Dulles rail construction near Tysons Corner. Photo credit: Washington Examiner.
Holy moly, I’m getting whiplash. Last week, word came out of the Attorney General’s office that the Comstock bill, written to ensure that union and non-union companies received equal treatment in state-funded contracts, would not block the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority (MWAA) from favoring a Project Labor Agreement (PLA) in Phase 2 of the Rail-to-Dulles heavy rail project.
Apparently, the AG’s opinion came through back channels and went public when Sen. Dick Black, R-Loudoun, shared the news with Loudoun County lawmakers. “It is the Attorney General’s firm opinion that those bills have no impact whatsoever on mandatory union provisions being imposed by MWAA,” he wrote. (See the Washington Examiner story here.)
But Cuccinelli called Black yesterday to tell him that the AG’s office had been wrong when it had advised him last week. “We have NOT issued an opinion on this yet, AND we have NEVER changed our position on [the Dulles funding bill]. That is just not correct,” Cuccinelli’s spokesman Brian Gottstein said in an email to the Examiner.
That should please the McDonnell administration, which has warned it might withhold $150 million in state funds appropriated for Rail-to-Dulles unless MWAA reverses its stance on the labor contract. In its most recent meeting, the MWAA board dropped its position that a PLA had to be mandatory and substituted instead a provision that would give preferential scoring to bids with PLAs.
Critics have said that requiring or favoring companies with PLAs would reduce interest by open-shop companies from participating in bidding for the job, estimated to cost $2.8 billion. Fewer bidders increases the odds that the winning bid will come in higher than the estimate.
— JAB
