Creative Construction has sued the NYC Council for 8 million alleging among other things racial discrimination and civil rights violations. The council has also been accused of bypassing the Out Of Work list and violating the new bylaws and thus the consent decree.
Creative Construction has accused the council of forcing substandard uncooperative, unskilled and non productive members who had been laid off by other contractors such as RCC Construction on the same job over to Creative instead of back to the Out Of Work List. The suit also alleges the council is by passing the Out of Work list and violating the consent decree by sending skilled members to non minority companies regardless of where they are on the list.
Council Reps Rambo and Betlewicz are accused of threats such as telling creative owner to “Lets go outside and settle this” and racists remarks such as. "You just hire your own kind” and “You minority’s take food out of my mouth.” There is also sexist remarks alleged by the Council against a Creative female project manger.
The Council is also accused of providing a non certified shop steward and harassing, threatening and intimidating any member not sent from the hall or placed on site by the council. The suit was filed on September 19, 2014.
Wednesday, October 15, 2014
New York District Council Sued for 8 Million By Minority SignatoryContractor
Thursday, August 21, 2014
Unions, Activists Align on Affordable Housing
A group of New York City construction unions have forged a coalition with affordable housing activists to ratchet up pressure on Mayor Bill de Blasio to require organized labor in the building of 80,000 lower-cost apartment units over the next decade.
The unions say they will begin supporting a call for 50% of the new units to be set aside for lower- and middle-income residents, a key tenet of the housing advocates' agenda and a departure from past practice in the city.
Unions are also willing to make an unusual concession, accepting wages that are 40% lower than normal union pay on affordable-housing projects in certain neighborhoods in Queens, Brooklyn, the Bronx and upper Manhattan for a new class of workers with less experience than existing members, many of them drawn from local communities.
The coalition would bring together two powerful interest groups who have traditionally been at odds. Much affordable housing has traditionally been built without union labor because developers, advocates and policy makers say that higher wages means fewer units.
Thursday, July 31, 2014
Picket Duty Opportunity - Join Build Up NYC
*OFFICIAL PICKET DUTY OPPORTUNITY
Saturday, July 19, 2014
Union Rally: Monday July 21, 2014 at 8:00
Join us on Monday and lets make some noise and turn this job UNION!
There is a rally scheduled on Monday July 21, 2014 at 8:00, at 25 Broadway, Manhattan, across from the Financial Bull downtown.
Tribeca Floors is the target. They are installing wood flooring and sub flooring, paying their top guy $21/hr cash and no benefits and a regular worker gets $15 to $18 dollars/hr no benefits.
The Coordinator is Gerry Matthews, stop bye and show your support and receive your picket duty credit.
Wednesday, September 11, 2013
Midday Rally at Pace
Their is a midday Rally tomorrow at 33 Beekman street, the site of a new 34 story Pace University Dormitory Tower.
Picket Duty Credit will be granted for this Rally. Contact Ruben Colon: Representative
NYCDC Area Standards Dept.
Rcolon@nycdistrictcouncil.org - Cell # ( 917 ) 376 - 5537
Thursday, August 15, 2013
Foes of Brooklyn's City Point get a court date
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| A rendering of the proposed City Point development in downtown Brooklyn. Photo credit: Rendering courtesy of Cook Fox Architects |
Labor unions fighting a legal challenge against a towering downtown Brooklyn development will get their day in court after all. Manhattan Supreme Court Judge Cynthia Kerns has set a Sept. 24 hearing for the case, which the city is fighting to dismiss, saying the unions have no grounds to bring the suit.
The unions argue that the massive City Point project along Flatbush Avenue, on the site of the former Albee Square Mall in the Fulton Square Mall in downtown Brooklyn, fails to provide promised wages for construction workers and quality permanent employment. Such jobs were laid out in the 2004 environmental review of the project, but the legal team argues they are unfulfilled, and that because of that the project's environmental review should be invalidated.
A union win could halt the project, which is already under construction.
