Thread: Labor Protest During Rush Hour

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Posted on Wed, Oct. 26, 2005

Union protest planned today in East Falls


The Philadephia Building Trades Council says it will bring 1,500 union members to the Dobson Mills residential-retail construction site in East Falls this afternoon.

The union members as well as Philadelphia Councilman Michael Nutter, who represents the area, are scheduled to attend to protest the use of a non-union workforce by Tocci Commercial LLC, the Woburn, Mass., construction manager for the project. The project includes 285 apartments and 7,000 square feet of retail space.

Union spokesman Frank Keel said the owner of the property, Dobson Mills LLC. had agreed to use union labor, but Tocci Commercial spokeswoman Amy West said her company knew of no such agreement.

West said the company typically runs a "merit-shop," meaning it allows both union and non-union subcontractors to bid on the work. Tocci itself employs no laborers, she said.

West said that the company now has one union subcontractor working along with four non-union contractors.

There would have been more union contractors, she said, but the unions would not allow them to take the subcontracting jobs unless the Tocci and the owners agreed to use all union subcontractors.

The unions say that the subcontractors have used illegal aliens and are paying less than the prevailing wage.

West said Tocci subcontractors are required to promise that their workers are legally entitled to work in the U.S. and that all workers are paid at least three to six times the minimum wage.

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Labor Protest During Rush Hour

October 26, 2005 - Thousands of Philadelphia trade union members are staging a protest today at a construction site in East Falls.

They gathered in the 4000 block of Ridge Avenue to protest workers from outside the state who are constructing the 50 (m) million dollar Chelsea Apartments complex.

Officials with the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers -- local 98 -- say the developer broke commitments he made to local unions and city officials.

The union's business agent -- John Dougherty says this was to "be a union project that would use a lot of local contractors and try to get as many neighborhood kids of all colors and all religions on the job."

Dougherty says some City Council members told him they may bring up the issue at tomorrow's council meeting.

Yep, it's the carpetbaggers of the 21st century: opportunists moving in and lining their pockets at the collective expense of the citizens who had always lived and toiled there. And how do they do it? By breaking the law through hiring criminal labor.

Disgusting.

October 26, 2005 - Thousands of Philadelphia trade union members are staging a protest today at a construction site in East Falls.

That is what i have been telling local Unions. It don't matter how many memebers you have. If you don't stop the contractors from hiring Illegals. Then your job is at risk.