In a move to expand the highway construction labor pool, Department of Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg has announced an effort to enhance local hiring.
“As we invest in world-class infrastructure for Americans, we want to make sure that our investments create jobs for people in communities where the projects are located,” said Buttigieg, in announcing the Enhancing Workforce Development Opportunities Initiative.
As structured, the program will belong to the Federal Highway Administration and will allow for greater flexibility for contracting agencies when it comes to hiring for highway projects.
Designed as a four-year pilot program, the initiative, according to a Transportation Department release, “will help to rebuild the skilled workforce needed to improve the nation’s transportation infrastructure.”
The move is additionally designed to allow state departments of transportation an opportunity to “better recruit qualified construction workers, which can be challenging in many parts of the country.”
A similar local hiring effort was in place during the Obama Administration, but later discarded by President Trump.
Notes the Engineering News-Record: reinstatement of the local hire program is part of a “series of moves by President Joe Biden to undo actions taken by the Trump administration and are also further examples of the Biden administration emphasis on equity.”
Last month Illinois Senator Tammy Duckworth urged adoption of a local hire program, noting that it was time to replace existing federal regulations that dictate “how local decision makers invest in their communities, with a more balanced approach that promotes equity and fairness without increasing costs to taxpayers.”
In a statement, Stephen Sandherr, chief executive officer of the Associated General Contractors of America, said local hire programs “solve the symptom and not the problem.”
Sandherr went on to note that “too many communities have defunded their career and technical education programs, and as a result there are often too few local workers with any interest in construction careers or basic skills that would make them qualified to be hired.”
By Garry Boulard