Tuesday, August 6, 2013
Brooklyn Bridge Park to Union Workers: You Cost Too Much
By Joe Maniscalco
Brooklyn, NY - Brushing aside concerns about responsible development, safety standards, quality work, storm preparedness and more, the board tapped to oversee the ongoing construction of Brooklyn Bridge Park told union workers on Wednesday that employing them to build out a new section of the park at John Street would just cost too much money.
Ignoring a pro-labor Build Up NYC rally taking place just beneath them on Joralemon Street, members of the Brooklyn Bridge Park Board backed a move to acquire a 1.5 acre site at John Street from Con Edison, and use the services of a suspect contractor called Empire Pile and Foundations, Inc. to establish more parkland and mixed-use residential and retail space.
But the 17-member board of directors - already in retreat from their first floor offices on Furman Street where noise from previous Build Up NYC rallies had made them uncomfortable - took the action before providing the public - including union workers - with one last chance to speak out on the project.
“This is a public park,” said Dan Walcott, NYC District Council of Carpenters director of special projects. “It’s not a playground for this group. Mr. [Seth] Pinsky did everything to get that money but he cut out labor.”
Wednesday, July 31, 2013
Unions to protest at Brooklyn Bridge Park meeting Wednesday oversubcontractor that doesn’t even have a Buildings Department license
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Starwood Capital Group and Toll Brothers are building this condo and hotel development in Brooklyn Bridge Park — but union members say a subcontractor doesn’t treat workers properly. |
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| Brooklyn Stand Up!!! |
Saturday, July 13, 2013
Shame on Major League Baseball and Hudson Meridian
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| FOR LOWERING THE STANDARDS OF THE MIDDLE CLASS |
Shame on Major League Baseball and Hudson Meridian, for contributing to the erosion of area standards for New York City Carpenters. The New York City District Council of Carpenters has a labor dispute with Hudson Meridian which is performing work at South Queens Boys & Girls Club at 110 - 04 Atlantic Avenue in Richmond Hill , New York. Hudson Meridian hires sub - contractors that do not meet area labor wages and benefits , including providing or fully paying for family healthcare and pension benefits for all of its carpenter craft employees.The New York City District Council of Carpenters objects to substandard wage employers like Hudson Meridian working in the community. In our opinion the community ends up paying the tab for employee health care. Low wages tend to lower general community standards, there by encouraging crime and other social ills.
The New York City District Council of Carpenters believes that Major League Baseball and Hudson Meridian have an obligation to the community to see that the area labor standards are met for construction work performed on their current and future projects .They should not be allowed to insulate themselves behind “independent” contractors.
PLEASE CALL: Thomas C. Brasuell Vice President, Community Affairs Major League Baseball 245 Park Avenue , New York, NY 10167 212 - 931 -7897
Sunday, June 30, 2013
Rebound in NYC construction spending seen
Boom in spending by private sector, especially for residential projects, is expected to drive the total up 6.2% this year and by a whopping 17% next year—to a point just 2% below the peak in 2007 in real terms.
BY MATT CHABAN
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| Construction spending is expected to reach $32 billion this year, according to the New York City Building Congress. |
Construction spending is expected to reach $32 billion this year, according to the New York City Building Congress. That is a 6.2% increase over last year. Next year construction spending is predicted soar by 17% next year, to $37.3 billion. That is just 2% below spending levels in 2007, when adjusted for inflation.
"It's amazing, because this recovery is being driven by the private sector, which we had not expected," said Building Congress president Richard Anderson.
Leading that charge is a remarkable rebound in residential construction, which is expected to build 13,800 units this year and 16,900 next year. That is up from 11,000 last year and a sclerotic 6,000 units at the depths of the recession in 2009. And the dollars being pumped into the economy are more, as well, since developers are taking on more expensive and complicated high-rise projects. Residential spending will reach $6 billion this year and $8 billion next—more than four times the $2.3 billion spent in 2010.
This means not only good news for New Yorkers desperately seeking apartments but also construction workers, who had long been out of work. And yet residential construction has not quite reached pre-recession levels, when 30,000 units were being built a year for four consecutive years, from 2004 to 2007.
"I don't think it's a bubble because you're seeing strength in a number of sectors," Mr. Anderson said.
