25 Comments - dave - Tuesday, Jul 20, 10 @ 10:12 am: Well done by both the Quinn admin and the unions. The unions played this perfectly - they were able to settle with the smaller associations, which in turn placed HUGE pressures on MARBA to settle. The Quinn admin then had the leverage to tell MARBA that they could get the contractors/workers elsewhere, which forced MARBA to settle. And the fact that the smaller associations were willing to settle showed MARBA to be the greedy ones, not the unions. This is a great example of how to use leverage to achieve your desired goals. - jonbtuba - Tuesday, Jul 20, 10 @ 10:14 am: Next time Brady implies Quinn is anti-business, I’ll think back on this and chuckle at the lunacy of such a statement. Good work, Governor. - leigh - Tuesday, Jul 20, 10 @ 10:17 am: Illinois needs to be a right to work state. Why in the world is extortion by a union being looked upon in a favorable light? Quinn needs to go, anyone that beholden to unions cannot serve our state fairly. - dave - Tuesday, Jul 20, 10 @ 10:22 am: Why in the world is extortion by a union being looked upon in a favorable light? Ha! You do realize that the union was able to make deals with all the small associations, right? And that it wasn’t the union holding out, or delaying negotiations, or not upholding their end of the collective bargaining agreements, correct? It was MARBA. MARBA thought that they had the leverage, because the public wouldn’t like the unions holding up work. And MARBA WAY overplayed their hand, and showed their greed, as the rest of the associations were able to settle very quickly as soon as they broke away from MARBA. Again, very well done by the unions and Quinn. And right now MARBA looks like this: http://tinyurl.com/347vydn - Confused - Tuesday, Jul 20, 10 @ 10:22 am: I am geninuely baffled by jobbtuba and dave’s comments– so the Governor effectively threatening contractors into capitulating to the union demands is *good*?? I guess it is good for Quinn’s political aspirations, but I fail to see how adding a 10 percent markup on future project work for the state is good for taxpayers… - dave - Tuesday, Jul 20, 10 @ 10:26 am: Oh… and didn’t MARBA, just yesterday, say that there was no way that they would settle for the same thing that the unions settled for with all the other associations? @Confused - Quinn used his leverage to get people back to work. That, to me, is a good thing, for everyone involved. And everyone else that will benefit by more money being in the economy sooner. And from infrastructure improvements that are badly needed. - anon - Tuesday, Jul 20, 10 @ 10:35 am: Congrats taxpayers of Illinois you will be paying more for all construction work. IDOT signing a PLA with the state would then give an open checkbook to the unions. Labor is a pass through cost, the “rich” owners only get a markup on it. Isnt Illinois broke? I wonder how many uinion jobs this will actually cost in the long run. - wordslinger - Tuesday, Jul 20, 10 @ 10:48 am: MARBA got beat like a rented mule. Why did they think the public would back them? People actually don’t like road construction. They like roads, but not road construction. - Small Town Liberal - Tuesday, Jul 20, 10 @ 10:58 am: - Congrats taxpayers of Illinois you will be paying more for all construction work. - Where do you work? Are you willing to never get a raise or have your benefits increased to meet rising gosts so that the cost of whatever good or service you provide doesn’t go up? No? Then shut up. - Small Town Liberal - Tuesday, Jul 20, 10 @ 11:02 am: *costs, not gosts - Sacks Romana - Tuesday, Jul 20, 10 @ 11:11 am: I hate when people complain about union pay-raises because they haven’t gotten a raise in months/years in the private sector. That’s the point of collective bargaining! Most of us would be much more forceful with our bosses and managers (both immediate supervisors and higher-ups) if we weren’t afraid of immediate and petty retaliation. I like it when I read about the little guy getting a raise. It’s ridiculous that private sector employees are jealous of 3%/year raises. When the public sector is truly strong, the private sector starts paying more to be competitive. Oh yeah, and we get nice roads. In my opinion, a great use of tax dollars. - Shemp - Tuesday, Jul 20, 10 @ 11:42 am: So merit state workers are told by Quinn to take 24 furloughs, most without a prior 14% raise, then he or his administration strong arms for a union settlement of 3.25% a year. Sensible. Sitting on the precipice of a deflationary when a lot of private businesses and local governments are freezing wages and/or furloughing, and yet we’re coughing up 3.25% more per year because the governor’s administration thinks that is in everyone’s interest? As usual, no one in the State government can tell a union or a special interest “no.” No one can take a gutsy stand they may cost votes, but save the State’s budget and the taxpayers. It’s one thing to stomach the governor’s proposed income tax increase because everything has fallen apart and we can’t afford to do what we’re already doing, it’s another to constantly drive up the cost of operating the State and then have the nerve to ask for a tax increase. - 4 percent - Tuesday, Jul 20, 10 @ 11:49 am: So the union and Quinn administration thinks its OK to bring in “replacement contractors.” I assume they will have the same sentiments during the next strike when employers bring in “replacement workers”? This is another example of a government entity throwing its power around and tilting the playing field between business and labor. - todd - Tuesday, Jul 20, 10 @ 11:50 am: Well that sound you here is what’s her name spinning like a top to figure out what happened. 