Oakland Port Commission renews Project Labor Agreement

Focus on local hiring in building and construction trades

Oakland, CA – January 29, 2016: The Port of Oakland Board of Port Commissioners has renewed a project labor agreement that will increase East Bay hiring for Port-related capital projects. The five-year pact approved last night is intended to boost earnings for local workers that totaled $4.4 million in FY14-15 and increase the number of local workers entering the construction industry.

“Our goal was to update the original agreement to strengthen the Port’s role in promoting local hiring and growing a pipeline of future talent in the construction and building trades,” said Port of Oakland Director of Social Responsibility Amy Tharpe. “The future of the construction industry depends on strong partnerships between industry, labor, and the communities they serve to build a workforce that creates good, family-sustaining jobs for workers.”

The agreement is designed to:

• Increase hiring of local apprentices by partnering with the Alameda County Building and Construction Trades;
• Ensure that 25% of locally-hired apprentices are those experiencing barriers to employment;
• Enhance the Port’s Small Business Enterprise Program to make it easier for small businesses to do business with the Port; and
• Provide truckers with more employment opportunities on Port capital projects

The Port of Oakland created a Maritime Aviation Project Labor Agreement (MAPLA) in 1999. The agreement covers maritime and aviation-related construction projects funded through the Port’s Capital Improvement Program. It supports smaller companies that do business with the Port.

Other major updates to the MAPLA include:

• Simplifying coverage threshold to $150,000 and above;
• Extending coverage to on-and off-haul trucking with exemptions for truckers who are independent contractors;
• Increasing in contributions to a Social Justice Trust Fund and the streamlining of the committee structure to be more efficient; and
• Creating opportunities for a broad cross-section of individuals from the contracting industry, labor, and community.

Project labor agreements are collective bargaining agreements between public agencies, contractors, and local labor organizations. The agreements are authorized under the National Labor Relations Act.

Through MAPLA, contractors working with the Port of Oakland agree pay into a Social Justice Trust fund that supports workforce development. Since 1999, the Social Justice Trust Fund has given $420,000 to local workforce development centers to support preparing individuals for construction careers.