Construction employment across all sectors is expected to reach 120,000 jobs this year, up from 115,000 last year, while 10,000 more jobs are predicted to be added next year.
Another important factor is institutional work, which has been strong the past few years as hospitals, universities and other private universities have continued to expand. Commercial construction, of offices, hotels and retail spaces, continues to grow, as well, as the economy in general, and the tourist economy in particular, strengthens. Overall, non-residential private spending will grow 38% this year, to $13.5 billion, from $9.8 billion, and it will expand a further $2 billion next year, according to projections.
The one weak spot is government work, though even it has remained stronger than expected. In 2009 and 2010, the industry was woefully dependent on public sector work, which accounted for nearly two-thirds of all projects. Now, at $12.4 billion in 2013 spending, it has fallen to 40% of the market. Last year, public spending was $15.1 billion. There is some anticipated growth in 2014, to $13.8 billion.
The latest construction estimates are the mid-year update of the New York Building Congress' annual Construction Outlook, which is released in October, and it shows significant promise because the numbers have been upgraded significantly from previous estimates, when construction was predicted to only reach $30.2 billion, about $1.8 billion below the new estimate. Furthermore, the market was expected to contract in 2014, to $29.1 billion, rather than the new estimate of $37.3 billion.
Mr. Anderson credits the city itself. "I think fundamentally, it's New York," he said. "There's a lot of confidence in the future of the city. People are living here, they're buying here, they're working here, institutions are investing. People are putting money into the city because they believe in the city."
Thursday, June 6, 2013
Monday, May 13, 2013
Carpenters rally at BAM on Lafayette Street to protest real estate development summit
Union carpenters, workers, trade unions, community leaders and politicians rallied last week to protest a real estate development summit.
The summit was being held at the Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM) on Lafayette Street.The protesters are demanding that the real estate developers include unions and local residents in any new development projects.
Friday, May 10, 2013
Union Members Protest Frieze Labor Policy, Andrea Bowers Joins the Fray
As a stream of taxicabs and black SUVs began pulling up at the south entrance of Frieze New York for today’s VIP preview, a red-eyed inflatable rat glared down at the procession from the side of the road.
At its feet, a crowd of roughly 30 people was gathered to listen to New York City Comptroller and mayoral candidate John Liu speak out against the fair’s labor policies.
“This is not the last time we’re going to have to set up this rat out here–we’ll do it as often as it takes,” he told the crowd.
Labor union representatives gathered outside the fair said they opposed Frieze New York’s use of exclusively non-union labor. Though they staged a similar protest protest against Frieze New York, Production Glue, LLC–the fair’s production company–and Deutsche Bank, last year as well, that protest was less visible.
“There are more unions involved now,” said Bernadette Kelly, who works for Teamsters Union Joint council 16. “Last year, it was primarily the district Council of Carpenters and Teamsters Local 807 and 817. We’re also now accompanied by the operating engineers–Local 30–and the Painters Union and IATSE locals 1 and 829.”
Ms. Kelly said that fair officials have refused to meet with labor union representatives. “All they do is issue statements that say there is no labor dispute going on”—she was cut off by a big red teamsters truck honking its horn wildly as it drove by, eliciting cheers from the crowd.
Frieze New York did not return Gallerist’s requests for comment.
Friday, May 3, 2013
Coalition sues city and developers to halt City Point construction, charging poverty-level wages are paid
"Everyone's mad as hell and we're not going to take it anymore," says union official
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| Union members demonstrate at City Point site. |
Unions and community groups that have charged City Point developers with paying poverty-level wages headed to court Wednesday to try to halt construction at the mega-project.
Their suit filed in Manhattan Supreme Court against city officials and developers asks that work at the downtown Brooklyn development be stopped and a new study done of the impact of construction workers’ low wages on the economy in nearby neighborhoods.
“Everyone’s mad as hell, and we’re not going to take it anymore,” said Richard O’Kane of Ironworkers Local 361, one of the unions suing Mayor Bloomberg, city housing agencies, Acadia Realty Trust and other real estate firms.
Workers are being paid $15 per hour with no benefits at the 1.9 million-square-foot project at DeKalb and Flatbush Aves. which includes 650,000 square feet of shops and 650 apartments, the suit alleges.