24 hours ago MARBA was calling the healthcare COLA:”astronomical and unrealistic.” the whole quote in the media was…. “Lissa Christman is a spokeswoman representing construction contractors. She says union demands are “astronomical and unrealistic.”" And what did Drucilla have to say about those other associations…. “Lissa Druss Christman, a MARBA spokeswoman, said the association was “really suspect of this whole situation” regarding the tentative contract agreement, but that it would have “no relevance” on the resumption of major road projects and other construction projects affected by the strike.” 7/16/10 “MARBA issued a press release saying the CAICA agreement will not affect its ongoing negotiations with the unions.” 7/16/10 “Unfortunately, these small firms will be the ones suffering when they realize the poor economic package they’ve accepted. ….. This strike may go on for a while until the unions gets serious about recognizing today’s economic realities to help us secure work and put their members back on the job, and until that happens we may have a long way to go.” MARBA Letter 7/15/10 I guess the they showed us. MARBA got the same deal that was given to The inde[endents, Illinois Valley & Will/Grundy. They could have had this deal 3 months ago. From the start we said all we wanted to do was cover the inlfationary costs of benefits. It was the greed of the contractors trying to break the little guys and the unions that kept them out. Taking two weeks off of bargaining. how is it that we ended up right where we said we would?? Our guys have seen a reduction on average of 600 hours per year. That is equal to 15 WEEKS of furloughs not days WEEKS alomst 4 months. so after all that, some here think that we should eat another 20% paycut and any other increases that came along. Not gonna happen. After we had been gopod stewards of our funds and benefits, for the contractors to back away from what we needed to keep things running was flat out wrong. consider, last year after cutting our pension mulitplier, knowing that our administration would be up for elelction in less than 12 months, we also took a $1 from our benefits and put it into the reserves where the member doesn’t get credit for it on his pension. so if $10 was goin in, you as the member got credit for $9. to help keep the fund solvent and avoid the feds mandating actions be taken. We did that without going back tot he bargaining table and it was a manegment proposal for the $1. we we looking at .50 but they demanded $1. Now when we go tot he table and say, we put inour $1, you put in $1 — becuase if you don’t, and the fund goes insolvent, EACH OF YOUR companies is liable for x% of that unfunded laibility. so by putting money in now, you avoid a doomsday whee each company could owe considerable sums. they wanted to walk away from it. After we acted prudently, and took their higher proposel which wasn’t real popluar nor politcally smart for us. But we told our members we would not play ploitics with their pension and do the right thing. Thats what we did. It was right then, its right today and fighting for that through this strike was the right thing to do. some have balked about rasing costs to taxpayers and for projects. The Dan Ryan project jumped frm $500 million to almost a 1 BILLION. Not becuase of labor costs — those were fixed and factored in. but because of material cost increases like steel and concrete. Now IDOT and others are telling us bids are coming in 30% lower than they expected. Why? labor hasn’t gone down. Steel hasn’t really gone down. Fuel costs haven’t gone down. So the differance in project costs is minimal and I suspect the cost of selling binds will do more to available money for projects than $2.15/hr. so the little ice queen can get back on her broom and claim triumph, indignation or what ever she wants. Next time you come to play in our sandbox, pack a lunch. And BTW, so how much did you cost MARBA, and how much are they gonna loose since the independents get the .07 cents an hour MARBA use to get from the contract. Nice job. - Quinn supporter - Tuesday, Jul 20, 10 @ 1:38 pm: Quinn just told the contractors in no uncertain terms to either crap or get off the pot. Got a problem with that? - reality check - Tuesday, Jul 20, 10 @ 1:59 pm: Well at least we found out during the strike that Project Labor Agreements don’t function during a work stoppage. Hope the next administration gets rid of these one sided, pro-union, costly behemoths. - Rich Miller - Tuesday, Jul 20, 10 @ 2:01 pm: ===Well at least we found out during the strike that Project Labor Agreements don’t function during a work stoppage.