Unions firmly control the political agenda in California’s largest cities, but civic leaders and citizens in some of the state’s smaller cities are still resisting the union political machine. Some of these cities, with populations from 100,000 to 250,000, include Escondido, Oceanside, Murrieta, Costa Mesa, Huntington Beach, Anaheim, Santa Clarita, Thousand Oaks, Simi Valley, Clovis, Elk...

Another year brings another rush of costly union construction monopolies to K-12 school districts and community college districts in California. Consider that voters in 2012 authorized 115 California educational districts to borrow a grand total of $15,266,651,190 ($15.3 billion) by selling bonds to investors, and you can see why schools are such an alluring target for special...

It’s a heady time to be a top construction union official in California, as the California High-Speed Rail Authority presumably now holds proposals from as many as five design-build consortiums to build the first segment of the $68 billion project. If this project moves forward, it will become part of the pantheon of huge American infrastructure projects...

On January 11, 2013, a video camera recorded a stunning public tirade by Fresno’s top construction union official at a conference about supposed local contracting opportunities for the first segment of California’s High Speed Rail. Below is video footage of the beginning of a panel discussion about Project Labor Agreements, and below that is the...

UPDATE (December 7, 2012): A article today in the Fresno Bee (‘Needy’ Workers Will Get Jobs on High-Speed Rail) about the “Community Benefits” policy approved on December 6, 2012 by the California High-Speed Rail Authority contains a stunning revelation: Five teams of contractors have been invited to bid on the first major contract for a stretch of the rail route between...

As reported over the past few months in www.UnionWatch.org, almost all of the sixteen community college districts within 50 miles of San Francisco have succumbed to the union political agenda and now require their construction contractors to sign a Project Labor Agreement with trade unions as a condition of working on taxpayer-funded projects. And unions are busy...

California’s Proposition 32 is the country’s most high-profile election in November 2012 directly related to labor unions and labor policy issues. There are also several California local elections – particularly Measure V to enact a charter in the City of Costa Mesa – that will potentially strengthen or weaken union control of government. Here’s a summary of...

In December 1997, the AFL-CIO implemented its “2000 in 2000” program to help elect union activists to public office. As the AFL-CIO reported in February 1999, “In 1998, we made progress toward our goal of putting 2,000 union members on the ballot in the year 2000. Over the next two years we will make a...

On October 10, 2012, leaders of the Contra Costa County Building and Construction Trades Council finally succeeded in getting the Contra Costa Community College District Governing Board to implement a Project Labor Agreement acceptable to union leaders for future district construction. The vote was 3-1. This is perhaps the longest crusade ever in California for...

Among the many Californians who only occasionally vote in elections, how many understand what they’re doing when they vote for a “bond measure” for a K-12 school district or community college district? They know it’s “for the kids,” but do they know that when they authorize a school district to sell bonds to fund construction, it...