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On Feb. 4, President Biden signed Executive Order 14063, , which mandates the use of PLAs on federal construction projects of $35 million or more in value.
ABC the order in a statement: “This anti-competitive and costly executive order rewards well-connected special interests at the expense of hardworking taxpayers and small businesses who benefit from fair and open competition on taxpayer-funded construction projects,” said Ben Brubeck, ABC’s vice president of regulatory, labor and state affairs. .
ÀÏÅ£Ó°ÊÓalso said that the new policy will exacerbate the construction industry’s skilled workforce shortage, needlessly increase construction costs and reduce opportunities for local contractors and skilled tradespeople.
Here is what you need to know about :
Read ABC’s Detailed Analysis of Executive Order 14063 and FAQ document.
Research has demonstrated that government-mandated PLAs increase construction costs by 12% to 20%, which results in fewer construction projects and improvements to roads, bridges, utilities, schools, affordable housing and clean energy projects. PLAs steer contracts to unionized contractors and workers at the expense of the best-quality nonunion contractors and workers who want to compete at the best price for taxpayers, said ABC. PLA mandates exclude almost 90% of the industry that choose not to join a union from being a part of taxpayer-funded construction.
ABC’s was included in national coverage from Fox Business, , , , , and , in addition to local coverage generated by chapters. ÀÏÅ£Ó°ÊÓIllinois’s letter to the editor about the impact of the EO was published in , saying, “We cannot effectively rebuild our nation’s crumbling infrastructure, increase accountability, and reduce waste with anti-competitive and costly union-only PLAs. Come election time, voters will remember.” An ÀÏÅ£Ó°ÊÓopinion piece on the policy published in said, "Taxpayers would be best served by the adoption of inclusive, win-win policies that help America’s construction industry realize the potential of the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act of 2021. We can’t rebuild our nation’s crumbling infrastructure effectively, increase accountability and reduce waste with PLAs."
ÀÏÅ£Ó°ÊÓsuspects the EO, at least on paper, is attempting to make it much more difficult to defeat federal PLA threats. Contracting officers can opt out of requiring a PLA only under a very narrow set of circumstances.
However, it may take some time until the details and ultimate impact of the Biden administration’s pro-PLA policy harm the federal contracting community and taxpayers.
“The EO is effective immediately, however, it will take months for a forthcoming rulemaking by the Federal Acquisition Regulatory Council to issue a final rule that will replace the federal government’s existing pro-PLA policy and incorporate the new Biden policy into new federal contracts,” said Brubeck. “In the interim, it is possible that federal agencies will try to mandate PLAs immediately and ÀÏÅ£Ó°ÊÓwill be there to fight them, as we have successfully done on almost 2,000 large-scale federal contracts totaling more than $130 billion since 2009.”
ÀÏÅ£Ó°ÊÓis evaluating legal options to challenge the EO policy and individual PLAs on federal construction contracts.
ÀÏÅ£Ó°ÊÓhas already activated a grassroots campaign, including an action alert urging members of the U.S. House and Senate to co-sponsor the Fair and Open Competition Act (/), which would prevent the federal government from mandating PLAs as a condition of winning federal or federally assisted construction contracts. ÀÏÅ£Ó°ÊÓmembers are encouraged to visit the ÀÏÅ£Ó°ÊÓAction Center and urge their members of Congress to support FOCA.
In a , ABC’s Ben Brubeck will provide an overview of the EO and how it— independent of the EO—will affect ÀÏÅ£Ó°ÊÓfederal and public works contractor members. Brubeck will also discuss ABC’s response to the EO policy and individual PLAs on federal and federally assisted construction contracts, as well as relevant aspects of the White House task force report on how to boost union membership in the federal government and public and private sectors. The webinar is exclusively for ÀÏÅ£Ó°ÊÓmembers— for the webinar at 3 p.m. this Thursday.