=== They didn’t have PLAs on the big IDOT projects. They had them on the tollway and they kept working pretty much, except when they couldn’t get supplies. - todd - Tuesday, Jul 20, 10 @ 2:46 pm: Reality Check – Project labor agreements have several components. one is we give up our right to strike in exchange for all the work being done with union labor. the strike is the best tool we have. When hundreds of other workers honor it and bring a job to a halt is is a powerful tool. Project labor agreements alos have contractual clauses. For instance PLAs might referance how jurisdictional disputes are settled as weel as how work is assigned. Or they may have clauses that the contractor be signatory to a CURRENT agreement. So the contractor has to live up to his end of the deal — no contract — no PLA protection. We didn’t strike those jobs. We honored the PLA. But the State acting as the consumer choose to enforce the contract/PLA on the bidder. If they we not going to live up to their end, they could be removed for breach of contract. Nothing unfair about it. The PLA worked, just as it should have. And we are not necessarily big fans of PLAs as it takes away our right to strike. Nothing getting general contractors and their clients more pi**ed off then having their project shut down. you want to see a thing of beauty, watch what happens when we walk up in the middle of a 500 yard concrete pur and throw up a picket and have guys start to walk off. No crane, no concrete gets up to the 20th floor. You want to see a general jump through their ass when hundreds of yards of concrete is sitting on the trucks with no where to go. That’s a circus. And you get results fast. But PLAs cover job sites. They don’t cover making the rock, hauling the rock or the contractor doing the hauling. They pertain to that site and the work being preformed on that site. Not everything connected to that contractor. So you had a couple of contractors trying to take advantage of having PLAs and still doinging work, earning money while others sat home and starved, dragging out the stike/negotiations. You can get rid of the PLA, just means three years from now, when we dance again, We’ll be able to shut all those jobs down. And since all the asphalt plants will be closed, you won’t get any mix. And since we represent all the quarries in the area you won’t get any stone. And since we represent all the equipment rental shops you won’t get any iron or mechanics from within 200 miles. Did I mention we represent more lowboys than the Teamsters? - - ! ***** - Quinn supporter - Tuesday, Jul 20, 10 @ 2:52 pm: Union Yes!!!!! - reality check - Tuesday, Jul 20, 10 @ 3:41 pm: ====They had them on the tollway and they kept working pretty much, except when they couldn’t get supplies.==== Rich, really? Is that why the Tollway announced it was ready to stop all work this Thursday if the strike wasn’t resolved? Todd, of course I know PLA’s only cover the actual jobsite. But if you can’t get materials, or haul off old concrete, or access your own yard to get equipment, you have effectively shut down the job. Again, checkout the statement issued by the Tollway this week before the settlement. - todd - Tuesday, Jul 20, 10 @ 4:04 pm: RC — so what is the problem. you don’t understand PLAs? Or labor law? Which is it? PLAs work just fine 99% of the time when both sides do what they should. But greedy contractors who were prolonging the strike didn’t care since they were not impacted as much. you want us to give up our right to strike across the board and red circle contractors? I don’t think so. the same guys that didn’t want to sit down for two weeks — again I don’t think so. there is a reason they are called PROJECT Labor Agreements. Go ahead, do away with them and see what you get next time. But maybe the contractors will understand we did our part by having a 95% market share. So their only competition is other union contractors. We built a training site to have the best.most qualified guys around. And if you want a fight, then don’t bring a knife to a nuclear war. One of their guys said it best. They build things — roads, bridges, buildings. This is what they (150) does for a living. They will be 5 moves ahead of us no matter what we do. Like I said take away the PLAs. We’ll have more places to strike next time and maybe the Lorrigs and Rocks won’t be so quick to go along with “their” goofy ideas. - leigh - Tuesday, Jul 20, 10 @ 7:21 pm: Reading all of this just makes me believe more that Illinois needs to become a right to work state. - united and strong - Tuesday, Jul 20, 10 @ 9:53 pm: God bless Jim Sweeney, Steve Cisco and the working men and women of Local 150 who have the gumption to stand up for (what’s remaining of) the middle class. Also, I agree with everything Todd says. - anon - Tuesday, Jul 20, 10 @ 10:17 pm: leigh, your correct. 10% unemployment in this state. Put a sign up that says now hiring $50.00/hr and watch the line grow. Union won this battle, I hope they dont lose sight of the war. - dave - Wednesday, Jul 21, 10 @ 9:10 am: Reading all of this just makes me believe more that Illinois needs to become a right to work state. Saying something, twice, doesn’t make it true. You could at least say why the state should be a right to work (and not have any rights and not get paid decently) state. Sorry, comments for this post are now closed.