At that rate, advocates calculated, a “fully employed worker” would work 1,500 hours and gross an annual $22,500, below the poverty level for a family of four.
Thursday, May 2, 2013
Build Up NY: 'There Ought To Be A Law' For Good Jobs
By Joe Maniscalco
New York, NY - A powerful group of building trade organizations and elected officials - including a trio of mayoral candidates - is calling for new legislation that could soon make good jobs a prerequisite to building anywhere within the five boroughs. (Watch Video)
Huge developers like Starwood Capital, The Moinian Group and Acadia Realty, currently benefit from generous public subsidies. But critics charge that the jobs resulting from their construction projects are increasingly substandard, and a drain on the community, while the buildings themselves are shoddy.
“Money is coming from the public, it should go back to the public,” said Daniel Walcott, director of special projects for the New York City District Council of Carpenters. “It’s the way things have been done for many years in the city, and that’s the way they should continue. It’s not a race to the bottom. It’s a race to the top, and to quality. That’s what we’re looking for.”
The New York City District Council of Carpenters is a member of Build Up NYC, a broad-based coalition of 200,000 private sector union members advocating for the kind of responsible development that not only benefits wealthy CEOs, but blue collar men and women as well.
On Tuesday, members of the coalition rallied next to City Hall, vowing to push through new legislation that changes the way business is done in New York City.
Thursday, April 18, 2013
Building Trades Jeer Rise of Low-Wage Construction Jobs
By Marc Bussanich
New York, NY—Members of the New York City Building Trades rallied outside the properties of family-owned Reider Holdings and Sam Zell’s Equity Residential on the West Side to protest the developers’ refusal to hire union ironworkers, plumbers and sheet metal workers. (Watch Video)
Kevin Kelly of the Metallic Lathers and Reinforcing Ironworkers Local 46 said that an increasing number of developers building projects throughout the city are paying lower wages to non-union workers.
“Developers like Sam Zell who come to New York are paying their workers far less than what they need to live in New York. The workers I’ve talked to at these sites have said they’re making $15 or $20 an hour but aren’t receiving health care benefits or pension contributions,” said Kelly.
Friday, April 5, 2013
Building unions labor for traction
Despite pick up in construction activity, developers still have edge in negotiations
BY DANIEL GEIGER
In another sign of a rebound in the housing market, the Zeckendorf brothers announced in December that they will build a 44-story, $500 million condominium tower across from the United Nations. Predictably, given the location and the siblings' track record as arguably the most successful ultra-high-end residential developers in the city, the units are expected to fetch tens of millions of dollars apiece.
What is surprising, though, is that those apartments will be built using a special package of work-rule and wage concessions from construction unions that is expected to shave as much as 20% off labor costs—a savings of millions of dollars.
Such agreements became common during the recession. Their continued use as the market recovers, especially by developers of some of the city's priciest projects, marks a departure from past recoveries, when labor costs typically have bounced back with a vengeance to drive construction costs to new highs. This time around, early indications are that the old, notoriously volatile pattern may be changing—a shift that most observers credit to the striking rise of nonunion contractors in recent years.
"A [developer] today has options," said Louis Coletti, president of the Building Trades Employers Association, a group that represents union contractors.
Instead of simply "take it or leave it," these days developers of all but the very largest of projects can opt to hire nonunion contractors, or use that option as a threat to negotiate lucrative concessions from unionized ones.
Among the current rising crop of gold-plated condos whose developers have negotiated such special project labor agreements, or PLAs, are the TriBeCa tower at 56 Leonard St., the 16-story high-end condo at 150 Charles St. in the Village, and 432 Park Ave., the city's tallest residential building, an 89-story, $1 billion project.
Wednesday, April 3, 2013
Unions examine share options
Think of it as a union of unions.
A number of New York City’s labor organizations are pooling their resources to campaign for “responsible development” by drawing attention to developers who employ non-union labor and — according to the workers’ representatives — drive down incomes and standards of living across the city’s workforce.
