Capitol dome shines light on labor deals

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Non-union contractors will be allowed to bid on the repair job to the Capitol dome in Olympia and will not have to pay into union pension and benefit funds their employees don't use. This is progress.

Gov. Gary Locke would have caused the state to lose a $15 million federal grant had he insisted on a "project labor agreement." These agreements have been used for the Mariner and Seahawk stadiums and are set to be used for Sound Transit's light rail project - almost always on projects that require a political sign-off.

The official reason is that project labor agreements provide predictability and labor peace. The unofficial reason is that they can give union contractors an edge. One way is by requiring non-union contractors to pay into union health and pension funds. That can mean payments of $6 or $7 per worker-hour to support programs that non-union workers already have. Because jobs typically last only a few months, the non-union contractor does not cancel his old benefits. He pays twice. In that way, a project labor agreement on public projects acts as a tax by unions upon unorganized labor.

All this is backed by political realities. Gov. Gary Locke was elected with the support of the unions. President George Bush was elected over their opposition. Locke was willing to grant a project labor agreement; Bush's administration wasn't. In this case, it was federal money, so Bush won.

After all this fuss, the contractor for the dome work may well be union anyway. Unions and union contractors are part of our commercial life and, of course, should bid on equal terms. Non-union firms should have the same privilege. The union status of bidders is up to the employees, and should not be the subject of official favoritism.