The Carpenters Union has a new target.
After months of picketing Huntington Beach’s Covi Concrete Construction and its clients last year, union members now have taken aim at Hil Builders.
The small general contractor is based in Midway City and is working on a three-floor improvement of Nortel Networks Corp.’s offices at the Koll Center Irvine.
What’s different this time around is that the union isn’t just holding up a sign that says “shame on” so and so. Emboldened by the Covi protests, the carpenters union two weeks ago showed up with 200-plus members,plus a skating rat, which is what the union calls Hil Builders for what it says are unfair practices. The union alleges Hil pays project workers below standard area wages.
“It just creates an economic burden when bosses don’t pay up to standard,” said Martin Dahlquist, business representative for Local 1506 out of Los Angeles, which staged the protest along with two OC-based unions, Local 2361 and Local 440.
“I have nothing to say to them,” said Steve Inlow, the company’s president.
But Inlow is quick to counter that while Hil Builders pays below union rates, its wages are up to area standards, though he declined to give specifics. And the company also offers healthcare benefits, he said. The union is targeting Hil because it is “self-performing” instead of parceling jobs out to union firms, he said.
Dahlquist contends Hil pays between $15 and $20 an hour. Union wages hover in the $30 range, including benefits. Union members also are sore because Hil recently subcontracted some drywall for the project to a non-union firm. And then there’s the union’s beef with CB Richard Ellis, the property manager and construction manager for the Nortel project. The union said CB is hiring non-union contractors in the first place. CB Richard Ellis officials declined to comment.
Dahlquist said the union will continue its lunchtime protests for at least two days out of the week for “as long as it takes.”
That’ll have little impact, according to Inlow. The demonstrations only end up irritating the neighboring tenants and building management, he said.
