News Jul 30, 2014 at 4:00 am

The City Council Debates a Mandate

She says construction of the new Rainier Beach Community Center was an “egregious example” of a Seattle public works project that employed too few local workers. seattle city council

Comments

1
This should be applied to city and county employees as well. Specifically the SPD.
2
I work in the construction industry as a project manager, and can tell you for a fact policies like this are fucking retarded, and never work well. Do you idiots who propose this crap even understand how a union hall works? Or how the bidding process works?

Fucking morons in govt, and their tools, cant help but screw shit up. Fools.

thank god I dont do public works projects anymore...
3
This is just idiotic. 30 mile commutes? Welcome to the metropolitan area gentrification creates. The city of Seattle costs too much for most construction workers to live in. The construction trade often requires a vehicle large enough to transport your tools and equipment...try to find a place in Seattle to park one! All the local workers live in Kent, Auburn, Lynnwood...where they can afford to live.
4
@2, I have to agree: this is a boneheaded idea to say the least. I work in a professional services company here in town and we often go outside of Seattle for many of our jobs. Sure this would theoretically open up more local public work for us: UNTIL TACOMA or BELLEVUE pass similar ordinances. Then we get fucked.

5
Most construction workers i know prefer not to live in an urban hell wearing skinny jeans.
6
Anna, you are an idiot.

This is an issue that has been settled in case law and precedent, and is a done deal – No, you cannot require those people who work on a specific public project (or agency) to reside in that locality, nor can you penalize those reside OUTSIDE the locality.

Next time, ask a grown-up.
7
I'd like to see another requirement, that all city employees be required to live inside the city limits.
Other cities have this requirement. It's been tested in the Supreme Court, and found to be acceptable.
It only makes sense that people who live off of city taxes be taxpayers in the city, too. That way, they're supporting the same system that they benefit from.
9
“There was street paving work going on all along Rainier Avenue, from I-90 all the way up into Rainier Beach. And the crews didn’t look like this community,” he says. (Michael Woo, an organizer and activist in Southeast Seattle.)

The crews didn't look like this community? Sounds pretty racist.
10
Michael Woo. These projects require UNION workers. If you hire local neighborhood people it's just not possible to drug test, run the required safety tests and screen just the neighborhood people. Rainier Beach.....C'mon, these people don't want to work anyway.
11
@10
What do you mean people in Rainier Beach don't want to work? Why, because they're mostly black? Just be an open bigot, and maybe you'll get just a little respect.
12
This is something I agree with the liberals on; city workers should live in the city and city projects should offer opportunity for city residents.
13
@11 I'll bet you $10.00 that IF you found a qualified union worker in Rainier Beach he would probably go with the dispatch, but knowing what I do, there aren't many union laborers and operators in that area. I know, because I dispatch them. Don't pull the bigot bullshit on me, pal, these people want to be on the welfare role. Whatever collectivism means, it does suck.

Please wait...

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