“Everybody loves talking about the shrinking middle class, and it’s about time to do something about it,” said William Hohlfeld, a labor management representative with Local 46 and member of the Build Up NYC coalition.
The premise of the coalition is that developers have an influence over the city that continues even after construction is complete.
“What our research shows — and this should come as no surprise to no one — is developers who come into New York, if they decided to develop non-union, they go on and own, operate and maintain non-union,” Hohlfeld said.
Build Up NYC is headed by Gary LaBarbera, president of the Building and Construction Trades Council of Greater New York, and it’s ranks are made up representatives of the various council member unions as well as the Service Employees International Union and the Hotel Workers’ Union.
Building Trades is made up of unions representing workers in a variety of construction trades, while SEIU represents service workers, including janitors, security guards and doormen.
“It’s a coalition of working people, and we certainly hope that it’s going to grow even larger,” Hohlfeld said.
In February the group organized a protest near 237 West 54th Street, where Starwood Capital and the Moinian Group are developing a Hilton Hotel using non-union labor. Later this month, they plan another street action tied to Starwood’s planed development in Brooklyn Bridge Park.
“There’s a lot of public money involved there,” Hohlfeld said of the project.
A video on the Build Up NYC website features union members who described their working lives before they joined their unions. They describe working off the books, being paid in cash, receiving no benefits, working multiple jobs, and being unable to buy Christmas presents for their children.
“Nobody’s saying that developers are not entitled to a profit,” Hohlfeld said. “Profit is a wonderful thing. It’s just a question of how are we going to spread this profit around.”
Source: Real Estate Weekly
Friday, March 29, 2013
Union-wages war heats up and threatens City Point project
A fair-wages war over the City Point mega-development in Downtown Brooklyn heated up today when its developer accused the Building and Construction Trades Council of trying to hold up construction by ending negotiations.
“After months of discussing in good faith the terms of a possible Project Labor Agreement, we were disappointed by the Building and Construction Trades Council’s decision to terminate negotiations unilaterally,” Paul Travis, managing partner of project co-developer Washington Square Partners, said in a letter to Gary LaBarbera, president of the BCTC.
“As you know, our agreement with the city requires local, minority and women contracting and employee participation regardless of whether a union contractor is hired. We have made it our priority to meet these obligations. In Phase 1 of City Point, over 50 percent of contract dollars went to such firms. Over 80 percent of the employees were local residents or members of minority groups.
“Unfortunately, the deal the BCTC wanted to make would have put these commitments to our neighbors in jeopardy— this is a point of contention that is not a viable position for the Brooklyn community.”
However, LaBarbera later fired back that his group never broke up negotiations, that Travis' letter was filled with "false" statements and that the developers showed “a lack of character and integrity” by distributing the letter to the media on Good Friday.
“The fact is that the Building and Construction Trades Council of Greater New York did not break off negotiations,” LaBarbera said in a statement. “What we refused to accept is a racist, discriminatory and disgusting offer from the development team that would have effectively agreed to have employees -- except those of minority and women-owned business enterprises -- enjoy the good wages and benefits that come with union representation.
“In effect, the development team asked us to agree that employees of MWBEs be treated as second-class citizens and that the bulk of the development team’s financial concerns be balanced on the backs of the employees of these MWBEs.”
A City Point spokesperson later responded that, "It's unfortunate that BCTC is making inflammatory claims instead of working with us to get an agreement that can keep minority workers on the job while employing the union's members."
Source: NY Post
Wednesday, March 27, 2013
Coalition calls for halt to City Point project, charging workers are paid poverty-level wages
By Lore Croghan / NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
Unions and community groups are calling on the Bloomberg Administration to halt construction work at the City Point mega-project.
The city should stop the massive downtown Brooklyn development at DeKalb and Flatbush Aves. while it does a new study of the impact of low wages developers are paying, the groups said.
“We know that construction workers are being paid poverty wages at City Point and they are not getting any benefits,” said Terry Moore of Metallic Ironworkers Local 46.
Workers are being paid $15 per hour at the 1.6 million-square-foot residential and commercial development, the advocates charged — which adds up to $22,500 per year, below the city’s poverty level for a family of four.
