Members of the Santa Barbara County Board of Supervisors weren’t satisfied with the latest Community Workforce Agreement progress report, which showed a lower-than-anticipated percentage of local workers used for major capital projects. 

The county has a five-year agreement with the Tri-Counties Building & Construction Trades Council for projects with a price tag over $10 million. The supervisors approved it in 2022 hoping to increase local labor participation for large projects. 

So far the agreement has applied to the Probation Department headquarters building ($37.7 million); Santa Claus Lane streetscape improvements ($19.6 million); and the Tajiguas Landfill groundwater protection system ($19.8 million). 

The agreement runs through 2028 and will apply to the Northern Branch Jail expansion and other large capital projects within that period. 

The supervisors had hoped for at least 50% local labor with the Community Workforce Agreement. 

Rates have varied between 10% and 68% for the projects, and are generally higher for non-CWA projects. Some of this could be attributed to the need for highly specialized contractors that aren’t readily available locally, staff said. 

“We’re getting less local hire, we’re getting fewer bidders, it’s costing us more …” Fifth District Supervisor Steve Lavagnino said at the March 10 meeting, where staff presented the implementation report.

He said the results would have to improve a lot for the agreement to be extended in the future. 

Lavagnino and Fourth District Supervisor Bob Nelson voted against the agreement in 2022, and Supervisor Joan Hartmann voted for it. The other two supervisors, Laura Capps and Roy Lee, were not yet on the board. 

“The training and education of unions is really unsurpassed,” Hartmann said in her comments for the progress report. 

She agreed with other supervisors that she hoped for higher local hire rates, but was optimistic that “in the five years, we will realize the goals we set for ourselves.” 

Progress Report

The local worker participation rates were reported at 25% for the landfill project and 40% for the probation building so far. The Santa Claus Lane project had 78% local worker participation (San Luis Obispo, Santa Barbara and Ventura counties). 

Santa Barbara County isn’t located near the metro areas of the San Francisco Bay Area and Los Angeles, and “large-scale construction firms capable of doing $10-million-plus projects do not have a presence here” and are not interested in traveling here to do work, General Services Director Kirk Lagerquiest said. 

“While we heard assurances from the TCBT that local union halls had sufficient labor, that was not what we experienced on site,” Lagerquist said.

There have been project delays and a “steep learning curve” as the county, trades and contractors adjusted to the Community Workforce Agreement system, Public Works Director Chris Sneddon said. 

The county hired a third-party coordinator, which cost about $618,000 for the projects to date and the next ones planned, Sneddon said. 

All three in-progress projects had a limited number of bids and exceeded cost estimates for construction, staff said.

However, non-CWA projects are also seeing limited contractor availability. The county can rebid projects outside the Community Workforce Agreement if they exceed the cost estimates, staff noted. 

Nelson said he’s a “huge fan” of union labor, but is just as interested in local labor and wants to see more of that as a result of this agreement. 

Some “course correcting” is essential, Capps said. It’s not the data the supervisors wanted to see, but they need to give it time, she added. 

The supervisors voted unanimously to receive and file the report. 

Joshua Madrano from the Building and Construction Trades Council said there were bound to be issues with implementing something new, and asked the supervisors to “take a deep breath” and give it time. 

The trades have heard the concerns and are using the data to adjust accordingly, said Madrano, the TCBT executive secretary and treasurer, at the March 10 meeting.

“We encourage the supervisors not to have a kneejerk reaction,” he said. 

Critics, including local construction company representatives, have said the agreement discriminates against non-union workers.