In 1978, President Jimmy Carter set a goal for women to hold 6.9% of work hours in the construction industry by 1982. Fast forward nearly 40 years and we aren’t even close. The national average sits somewhere between two and three percent. But there is cause for optimism, and one bright spot is Boston’s [&hellip…;

  This summer, voters in Fairfield, California approved Measure J, a $249 million bond for the Fairfield-Suisun School District. This week, after much handwringing, the board of trustees agreed to put a Project Labor Agreement (PLA) in place for all construction work funded by the measure: Trustees [met] with supporters and critics of…

  Nashville is booming. Davidson County’s unemployment rate is the second lowest in the state at 3.8%. And the Nashville Business Journal recently found that the city’s wealthiest zip codes have grown wealthier over the past three years. Unfortunately, they also found the poorest have grown poorer during the same stretch….

  This year, Maryland joined the surge in states cracking down on employee misclassification, and earlier this month the Maryland General Assembly approved new sanctions on employers who misclassify their workers as independent contractors. The “Recovery of Benefits and Penalties for Fraud Act” implements penalties for employers…

  West Virginia gubernatorial candidate Jim Justice (D) appears to be in a strong position heading into election day. Polling gives Justice a double-digit lead over his chief rival, state Senate president Bill Cole (R). A Repass Research poll shows Justice running at 44% to Cole’s 33%. The Justice campaign released their own poll…

  The City of New York saw yet another construction worker die on the job last week. The Department of Buildings (DOB) issued a stop work order immediately after the accident, which occurred at a Brooklyn hotel site. New York City has experienced a slew of fatal construction accidents of late, prompting local building trades [&hellip…;

  Canada’s Building Trades Unions (CBTU) celebrated the passage of Bill C-4 through the House of Commons last week. The bill aims to repeal anti-labor legislation, most notably Bill C-377, passed by the previous administration during a prior legislative session. C-377 aggressively targets labor unions with onerous bookkeeping and…

  According to a poll from WMUR and the University of New Hampshire, Sen. Kelly Ayotte (NH-R) is currently trailing Democratic challenger Gov. Maggie Hassan by eight points. It’s one of a handful of races that could determine whether Democrats are able to retake the Senate in November: The poll, which was conducted between Oct. 11 and…

  Earlier this month, U.S. scientists stumbled upon a way to convert carbon dioxide into ethanol. Carbon dioxide, or CO2, is a greenhouse gas that results from burning fossil fuels and contributes significantly to global warming. Ethanol is a far cleaner energy source that many, including the United States and Chinese governments, see as an…

  In Indiana, a St. Joseph County Council committee has been grappling with a bill that would give an advantage to local firms bidding on public works projects. After approving the bill 4-2 along party lines, the committee sent the “Responsible Bidder Ordinance” to the full county council for a vote, only to have the [&hellip…;

  UPDATE: The resolution has been voted on, but results have been difficult to come by. We will update this post when more information is available. The Oakland City Council is voting on a resolution that would guarantee jobs to African-American and female workers on all city-funded construction projects. Both demographics have typically…

  The Teamsters scored a couple victories in their ongoing battle to organize XPO Logistics. In a 72-49 vote last week, XPO warehouse workers in North Haven, Connecticut, became the first of the company’s warehouse workers to unionize in the United States: “This is all about us workers standing up to this corporate bully and…