meaningful way.
Lawmakers, stop grandstanding on Black Americans while setting political restrictions to end the Black Contractors Association Apprenticeship Program.
Urgent call to action
The National Black Contractors Association is calling for public meetings with the policymakers to educate them and the public on the illegal exclusion of state-approved apprenticeships like the Black Contractors Association (BCA) by Project Labor Agreements (PLAs). PLAs impose Jim Crow policy on land owned by the taxpayers – opening all public works projects to closed shop trade union apprentices only.
We are inviting San Diego Mayor Todd Gloria, San Diego County Board of Supervisors Chairman Nathan Fletcher, San Diego City Councilmembers, Assembly members, SANDAG board members, San Diego Airport board members and Port of San Diego board members. To learn the time and additional meeting dates, contact National Black Contractors Association of U.S.A. Inc. National President and CEO Abdur-Rahim Hameed, 6125 Imperial Ave., San Diego, CA 92114, 619-263-9791, nationalbca@aol.com and visit the website, www.bcasd.org.
They need to know that the Project Labor Agreement will exclude BCA’s state-approved apprentices from working on public works projects, including those sponsored by the San Diego City Schools, San Diego County Government, City of San Diego, HUD affordable housing projects, SANDAG, San Diego Airport Authority, San Diego Metropolitan Transit System and the San Diego Water Authority.
All those government agencies might as well put a sign on all their projects – which are valued at many billions of dollars – announcing “NO BLACK CONTRACTORS,” because the only apprentices allowed to work will be in trade union-sponsored apprenticeship programs! Apprentices with the Black Contractors Association Apprenticeship Program will be locked out.
The state of California mandates that any apprentice who works on publicly funded projects must be a registered apprentice. It does not specify whether apprenticeship programs are so-called union nor non-union – only that they are registered with the state. Apprentices can be sponsored into an apprenticeship by any state-approved program, such as the Black Contractors Association’s Inner-city Community Unilateral Apprenticeship Committee or
the Carpenters Union. Apprenticeships are the only way for unskilled and under-employed Blacks to learn a construction trade, and the BCA is that open door for Blacks and the BIPOC community.
“Jim Crow laws” were used by state and local governments to legalize and enforce racial segregation. Those laws lasted for almost 100 years, from the post-Civil War era until around 1965, and their main purpose was to legalize the marginalization of African Americans in jobs and business opportunities and to promote economic exclusion.
This system of Jim Crow is now being used to force unionization on job seekers and to marginalize free enterprise African American businesses. Its main intent is to kill America’s first and only Black state- and federal-approved apprenticeship program by outlawing BCA’s apprenticeship program. The BCA program was approved by the California State Department of Industrial Relations (DIR), which California mandates to be used on any prevailing wage public works project that requires the hiring of apprentices.
Wake up, People, Jim Crow is back!
Make a donation today
Donations will be used for marketing materials, billboards, educational signs and much-needed legal support to fight this morally repugnant, illegal policy.
NO funds will be used for any union bashing. They don’t make laws; politicians do. Call Abdur-Rahim Hameed for more information at 619-865-9057.
Donate at https://www.bcasd.org/donations or mail to: National BCA, 6125 Imperial Ave., San Diego, CA 92114.
