SECTION: OP-ED; Pg. A15; FREE FOR ALL

LENGTH: 314 words

HEADLINE: Fair Wages for All

BODY:


The Feb. 19 article "Construction Wage Plan Draws Few Foes" [Metro] discusses a bill requiring that Maryland's prevailing wage law be extended to include school construction. While I support this legislation, I resent your paper's characterization of the bill as requiring "union prevailing wages." This language implies that these laws are some sort of legislative "favor" for construction trades unions.

Maryland's prevailing wage law is patterned after the Davis-Bacon Act, as are similar laws in other states. All require a periodic survey of the construction industry in which contractors provide information on projects they have done in a specific geographic area. This information includes the number of workers involved, the type of work they did and the wages that were paid them. This survey is not limited to unionized contractors.

The problem with prevailing wage laws is enforcement. Many enforcement personnel on government projects assume that the union will see that the workers are properly paid. But the union can't do that if the workers are not represented.

Prevailing wage legislation is intended to ensure that local construction craftspeople are not frozen out of government construction projects by out-of-town contractors who bring with them workers who earn less than the locals do. This is occurring now on school construction projects in Maryland. Contractors are winning work with bids based on lower wages paid to workers from nearby states.

In 29 years as a union construction worker in this area, I have worked on only one school in the state of Maryland.

No legislator would introduce a bill to save taxpayers money by requiring that schools be built using substandard material. Why do we want them built by workers earning substandard wages?

--Edward Mattos

The writer is president of

Reinforcing Ironworkers Local 201.

LOAD-DATE: March 04, 2000